The battle for Iran’s soul has most probably been lost already. Even if all the objectives of the attack on Iran as enumerated by US President Donald Trump are achieved, the endgame in all probability will turn out to be vastly different from that imagined in Washington.
A major American objective as articulated by Trump was to decimate the leadership of the Islamic Republic to pave the way for regime change. This has been achieved partially. Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as well as several of his trusted military and civilian lieutenants have been killed by an Israeli air attack conducted on the basis of information provided by the CIA. There is little doubt that the air campaign launched by the US and Israel has the capacity to destroy what little is left of Iran’s nuclear production and enrichment capabilities over the next few weeks, thus meeting another American-Israeli goal. Iran’s missile and drone stocks are not unlimited and are likely to be exhausted and/or destroyed within the next couple of weeks at the present rate of use. Tehran’s non-state allies such as Hezbollah and Hamas are in such a state of disrepair following Israeli attacks over the last couple of years that they are unlikely to take part significantly in any military campaign in the near future. The Houthis in Yemen are too engaged fighting off their local enemies and too far away to make any difference to the war’s outcome. The pro-Iranian militias in Iraq are more a nuisance than a threat to American-Israeli hegemony in the Middle East. Therefore, it is highly likely that Trump and Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu will declare victory in a few weeks after announcing that they have achieved their goals.
The question arises where will this leave Iran, one of the largest and most populous countries in West Asia, strategically situated on the Persian Gulf and commanding the Strait of Hormuz, through which one-fifth of the world’s oil supplies pass.
There are only two possibilities. First, it could leave Iran in chaos with multiple factions fighting over its carcass, especially since there is no organised opposition group that has the effectiveness and legitimacy to take control of the levers of state power and impose its rule over the whole country or at least most of it. Regime change that would bring a pro-American group to power in Tehran does not appear to be a real possibility.
Second, and the more probable scenario, is that of an Iran rising like a phoenix from the ashes and vowing retribution for the humiliation and pain inflicted upon it. There are several good reasons why this will be the outcome.
One, Iran’s military and political structure as it currently exists cannot be effectively destroyed by an air campaign alone. It would need hundreds of thousands of American boots on the ground to achieve this goal. This option has never been on the table in Washington as American public opinion, tired of involvement in “forever” wars in West Asia, will not tolerate it.
Two, Iran is not Iraq. Therefore, the process of regime change as happened in Baghdad cannot be repeated in Tehran. The distinction between Iraq and Iran is fundamental and not limited to the difference in terms of size and population. Iraq was an artificial creation of the British victors of World War I, who threw together three vilayets (provinces) of the Ottoman Empire — Mosul with a Kurdish majority, Basra with a Shia Arab majority, and Baghdad with a mixed Shia-Sunni population — and created a state in order to provide a kingdom for their protégé Prince Faisal ibn Ali, who had been booted out of Syria by its French conquerors. The Iraqi state almost disintegrated with the fall of the Baath regime, which led to a great deal of chaos, mayhem, and sectarian conflict. The American invasion had disastrous consequences for Iraq but the blowback did not lead to the emergence of a hardline ultranationalist regime that could threaten American interests in a major fashion because of the internal fragmentation of the country.
Unlike Iraq, Iran has a long history of statehood going back to pre-Islamic times and has existed as a unified political entity more or less within its current geographical contours at least since the 16th century with the establishment of the Safavid Empire. It is true that Iran also has minority populations, especially the Azeris, the Kurds and the Baluch. However, the Azeris, who constitute between 20 and 25 per cent of the country’s population, are well integrated into the Persian core economically and politically and culturally Persianised. The Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, was an Azeri himself as were some other leading figures in the government and the opposition. The Safavids, who laid the foundations of the present-day state of Iran in the 16th century, were Azeris themselves. The Tehran bazaar, the principal economic institution in the capital, is dominated by Azeri businessmen. The Kurds and the Baluch have much smaller populations, live in peripheral areas in the west and east of the country and are in no position to destabilise the Iranian state the way Iraqi ethnic groups could do. Considering these facts, it is clear that the Persian centre will hold.
The questions that then arise are (a) who will control the Iranian centre at the end of the air war and (b) will the new rulers of Iran be willing to follow American-Israeli diktats. The successors of the present regime are likely to be hardline military figures, whether from the IRGC or the regular military or both. These military structures are likely to survive the present war in relatively decent shape absent American boots on the ground à la Iraq. Equally importantly, they will survive with the most acute sense of resentment against the humiliation heaped on Iran because they were expected to be the guardians of national dignity and state security. One can almost take it for granted that it would be a revanchist regime. Whether it would strive to produce nuclear weapons is of secondary concern.
It would not be very difficult for the successor regime to deflect criticism against it and its predecessor and direct it towards the Americans and the Israelis because of the sufferings inflicted on the Iranian population by America’s “war of choice” and the economic travails that the Iranian people have suffered because of the American sanctions imposed upon Iran for the last two decades.
Here the lessons of the aftermath of World War I are instructive. The rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis in Germany was a direct consequence of the humiliation and suffering inflicted on the German people by the victorious powers. The Treaty of Versailles and the Allies’ actions to ruthlessly enforce its provisions began the process of German alienation that culminated in the rise of Hitler with disastrous consequences for Europe and the world.
When suffering crosses the boundaries of tolerance, it produces a reaction that often translates into revanchism regardless of the consequences. Iran is a highly likely candidate for such a reaction. The only beneficiary of this campaign will be Israel because it will make it impossible in the short term for Iran to level the playing field with Israel in terms of nuclear weapons capability.
But will an Iran bent on revenge be in America’s and the region’s interest in the long term? Policymakers in Washington should have pondered over this question very seriously before making the decision to launch the attack on Iran with the goal of overthrowing the regime. In the long term, the United States and its Arab allies will have to deal with an ultranationalist and revanchist Iran bent on avenging the humiliation inflicted upon it by the current air campaign. This is likely to increase the instability and volatility already present in strong measure in West Asia, affecting among other things oil and gas supplies to the rest of the world.
The writer is university distinguished professor emeritus of International Relations, Michigan State University
