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U.S. Policy Has Fed the Islamic Republic's Campaign of Terror
(Wall Street Journal) Brian Hook - Iran's oil exports hit a six-year high last month. The regime in Tehran is a violent theocracy under U.S. and international sanctions. The energy sanctions reimposed on Iran in 2018 remain in effect, but the Biden administration is failing to enforce them, which has created a financial windfall for Iranian terrorism. Iran's oil revenue underwrites a war machine that is tearing apart the Middle East, financing militias in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Bahrain and Yemen that target and kill American citizens. Hizbullah receives $700 million a year from Tehran. Iran's oil supported the Hamas death squads that carried out the Oct. 7 massacre, where at least 32 American citizens were murdered. The regime's oil revenue also funds its nuclear program and missile arsenal. Iran is now exporting 1.56 million barrels a day of crude oil, most of it to China. This is netting the regime up to $35 billion annually. That's more than $100 billion in revenue since Mr. Biden took office in January 2021. Buoyed by these exports, Iran's economic growth surpassed that of the U.S. in 2023; the International Monetary Fund expects that to happen again in 2024. The previous administration successfully reduced Iran's exports to a low of 70,000 barrels a day in April 2020. This denied Tehran access to as much as $50 billion in annual revenue. I monitored the sanctions' efficacy daily. Teams from across the federal government worked to track Iran's illicit oil transfers and disrupt them in every region. Countries took notice and heeded our warnings. Today, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries has spare oil capacity. That gives President Biden ample room to enforce the oil sanctions vigorously. Skeptics have said our sanctions had little effect. That would be news to Iran's then-President Hassan Rouhani, who complained in late 2019 that U.S. sanctions cost the regime as much as $200 billion. That year, Iran cut its military spending by 28%. Iran-backed militias across the Middle East told reporters that Tehran's handouts had dried up. Restoring deterrence starts with enforcing the existing sanctions with the goal of zero oil exports for the top financier of terrorism in the Middle East. The writer was director of the Office of Policy Planning at the U.S. State Department, 2017-18, and served as U.S. special representative for Iran, 2018-20.