Over the weekend, four oil tankers off the coast of the United Arab Emirates were damaged in a mysterious incident that U.S. officials rushed to characterize as Iranian sabotage.
The incident comes as the Trump administration reportedly has updated war plans against Iran . U.S. allies, on the other hand, have said they do not see any increased threat from Iran.
Joining Boston Public Radio to share her analysis was homeland security expert Juliette Kayyem. Kayyem is on the faculty of Harvard's Kennedy School and is a CNN analyst.
Kayyem sees the escalation of rhetoric from the United States as stemming from adviser John Bolton, who has long taken a hardline stance against Iran.
"Our national security adviser John Bolton has been pushing for war with Iran for decades," Kayyem said.
"The lessons of Iraq don't seem to have moved him much, and the belief that military power to curb the aggressions of an enemy — which Iran is, with lots of complications, of course — seems to be the only tool in his toolbox," she continued.
Kayyem cited the build-up to the Iraq War and warned against the danger of inflating the threat from Iran and getting involved in another conflict.
"That [Bolton] wants a conflict should not surprise us. The fact that the intelligence that they're citing seems specious at best — I'll give them some benefit of the doubt — also shouldn't surprise us, because this is a repeat of Iraq," she said.
