Freedom for Iran: What a Difference a President Makes 

Freedom for Iran: What a Difference a President Makes 

The joint U.S. and Israeli strike that led to the decapitation of Iran’s tyrannical, anti-Western, terrorism-sponsoring regime was nothing short of extraordinary. President Trump declared:

Our objective is to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime, a vicious group of very hard, terrible people.

Its menacing activities directly endanger the United States, our troops, our bases overseas, and our allies throughout the world. For 47 years, the Iranian regime has chanted ‘Death to America’ and waged an unending campaign of bloodshed and mass murder targeting the United States, our troops and the innocent people in many, many countries. Among the regime’s very first acts was to back a violent takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, holding dozens of American hostages for 444 days….

From Lebanon to Yemen and Syria to Iraq, the regime has armed, trained and funded terrorist militias that have soaked the earth with blood and guts, and it was Iran’s proxy, Hamas, that launched the monstrous October 7 attacks on Israel, slaughtering more than 1,000 innocent people, including 46 Americans, while taking 12 of our citizens hostage. It was brutal, something like the world has never seen before.

Iran is the world’s No. 1 state sponsor of terror and just recently killed tens of thousands of its own citizens on the street as they protested. It has always been the policy of the United States, in particular, my administration, that this terrorist regime can never have a nuclear weapon.

Despite the hysteria of leftist critics at home and abroad, there is no question that the strike was fully compatible with American interests and executed at the most opportune moment, when the regime was at its weakest. Waiting for it to grow stronger again defies common sense and the principles of successful military strategy.

Last but not least, it was morally justified not only as a self-defense strategy for America and its allies but also for the people of Iran, who have been brutally oppressed and slaughtered by their regime for decades. Trump remarked:

Finally, to the great, proud people of Iran, I say tonight that the hour of your freedom is at hand. Stay sheltered. Don’t leave your home. It’s very dangerous outside. Bombs will be dropping everywhere. When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be, probably, your only chance for generations. For many years, you have asked for America’s help, but you never got it. No president was willing to do what I am willing to do tonight. Now you have a president who is giving you what you want. So let’s see how you respond. America is backing you with overwhelming strength and devastating force. Now is the time to seize control of your destiny and to unleash the prosperous and glorious future that is close within your reach.

Some 15 years ago, I attended a civics class at a local high school on the eve of passing the U.S. citizenship test. I was sitting next to an elderly woman with kind features that betrayed some existential sorrow. She was an Iranian refugee who barely knew English, but when the lecturer asked her why she had come to America and wanted to become a citizen, she answered decisively: “Freedom.”

Growing up in Eastern Europe under communism, I remember the undying hope passed across generations that one day the Americans would come to the rescue. A character in the book Wolf Hunt, published in Bulgaria in 1986, uttered a prophecy that captured the dreams of millions behind the Iron Curtain, a prophecy that the Americans will come [Wolf Hunt, p. 118]:

If they don’t come in our time, then they’ll come in our children’s or our grandchildren’s time. This world wasn’t created yesterday; it has its way of doing things. What was again will be.

These words are especially relevant today for the people of Iran. Eastern Europe waited 45 years to be liberated from communism; Iran waited 47 years to be liberated from its Islamic theocratic tyranny. During the rallies in 1989 and 1990, we chanted a popular song: “45 years are enough. Time is on our side.”

Now we can say that 47 years of state-sponsored anti-American and anti-Israeli terrorism, as well as murderous domestic oppression, are enough. Communism and radical Islam are the twin forces that constitute the greatest threat to Western civilization, both externally and internally. We are incredibly fortunate to finally have a remarkably brave leadership that is intent on destroying this threat. Hopefully, the people of Cuba will also taste freedom soon.

Nora D. Clinton is a Research Scholar at the Legal Insurrection Foundation. She was born and raised in Sofia, Bulgaria. She holds a PhD in Classics and has published extensively on ancient documents on stone. In 2020, she authored the popular memoir Quarantine Reflections Across Two Worlds. Nora is a co-founder of two partner charities dedicated to academic cooperation and American values. She lives in Northern Virginia with her husband and son.

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