Israel Should Follow Reagan's Example in Responding to Iranian Attack with Strategic Restraint

A massive Israeli attack on Iran might start a full-scale war that draws in the US and escalates to the nuclear level

Israeli missile defenses shoot down incoming Iranian missiles over Israel during Iran’s unprecedented attack Sunday morning.

April 19th Update: Iran has stated it has no plans to retaliate after Israel fired only three missiles at an Iran air defense radar near a heavily defended air base in southern Iran because it was largely symbolic and caused little to no damage or Iranian casualties and appeared to be aimed to de-escalate the conflict rather than provoke another Iranian retaliatory strike on Israel.

April 18th Update: Israel conducted a limited missile strike this evening against Isfahan Air Base located near an Iranian nuclear site. Iran is claiming it shot down the missiles and that there was no damage. If that is true, Iran's next retaliatory strike on Israel may be limited as well but either way the Israeli strike against Iran risks perpetuating tit for tat strikes between two nuclear powers that could lead to the outbreak of a full-scale regional war with the potential for nuclear escalation.

Shortly after the Hamas terrorist attacks on October 7, 2023 which killed nearly 1,200 Israeli civilians, Israeli leaders threatened to assassinate the Iranian political and military leaders who they believed were responsible for the attack. Iran responded that such an action would constitute a red line which would entail grave consequences for Israel. On April 2^nd, Israel conducted an attack on Iran’s consulate in Damascus which killed seven Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders including two Brigadier Generals--Mohammad Reza Zahedi, Quds Force commander over Lebanon and Syria who is believed to be the Iranian general who masterminded the Hamas attacks--and his deputy. As I wrote back in October, the Islamic Republic of Iran clearly masterminded the Hamas terrorist attacks that started their proxy war against Israel on October 7th but the Israeli strike on the Iranian embassy was not only illegal, but it constituted a dangerous escalation of Israel’s proxy war with Iran. Netanyahu had every reason to know it would provoke a massive, unprecedented Iranian retaliatory strike on Israel that could potentially result in the deaths of many Israelis, and he ordered it anyway in the apparent belief it was worth the risk to Israel’s national security exact its revenge. Ultimately, Iranian leaders felt compelled to respond with a major direct military strike on Israel.

On Saturday evening, in response to the Israeli strike, the Islamic Republic of Iran and Iranian proxies located in Iraq, Syria and Yemen launched 170 Shahed ‘suicide’ drones, 120 Emad Medium-Range Ballistic Missiles (MRBMs) and 30 Paveh cruise missiles at Israel. This Iranian missile strike on Israel is believed to the largest single day missile and drone attack in history. The attack was unprecedented as Iran had never before directly attacked Israel before and was much larger than US intelligence had forecasted with one expert describing it as “worst case.” The Iranian missiles were reportedly seen flying over Israel’s Knesset building signaling to Israeli leaders that Iran could have targeted Israeli government buildings in Tel Aviv had Iran wanted to do so. It was the first time that Israel had been directly attacked by a foreign country since Saddam Hussein fired Scud Short-Range Ballistic Missiles (SRBMs) at Israel during Operation Desert Storm in January 1991. They served as a strategic warning to Israel that future Israeli assassinations of top Iranian political and military leaders would be met with a much harsher response by Iran. The attack represented yet another colossal foreign policy failure of the Biden administration which warned Iran repeatedly not to engage in any direct military strikes against Israel.

Multiple Iranian Emad MRBM’s of the type used in Iran’s attack on Israel being fired in tandem

COL Rob Maness (Ret. USA), one of America’s top military experts, and I were interviewed by Brannon Howse on Patriot TV for two hours while the Iranian missile attack was still underway. During the interview, I stated my belief that the Iranian missile strike appeared largely symbolic in nature, causing little damage and designed to minimize Israeli casualties in order to reduce the odds Israel would feel the need to retaliate with a direct military strike against Iran and that it was essentially Iran’s attempt to “escalate to de-escalate.” Iran was careful not to target civilians in its missile attacks and instead targeted both Israeli Air Force bases used to launch the Israeli missiles on Iran’s consulate in Damascus was attacked on April 2^nd, one of which is located in northern Israel and the other is located in southern Israel, as well as a military command center from which it is believed the strikes were ordered. It is notable that Iran did not seek to kill Israelis in response to Israel's assassination of seven top Iranian military leaders earlier this month.

If Iran had wanted the outbreak of a full-scale war, they wanted the outbreak of a full-scale regional war they would have launched a saturation attack deisgned to overwhelm Israel’s missile defense system, employing both Intermediate-Range Ballistic Missiles (IRBMs) and Fattah hypersonic cruise missiles. Instead, they appear to have deliberately limited the number and types of drones and missiles they used in the attack to increase the chances they were shot down. Before the first wave of drones had reached Israel, Iran’s mission to the United Nations wrote on X that “the matter can be deemed concluded,” indicating it would not attack Israel again if Israel did not respond militarily to Iran’s retaliatory strike. The statement continued. “However, should the Israeli regime make another mistake, Iran’s response will be considerably more severe. It is a conflict between Iran and the rogue Israeli regime from which the US MUST STAY AWAY!” Iranian President Muhammad Bageri confirmed over the weekend that Iran would not attack Israel again if Israel did not respond militarily.

Iran had been signaling since the Israeli strike on its Syrian diplomatic consulate that it would respond with a direct military strike against Israel providing the US and Israel a week or more to prepare to defend Israel from Iran’s retaliatory attack. The US pre-positioned air and naval assets to enable us to quickly respond to the attack allowing US fighters to join with  British, French and Israeli fighters in shooting down most of the missiles outside of Israeli territory. Jordan also attempted to shoot down some of the Iran missiles that flew over their territory en route to Israel saying it would not tolerate any missiles overflying their territory. The US shot down eighty Iranian drones and missiles while Israel claims its missile defenses and its allies shot down over 99 percent of Iran’s missiles and drones. The IDF subsequently admitted that five Iranian MRBMs succeeded in penetrating Israel missile defenses hit Nevatim Air Base damaging a C-130 cargo plane, an out-of-use runway and empty storage facilities while four more missiles hit another Israeli air base located in the Negev Desert, causing significant damage. This means the Israeli intercept rate was approximately 97 percent, rather than 99 percent, which is still an impressive level of effectiveness.

Map showing the location of Iranian ballistic missiles intercepted over Israel

In the immediate wake of the attack, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed that “Israel will show no mercy on Iran” in response to the attacks even as Iran warned Israel that if attacks Iran in a direct military strike, Iran will respond with an attack “ten times harsher” against Israel than the one it launched against Israel this past weekend.  Will Israel actually start a full-scale regional war in response to an Iranian attack that failed to kill a single Israeli citizen? The question has been raised by some national security analysts whether Israel may be deliberately trying to start a full-scale war with Iran in an effort to divert attention from its brutal collective punishment campaign in Gaza and entrap the US into engaging in direct military strikes against Iran, despite the fact it could lead to nuclear escalation.

President Biden had been scheduled to address the American people on Saturday evening before the Iranian attack but ended up canceling it and issuing a brief written statement of support for Israel instead. Israeli media has reported that the War Cabinet has met twice to discuss options on how to respond to the unprecedented Iranian missile attack on Israel from a full-scale air and missile strike on Iranian military targets to not responding militarily at all. An Israeli military strike on Iran would likely target Iranian nuclear sites, command-and-control, potential long-range missile sites, airbases, naval bases, and oil infrastructure. The Israeli war cabinet reportedly decided Saturday night to launch major Israeli strikes on Iran but, according to the New York Times, a phone call with Biden persuaded Netanyahu to cancel the attack, putting the decision as to how Israel will respond in limbo. CNN reported that Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he should consider Israel’s successful defense against Iran’s attack as “a win.” Biden reportedly told Netanyahu that while the US commitment to Israel’s defense remained “ironclad”, the US would not support an Israeli retaliatory attack against Iran. British, French and German leaders joined Biden and other world leaders in urging Israel not to attack Iran. In exchange, Biden likely promised Netanyahu that the US would coordinate a global response with other G7 members which would likely include both diplomatic and economic sanctions. The following day, Benny Gantz, a member of Israel’s War Cabinet and a prominent Israeli political opposition leader declared, Israel would “exact a price from Iran in a way and time that suits us,” seeming to suggest that Israel’s response to the Iranian attack would not be immediate and would likely not include direct kinetic attacks on Iran.

The bottom line is that Israel got away with killing seven top IRGC commanders meeting at a diplomatic consulate, which is considered Iranian soil under international law, and the Iranian retaliatory missile attack killed no Israelis. At face value, this would seem to be an acceptable tradeoff for Israel so Israeli leaders would be wise to “take the win” rather than escalate into an existential war with a likely already nuclear-armed Iran with unknown consequences that could very possibly result in the end of the State of Israel. Contrary to Israel’s statements, its war with Gaza is anything but an existential fight. However, a direct war with Iran undoubtedly would be given the fact as I have reported previously that Iran likely developed nuclear weapons many years ago according to the assessment of former CIA Director James Woolsey and the late Dr. Peter Pry who served as the co-founder and Executive Director of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security.

The single most, overriding US national security interest is to avoid war with our nuclear adversaries including Russia, China, North Korea and Iran yet Biden has been loathe up until this point to dissuade having its allies Israel and Ukraine from taking actions that could end up provoking such regional conflicts that would quickly become global in nature. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s ill-considered military guarantee of Poland in March 1939 effectively surrendered Britain’s right to decide whether to declare war to an autocratic regime which was created following a military coup which had crushed democracy over a dozen years earlier and served to ensure the outbreak of World War Two that led to the unnecessary deaths of tens of millions of innocents. Today, with his blank checks of military support for America’s ally Israel and our de-facto ally Ukraine, President Joe Biden has arguably surrendered America’s right to decide whether the US gets dragged into a direct war with an enemy alliance of four nuclear powers, any one of which could erase the US from the face of the Earth on a whim with zero warning.

Meanwhile, the Biden administration and neoconservative Republicans continue to falsely conflate Ukrainian and Israeli national security interests with our own when they are often in conflict with one another. Neoconservative Republicans led by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) are now calling for Biden to use this Iranian missile strike on Israel to attack Iran’s underground nuclear sites, of which it is believed to have hundreds of them dispersed against enemy air and missile attack, claiming that if the US doesn’t allow Israel to respond with a massive military strike on Iran, then it will embolden Iran to attack Israel again. As an example of the bombastic neocon propaganda talking points, the uberhawkish think tank, the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, published an article entitled, “Why Israel’s Failure to Strike Back at Iran Could Lead to Nuclear War.” The authors of this article essentially parrot Sen. Lindsey Graham’s nonsensical trope that the only way to prevent the outbreak of World War Three with Russia is to start World War Three in Ukraine right now by saying that the only way to prevent World War Three with a nuclear-armed Iran in the future is for Israel to start World War Three with Iran right now. Of course, as is so often the case, the truth is the exact opposite of what neoconservatives are claiming. If Israel doesn't respond to this Iranian attack with a direct military strike, Iran likely won't attack them directly again. But if Israel responds by launching 300 missiles at Iranian targets, Iran will likely respond with massive ballistic and hypersonic missile attacks perhaps targeting Israeli population centers like Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and one or more of them just might be armed with a nuclear warhead. There will be no way for Israel to know for sure.

Colonel Douglas Macgregor wrote an article speculating Israel might even opt to use one or more nuclear weapons against Iran in response to Iran’s attack on Israel. However, I think the chances of Israel escalating to the nuclear level is essentially zero as it would ensure Iranian nuclear retaliation against Israel all but ensuring its destruction in the event Israel’s missile defense system allowed even a few nuclear missiles to get through. Israel has the world's fourth largest nuclear arsenal and is the most militarized nation on earth with over half a million military servicemen (66 troops per square mile) out of a population of less than ten million, so it doesn't need US help to defend itself, providing it doesn’t go out of its way to start a full-scale regional war by engaging in air and missile strikes on Iran itself. That said, Biden was right to help Israel shoot down Iranian missiles hopefully in exchange for an Israeli commitment not to directly strike Iran to trigger World War Three.

Following the attack, Sen. Joni Ernst stated the Iranian attacked raised the question of Iran's nuclear capabilities but of course it is Iran's nuclear capability likely consisting of a dozen or more warheads, that gave Iran the confidence to stage an attack of this scale against Israel. In addition, Iran’s recent admission as a full member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization which Putin described as “a reborn Warsaw Pact”—a formal military alliance led by Russia and China has given it added assurance to engage in a largescale missile strike on Israel without much concern about a potential major US or Israeli retaliation. Iran’s nuclear-capable ballistic and cruise missile arsenal is one of the largest in the world and includes a significant number of MRBMs, IRBMs and perhaps even one or more ICBMs capable of hitting the US. Iran has deployed hundreds, perhaps thousands of nuclear-capable ballistic and cruise missiles including long range, road-mobile ballistic missiles located in underground silos impervious but all but nuclear attack. Accordingly, a massive Israeli retaliatory strike against Tehran or Iranian military or nuclear bases could potentially result in Iranian nuclear retaliation even if Russia and China did not intervene militarily. In addition, Iran has deployed what appears to be two satellites orbiting over the US at an altitude of 280 miles which is the optimum altitude to conduct a super EMP attack which could cause 275 million Americans to die within a year in the event the US were to engage in largescale attacks on Iranian territory so the stakes could hardly be any higher.

Under the Biden administration’s policy of fighting simultaneous proxy wars against Russia and Iran, the US has either given away or has expended a huge number of its limited supply of precision guided munitions, greatly weakening the US military and making us much less capable of fighting, let alone winning, a war with China over Taiwan. The question is who would benefit the most by a full-scale regional war between Israel and the Islamic Republic of Iran that involve major US military intervention even if it remained a conventional (i.e. non-nuclear) fight? Clearly, Russia and China would benefit the most as the US would divert a much larger portion of its military forces to fighting the war against Iran causing US military support for Ukraine and Taiwan to dry up. This could force Ukraine to accept Russia’s reasonable peace terms and could embolden China to take advantage of the war with Iran to greatly speed up its timetable to blockade and invade Taiwan in the belief that the US would be unable to effectively intervene to defend the island nation.

Shortly after the attacks, General Flynn posted on X, attacking the Biden administration for funding both sides of the war. The General’s critique of President Joe Biden is very well founded in view of the administration’s decision to pay $6 billion for the release of six American hostages, to unfreeze Iran’s bank accounts totaling $10 billion and its decision to drop sanctions on Iran allowing to obtain $80 billion in revenue from oil sales all of which it has used to fund its proxy attacks on the US and Israel in the Middle East and likely fund its nuclear missile program as well. Israel should seek to obtain a commitment by the Biden administration to cut off its funding of Iran and to reinstate former President Trump’s maximum pressure campaign of multilateral economic sanctions on Tehran.

The truest test of leadership of a nation is knowing when and when not to engage in acts of war against a foreign power and knowing when and when not to retaliate militarily against enemy attacks short of all-out war. The fact that the Iranian attack caused no Israeli deaths and wounded at most several Israelis provides Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with the flexibility to claim victory in its recent exchange with Iran and avoid a direct military response on Iran’s territory, that would likely elicit even more massive Iranian retaliation perhaps against Israeli civilian targets like Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, altogether. Israeli leaders would be wise to limit themselves to a major cyberattack on Iran, for which they might be able to maintain plausible deniability while refraining from any kinetic attacks on Iran, as well as attacks on Iranian proxies in Syria.

While the Islamic Republic of Iran has been a state-sponsor of terror since its inception in 1979, Iran has made clear it does not seek a general war with either the US or Israel, underscored by the recent Iranian missile strikes which targeted two Israeli military bases located in unpopulated areas in northern and southern Israel. As was the case of Iran’s missile strikes launched in retaliation to former President Donald Trump’s assassination of Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps Commander Major General Qasem Soleimani against a US military base in Iraq in January 2020, which wounded dozens of US soldiers but did not kill any of them, this Iranian missile strike on Israel was a measured retaliatory strike calculated not to provoke direct Israeli military retaliation on Iranian territory. Rather the attacks were conducted in order to allow Iranian leaders to save face in the eyes of the Iranian public and the Muslim world to show that they would not allow these assassinations of their top military leaders to go unanswered. President Trump wisely rejected the calls of some of his neocon advisors to respond to the missile strikes with US missile strikes against Iranian military bases inside Iran.

President Ronald Reagan faced a far more dire Iranian-sponsored terrorist attack in October 1983 when a car bomb attack killed 241 US Marines in their barracks in Beirut, Lebanon. Reagan, who has been cited for decades as a model President by neoconservative Republicans, prudently opted not to respond with direct military force against Iran and instead opted to withdraw all remaining US Marines from their UN peacekeeping mission to safeguard them from future Iranian attacks. This brazen Iranian-backed terror attack was likely in retaliation for Reagan’s decision the previous year to side with Iraq, then led by Saddam Hussein, in its war against the Iranian terror regime which it fought from 1980-1988. In March 1982, as Iran appeared to be on track to defeat Iraq, Reagan had signed a national security memorandum declaring, "The United States could not afford to allow Iraq to lose the war to Iran." the war as he provided Iraq with billions of dollars’ worth of economic aid, dual-use military technology, military helicopters, military intelligence and special operations training. In furtherance of Reagan’s policy, the CIA also facilitated the sale of large-scale weapons shipments to Iraq through third parties.

Similarly, Reagan chose not to respond militarily when the Soviet Union assassinated one of America’s most ardent opponents of Communism, Rep. Larry McDonald (D-GA) along with 268 other civilians when the Soviets shot down on Flight KAL-007 in September 1983. However, two months later, perhaps partly in response to the attack, Reagan reportedly ordered US Strategic Command to increase its alert status all the way to DEFCON One during the NATO Able Archer military exercises simulating nuclear bombing runs on the Soviet Union, which reportedly spooked the Soviets and caused them to come close to launching a nuclear strike against the US and NATO in response to what they believed to be an imminent US nuclear first strike. The ensuring nuclear war scare may well have served as the main catalyst for Reagan to abandon his more confrontational approach with the Soviet Union during his first term and pursue a diplomatic peace offensive with the Soviets during his second term. It is worth noting that in not one of these three instances of a US President showing strategic restraint was US national security endangered by their failure to respond militarily to enemy attacks.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vows Israel will respond to Iran’s unprecedented missile attack on Israel.

Israeli leaders would be wise to follow the historic examples of President Reagan and Trump in showing strategic restraint in the face of this Iranian missile strike and avoid engaging in direct military strikes on Iran to avoid provoking a much more devastating attack on Israel and prevent this crisis from escalating to a full-scale regional war that could involve the US and potentially even Russia and China leading to nuclear escalation. Given these existential risks to the US, President Biden was wise to bluntly inform Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that if he opts to conduct suck attacks anyway, Israel would be on its own without US support. It seems extremely unlikely that Israel would move forward with kinetic attacks against Iranian territory without US support as it cannot afford to be any more isolated internationally than it already is. In every previous instance in which they have been denied US support for proposed Israeli airstrikes on Iran, they have accepted the US veto. Israel is far more likely to retaliate by engaging in military strikes on Iranian military and Iranian proxy forces outside of Iran, most likely in Syria. Such strikes would likely target storage facilities with advanced missile parts, weapons or components that are sent from Iran to Hezbollah. There is also a chance that Israel could strike Iranian proxy forces in western Iraq, which would be the first ever such Israeli attack against Iraq.

Furthermore, Israeli leaders should follow the example of former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir when he opted not to respond with direct Israeli military retaliation against Iraq’s use of 42 SCUD SRBMs to attack Israel from January-February 1991 following the beginning of the US bombing campaign which initiated Operation Desert Storm in order not to inflame Muslim opinion against Israel. While moderate Arab states like Jordan helped defend their airspace (and by extension Israel) against last weekend’s Iranian missile attack, a largescale Israeli strike on Iran would have the opposite effect inflaming many Arab states against Israel potentially sparking a regional war not just between Israel and Iran but potentially bringing in other Arab states against Israel as well. Even worse, such a war could bring in the US and perhaps even Russia and China as well leading to a Third World War including multiple nuclear powers on the opposing side. 

As it is, US security guarantees of Ukraine and Israel are bringing America ever closer to the verge of an unnecessary nuclear war with the Sino-Russian military alliance which the US would have no chance to win and little prospects of surviving. That is why it is imperative that the Biden administration abandon its blank checks of US military support for Ukraine and Israel and condition US support on their commitment to implement cease-fires and armistice agreements. As Stephen M. Walt notes, the Biden administration has only itself to blame for Israel provoking this largescale Iranian missile attack as well as the prolongation of Israel’s invasion and occupation of Gaza at an ever increasing humanitarian cost. He stated, “Giving Israel unconditional support gave its leaders little incentive to heed U.S. calls for restraint so it is hardly surprising that they have ignored them,” by bombing the Iranian consulate building in Damascus. The same reasoning can be applied to Biden’s unconditional support given to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenksy which has emboldened him to attack Russian nuclear bases, target and kill Russian civilians and even sponsor a terrorist attack on a concert hall located in a Moscow suburb which killed at least 133 Russian civilians, threatening potential Russian nuclear escalation. The Biden administration should also establish strategic clarity with regards to Taiwan making clear that while the US will continue to provide arms to Taiwan to defend itself, the US will not defend Taiwan militarily. Only then, can the safety and security of the American people from the existential threats of nuclear missile, super EMP and comprehensive cyberattack be assured.

President Ronald Reagan and General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Evil Soviet Empire, sign one of a number of negotiated diplomatic peace agreements that helped to end the Cold War.

Reagan’s policy of peace through strength was not about reckless escalations of military conflict and endless nuclear brinkmanship as the neoconservatives falsely claim but was rather focused on strengthening our defensive alliances and selling our allies the weapons they needed to defend themselves against Communist aggression. At the same time, Reagan deliberately refrained from starting any major wars and conducting robust diplomacy with our Soviet adversaries to help successfully manage the end of the Cold War. His successful policy of strategic restraint provides a model which the US and Israel should seek to emulate by the US mediating the negotiation of peace agreements ending both wars in Ukraine (in accordance with my peace plan) and Gaza to restore peace and stability to Europe and the Middle East rather than follow the siren song of neoconservative warmongers to fight Russia and Iran directly and start an unnecessary world war that could cost the lives of hundreds of millions of innocents and devastate or destroy the US, Israel and our NATO allies.

While I supported Israel’s initial strong military response following the Hamas terrorist attacks along the lines of its partial invasion of Gaza in 2009 which lasted a few weeks, its questionable decision to prolong its invasion and occupation of Gaza over the past nearly six months has resulted in the deaths of 22,000 Gazan civilians thus far. The war in Gaza has been a strategic disaster for Israel, leaving it internationally isolated and serving to massively damaged Israel’s reputation on the world stage that has served to inflame several Arab states such as Turkey, with which it has previously had reasonably good relations, against it while Israel continues to strive for the unachievable end of eradicating Hamas, which could take years if indeed it can be achieved at all. In order to begin the long process of restoring its international standing and repair damaged diplomatic ties to Arab states with which it must peacefully co-exist, Israeli leaders would be wise to implement a peace agreement along the lines I have been advocating perhaps including a near-term full Israeli military withdrawal from Gaza while allowing Israel to claim victory over Hamas. They must come to realize that there is no purely military solution to Israel’s security dilemma. Rather its security and the very existence of Israel rests not merely on military strength but also upon robust diplomacy and negotiation of Israel’s disputes with its neighbors.

Following Israel’s success in shooting down the Iranian missile attack, the Israeli government touted its plans to create a new game changing “strategic alliance” between the US and Israel and moderate Arab states such as Jordan which helped shoot down incoming Iranian drones and missiles, Bahrain, United Arab Emirates, Egypt and perhaps even Saudi Arabia, to help counter Iran’s attempt to obtain hegemony over much of the Middle East region. The formation of such a defensive alliance, which could include intelligence sharing, military exchanges, joint military exercises and trade and technology sharing agreements as well as a joint air and missile defense system, should be the center peace of Israel’s grand strategy going forward to more effectively counter and deter future Iranian aggression in the Middle East. Indeed, it was Saudi Arabia’s planned signing of a peace agreement with Israel last fall which prompted Iran to greenlight the Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel which started the current Middle Eastern conflict. It would be a very welcome, albeit ironic, development if Iran’s unprecedented missile strike on Israel, combined with an Israeli agreement for a permanent cease-fire and armistice agreement in Gaza enabled Israel’s historic, proposed peace agreement with Saudi Arabia to move forward.

© David T. Pyne 2024

David T. Pyne, Esq. is a former U.S. Army combat arms and Headquarters staff officer, who was in charge of armaments cooperation with the former Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Africa and the Americas from 2000-2003, with an M.A. in National Security Studies from Georgetown University. He currently serves as Executive Vice President of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security and as a member of the Committee on the Present Danger-China. He recently served as Defense and Foreign Policy Advisor to a top-tier presidential candidate. He has also co-authored the best-selling new book, “Catastrophe Now--America’s Last Chance to Avoid an EMP Disaster” and his new book “Restoring Strategic Deterrence” will be published in early fall 2024. He serves as the Editor of “The Real War” newsletter at dpyne.substack.com and as a contributor to “The National Interest”. Here is a link to his interview archive. He may be reached at emptaskforce.ut@gmail.com.

Recent Media Interviews

March 15th—Interview on The American Journal hosted by Harrison Smith to discuss Russian and Chinese super-EMP satellites and orbital nuclear weapons as well as the coming Chinese blockade of Taiwan and ramifications for the US. Here is a link to the interview.

March 19th—Interview with Jon Twitchell on his Talk with Jon show to discuss China’s planned blockade of Taiwan which I am predicting will materialize later this year, Biden’s rejection of a peace agreement ending the war in Ukraine two years ago and how escalating Western threats against Russia in Ukraine could provoke a nuclear war could destroy the US and NATO, Here is the link.

March 22nd—Interview with Canadian Prepper to discuss the chances that the US may soon be embroiled in a two-front world war with both Russia and China. Here is the link to the interview.

March 23rd—Interview with Jonathan Hollerman who serves as Deputy Executive Director of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security on the EMP Task Force YouTube Channel to discuss the increasing threats of World War Three with Russia and China. Here is the link.

March 24th—Discussion with COL Ron Maness (USA Ret) and Brannon Howse on his Sunday Morning show on Patriot TV to discuss Ukrainian involvement in the terrorist attack against Russia as well as the implications of the Russian declaration of war against NATO in Ukraine. Here is a link to the interview.

March 24th—Panel Discussion about the perpetrators and ramifications of the Russian terrorist attack on Moscow on a Twitter Space hosted by Mario Nawfal.

March 26th—Interview with Cyrus Janssen on his podcast to discuss the costs and consequences of the war in Ukraine and Biden’s decision to veto the Russo-Ukrainian peace agreement in April 2022 which would have delivered a victory for Ukraine. Here is a link to Part One of the interview.

March 26th—Panel Discussion about the ramification of the potential enemy sabotage attack on the cargo ship that rammed and collapsed the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore on a Twitter Space hosted by Mario Nawfal.

March 28th—Interview with Nima Alkhorshid on his Dialogue Works podcast to debate former USAF Major Scott Ritter to debate the merits of my proposed Gaza Peace Plan.

April 5th—Interview with Brannon Howse on his Worldview Weekend Hour show on Patriot TV to discuss the latest Biden administration statements relating to its support for Taiwan and its support for NATO membership for Ukraine. Here is the link to the interview.

April 13th—Interview with Brannon Howse and COL Rob Maness (USA Ret.) on Patriot TV to discuss the prospects that the war between Israel and Iran will escalate to World War Three. Here is the link.

April 15th--Interview with COL Rob Maness (USA Ret.) on Patriot TV to discuss the prospects of World War III with Iran and Russia. Here is the link to the interview. My segment starts at Minute 33.

Upcoming Media Interviews

April 18th—I will be presenting an extensive briefing at the Firm Foundation Expo at 8pm at the Mountain America Expo Center at 9575 South State Street in Sandy, Utah to discuss the increasing threat of World War Three with Russia, China, North Korea and Iran and what we need to do to avert it.

April 23rd—Interview with Brannon Howse on Patriot TV to discuss the FBI warning that the Chinese are preparing a Volt Typhoon cyberattack to take down US military bases and America’s critical infrastructure to prevent us from being able to effectively respond to a Chinese blockade and/or invasion of Taiwan.