The United States, alongside coalition allies like the UK and France, established two no-fly zones in Iraq in the 1990s after the first Gulf War that followed Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, which remained in place until the major combat operations in Iraq ended after the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
The northern “no-fly” zone was established in April, 1991. The southern no-fly zone was established in August, 1992. The northern zone was designed to protect Iraqi Kurds from more retribution from Saddam Hussein. The southern zone was established to protect the Shia populations there that Saddam had massacred after his massive defeat at the hands of the “Coalition of the Willing” in the “100 Hours” campaign to expel Saddam s forces from Kuwait. Those two operations were low intensity conflicts and carried on for years. It’s time to reprise that sort of operation.
The Strait of Hormuz is an international waterway, protected by customary law of the sea for as long as humankind has voyaged, though never without peril from pirates or, since the Iranian Revolution of 1979, the forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran. While the Iranian navy’s capital ships have been sunk, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (“IRGC”) continues to menace shipping in the Strait via mines, drones and missiles, both short range and longer range.
TRUMP PRESSES NATO PARTNERS ON SUPPORT AS HEGSETH BLASTS HESITATION
The U.S. and its allies can and should recommence combat operations against the IRGC. The rump regime(s) in control of the IRGC or parts of it need to be shattered to an even greater level of destruction as they do not yet understand the depth of their defeat, or in fact relish martyrdom which we should oblige. Their guns and missiles can be silenced. The sooner that President Trump orders that done the better.
After major combat operations end again, they should be followed by a “no fire” zone extending back at least a hundred miles from the coast of the Strait. That distance allows for sustainable defense against most if not all of Iran’s remaining arsenal. If firing continues, the allies shall have to insist on a “no movement” zone in the same area. The Strait is of too much importance to the global economy and all nations to allow a pirate regime that cannot exercise command and control of its armed forces to be close to the shore.
The “no fire/no movement” zone will require ongoing U.S. operations for some time and will also provide the litmus test for whether NATO endures as a useful alliance. Failure to take up its share of the policing of the Strait is simply to stick the U.S. with the tab.
If and when that happens, Europe — 80 plus years after the end of World War II and 30 plus years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union — will need to pay its own way if taking care of international waterways becomes a U.S.-only burden. We can shoulder that burden alone as well as deterrence of China in the Pacific.
If obliged to do that without European help (and not just token help) it will be time to serve notice on the Atlantic Alliance that its sugar daddy days are done. I’m not the only Reagan conservative to feel this way. Europe has changed, not the U.S., and America must take care of itself first, not a wealthy but washed-out Euro-elite that seems to believe it is owed our protection regardless of their feckless defense policies and repulsive neutrality in the conflict with Iran.
This is a hinge moment for the West. Don’t be surprised if our alliances in the Gulf, like “the Quad” in the Pacific, take the front and perhaps only seats at the table with the United States.
Ingratitude burns. Europe’s scalds, especially after not once or twice, but three times having to save the continent from dictators bent on destroying the freedoms of the people living west of Russia. It’s not written in the ages that the “new world” must always come to the defense of the old, especially when the old can fully well pay its own way.
Hugh Hewitt is a Fox News contributor and host of “The Hugh Hewitt Show” heard weekday afternoons from 3 PM to 6 PM ET on the Salem Radio Network, and simulcast on Salem News Channel. Hugh drives Americans home on the East Coast and to lunch on the West Coast on over 400 affiliates nationwide, and on all the streaming platforms where SNC can be seen. He is a frequent guest on the Fox News Channel’s news roundtable, hosted by Bret Baier weekdays at 6pm ET. A son of Ohio and a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School, Hewitt has been a Professor of Law at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law since 1996 where he teaches Constitutional Law. Hewitt launched his eponymous radio show from Los Angeles in 1990. Hewitt has frequently appeared on every major national news television network, hosted television shows for PBS and MSNBC, written for every major American paper, has authored a dozen books and moderated a score of Republican candidate debates, most recently the November 2023 Republican presidential debate in Miami and four Republican presidential debates in the 2015-16 cycle. Hewitt focuses his radio show and his column on the Constitution, national security, American politics and the Cleveland Browns and Guardians. Hewitt has interviewed tens of thousands of guests from Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to Republican Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump over his 40 years in broadcasting. This column previews the lead story that will drive his radio/ TV show today.
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