TEHRAN - The deputy Army commander for coordination affairs said on Wednesday that deterrence power can be actually utilized as a diplomatic tool to counter threats and make regretful any enemy who even may think about aggression against the country.    

“Deterrence is a diplomatic principle which is utilized to convince the enemy to refrain from waging war and instead resort to peace,” Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari said. 

“When we targeted two U.S. bases by our missiles and they did not do anything, it proves that if the U.S. attacks us we will attack them again. This issue is blatant evidence of Iran’s military deterrence power. The deterrence should foil the enemy’s strategy or lessen its effects,” the commander stated. 

“Some say that Iran’s military approach is defensive but it is not sufficient. The approach should be deterrent too,” underscored Sayyari who was Navy chief from 2007 to 2017. 

On Tuesday, the defense minister announced that enhancing deterrence power was a religious necessity for the Iranian Armed Forces. 

Brigadier General Amir Hatami made the remarks in a ceremony introducing Second Brigadier General Afshin Khajefard as the new director of the Defense Ministry’s Aviation Industries Organization. 

Touching upon the statements of the Leader in the Friday Prayers sermons, Hatami said Ayatollah Khamenei, as the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, underscored the strategy of “being strong and trying to be stronger” as a key to overcome problems. 

“Iran has proved that, based on its own might and power, it will respond to any threat at any level,” the minister said, adding that his forces consider the Leader’s strategy as a religious obligation.  

Last October, Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Hossein Baqeri said that Iran had developed such a high level of deterrence that all threats and plots against it would be vigorously responded.

Addressing a national gathering of commanders and staff officials of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), Major General Baqeri said the Islamic Republic utilizes sustainable and strong deterrence power to ward off plots by enemies who think about any form of aggression against the country.

MJ/PA