The morning after Iranian attacks on neighbouring Pakistan and Iraq, Iran‘s defence minister vowed Wednesday that his country would “not set any limits” on using its missile capabilities against enemies whenever necessary.
“We are a missile power in the world,” the minister, Mohammad Reza Ashtiani, told reporters at a cabinet meeting, according to state media.”Wherever they want to threaten the Islamic Republic of Iran, we will react, and this reaction will definitely be proportionate, tough and decisive.”
Iran said its missile strikes had been in response to terrorist attacks within its borders. Government supporters had been incensed over the recent attacks inside Iran, which seemed to expose the authoritarian clerical regime’s weaknesses and security failings.
Some conservative Iranians celebrated the missile strikes as appropriate vengeance, a defiant show of force against regional foes.
In Syria, Iran targeted the Islamic State, which claimed responsibility for a bombing in Kerman, Iran, that killed nearly 100 people this month. In Pakistan, Iran said it had struck a remote mountainous area in Balochistan believed to be the base of Jaish al-Adl, a Sunni militant group that claimed responsibility for a December attack that killed 11 security officers in Rask, a town near Iran’s border with Pakistan.