4 Things You Need to Know About the Middle East - Chris Mitchell CBN News

4 Things You Need to Know About the Middle East

01-03-2016

Chris Mitchell

CBN News

Chris Mitchell

JERUSALEM, Israel -- The Middle East has been collapsing in turmoil and violence in recent years -- from the 'Arab Spring' disasters in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and elsewhere to the rise of ISIS in Syria and Iraq.

What do Americans really need to know about what's going on in the Middle East?

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., retired Gen. Jay Garner, and former Israeli U.S. Ambassador Michael Oren are leading experts on the Middle East who explain four things you need to know.

1. Unprecedented Turmoil

"More generally in the Middle East, what the American people need to know is that this a time of unprecedented turmoil," Cotton said. 

"Again, you have Iranian-backed proxies -- whether they are militias, or state actors or terrorists groups -- that are largely in control of large swaths of Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, (and) Yemen and that are going to continue to aggressively destabilize the region because Iran is going to get tens of billions of dollars to support them," he said.

2. Iran Will Get Nukes

Cotton explained that Iran is going to get more conventional weapons and eventually they will also get nuclear weapons.

"That is all going to happen in almost the first day of this (U.S.-led Iranian nuclear) deal," Cotton continued. "They're going to get the money immediately."

Cotton believes the nuclear umbrella they'll be developing will be a key factor in the pushback against Iranian actions in the region.

"That's why it's so important to stand up to them now before they get stronger, before they realize that they can confront the U.S. and our allies throughout the region," he said.

3. A Middle East Torn Apart

Gen. Garner said the Middle East is beginning to break apart.

"It's beginning to be subverted by terrorist elements like al Qaeda or like al Qaeda in the Sinai Peninsula," he said.

Garner said the United States does not have a coherent Middle East policy, and Americans don't generally recognize the realities in the region.

"In Syria and Iraq...we're running the gamut of nuclear proliferation...we need to have a policy and have to put the resources behind the policy to correct that," he said.

Oren said that isn't necessarily the full picture with regard to the West.

"The state system, as devised by the Europeans, they're arbitrary borders that didn't take into consideration ethnic and religious differences," he explained.

4. Middle East Not like Vietnam

"The Middle East is not like Vietnam where you can pull your troops out and go home and be pretty confident that the Viet Cong are not going to follow you to wherever you're going to -- Chicago or Florida. The Middle East is going to come after you," Oren said.

"The Middle East is coming to a neighborhood near you, and the United States will remain deeply connected both strategically and financially to the Middle East," he said.

"So there's no detaching," he said. "If the United States wants to be a player in this region, a player diplomatically, it has to be a player militarily as well."

Watch full report here: CBN News - Middle East

Iran Deal Advent of 'Second Nuclear Age'?

By Chris Mitchell

CBN News Middle East Bureau Chief

Thursday, September 03, 2015

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JERUSALEM, Israel -- Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., is one of the most outspoken critics of the Iranian nuclear deal. Cotton visited Israel this week and explained to CBN News why he believes this agreement may be one of the worst in American history.

Sen. Cotton met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders about the Iranian deal. He says the deal puts Israel and the United States in great danger.

"Even if Iran follows the deal to the letter, they're going to be a nuclear threshold state in a mere 10 or 15 years, which Prime Minister Netanyahu says is a blink of an eye in the life of nations," Cotton told CBN News.

Secretary of State John Kerry made the case that the deal is the best way to prevent Iran from going nuclear.

"Without this agreement, Iran's breakout time was two months," Kerry said. "With this agreement, it will increase by a factor of six, to at least a year, and it will remain at that level for a decade or more."

"Without this agreement, Iran could double its operating centrifuges almost overnight, and continue expanding with ever more efficient designs," he continued. "With this agreement, Iran's centrifuges will be reduced by two-thirds for 10 years."

Sen. Cotton exposed the secret side deal between Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) over Iran's sensitive military site at Parchin. Instead of outside inspectors, the deal allows Iran to inspect itself and send in the results to the U.N. inspection agency.

"It's kind of like letting an NFL player take his own drug test at home and mail it in to Roger Godell at NFL offices so he can establish his eligibility," the senator said.

Cotton said if Iran goes nuclear, they're different from other nations.

"Iran is run by radical clerics who continually chant 'death to America' and 'death to Israel' in the street led by their national leadership," he explained. "They have the blood of hundreds of Americans on their hands from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They continue to kill Jews all around the world … and they are destabilizing the entire Middle East."

Meanwhile on Capitol Hill, the president has the votes he needs in the Senate to uphold his promised veto.

"So for the first time in American history a deal is going to go forward with a majority vote against it in both the Senate and the House and a strong majority of the American people against it," Cotton said.

"This nuclear deal is going to be the worst agreement in the history of American foreign policy and that's because the president didn't respect the Constitution, didn't respect the treaty clause of the Constitution," he continued.

"If there's anything that should have been submitted to the Congress as a treaty it's a nuclear arms deal with a mortal and unrepentant enemy," Cotton said.

With Middle East nations already saying publically and privately they want nuclear weapons, Cotton fears the deal will inevitably lead to a nuclear arms race with possible catastrophic consequences to the region and to the United States.

"I believe if this deal goes forward, we are at risk of entering a second nuclear age and the loss of life, not in the tens, not in the thousands, not in even the hundreds of thousands -- but in the millions," he warned. "And that loss of life could include American life because Iran is also developing a ballistic missile program and they also have shown they are willing to kill Americans."