History is a profound teacher. Iran should pay attention. Israel’s first-ever interior attack on Iranian military targets, retaliating for Iran’s missile barrages and attempt on the Israeli Prime Minister’s life, is only the beginning. Iran misses how World War II started. They have awakened a sleeping giant.

Quick facts: On October 7, 2023, Hamas – a terror group supported by Iran – viciously attacked Israeli innocents. Israel responded by going into Gaza to uproot Hamas. Iran ramped up missile strikes throughout 2024, from Iranian-supported Hezbollah in Lebanon and Iran proper.

Most were knocked down by Israel’s air defenses and the US Navy. Iran then poured more missiles into Israel. Israel responded by killing top Hamas and Hezbollah leaders.

Iran then elevated the fight, putting missiles deep into Israel, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and Haifa, sending drones after the Israeli Prime Minister. Israel, never before deploying air assets to interior Iran, finally said, “Enough.” They sent 140 bombers into Iran, a “limited” strike on strictly military targets.

Now, this is where Iran should stop, and start restudying World War II. The Allied forces, resolved to stop Nazi German aggression, began in March 1940 with “limited” attacks on Nazi military targets.

The Allied goal, like Israel’s goal today, was not to destroy the adversary’s economy, and kill civilians or their leadership, but to stop German military attacks on innocent countries. Germany did not stop.

Because the Nazis continued to escalate, the Allies had no choice. The Germans, arrogant, undeterred, and filled with hate, hit Allied cities, killing innocents. So, the Allies expanded their target list, moving from military to economic targets. British bombers hit oil and industrial plants.

Still, the Germans did not stop, determined they could inflict greater damage. This widened and tightened Allied ranks, unifying global condemnation of Germany. Allies now hit German cities.

As the war progressed, American scientists raced for the “ultimate weapon,” something to end things swiftly. Securing victory in Europe, the Allies focused on Japan – which had attacked the US in December 1941, triggering our entry into the war, now refused unconditional surrender in 1945.

Both Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan had, themselves, misunderstood history. They believed they could combine and split the world, win a war of attrition, even on their own soil. They thought they could intimidate the West with “lightning warfare” (Blitzkrieg), suicide bombers (“kamikaze”), and a go-for-broke strategy that terrorized, demoralized, and outgunned the free West. They were wrong.

Reportedly, after Japan discovered US carriers were not at Pearl Harbor, or after the Doolittle Raiders daringly bombed Tokyo, Japanese Admiral Yamamoto said, “IN fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant, and fill him with a terrible resolve.”

Had Germany and Japan pulled back early in the war, before the US was fully engaged, their regimes – horrific as they were – might have survived through a negotiated peace. By escalating in the face of Allied resolve to stop their aggression, they sealed their own fates.

Iran is following the Nazi blueprint, initiating aggression, direct and indirect means to pursue an unjust war, believing escalation will – in time – produce capitulation, or allow military victory.

Now, as then, these assumptions are wrong. Israel, supported by the US, much like the WWII Allies,  will not capitulate to evil, not permit itself to be overwhelmed by Iranian conventional forces, or – now just like in 1945 – allow evil to acquire and use a nuclear weapon.

Iran misunderstands the stakes, resolve, power of moral compass, unity of the West when things become existential, and the self-defeating nature of escalation.

Just as in the 1940s, the target list will expand from conventional military targets to oil and economic infrastructure, from military to civilian targets, in time knocking out Iran’s uranium enrichment and nuclear potential, eventually hitting Iran’s leadership, likely to greater effect.

The point is simple:  For Israel, this fight is defensive, existential, and cannot be lost, it must be won. On what terms, for how long, what loss to Iran, with what consequences – are unanswered questions. The irony is, that Iran started this and can end it, or Israel will. Iran has awakened a sleeping (nuclear) giant.

Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC. Robert Charles has also just released an uplifting new book, “Cherish America: Stories of Courage, Character, and Kindness” (Tower Publishing, 2024).