Mark Dubowitz

Eric: Mark Dubowitz joins us, CEO of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. So Mark, this meeting, starting February 13th in Poland will help create, they hope, an Arab NATO.  Do you think the Gulf States, the Sunni Arab allies and the European nations that just slapped more sanctions against Iran, do you think they can all unite against that regime?

Mark: Eric I just got back from the Gulf, I met with top leaders in the Gulf Arab countries, I was also in India, and you get a sense from the Gulf, from countries around the world that there is deep concern for what Secretary Pompeo rightly calls the destructive and malign activities of the Islamic Republic of Iran. So I would expect dozens of countries to be in Poland to talk about these destructive activities and I think this is something that is necessary — and I think even the Europeans, who have opposed President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the nuclear deal, understand that the Islamic Republic needs to be stopped.  

Eric: Yeah in the Netherlands, the EU is slapping sanctions on Tehran because they accuse the government of sending assassination squads that killed two activists on the streets in 2015 and 2017. Two dissidents shot in the head. Do you think the Europeans really will give up Iranian business for the principal of dealing with this outlaw regime?

Mark: I don’t think they will, I don’t think they want to, but I don’t think they have any choice, because I think President Trump is rightly putting them to a fundamental choice between Iran’s $400 billion economy and America’s $20 trillion economy. Between doing business with the Iranian rial, which has been collapsing in value and doing business with the U.S. dollar which is the world’s predominant currency, so European business leaders are making a very different decision than the European political leaders and they’re high-tailing it out of the Islamic Republic.

Eric: So what do you expect could happen out of this meeting if indeed the Europeans don’t want to give up the dough?

Mark: Well I think the Europeans are acknowledging the reality that they have very little choice and I think there just needs to be a common understanding that regardless of your position on the Iran nuclear deal, I think dozens of countries including the Europeans understand the Iranian regime is engaged in assassinations and support for terrorism and building ballistic missiles capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, including ICBMs to target the United States and other countries, and not to mention brutal human rights abuses within Iran. So I think that there is a broader understanding amongst dozens of countries, including the Europeans, that those aspects of Iran’s malign activities need to be addressed immediately. 

Eric: And you just mentioned an assassination plot, there was one here in the United States, where the intelligence services were allegedly behind and a plot to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador to Washington, in a restaurant in Georgetown. Let me show you some video of the big meeting by the largest opposition group, the National Council of Resistance of Iran. They hold this huge rally, there’s Maryam Rajavi, who is the head of that group. They hold this huge rally just outside of Paris every year. And authorities in Belgium and in France, they’ve arrested three people, including an Iranian diplomat in an alleged plot to bomb, that Iran was going to bomb that rally, and it included a lot of former U.S. officials including Rudy Giuliani, who speak every year at that group. So you’ve got a potential assassination planned right there in France allegedly directed by Tehran, and here’s what Ms. Rajavi says about Secretary Pompeo, “The U.S. Secretary of State reiterated that when America partners with enemies suchs as the mullahs, ‘they advance…’ gaining access to weapons of mass destruction, violations of human rights, export of fundamentalism, and terrorism are the four pillars holding up the theocratic regime ruling Iran. The ultimate solution for discarding the mullahs’ religious fascism is changing this illegitimate regime at the hands of the Iranian people and Resistance.” Can that ever be done?

Mark: Well one hopes, I mean people were very skeptical in the 1980s when Ronald Reagan came into office and believed that we had to reach some kind of détente with the Soviet Union that they would be around for generations and Reagan called them rightly so the evil empire and launched a comprehensive policy, using all the instruments of national policy to go after the Soviet Union. Six-seven years later, the Soviet Union collapsed, so I think these regimes are actually a lot weaker than you would expect. They use repression and brutality to keep down their own people. And the Islamic Republic is spending billions of dollars on an expansionist agenda through the Middle-East and through the world. I think that hopefully within our lifetime we will see the end of the Islamic Republic, which is the best guarantee for global security.  

Eric: And they also allegedly targeted two of the National Council of Resistance of Iran officials who live here, in the United States, in Washington. Mark Dubowitz of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, always appreciate you coming in and thank you as always, for your insight.

Richard Goldberg is director for countering Iranian weapons of mass destruction at the National Security Council and previously served as a senior advisor at FDD. On February 11, the 40th anniversary of the Islamic revolution in Iran, Richard delivered remarks at FDD’s panel “40 Years After the Revolution: Understanding the Islamic Republic of Iran.” Text and footage of Richard’s remarks follow.

40 years of failure: that’s what the Islamic Republic has produced for the Iranian people.

In a country with such vibrant history and culture, advanced educational opportunities and plentiful natural resources, the people of Iran rightly look at their leaders today and wonder: where did all our money go?

Billions of dollars wasted on terrorist organizations far away from Iran’s borders. Billions of dollars wasted on threatening missile systems that serve no defensive purpose. Billions of dollars wasted in Syria. Billions and billions not spent on the Iranian people.Inflation is out of control, prices are rising and Iran’s leaders spend money sending missiles to Yemen?

Workers are striking, the rial is under enormous pressure and Iran is headed into recession – but Iran’s leaders keep pouring resources into Syria?
Layer on top of that the decades of corruption, graft and diversion. The money siphoned away from the Iranian people for the personal enrichment of an elite few.

40 years of failure.

It’s no wonder the Iranian people are finally asking a basic question: Where’s the money going?

40 years of failure; 40 years too long.

The Iranian people could have a much brighter future if their leaders chose a different path – the path of a normal nation. As Secretary Pompeo has said, the United States is prepared to fundamentally change the relationship with Iran – including diplomatic and economic relations – if Iran’s leaders fundamentally change their behavior.

Comply with international obligations and expectations when it comes to missiles, nuclear activities, proliferation and human rights. Release our citizens. End state-sponsorship of terrorism. Stop threatening your neighbors and fomenting chaos outside your borders. Until Iran’s leaders decide to put the interests of their citizens ahead of their own self-interest, the U.S. maximum pressure campaign will continue and strengthen.

We know where the money goes. It doesn’t go to the Iranian people.

And so, the United States will do everything we can do to dry up the money the Islamic Republic uses for illicit, dangerous and destabilizing purposes.
When the President says maximum pressure, he means maximum pressure. As Special Representative Hook recently noted, jurisdictions that received Significant Reduction Exceptions to import Iranian crude should not expect those exceptions to be renewed. The oil market is well supplied and can absorb the loss of Iranian crude. U.S. sanctions will be enforced. As Ambassador Bolton and the State Department have repeatedly said: Special purpose vehicles are no exception. More sanctions are on the way. The re-imposition of sanctions in November should be considered a first step. It is a baseline, not a finish line.

40 years of failure; 40 years too long.

We know where the money goes – and, like the Iranian people, we’ve seen enough.

Video and transcript of FDD’s full panel featuring Gholam Reza Afkhami, Houchang Chehabi, Toby Dershowitz, Reuel Marc Gerecht, Richard Goldberg, Ray Takeyh, and Behnam Ben Taleblu here.

In the Midterm Assessment by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), FDD experts analyze the Trump administration’s policies in more than 20 key issue areas related to foreign policy and national security, ranging from Hezbollah to cyber security.

Mark Dubowitz spearheaded the assessment on policies related to the Islamic Republic of Iran, beginning with an overview of the Trump administration’s current policies.

The following is an excerpt:

“For almost two years, before President Trump ordered the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria in December 2018, the Trump administration pursued an Iran policy based on the use of all instruments of national power to stop Tehran from engaging in a wide array of aggressive and malign behaviors that defy global norms. In his May 21, 2018 speech, “A New Iran Strategy,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called on Iran to end verifiably its nuclear weapons and advanced ballistic missile programs, cease its support for terrorism and the destabilization of foreign governments, release all hostages, and halt its aggression against Israel and other U.S. allies. To achieve these objectives, the administration designed a strategy to pressure the regime – diplomatically, economically, and militarily. To that end, the administration walked away from the nuclear deal known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and reinstated the comprehensive sanctions that had forced Iran to the negotiating table in 2013.”

[…]

“The Trump administration’s strategy came down to putting the regime in Tehran to a stark choice between a fundamental change in its behavior and an unrelenting pressure campaign to severely weaken the Islamic Republic. However, Trump’s decision to pull U.S. troops from Syria raises serious doubts about the president’s commitment to pressuring Iran on every front.”

The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) released its midterm assessment of the Trump administration’s foreign and national security policies with analysis by more than 20 FDD experts on over 20 key issue areas.

Lt. Gen. (Ret.) H.R. McMaster, the Chairman of FDD’s new Center on Military and Political Power (CMPP) that Mark Dubowitz co-founded, wrote the foreword to the report.

The following is an excerpt:

“In this Midterm Assessment, FDD experts and scholars evaluate the Trump administration’s efforts to advance and protect U.S. vital interests. The assessment spans the broad range of threats and challenges to national security and prosperity that our nation faces. Those threats and challenges include revisionist powers, hostile states, and transnational terrorist organizations. And the essays also consider new domains in which these threats operate (such as cyberspace) as well as increasing dangers associated with the potential breakdown of the nuclear nonproliferation regime and the prospect of hostile states and non-state actors gaining access to some of the most destructive weapons on earth. This assessment deserves wide attention because the stakes are high. And it deserves attention because the authors have transcended the vitriolic and shallow partisan discourse that dominates much of what passes for commentary on foreign policy and national security.”

Even the Losers

The following is an excerpt:

Each Christmas for the past 15 years, I’ve returned to the city of my childhood, Toronto. It feels like the same city of immigrants united by their ethnic food, entrepreneurship, and gratitude for Canada’s polite and tolerant embrace. But this time is different. The Maple Leafs are winning. There’s even hope that this may be the year they win their first championship since 1967, the year before I was born to a rugby-loving family in South Africa.

Read Mark’s op-ed for The Washington Examiner here.