On January 4, 2022; Ali Fadavi, the deputy head of the IRGC explicitly threatened on Hezbollah’s al-Manar television station to “annihilate America”. The threat of extermination has long been reserved for the “Small Satan” and now Iran reveals that it plans to exterminate the “Great Satan” as well. Is this a serious threat or is it merely psychological warfare? Iran is a country that acts according to strategic plans in a highly consistent and systematic manner and does not allow events or external influences to affect its strategic planning. As a rule, Iranian threats are never hot air and must therefore be taken extremely seriously indeed.
What is the meaning of the threat to “annihilate America”? When Iran states that it will “annihilate Israel” this refers to attacking Israeli cities with chemical weapons on a mass scale. This is so as Tehran won’t use biological weapons against Israel since this would end up killing vast numbers of Palestinians as well. In contrast, chemical weapons would hardly be enough in order to attempt to “annihilate America” considering the size of the American population as this would be logistically impossible for Iran. Therefore the threat to “annihilate America” clearly reflects a preexisting intention to use biological weapons against the American homeland.
The deputy head of the IRGC characterized the demise of Israel and the annihilation of America as inevitable. He also claimed that this would happen sooner rather than later. Was this a response to the head of CENTCOM, General Frank McKenzie earlier threatening to invade Iran should Tehran attack America? Yes, but the interview also clearly reflected the Iranian position that the US is a paper tiger. Tehran does not fear America and the implications for American national security are ominous indeed. Iran would never have dared issue this threat against a Republican administration which would be certain to respond to attacks with biological weapons by nuking Iran. It is however very helpful that Tehran exposed its “inevitable” plan to “annihilate America”.
This underscores that Iran will inexorably come to define the Biden presidency and illustrates the strategic necessity for the US to simultaneously focus on the three imperialist threats; Iran, China and Russia. The JCPOA was a desperate attempt to defer the Iranian WMD threat and Iranian intentions illustrate the utter futility of doing so. It turns out that it was a big mistake for the Trump administration to not confront Iran and destroy the Iranian nuclear weapons program since Tehran fears Republican administrations and Tehran would be extremely unlikely to use biological weapons against the United States during a Republican administration considering the effectiveness of American nuclear deterrence when Republicans are in power.
America finds itself in the most difficult situation ever since the American civil war as biological weapons could wipe out millions of Americans. Of course, backing down on the question of the Iranian nuclear weapons program is not an option since the threat would be a hundred times worse if Iran possessed a nuclear deterrent. Once Tehran has nuclear weapons will Iran be able to attack other nations with chemical and biological weapons with complete nuclear impunity as the US would not dare invade Iran once Iran has attained nuclear weapons capability.
The reality that vast numbers of American Muslims would be killed in biological weapons attacks against major American cities apparently does not bother Tehran. This exposes the hypocrisy of Iran claiming to care about protecting Muslim lives. Except when it comes to the Palestinians does losing Muslim lives not bother the Khomeinist regime the slightest. Of course, this attitude is very typical of totalitarian regimes. All this illustrates how the Biden administration has all the time misread the situation by erroneously assuming that pivoting away from Iran to China was even possible.
The divide between America and Israel’s perception of the Iranian WMD threat has proven to be based on an illusion. Iran has ever since the 1979 Islamist revolution planned to “annihilate America” and now they think that they have the perfect opportunity due to the perceived “weakness” of the personality of US President Joe Biden. It is good that Iran has revealed its strategic intentions as the Iranian nuclear weapons program is indeed an existential threat no less to America than to Israel and not merely a strategic threat. The White House still appears to be in the thrall that a nuclear agreement with Iran is feasible and has not yet concluded that Iran has no interest in a nuclear agreement with America. This US perception is laughable to Tehran which considers it evidence of “weakness” and that reinforces the Iranian perception that attacking major American cities with biological weapons will merely prompt the US to withdraw from Islamdom. The Biden administration has still not done its homework in terms of reassessing US policy with the goal of restoring credibility and aggressively moving to reinstate US deterrence worldwide. Considering the immense Iranian WMD threat against the United States is nevertheless US policy deeply understandable even if fundamentally misguided as it exacerbates the Iranian threat, rather than ameliorating the situation.
Aliyah Organization 