After Iran’s newly established Islamic leadership was dragged into war by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein in 1980, it fought, in the words of a top commander, with “empty hands”.
For the republic’s young, ideologically driven leaders, determined to export their vision of Islamic radicalism, it was a brutal reckoning: Iran’s conventional army was in disarray and faced an adversary backed by regional and Western powers.
![“We’re having a birthday party for [daughter] Rada in a few weeks and we’re going to get the truck to come, which is a real flex,” O’Neill says.](https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.7012%2C$multiply_2%2C$ratio_1.777778%2C$width_1059%2C$x_732%2C$y_641/t_crop_custom/c_scale%2Cw_600%2Cq_52%2Cf_auto/b5e4395344f07ccd1e3a348af02af77c8eeb8d1b)
