Time to help Iranian people change their regime

Forty years ago, Iranian regime operatives masquerading as students seized the U.S. embassy in Tehran. In recent days, Iranian regime operatives masquerading as Iraqi militiamen hoped to do the same to the one in Baghdad, our largest anywhere in the world.

President Trump sensibly responded to the present danger  to our personnel and facility by authorizing the embassy’s Marines to disperse the so-called “protestors” and by promptly dispatching reinforcements. The militiamen withdrew, at least temporarily, on New Year’s Day.

The episode serves as a reminder, however, that the ayatollahs who have been our self-declared enemies for four decades are a threat to us, as well as a tyrannical menace to their own people. Rather than remain on defense against further Iranian attacks, the United States should actively delegitimate the mullahocracy and help the long-suffering Iranian population bring about its downfall, at last.