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By Tom O'Connor
Deputy Editor, National Security and Foreign Policy
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In an interview for a 2012 documentary, Russian President Vladimir Putin broke his characteristic composure when a German journalist referenced the threat of Iranian missiles as NATO's pretext for deploying missile defense systems in Europe.
"You really made me laugh," a chuckling Russian leader responded in a clip resurfacing across social media. "God bless you, because it's already time to finish the day. Indeed, it is already time to go to sleep. At least I get to go home in good humor."
His reaction was understandable at the time. The Western bloc's decision to ramp up defensive capabilities in Eastern Europe and Turkey was widely read as a thinly veiled effort to blunt Moscow's missile might.
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But today, with Iran at war with the United States, demonstrating lethal strike capabilities across the Middle East and openly threatening to expand the conflict to Washington's European allies, the joke is on those who doubted Tehran's capacity to inflict effective long-range destruction.
"If the US launches another war against Iran, every military base involved in the aggression—from West Asia to Europe—will be a legitimate target for Iran’s lethal strikes," Iranian Supreme National Security Council Secretary Mohsen Rezaei wrote Thursday on X. "NO SAFE DISTANCE. NO SAFE HAVEN. NO IMMUNITY."
And Putin may still be looking for the last laugh as he ramps up defense cooperation with Iran in the midst of his own conflict raging right on NATO's borders.
Bradley Bowman, senior director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies' Center on Military and Political Power, said "Iran has several motives for wanting to extend its ballistic missile range to ensure that it covers all of Europe" at a time when U.S. bases on the continent have supported the war launched against the Islamic Republic in late February.
"One is to intimidate and threaten, blackmail and coerce Europeans, but also potentially to hit U.S. military bases in Europe," Bowman, who served as a national security advisor to members of the Senate Armed Services and Foreign Relations committees, told Newsweek.
"So, they absolutely have the ability to hit parts of Eastern Europe, and that range fan is expanding over time," he added. "And it will expand quicker the more that Iran gets help, particularly from Russia."
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'The Most Dangerous Moment ... Since 1945'
Bowman, author of Axis of Aggressors: Countering the Cooperation of China, Russia, Iran & North Korea, has devoted extensive research to the growing partnerships emerging among four nations often regarded as among Washington's principal national security concerns.
"I believe the United States confronts the most dangerous moment we have seen as a country since 1945," Bowman said. "Yes, we have periods of acute danger like the Berlin Airlift and Cuban Missile Crisis, but nothing like what we're seeing currently. And one of the major reasons for that, this era of heightened danger, is this unprecedented cooperation we're seeing among these four countries."
The Moscow-Tehran partnership has emerged as a particularly potent manifestation of this threat.
Having already collaborated during their earlier interventions in Syria, the two nations marked a new milestone in their defense ties when a licensed version of Iran's Shahed suicide drone was introduced to Russia's arsenal in its war against Ukraine, Europe's deadliest conflict since World War II.
More recently, since the eruption of the Persian Gulf crisis, reports have indicated that the Kremlin was repaying the favor through improvements in Iran's drone prowess, space-launch vehicle program and visibility on targets.
"Russia has provided very significant assistance to the Islamic Republic of Iran in terms of putting satellites in space, which has improved Iran's intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and targeting," Bowman said.
Jim Lamson, senior research associate at Middlebury College's Center for Nonproliferation Studies and former CIA analyst specializing in Iranian military developments, outlined the threefold benefits for Tehran from this arrangement with Moscow.
"Iran has already benefitted from Russian assistance that has helped Iran improve its long-range missile and drone strike capabilities, across three areas: One, intelligence and targeting data, including satellite imagery; Two, technologies, including drones, drone components, access to GLONASS satellite signals, anti-jamming systems, technical help to develop a ramjet engine; Three, tactics, including advice on drone tactics," Lamson told Newsweek.
"Combined, this Russian help has probably provided a cumulative impact to help Iran increase the effectiveness of its missile and drone strikes," he added. "As Russia-Iran military-defense cooperation deepens, Iran could receive more significant help from Russia to improve its long-range strike capabilities, rebuild its air defenses, and rebuild its defense industries."
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'Europe's Turn to Pay the Price'
The acceleration of Russia-Iran cooperation in defense would mark a shift from extended delays that have beset Tehran's efforts to acquire advanced weaponry from its great power partner.
One particularly valuable piece of equipment, the Su-35 air superiority fighter, was supposed to arrive years ago in hopes of reinvigorating Iran's aging air force. Yet Iranian Army spokesperson Brigadier General Mohammad Akraminia confirmed in a local media interview earlier this month that the jets would not be coming until after the war.
Alireza Taghavinia, a Tehran-based security analyst, described Russia and Iran as having "good relations and parallel interests on preventing the expansion of the NATO alliance and American excesses."
At the same time, Taghavinia told Newsweek that "Iran is not playing Russia's cards and acts independently in this regard." He noted differences of views as well, such as the fact that "Iran even still considers the Crimean peninsula occupied and belongs to Ukraine."
Technology and intelligence transfers between Russia and Iran are not the only factor linking two of the world's most disruptive conflicts. In July, a Ukrainian strike reportedly targeted both an Iranian and Russian ship in the Caspian Sea, prompting condemnation from Tehran toward Kyiv, which has also set out to aid U.S. partners in the Middle East in shoring up their drone defenses.
Iran's top challenge is not necessarily with Ukraine, however, but rather its European backers who, despite garnering criticism from President Donald Trump for their perceived lack of support in the Middle East conflict, may find themselves in the crosshairs.
"Now it is Europe's turn to pay the price for accompanying and provoking the U.S. and Israel against Iran," Taghavinia said. "And if the Europeans want to be immune from Iranian missiles, they better pressure Trump not to start a new war. Otherwise, they will have to pay for its security costs."
"Iran is aware of Europe's economic and military weakness and knows that Europe cannot afford to pay high costs for military affairs," he added. "So, the best time has come to attack European bases."
In fact, the Trump administration has already linked one incident targeting a critical U.S. military installation in Europe, RAF Fairford in the United Kingdom, to Iran.
Earlier this week, the Justice Department announced charges against three individuals suspected of attempting to sabotage the base, which houses U.S. bombers and other aircraft involved in the Iran war, along with 17 other plots across Europe.
The charges alleged that the group was operating in support of the Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya organization. The suspected Iran-linked group, which bears a logo matching a pattern established by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and allied Axis of Resistance factions across the Middle East, has claimed a number of attacks and attempted attacks across the continent, many of them targeting Jewish people and institutions, since the start of the conflict in the Persian Gulf.
Iran has denied any connection to the group and its activities in Europe, dismissing the allegations as propaganda.
But Brian Carter, a fellow with the American Enterprise Institute's Critical Threats Project, felt that Tehran's confidence in avoiding significant retaliation from Europe was fueling the surge in plots.
"Europe needs to reckon with these Iranian attacks for what they are: not terrorism, but military attacks on sovereign states," Carter told Newsweek. "Iran has likely chosen to conduct these direct action attacks in Europe because Tehran believes it will face only limited consequences from European states."
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'Europe Is Not Ready'
While Carter argued that "Europe is preparing for these kinds of campaigns," he said that "the reforms and changes have not yet had their full impact, so vulnerabilities still exist."
These shortcomings have also been witnessed in Europe's struggle to counter and respond to what regional leaders are referring to as a "hybrid" campaign being waged in parallel by Russia. Notable examples include the back-to-back incidents that took place in August at Germany's Leipzig airport, where an explosive-laden drone was identified near a Ukrainian cargo plane carrying munitions, followed by a second drone colliding with a DHL aircraft.
Michael Horowitz, director of the University of Pennsylvania's Perry World House, stated that the efforts by European countries to bolster defenses against these shadowy campaigns "will help protect against challenges from Iran" of these varieties.
But when it comes to open escalation, the situation would prove more daunting.
"Europe is not yet ready to defend at scale in a world of precise mass if Iran’s threats become kinetic," Horowitz told Newsweek. "As Ukraine and the Middle East show, defending against masses of kinetic strikes by low-cost systems is incredibly difficult."
The fallout could prove many times more disruptive than the temporary closures of airports and air traffic headaches associated with the surge of drone sightings across NATO countries over the past year. It would also put further strain on European interceptor stockpiles already in question over waning U.S. shipments due to Iran war demands.
And there are clear benefits to both U.S. rivals if their joint gambit succeeds.
"Both Iran and Russia seek to divide the United States from its allies and partners," Horowitz said. "To the extent that Russia believes Iran placing pressure on the United States may make support for Ukraine more difficult, Russia likely views support for Iran strategically."
"Moreover," he added, "if the U.S.-Iran conflict ends on favorable terms for Iran, it will likely bolster Russia, and especially China’s, influence in the Middle East."
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Samantha Beech and Gray R. Thomas
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