Rep. Mike Gallagher calls on Biden to target Iran after deadly drone attack on U.S. troops

WASHINGTON – Wisconsin’s leading national security hawk said this week the Biden administration should strike Iran directly following a drone attack that killed three U.S. soldiers and injured dozens more in Jordan over the weekend.

U.S. Rep. Mike Gallagher, a Republican from Green Bay, urged “immediate action” against Iran and its proxies after the attack launched by Iran-backed militants on Sunday struck an American base in northeastern Jordan, near the country’s border with Syria and Iraq.

Three American soldiers were killed and at least 40 others were wounded. The deaths marked the first U.S. troop fatalities since the Israel-Hamas war began in early October and after months of strikes across the region from militant groups.

“You have to hit Iran,” Gallagher, who sits on the Armed Services Committee and the Select Committee on Intelligence, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Tuesday. “If you don’t hit Iran you're not going to have an impact on deterrence.”

He said the U.S. should target Iranian troops, including those of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a unit that focuses on foreign operations. Launching attacks inside Iran, he said, “should be an option.”

Gallagher’s comments put him among a number of lawmakers on Capitol Hill who have urged the Biden administration to target Iran following the fatal attack that the U.S. has attributed to Iran’s proxies. But that idea has faced bipartisan pushback from those who say such action could risk escalation and draw the U.S. into a broader conflict in the Middle East.

The competing voices have raised questions about President Joe Biden’s potential response. The president has vowed to “hold all those responsible to account at a time and in a manner our choosing.” The administration has maintained Biden has the authority to act unilaterally to protect U.S. troops, citing Article II of the Constitution.

On Tuesday, Biden told reporters he holds Iran responsible for the attacks “in the sense that they’re supplying the weapons to the people who did it” and claimed he has decided how he will respond. But he did not provide details on what that response would look like.

“I don’t think we need a wider war in the Middle East,” Biden said. “That’s not what I’m looking for.”

Like Gallagher, lawmakers including South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham and Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn have urged the administration to put a target on Tehran. But others have been less aggressive.

Wisconsin Republican Rep. Derrick Van Orden, a Navy SEAL veteran, told the Journal Sentinel that he has concerns Biden is going to “do something so incredibly over the top” that will get the U.S. involved in a bigger war.

And Rep. Mark Pocan, a Democrat from Madison, has said the Biden administration should work with Congress on any potential response.

“I just think there’s always the logic of coming to Congress,” Pocan told the Journal Sentinel. “It’s not like this is an ongoing attack. What happened is something that he has time to come to Congress, and that would be the proper route to go.”

Pocan cited reports claiming the drone that killed the soldiers in Jordan was not intercepted because it was mistaken for a U.S. drone returning to the base around the same time, noting officials were “still learning” details of the incident.

“That’s why due diligence needs to happen,” Pocan said. “That’s why we give a little bit of latitude and time for the president to approach Congress on these matters."

Gallagher, for his part, has long preached the importance of deterrence in preventing global conflict. In recent weeks, he has been critical of the Biden administration's response to scores of attacks from the Iran-backed Houthi militants in Yemen on ships in the Red Sea, which have disrupted trade.

Gallagher on Tuesday noted the U.S. response has targeted, in some cases, supply depots and suggested the administration could put its focus on Iranian troops, ships and ports. “It’s the only way to impose, establish some semblance of deterrence,” he said.

A spokesman for Gallagher said the congressman does not think Biden should seek congressional approval before initiating his response. He cited the War Powers Resolution of 1973, which gave the president the authority to act in defense of U.S. interests or personnel under the requirement he notifies Congress within 48 hours, absent a declaration of war.

The Green Bay Republican, who chairs a congressional committee focused on countering the Chinese Communist Party, maintained Tuesday that deterrence in the Indo-Pacific “should be the top priority of the entire national security and defense establishment.”

He called China “the senior partner in what is increasingly looking like an axis of authoritarian powers” and labeled Iran the "primary source of chaos in the Middle East.”

“We have to have a global strategy because we’re a global superpower,” he said of deterring foreign threats to American interests. “But that’s the name of the game.”

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Mike Gallagher calls for strike on Iran after deadly drone attack