GORDON SONDLAND: Iran is Europe’s moment of truth — will it stand with America?

The USA and Israel are bearing the brunt of the work. On February 28, joint American-Israeli strikes – Operation Epic Fury and Operation Roaring Lion – eliminated Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Iran’s defense minister, the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council.

American soldiers and Israeli pilots are currently in danger; they absorb retaliatory attacks so that the free world does not have to live under the shadow of a nuclear-armed theocracy. So what did Europe offer? Ursula von der Leyen described the situation as “extremely worrying”. Emmanuel Macron warned of “the outbreak of war”. France, Germany and the United Kingdom rushed to clarify that their forces were not participating.

The continent’s collective message was not solidarity but distance. If the transatlantic alliance cannot even count on the full popular support of Europe while the Americans and Israelis bear the costs and risks, then what exactly is the alliance for?

I write from experience. As the United States ambassador to the European Union, I have been charged with encouraging our allies to abandon the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and join America’s maximum pressure campaign.

What I encountered in Brussels was deliberate denial. European officials used extraordinary distortions to avoid acknowledging what the intelligence made clear: Iran had already violated the agreement. The EU’s then High Representative, Federica Mogherini, was not interested in any evidence that contradicted her narrative. And the creation of INSTEX, a financial instrument designed to circumvent American sanctions and streamline European trade with Iran, was a stunning demonstration of misplaced priorities.

At a time when the democratic world needed to tighten its grip, Europe was producing temporary solutions to do business with the mullahs. Iran took notice and subsequently systematically violated every enrichment limit imposed by the JCPOA, reaching 60% purity; This is a short technical step from weapons-grade material. Europe’s loyalty to the JCPOA did not constrain Iran. It enabled Iran.

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What makes Europe’s peripheral stance not only disappointing but also absurd is that Iran has been attacking Europe for years.

In 2018, an Iranian diplomat serving at the Vienna embassy was convicted in Belgium of masterminding a plot to bomb a rally of Iranian dissidents near Paris; A group of tens of thousands of people, including a sitting British MP, said that if the plot had been successful it would have been the deadliest terrorist operation ever carried out on European soil.

In London, a journalist with Iran International was stabbed near his home by attackers linked to Tehran. British security services are tracking more than 20 potentially deadly Iran-backed plots in a year, MI5’s director-general has revealed.

Dutch intelligence linked Tehran to assassination attempts in the Netherlands. German and French authorities uncovered Iranian agents who hired European criminals to spy on Jewish targets in Paris, Munich and Berlin.

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Iran did not just threaten Europe in the abstract. He deployed operatives, recruited criminal proxies, and launched mass casualty attacks on European soil. And yet Europe is evasive.

The regime in Tehran chose this path. It enriched uranium to levels close to weapons grade. He armed and guided Hamas in the barbaric attack on October 7. It freed the Houthis to international shipping. And when its own people rose up in the largest protests since the 1979 revolution, the regime massacred thousands of unarmed civilians on direct orders from Khamenei; This was the largest street massacre in modern Iranian history.

Even as Oman’s foreign minister announced a so-called breakthrough in nuclear negotiations two days before the attacks, Iran was tripling its oil exports to protect its economy from sanctions. The diplomatic runway has been exhausted.

Now Khamenei is dead. The top leaders of the Revolutionary Guard were eliminated. The interim leadership council hastily announced by Ali Larijani is a sign of desperation, not stability. The regime’s retaliatory attacks show that even a mortally wounded theocracy remains dangerous; This is exactly why the pressure should not be softened.

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The United States and Israel should continue operations until Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, ballistic missile capability, and ability to wage proxy wars are permanently disrupted, and whatever authority emerges in Tehran understands that reestablishing these programs means destruction.

Nobody wants Europe to fire a single shot. The USA and Israel took on this burden. But the least our closest allies can do is offer unequivocal public support. Not empty-mouthed calls for “maximum restraint.” Not crazy statements about participation. Macron is not calling for an emergency Security Council meeting, as if the problem was the response to Iran’s 40 years of aggression rather than the aggression itself.

Europe should openly support the regime’s campaign to eliminate its military capabilities, impose sanctions to their full extent without any specifics, and tell the Iranian people that the world’s democracies are on their side, not on the side of the apparatus that is slaughtering them.

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There is a broader dimension that European leaders need to consider. No one is watching more carefully than Beijing. China deepened its ties with Tehran by purchasing oil at a discount despite sanctions.

If Europe stands on the sidelines while America and Israel shoulder the burden alone, China will conclude that the Western alliance lacks the cohesion to combat determined adversaries, and this will shape Beijing’s calculations on Taiwan and beyond.

A united front sends the opposite message: The democratic world will not be divided, and the costs of supporting rogue regimes are real and growing.

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The window of surrender is now open and will not remain open forever. The United States and Israel have demonstrated their determination to act, and are paying the price with treasure, risk and blood. Europe owes it to its allies, the Iranian people and their declared values, to stand by them openly, openly and without daylight in between.

Now it’s time to prove it.

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