This article needs to be updated.(September 2023) |
Ilan I. Berman | |
---|---|
Born | December 23, 1975 |
Education | Brandeis University (BA) American University (MA, JD) |
Occupation(s) | Lawyer, policy analyst |
Known for | Middle East and Iran analysis |
Notable work | Winning the Long War: Retaking the Offensive Against Radical Islam (2009); Tehran Rising: Iran's Challenge to the United States ( 2005) |
Ilan I. Berman (born December 23, 1975) is an American lawyer and policy analyst. He is the Vice President of the American Foreign Policy Council. [1] He focuses on regional security in the Middle East, Central Asia, and the Russian Federation. [1]
Berman has a BA in Politics from Brandeis University, an MA in International Politics from American University, and a JD from Washington College of Law. [2]
Berman is adjunct professor for International Law and Global Security at the National Defense University, and a member of the Associated Faculty at Missouri State University's Department of Defense and Strategic Studies. [1] He also serves as a member of the Committee on the Present Danger, writes a monthly column for Forbes.com , and is an Editor of The Journal of International Security Affairs . [1] [3] He has also advised the United States Department of Defense, agencies of the U.S. government including the CIA, and offices of congressmen on matters of foreign policy and national security. [1] [4] [5]
In November 2002, Al Ahram Weekly quoted him as remarking with regard to the U.S.'s targeted killing of al-Qaeda terrorists in Yemen,
It is too early to tell whether this event alone will precipitate a shift toward explicit support of such tactics as employed by Israel on Washington's part. What does seem clear, however, is that the United States and Israel are gravitating toward increasingly similar perceptions, and possibly strategies, in the war on terrorism. [6]
He wrote in his 2005 book Tehran Rising: Iran's Challenge to the United States and has said in speeches that in displacing Saddam Hussein's government in Iraq which had been an enemy of Iran, and the Taliban in Afghanistan which had been a rival, the United States had unintentionally taken away two significant checks on the power of Iran in the Middle East. [7] [8] [9] [10]
In August 2006 he noted that to that point in time, the U.S. had had a lot of difficulty in convincing especially Russia and China, to support sanctions on Iran for its moving forward with its uranium enrichment program, and that "both Moscow and Beijing are major strategic partners of the Islamic republic and have a vested interest in protecting their investments in the Iranian regime." [11] In July 2008 he observed: ""The Iranians are playing a colossal game of chicken with us," and asked: "Does the international community have the will to take the short-term pain and disarm these guys, or accept the long-term pain of a region completely dominated by this regime? I think the world community has essentially come to grips with the fact that Iran is going to go nuclear." [12]
In October 2009, Berman noted: "The Iranian strategy has been pretty consistent all along; to keep the West talking while they work on their nuclear program." [13] In March 2010, commenting on Iran's warning to Europe not to sanction it, he observed:
The Iranians have a pattern of warning anyone threatening to get tough with them, basically saying, 'Don't do this, because there will be consequences. What's notable here is that they are singling out Europe. It's a sure sign Europe is being more activist [about curtailing economic ties to Iran] than it normally is." [14]
Lou Dobbs of CNN in 2008 described him as "one of the [U.S.]'s leading experts on the Middle East and Iran." [15]
The foreign relations of Iran are the economic and diplomatic relationships between the Iranian government and governments of other countries. Geography is a very significant factor in informing Iran's foreign policy. Following the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the newly formed Islamic Republic, under the leadership of Ayatollah Khomeini, dramatically reversed the pro-American foreign policy of the last Shah of Iran Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Since then the country's policies have oscillated between the two opposing tendencies of revolutionary ardour to eliminate Western and non-Muslim influences while promoting the Islamic revolution abroad, and pragmatism, which would advance economic development and normalization of relations. Iran's bilateral dealings are accordingly sometimes confused and contradictory.
Iran and the United States have had no formal diplomatic relations since 7 April 1980. Instead, Pakistan serves as Iran's protecting power in the United States, while Switzerland serves as the United States' protecting power in Iran. Contacts are carried out through the Iranian Interests Section of the Pakistani Embassy in Washington, D.C., and the US Interests Section of the Swiss Embassy in Tehran. In August 2018, Supreme Leader of Iran Ali Khamenei banned direct talks with the United States.
The nuclear program of Iran is an ongoing scientific effort by Iran to research nuclear technology. Iran has several research sites, two uranium mines, a research reactor, and uranium processing facilities that include three known uranium enrichment plants.
The National Council of Resistance of Iran is an Iranian political organization based in France and Albania and was founded by Massoud Rajavi and Abolhassan Banisadr. The organization is a political coalition calling to overthrow the Islamic Republic of Iran. The coalition is made up of different Iranian dissident groups, with its main member being the People's Mujahedin of Iran (MEK). Both organizations are considered to be led by Maryam Rajavi.
Iran is not known to currently possess weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and has signed treaties repudiating the possession of WMDs including the Biological Weapons Convention, the Chemical Weapons Convention, and the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Iran has first-hand knowledge of WMD effects—over 100,000 Iranian troops and civilians were victims of chemical weapons during the 1980s Iran–Iraq War.
Alireza Jafarzadeh is an Iranian dissident, media commentator on the Middle East, and US representative of the People's Mujahedin of Iran. He is known for releasing information on Iran's secret nuclear program.
Arab League–Iran relations refer to the political, economic, and cultural ties between the League of Arab States and the Islamic Republic of Iran. The former is a regional organization composed of 22 Arab states in MENA with a combined majority of Sunni Muslims, whereas the latter is a country in Western Asia with a majority of Shia Muslims.
Louis René Beres is emeritus professor of political science and international law at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. He was born on August 31, 1945, in Zürich, Switzerland, and earned his Ph.D. at Princeton University in 1971. Beres has written many books and currently also writes editorials for various major newspapers and magazines.
Military action against Iran is a controversial topic in Israel and The United States. Proponents of a strike against Iran point to the threat presented by Iran's nuclear program as a casus belli. Many Israelis, and particularly hardline politicians such as Prime Minister Netanyahu, support military action. Opposition to military action is often based in pacifism, but some who are opposed to military action against Iran are opposed for other reasons.
Iran–Turkey relations are the bilateral relations between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Republic of Turkey. The two states' relationship is complex and characterized by periods of both tension and cooperation, as both Iran and Turkey are fighting for influence in the Middle East through supporting opposing proxies as part of a proxy conflict. The two countries are also major trade partners and are perceived as mutually interdependent due to geographical proximity as well as historically shared cultural, linguistic, and ethnic traits. Notably, the Kurds, an Iranic ethnic group, and the Iranian Azerbaijanis, a Turkic ethnic group, comprise the second-largest ethnicities of Turkey and Iran, respectively.
This is the timeline of the nuclear program of Iran.
This article is about the current international tensions between Iran and other countries, especially the United States and Israel.
Dual containment was an official US foreign policy aimed at containing Ba'athist Iraq and Revolutionary Iran. The term was first officially used in May 1993 by Martin Indyk at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and officially announced on February 24, 1994 at a symposium of the Middle East Policy Council by Indyk, who was the senior director for Middle East Affairs of the National Security Council (NSC).
James S. Robbins is an American commentary writer for USA Today and Senior Fellow for National Security Affairs on the American Foreign Policy Council. He is the former Senior Editorial Writer for Foreign Affairs at the Washington Times, an author, political commentator and professor, with a focus on national security and foreign and military affairs. He also served as special assistant in the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
Project Koussar, also known as Project Kowsar, is an alleged intermediate range or intercontinental ballistic missile program of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
There have been a number of sanctions against Iran imposed by a number of countries, especially the United States, and international entities. Iran was the most sanctioned country in the world until it was surpassed by Russia following its invasion of neighboring Ukraine in February 2022.
Brazil–Iran relations are the bilateral relations between the Federative Republic of Brazil and the Islamic Republic of Iran. Relations are characterized by economic and diplomatic cooperation and are quite friendly. Iran has a productive trade balance with Brazil. The two governments signed a document to bolster cooperation during the G-15 Summit in Tehran in 2010. However, since the election of former Brazilian president, Dilma Rousseff, relations between the two countries recently have deteriorated greatly, following Rousseff shifting Brazil away from Iran due to Iran's violation of human and civil rights. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's media adviser, Ali Akbar Javanfekr, was quoted as stating that Rousseff had "destroyed years of good relations" between them. He denied making such a statement.
The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit think tank and registered lobbying organization based in Washington, D.C., United States.
Dr. Faramarz Tamanna is a university professor, writer, an Afghan politician and the chancellor of the University of Afghanistan in Kabul. He was Director General of the Center for Strategic Studies of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Afghanistan). He holds his PhD from Jawaharlal Nehru University in International Studies.
Maximum pressure campaign refers to the intensified sanctions against Iran by the Trump administration after the United States exited the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in 2018. The campaign was aimed at pressuring Iran to renegotiate the JCPOA, adding more restrictions on Iran's nuclear program and expanding the scope of the agreement to cover Iran's ballistic missiles as well as other regional activities. This strategy was faced by Iran's counter pressure policy to thwart the U.S. maximum pressure campaign.