Since Iranian President Hassan Rouhani took office in August 2013, he has pursued a foreign policy based on fostering amiable diplomatic and economic ties with Iran’s neighbors and resolving the country’s nuclear issue with Iran’s P5+1 negotiating partners.
Congress is potentially going to passing a new Authorization of Use of Military Force (AUMF) bill to sanction the Obama administration’s air strikes against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
Even if war is not always good for business, it is at least a business. Whether dealing in arms, antiquities, oil, grain, taxes or international aid, the Islamic State is building the basis for the sort of exploitative economy whose inequities and corruption (ironically) helped its star rise among the poor and discontented.
The threat the Islamic State (IS) poses to Western nations is very real — witness in recent weeks the thwarting of a public beheading in Sydney, the raids on terrorist cells in Melbourne, raids in The Hague and Brussels, possible threats to subways in Paris and New York, and the recent averting of a terrorist plot in London.
Mohsen Milani is the Executive Director of the Center for Strategic and Diplomatic Studies at the University of South Florida, where he is a professor of international relations.
Mark Dubowitz is executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington, D.C.-based nonpartisan policy institute, where he leads projects on Iran, sanctions, nonproliferation, and countering electronic repression.
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