The Axis Across the Atlantic: Iran’s Influence in the Western Hemisphere

Introduction

Appearing on CBS News hours after the extradition of Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro, Secretary of State Marco Rubio explained that one of the goals of Operation Absolute Resolve is to make sure that “[in] the 21st century, under the Trump administration, we are not going to have a country like Venezuela in our own hemisphere, in the sphere of control and the crossroads for Hezbollah, for Iran and for every other malign influence in the world. That's just not gonna exist” (Weinthal, 2026).

Since the Iranian Revolution in 1979, Iran has cultivated a network of political, economic, and security partnerships across Latin America. In light of significant losses to both its regime and proxies due to Israel’s successful two-year military campaign following the October 7, 2023, attack, the Iranian regime has looked beyond the Middle East to keep its influence alive. Foremost among these targets has been the backyard of the country they consider “the Great Satan,” the United States.

Central to Iran’s Western Hemisphere strategy is Hezbollah, its oldest and most established proxy, which has developed a presence across Latin America through a combination of illicit financing, political influence, and paramilitary activity. Hezbollah’s operations allow Tehran’s influence to bypass traditional diplomatic limitations and apply new methods of pressure. By using such a proxy, Iran can project power while maintaining plausible deniability.

Iran has also used official means of influence, such as establishing partnerships with Leftist and anti-American regimes such as Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba, viewing these partnerships to counterbalance U.S. hegemony in the Western Hemisphere. Coupled with the expansion of Hezbollah’s clandestine networks, Iran’s alignment with ideological counterparts creates a multifaceted threat to U.S. national security. These threats include transnational organized crime, eroded regional democratic institutions within Latin American countries, and an intelligence and operational foothold near the United States, all of which provide Iran with the proximity to conduct hostile activity against Americans and U.S. interests. Despite these implications, U.S. policy responses to Iran’s threats in the Western Hemisphere have remained inconsistent.

This paper argues that Iran’s sustained engagement in the Western Hemisphere represents a strategic threat to the United States, which, up until Operation Absolute Resolve, had been inadequately addressed. It will examine the mechanisms that Iran uses to expand its influence and assess the risks posed to U.S. national security and regional stability, in line with the National Security Strategy to counter and mitigate this evolving threat.

Iran’s Goals

Iran’s goals in the Western Hemisphere are to alleviate its economic and diplomatic isolation, its proximity to the United States, and its desire to establish partnerships to develop weapons and warfare capabilities. Given its founding doctrines rooted in Marxist ideology, Iran rightly perceives natural ideological familiarity with the region’s Leftist regimes, making it particularly fertile ground for exploiting popular resentment towards the United States and the West. This ideological connectivity, in part, enables the region to serve as a harbor for its proxies, such as Hezbollah.

Iran’s involvement in the region can be traced back to the early 1980s, after an insurgency in Nicaragua led by Daniel Ortega coincided with the Shah's flight from Iran. The two countries shared a common opposition to the U.S., stemming from Washington’s support for the regimes they had just overthrown, which spurred cooperation between them (Ziemer et al., 2024). Early efforts by Iran to gain influence in the region were thus driven by shared interests to oppose the U.S. in the region. In the mid-2000s, a wave of socialist governments skeptical of the U.S. came to power in Latin America, creating an opportunity for Iran to have a more significant impact (Ziemer et al., 2024). One prominent example of such a socialist government is Hugo Chavez’s presidency in Venezuela from 1999 to 2013, which effectively laid the groundwork for the current regime in Venezuela. From 2005 to 2009, Iran opened embassies in six countries in the region: Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Uruguay.

Iran and Venezuela have had a longstanding relationship centered around their roles as founding members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and their roles in the broader energy market. However, since 2020, that partnership has expanded to include military and economic engagements. Most recently, in June of 2022, during Maduro’s visit to Iran, the two signed a 20-year cooperation pact cementing their ties in the oil, petrochemical, and military industries (Vahdat, 2022).

Iran’s Mechanisms of Action

Direct Political and Economic Ties

Although most of Iran’s involvement in Latin America has occurred through indirect engagement—particularly through its proxy Hezbollah and other affiliated criminal networks—Iran has also formed strong official bilateral relationships with numerous countries, most notably Venezuela. For Iran, direct engagements in the region serve two purposes: first, to diversify and expand the country’s oil export footprint, and second, to replicate the state/non-state alliances it formed in the Middle East that enabled its rise to power.

Economically, the partnership between Iran and Venezuela has centered on a shared desire to circumvent U.S. sanctions but has recently evolved to include larger parts of the energy sector, exchange of advanced military equipment, and scientists. With the aforementioned 20-year plan informing the economic relationship between the two countries, the past five years have seen sharp increases in Iranian investments towards Venezuela’s oil industry and the bilateral relationship between the two countries.

Venezuela, for example, has served as a new export partner for Iranian oil.(Oppenheimer, 2025). In 2023, Iran pledged to ramp up its involvement in Venezuela’s oil sector with the goal of boosting its oil exports to 860,000 barrels a day by 2026 (Shokri, 2023). As a part of this plan, Iran has not only committed to increasing oil exports but has also pledged to repair multiple Venezuelan refineries.

Another aspect of this deal includes the renovation of the Paraguayan Refining Center—Venezuela’s largest refining complex—beginning in 2023, but since paused due to funding and technical complications. Nonetheless, the framework for a robust partnership between the two nations now exists. From October 2021 to June 2023, Iran supplied Venezuela with over 2.8 million pieces of spare refinery parts, providing a suitable alternative for parts that were previously acquired from the United States (Ottolenghi, 2023).

Regarding trade, January 2023 saw the official launch of a direct shipping route between Tehran and Caracas. Operated by the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Line (IRISL), ships depart every three months between each country’s ports, allowing for businesses in both countries to conduct business without worry of U.S. sanctions (Al Mayadeen, 2023). Subsequent meetings have resulted in additional memoranda of understanding (MOUs), with a November 2024 meeting yielding an MOU on visa exemptions and another on the information exchanges related to technology and artificial intelligence (Knipp, 2025). Furthermore, in June 2025, the two countries finalized another trade agreement that will see the elimination of tariffs on raw materials, agricultural goods, and other undisclosed industrial products (Ruiz, 2025).

Iran has also supported Venezuela militarily. In 2023, several Iranian officials were sanctioned by the United States in association with the sale of Mohajer-2 and Mohajer-6 UAVs to Venezuela. These Iranian officials coordinated arms sales agreements with Venezuela worth hundreds of millions of dollars (U.S. Treasury, 2023).

In addition to Venezuela, Iran also maintains strong economic ties with fellow BRICS member Brazil. In 2024, exports from Iran to Brazil jumped 31%, with final trade totals being reported at approximately $3 billion. When combined with the imports Iran received from Brazil, total trade between the two countries approaches $8 billion (PressTV, 2025). Further, according to April 2025 reports from the Iranian government, Iranian officials expressed a desire to boost this number to $10 billion through increasing Iranian exports and establishing Iranian banks in Brazil (PressTV, 2025).

While not as active in other Latin American markets, Iran has sought to expand its relationship with Bolivia, Cuba, and Nicaragua, as these countries are also isolated from American markets. A 2023 accord proposed shipments of Iranian-made drones and river boats to Bolivia, which has purchased military aircraft parts from Iran since 2010. Cuba also recently signed undisclosed agreements with Iran related to port usage and cybersecurity while also maintaining credit lines that have existed between the two countries over the past decade (Delgado, 2024).

Indirect Tools for Exerting Influence

Iran utilizes indirect channels, such its proxy organization Hezbollah, to influence the Western Hemisphere. Unlike formal state-to-state engagement, these mechanisms rely on covert networks, illicit financing, ideological penetration, and criminal partnerships that allow Tehran to project power while maintaining plausible deniability. Hezbollah’s presence in Latin America exemplifies a model of hybrid influence that combines terrorist capability, organized crime, and soft power to advance Iran’s strategic objectives in the region.

Iran’s Use of Soft Power and Ideological Infiltration

“Soft power” is a critical tool used by Iran to legitimize and normalize its presence in the region. This includes the dissemination of ideological material, religious education, and cultural engagement. Iran’s use of these tools coincides with anti-West messages already being propagated in these countries. This increases the effectiveness of Iran’s influence in the region.

Iran has shown a growing interest in spreading its ideology to gain influence around the world. Recent efforts have been aimed toward Latin America through projects such as Hispan-TV, an Iranian Spanish-language news channel that was launched in 2011 (Giambertoni, 2025). The channel is designed to provide messaging that counters Western narratives and promotes Iranian positions on global and regional issues. It has also benefited from partnerships with other authoritarian outlets, such as Venezuela’s teleSur and Russia’s RT, which often cite each other and echo the same messaging (Ziemer et al., 2024). Furthermore, in 2023, Iran translated and distributed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s memoir, Cell No.14, into Spanish to target Latin American audiences (Giambertoni, 2025). These moves aim to reach those in the region who may already have anti-American sentiments, as well as new audiences.

The use of educational institutions is another mechanism through which Iran tries to disseminate its views and gain influence with younger audiences. Al-Mustafa International University operates across Cuba, Venezuela, Peru, and Argentina, offering scholarships and religious training that reinforce ideological alignment (Giambertoni, 2025). These institutions serve not only as academic centers but also as networks for cultivating influence, loyalty, and potential recruitment pathways.

Hezbollah

Hezbollah has maintained a presence in Latin America since the early 1990s, particularly in areas with established Lebanese diaspora communities. Acting on behalf of Iran, Hezbollah maintains operational autonomy from Tehran but strategically is bound to the command of Iran’s Supreme Leader.

Hezbollah functions as a decentralized network embedded within local criminal organizations, business sectors, social, and political institutions. This network allows Iran to exert persistent influence without overt military engagement.

Hezbollah maintains an operational role in the region capable of striking U.S. assets, citizens, and interests, along with Jewish communities and Israeli state facilities. This manifests as acts of terrorism, with devastating examples occurring first in the 1990s. In 1992, a suicide bombing of the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires killed 20 people. This was followed by a bombing in 1994 ordered by Iran against the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA) Jewish community center, which killed 85 and injured over 200. That same year, there was a bombing of a commercial airline in Panama, which killed all passengers. These attacks were widely attributed to Hezbollah with Iranian sponsorship, demonstrating the geographic reach and operational ambition of the network (Giambertoni, 2025).

Despite no recent major attacks, the organization's presence remained, with regional authorities uncovering numerous plots and surveillance activities. In 2014, Mohammed Ghaleb Hamdar was arrested in Peru after conducting surveillance of potential targets. In 2016, Bolivian authorities seized several tons of explosives from a Hezbollah-affiliated warehouse. In Panama, Hezbollah operative Samer El Debek conducted surveillance of the U.S. and Israeli embassies and studied security procedures at the Panama Canal (Giambertoni, 2025). These examples demonstrate Hezbollah’s maintained operational capacity in Latin America and nefarious ambitions in the region.

Hezbollah also has financial objectives in the region. In contrast to most of its operations in the Middle East (where Iran is reported to provide roughly 70-80% of Hezbollah’s total funding), Hezbollah has established revenue pathways in Latin America through illicit activities (Giambertoni, 2025). This represents a broader trend of Iran and its proxies moving to diversify their revenue streams in the face of U.S. sanctions and international scrutiny.

Hezbollah’s Criminal Network

Iran, primarily through Hezbollah, has developed ties within the region’s criminal underworld, particularly in cocaine trafficking and contraband smuggling. Estimates indicate that Hezbollah’s involvement in illicit activities accounts for 30% of its roughly $1 billion annual budget (Ottolenghi, 2024).

Narcotics, for example, provide a revenue stream for Hezbollah, which takes a percentage of profits made from the drug trade. In 2008, Chekri Harb was arrested in Colombia for operating a black-market cocaine network linked to Hezbollah, and it was reported that this operation was paying a 12% tax to Hezbollah. A similar system was uncovered in 2006 during Operation Camel, reinforcing the pattern of Hezbollah’s involvement with narcotics operations (Giambertoni, 2025). These operations are also connected to Hezbollah’s activities in West Africa, where narcotics coming from the Western Hemisphere are transited through West Africa en route to Europe and the Middle East.

Hezbollah also uses sophisticated financial crime schemes. According to the Treasury Department, a man directing Hezbollah activities in America, Ayman Joumaa coordinated multi-ton shipments of cocaine and laundered up to $200 million a month for Mexican and Colombian cartels through multiple channels, such as bulk cash smuggling operations and Lebanese exchange houses, taking 8-14% commission for his services (U.S. Treasury, 2012; Ottolenghi, 2024). Another known Hezbollah affiliate, Assad Shmad Barakat, is known to be the de facto leader of Hezbollah’s financial operations in the Tri-Border Area and is a part of a prominent family in Hezbollah’s clerical hierarchy. The Treasury Department accuses Barakat of using every financial crime in the book, from counterfeiting to extortion, to raise large amounts of money and send it to Lebanon and Iran from his operations across Chile, Argentina, Paraguay, Brazil, and Angola (U.S. Treasury, 2004; Ottolenghi, 2024).

As part of the scheme, Hezbollah provides logistical facilitation, protection, and laundering services in exchange for a cut of the revenue. These relationships deepen Hezbollah’s integration into transnational criminal networks while simultaneously strengthening Iran’s influence abroad. Such criminal networks allow Iran to directly penetrate the United States, trafficking dangerous narcotics into U.S. territory, which kill American citizens, and enable Hezbollah terrorists to enter the United States. Mexico, in particular, has acted as a passive host for Hezbollah’s networks to penetrate the United States: in 2024, Hezbollah affiliates were caught entering the U.S. through Mexico, one being Basel Bassell Ebbadi, who confessed to being a member and coming to the U.S. to “make a bomb” (Taer, 2024). Similarly, in 2010, a Hezbollah smuggling ring was dismantled in Mexico, demonstrating sustained efforts to infiltrate into the U.S over the last two decades (Giambertoni, 2025).

The organization also plays a role in supplying paramilitary and criminal organizations with weapons. In Brazil, the prison gang First Capital Command (PCC) reportedly obtained weapons through Hezbollah supply channels in Latin America (Giambertoni, 2025.

Hezbollah has also been linked to large-scale identity theft and document fraud operations. Congressional testimonies indicate that Hezbollah operatives and facilitators have created false passports, IDs, and travel documents to aid their movements and financial transactions (Giambertoni, 2025). Such capabilities reinforce the transnational nature of the threat, facilitating enhanced global mobility of Hezbollah operatives and the capacity to avoid detection.

U.S. Interests at Stake

Iran’s rising presence in the Western Hemisphere challenges U.S. national security goals, not just regionally but internationally.

Sanctions have become a primary tool of the United States in the fight against Iran, its proxies, and its allies. So far, sanctions against Iran block Iranian government assets in the United States, ban most trade between the United States and Iran, and prohibit foreign assistance and arms sales. Sanctions have specifically targeted Iran’s energy, shipping, construction, mining, textiles, automotive, and manufacturing sectors, its central bank, and groups that are affiliated with the Iranian government, such as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Through this, Iran has been virtually boxed out of all the areas of the international market in which the United States plays a controlling role, forcing Tehran to look to alternative outlets to conduct business (Thomas, 2025).

However, these sanctions are only applicable to trade conducted with entities that have a stake in the U.S. market; thus, as Iran increases its footprint in Latin America, it also increases its ability to evade these sanctions. By partnering with countries such as Venezuela and Cuba (which are also sanctioned by the United States), Iran simply evades U.S. trading penalties. Furthermore, these partnerships help Hezbollah and other Iranian-affiliated criminal groups evade U.S. sanctions. Under diplomatic cover, operatives from these groups conduct business, often mixing legal trade deals with illicit activities to launder money and send “clean” money back to Iran.

Following the successes of Israel’s post-October 7 campaign in eliminating significant members of Hezbollah’s leadership—Hassan Nasrallah (commander), Ibrahim Aquil (Radwan Unit Commander), Fuad Shukr (top military commander), to name a few—Hezbollah has been markedly reduced from its former stature. Even with the organization itself and its primary funding arm reeling, Hezbollah has continued its global operations. But this is not the first time Hezbollah has been stymied in its funding. Following Hezbollah’s war with Israel in 2006, the drop in oil prices during the green revolution in 2009, and the group’s involvement in the Syrian Civil War in 2011, Hezbollah leaned on its global offshoots in Africa and South America to make up for lost revenue (Jacobson & Levitt, 2025). This trend has continued, with the U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network raising concerns about increases in the group’s involvement in illicit networks across West Africa in October 2024 (Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, 2024). Subsequently, in May 2025, the State Department issued a “Rewards for Justice” notice for any information related to Hezbollah’s activity in Latin America’s Tri-Border area between Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay (U.S. State Department, 2025).

Following the success of Operation Absolute Resolve, in which the United States removed Nicolas Maduro from Venezuela to face criminal charges, a clear message was sent to other regional leaders: The Trump Administration is committed to achieving its goals, and it is in these leaders' best interest to cooperate with the United States. The Administration’s National Security Strategy outlines that in the Western Hemisphere, the U.S. will reassert its preeminence in the region and “will deny non-Hemispheric competitors the ability to position forces or other threatening capabilities, or to own or control strategically vital assets, in our Hemisphere” (Trump, 2025, p. 15). Removing Iran and its proxies falls under this priority of the National Security Strategy. The United States should maintain this comprehensive pressure campaign to eliminate Iran’s influence in the region and prevent non-Hemispheric competitors from accessing our backyard.

Although weakened, the Iranian regime still poses a threat to the Middle East, and its proxies continue to infiltrate our hemisphere. Alongside the Trump Administration’s efforts to stabilize the Middle East through bilateral partnerships with Arab countries (namely Saudi Arabia and the UAE) and the proposed renewal of the Abraham Accords, dismantling Iranian proxies such as Hezbollah in Latin America is necessary to ensure the security of America First interests in our region. While recent efforts by the United States and Israel have disrupted its operations, Hezbollah has proven effective at expanding its reach and influence worldwide. It's growing financial and leadership structures in the Western Hemisphere not only provide Iran a pathway to re-arm but also place hostile actors in our own sphere of influence. The United States, under President Trump, must eliminate this threat to ensure that America First policies and partnerships will shape the region in the decades to come.

Conclusion

For decades, Iran has cultivated a network of political, economic, and military might in America’s backyard. Through its ties to regimes in countries such as Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua, Iran has been able to circumvent sanctions and other tactics used by the United States to thwart Iran’s nuclear program and dissuade it from provoking further conflict in the Middle East. The presence of its main proxy, Hezbollah, in Latin America presents national security threats to the United States, including drugs, terrorism, and other threats to American life and property. Operation Absolute Resolve represents a new dawn in the Western Hemisphere. No longer will the United States allow malign actors to operate freely within its hemisphere; rather, American preeminence will be restored, blocking illicit actors from threatening the homeland.