Publications

Iran Strategy Brief No. 3: The Case For Economic Warfare

January 29, 2008 Ilan I. Berman

What can the United States do about Iran? Today that question, fueled by growing international concern over the Islamic Republic’s persistent nuclear ambitions, has emerged at the forefront of the American strategic debate.

In this calculus, economic measures have received comparatively short shrift. This is because conventional wisdom has it that the United States possesses little leverage that it can bring to bear in order to deter and contain Iran’s nuclear ambitions. In this case, however, the conventional wisdom is wrong; the United States has a considerable number of economic tools at its disposal, despite its lack of trade relations with the Islamic Republic.

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‘Enter Islam or Else!’

January 9, 2008 James S. Robbins National Review Online

Adam Gadahn, a.k.a. Azzam al Amriki, has come a long way since his days living on a goat farm and playing in his one-man death metal band Aphasia. The 30-year-old California native has quickly become the American face of al Qaeda. Azzam’s purpose is to make an appeal to the American people, to explain the current situation in the war and to exhort them to join in supporting al Qaeda and its cause.

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The National Intelligence Guesstimate

December 5, 2007 Ilan I. Berman The American Spectator

In recent weeks, the White House appeared to be gaining serious ground in its efforts to cobble together an international consensus to confront Iran. Today, however, Administration officials are desperately trying to put the pieces of their Iran policy back together. The culprit is the intelligence community's new National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), which asserts that the Iranian regime currently is not in the business of making nuclear weapons.

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Losing The War Of Ideas?

December 3, 2007 The Claremont Institute

After a short two-year tenure, Karen Hughes now departs as Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. She concentrated on the public affairs area of her job by creating the Rapid Response Unit and regional media hubs—things that anyone would find hard to believe the U.S. government was not already doing before her arrival. Hughes inherited the detritus from the 1999 destruction of the U.S. Information Agency, and tried to put back some of the missing building blocks of public diplomacy. However, by almost every index, we are not doing well in the war of ideas. Some say we have already lost.

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Eurasia Security Watch: No. 163

December 2, 2007

Hezbollah's swelling coffers;

Saudis and Libyans fuel Iraqi jihad;

A change of heart in prison;

The struggle over Kirkuk's oil;

Moscow gets a dose of its own medicine...

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Confronting Iran: U.S. Options

November 14, 2007 Ilan I. Berman

Today, the Islamic Republic of Iran looms large on the agenda of policymakers in Washington. Over the past several years, it has become clear that the Islamic Republic is pursuing a massive, multifaceted endeavor to acquire a nuclear capability—and that it is making rapid progress toward this goal, despite pressure from the world community. Yet Iran’s nuclear program is just part of a larger picture. The Islamic Republic’s enduring support for terrorism, its growing and pernicious regional role, and its radical, uncompromising ideology currently also pose serious challenges to the United States, its allies and American interests in the greater Middle East.

So far, policymakers in Washington have failed to muster an adequate response on any of these fronts. As a result, the Islamic Republic has gained precious time to entrench itself in Iraq, expand its support for terrorists and bring added permanence to its nuclear effort. The logical conclusion of the current status quo is a mature Iranian nuclear capability, continued Coalition casualties in Iraq, and emboldened terrorist groups across the region. If it hopes to avoid such an outcome, the United States must harness all the elements of national power into a strategy that focuses on three concrete goals vis-à-vis Iran: counterproliferation, counterterrorism, and counterinsurgency.

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