Trump’s conquest can be harbinger of stability, peace

After 40 years of Iran’s theocrats preaching “death to America” and “death to Israel”, Donald Trump met the moment early on Sunday, Australian time, to take the Middle East into an era that will be far safer without the impending threat of Iranian nuclear weapons.

It should also, over time, be more peaceful, although Israel, wisely, is bracing for repercussions from the US strike on Iran’s nuclear and uranium enrichment facilities.

On Monday, schools, shops and workplaces will again be closed. Much depends on Iran’s remaining conventional military capacity to cause “irreparable harm’ to US interests and attack Israel. In little more than a week of Operation Rising Lion, as Israel did the world’s work, its citizens have suffered loss of life and widespread destruction as it crippled Iran’s air defences and eliminated the extremist theocracy’s top military and nuclear officials. But the US, with its unrivalled firepower, was best equipped to destroy Iran’s advanced nuclear installations. In doing so, it has removed a significant danger for millions of people, in Israel, which Iran has long wanted “wiped off the map”, and across the Middle East, the US and Europe.

Sunday’s operations, led by US B-2 stealth bombers that released 13,600kg Massive Ordnance Penetrator “bunker-buster bombs” on Iran’s heavily fortified Fordow enrichment plant deep inside a mountain 100km south of Tehran, “completely and totally obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program, President Trump told the world. Tomahawk missiles destroyed nuclear facilities at Natanz and Isfahan. If Iran, “the bully of the Middle East”, does not make peace, Mr Trump said, future attacks “will be far greater and a lot easier”.

Retaliation was always likely, and within hours of the US strikes Iran had launched about 30 missiles at Israel, hitting Tel Aviv and other centres. While reluctant to capitulate, Iran has been severely weakened and, as Mr Trump warned it, if peace does not come quickly, “we will go after those other targets with precision, speed and skill. Most of them can be taken out in a few minutes”. Iran’s terrorist proxies are also severely debilitated, after Israel pursued them relentlessly, while fighting for its existence and trying to save as many as possible of 250 hostages kidnapped by Hamas in its barbaric attack on civilians in the Jewish state on October 7, 2023.

The US’s destruction of Iran’s nuclear program has sent a powerful message to the world, including Iran’s autocratic allies, Russia, North Korea and China, that the capacity of the West, led by the US, to deal with hostile adversaries, and President Trump’s willingness to exercise deterrence, is strong. Australia, as the closest US ally in this region, should be unequivocal in backing Mr Trump’s courageous action. We should be showing support for our closest friend on the world stage and acknowledging the long-term benefits to the world of eliminating Iran’s nuclear capacity. Two days before the NATO summit in The Hague, where the strikes on the Iranian nuclear facilities, the aftermath and implications for the world’s geostrategic balance will feature, the silence of Anthony Albanese and Foreign Minister Penny Wong on Sunday was inexcusable, far short of what Australians are entitled to expect.

By midafternoon Sunday, the only official government reaction was a weasel-worded anonymous statement. It was a pathetic effort that did not explicitly support or condemn the actions of Mr Trump. “We have been clear that Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile program has been a threat to international peace and security,” it said. “We note the US President’s statement that now is the time for peace. The security situation in the region is highly volatile. We continue to call for de-escalation, dialogue, and diplomacy.” Where was the acknowledgment of a major operation well done, the recognition of what the strikes have potentially saved mankind from? As former Home Affairs secretary Michael Pezzullo told The Australian: “Australia should voice its support for this necessary action. It cannot leave the dirty work of confronting threats to peace and stability such as that posed by Iran’s nuclear weapons program to the United States and, in the case of Iran, Israel. Peace can ultimately only be preserved by strength and the will to use that strength.”

By remaining silent, the Prime Minister and his government have left the last public comments of the day on the Iran-Israel conflict to Defence Minister Richard Marles, who appeared on Sunday Agenda on Sky News shortly before news of the US strikes emerged. His lukewarm response to questions from host Andrew Clennell about reports the US had positioned B-2 bombers in case they want to strike the Iranian nuclear facilities fell far short of the solidarity most Australians would expect from a solid, loyal ally. “I’m not about to speculate on what the United States does,” Mr Marles said. “I mean, the position that we have articulated in relation to this conflict has been consistent from the outset, and that is that we are worried about the prospect for escalation here, and we’ve been urging de-escalation, we’ve been urging dialogue and diplomacy, and we continue to do that.’’

While acknowledging the risk the Iranian nuclear and ballistic missile program represented to the region and the stability of the world, his focus, along with “many other countries”, was “ to de-escalate and to put an emphasis on dialogue, on diplomacy”. Asked about the fact he was not in lock-step with the US, Mr Marles quoted French President Emmanuel Macron, who was also seeking “greater diplomacy and dialogue and a de-escalation” of the conflict, which is “where Australia sits as well”. How those comments play out with US officials or Mr Trump at NATO, which Mr Marles will attend, remains to be seen. They, along with similar comments last week from Senator Wong, and Mr Albanese’s silence on Sunday and his failure to lift defence spending to more realistic levels, suggest the government has drifted further from the unity of purpose and esprit de corps of the US-led Western alliance Australians traditionally support. That is especially concerning at the most dangerous time in our region for 80 years.

Scott Morrison was correct on Sunday when he said it was “time for some clarity” after too much ambiguity from the Albanese government. Iran, he said, “is not a friend of Australia” or Australian interests. “The President came to office with a peace-through-strength doctrine, and we have now seen what that means when all other avenues fail,” Mr Morrison said. “This is a President that I think doesn’t wish to rush to these outcomes or to use these capabilities, but if necessary will. And as a result, a massive blow has been struck against Iran’s nuclear capability.” That was something that had been sought for “a very long time”.

Ever since Jimmy Carter’s spectacular Operation Evil Claw failure on April 25, 1980, when he dispatched forces to try to rescue the US embassy hostages, the West has been dogged by challenges posed by the ayatollahs’ regime. Barack Obama’s deeply flawed 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which he and similarly naive European negotiators hoped would curb Iran’s nuclear program, was a spectacular failure. Not only did it not halt Iran’s nuclear ambitions, it rewarded and fuelled Tehran’s malign conduct against Israel and across the Middle East with billions of dollars in sanctions relief and lifting arms embargoes. In his first term, Mr Trump recognised these flaws, denounced it as “the worst deal ever negotiated”, and wisely withdrew from it in 2018. Instead, he embarked on an effective “maximum pressure” campaign that severely weakened Iran’s economy. Joe Biden, however, returned to the Obama-era appeasing of the ayatollahs, bringing Tehran closer towards producing nuclear weapons. The Biden administration’s policies are estimated to have boosted Iran’s accessible foreign exchange reserves from $US4bn at the end of the first Trump administration to nearly $US34bn by the end of Mr Biden’s term. Iran earned more than $US100bn from the export of oil alone when Mr Biden failed to enforce US sanctions. The windfall also enabled Iran to double down on backing terrorist proxies such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis in Yemen.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says 80 per cent of Iran’s 90 million people, given the opportunity, “would throw these theological thugs out”. The possibility of regime change in Iran is an open question. Signs of serious disaffection surfaced in 2022 following the death in custody of Mahsa Amini for allegedly violating hijab regulations. But the uprising was ruthlessly suppressed, and in the days since Israel launched Operation Rising Lion, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei appeared to maintain authority over key institutions. As fast as Israel killed top Iranian generals, they have been replaced.

For 40 years, as Mr Trump told the world, “Iran has been saying, ‘Death to America, death to Israel’. They have been killing our people, blowing off their arms, blowing off their legs with roadside bombs – that was their speciality. Hundreds of thousands of people have died as a result of their hate”.

Despite the doubts of isolationists in his political base, his inflicting a heavy loss on some of the most malevolent actors on the world stage is a historic victory the US, Israel and the free world have needed for decades.