It is hazardous to make any prediction about a war that is ongoing. Yet, certain elements about the Iran war, including its immediate background, can be discerned despite the accompanying deliberate and inadvertent misinformation. This is not unusual in military conflicts for information is an instrument of war.
On March 23, Oman’s foreign minister, Badr Albusaidi, wrote, “Whatever your view of Iran, this war is not of their making.” Albusaidi’s comment is authoritative. He was the intermediary in the last round of indirect talks between Iran and the United States of America, which concluded on February 26 in Geneva. This round generated optimism that the two countries may successfully address their outstanding disputes, including the nuclear issue. The talks were to continue. However, on February 28, the US and Israel began the war with a decapitation strike that killed Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, some members of his family, and several important leaders.
President Donald Trump defended the strike by asserting the need to retain the element of surprise. On March 19, he insensitively said, in the presence of the Japanese prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, at the Oval Office, “Who knows better about surprise than Japan? Why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbor?” What Trump overlooked was the reaction of the then president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, when he learnt that Japan had attacked Pearl Harbour.
When an aide initially doubted the report of the attack Roosevelt remarked, “At the very time they were discussing peace in the Pacific, they were plotting to overthrow it.” The US and Israeli attack on Iran is, in this sense, similar to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour. A day after the Pearl Harbour attack, Roosevelt told both Houses of the US Congress: “Yesterday, December 7th, 1941 — a date which will live in infamy — the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.” There is little doubt that for Iran, February 28 will live in infamy because the surprise decapitation strike occurred while the negotiating process was on.
Perhaps US strategists were misled by Israel that the decapitation strike would demolish Iran’s resolve and lead it to sue for peace. It was a blunder. The hope that the Vilayat-e-Faqih system, which constitutes Iran’s political structure, would implode with the killing of Ali Khamenei was patently wrong. So was the thought that groups opposed to this system would rise and push it aside. Neither happened. Despite all its resources, the Trump administration revealed a complete lack of understanding of Iran’s Shia Islam’s basic impulses. The decapitation strike not only killed the supreme leader but also his family members, including his fourteen-month-old granddaughter. This was similar to Karbala which is seared in Shia memory. If only someone had drawn Trump’s attention to Maulana Mohamad Ali Jauhar’s well-known couplet, “Qatl-e-Hussain asl mai marg-e-Yazid hai, Islam zinda hota hai har Karbala ke baad” (“The murder of Hussain was actually the death [end] of Yazid, Islam rises after every Karbala”). This does not mean that the Iranians are not practical in matters of war and peace but it does connote that the decapitation strike was a mistake for it only strengthened the Shia resolve for martyrdom. The killing of other leaders also has only reduced the number of interlocutors the US could have engaged with, not Iran’s ability to wage war.
Faced with an existential crisis, the upholders of the Vilayat-e-Faqih naturally pushed back by choking the Strait of Hormuz and taking the war across the Gulf. Why do US and Israeli strategists appear to have failed to realise that this was the only course open to Iran even if it meant earning regional and international opprobrium? And, if they did anticipate it, why did they not neutralise it? Perhaps that would have needed boots on the ground. And that was one step that Trump was not willing to take. Now, he is augmenting US ground troops in the region. But will he be willing to bomb Iran’s energy facilities after the pause which ends on April 6 and also take over Kharg island? The latter would require ground troops. This eventuality may arise if the two sides cannot find a way out during the pause. Iran has threatened that it will unleash its military capabilities on hydrocarbon-producing facilities of the Gulf Arab states. Doubtless it will go further than that if it is cornered more.
The nightmarish scenario, particularly for South Asian countries, is Gulf countries becoming deficient in water and energy. There are around 22 million South Asians living in the Arab peninsular countries, including between 9 and 10 million Indians. Had relations between the South Asian countries been normal, they could have come together to appeal to the belligerent nation-states not to allow the situation to exacerbate further. But that is not to be.
Pakistan has gone on its own. The ‘dalal’ has joined hands with Egypt, Turkey and Saudi Arabia to become the principal conduit to pass messages back and forth between the US and Iran. The foreign ministers of the four countries have met in Islamabad, and it is possible that the belligerents may meet there too. This is a diplomatic positive for Pakistan. It will raise its standing in the Islamic world. That is what it has always hankered for.
Iran’s ‘allies’ are the world’s oil and stock markets. They are in complete turmoil and are putting great pressure on Trump. This is especially so when ‘affordability’ has become a social, economic and political issue. Will Trump now claim a pyrrhic victory and call off the war? Or will he go in the opposite direction and put boots on the ground? That may create a chaotic situation in Iran which the region cannot even contemplate.
Without inserting itself in the diplomatic process, India should strongly demand that a land war is avoided. It should also demand that energy facilities are not targeted by the belligerents. It should also ask that the scope of the pause is enlarged to avoid damage to
civilians in addition to energy facilities. Trump must stop the Iran war
immediately for the sake of the region and the world.
Vivek Katju is a retired Indian Foreign Service officer