WORLD AT WAR: 6.1.19 - Iran's Options and the Destructive Defiance

Iran's Options and the Destructive Defiance - by Amir Taheri - https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14269/iran-options-defiance

 

According to an old adage, every crisis also contains an opportunity. And the current crisis between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the United States may be no exception. Intense saber-rattling on both sides, combined with what one might call "diplomacy of gesticulations," have reignited interest in what was a half-dormant conflict. That renewed interest could be used for persuading both sides, and others interested in the "Iran problem", to re-visit the root causes of the conflict. And, having done so, try to find realistic ways of defusing the situation.

 

But before that could be done, a number of steps must be taken.

 

To start with, we must realize that the crisis in question isn't caused by any of the traditional causes of conflict between nation-states. Iran and the US do not have a border problem, they are not fighting over access to natural resources and do not seek to snatch market share from one another. Nor are they in conflict over the oppression of one side's kith-and-kin by the other. The two are not fighting over water resources, access to open seas or calculations about national security.

 

In other words, the conflict isn't a classical international one. The reason is that Iran no longer behaves as a nation-state but as a vehicle for an ideology. One might suggest that ideological aspect is also present on the American side, as shown by all the talk about democracy and human rights. However, as decades of Cold War with the Soviet Union -- as ideological adversary -- showed, the US was mostly successful in fitting the ideological aspect of the conflict into a frame of nation-state behavior.

 

In the case of the current conflict with the Islamic Republic, the US has on several occasions indicated that it could do the same, provided the ruling mullahs pursued their ideological fight against "American values" as a nation-state and through generally accepted standards of international behavior. The US never shared, let alone approved of, the Soviet Union's Communist ideology, but was capable of factoring it in as one element among many in a complex relationship. From Nikita Khrushchev onwards, Soviet leaders were ready to reciprocate that approach. They still said they wanted to "bury capitalism" and made ample use of black-arts and other shenanigans to advance their cause. However, all that was done within the parameters of "cold monster" behavior. In other words, the USSR was pursuing its ideological goals, which over time became less and less defined, by non-ideological methods. Where raison d'état demanded, ideology was ditched with few qualms.

 

In 1970, when Iran decided to establish diplomatic relations with "Red China" it did not demand that China cease to be Communist or even stop hosting dozens of anti-Shah Iranians who had traveled to Mao-istan to train as guerrillas. What Tehran demanded was for Beijing to stop arming Omani insurgents operating from South Yemen, then under Communist control, and to conclude a trade agreement with Iran. Two years later, the success of Iran's Chinese experiment encouraged the Nixon administration in Washington also to launch a process of normalization with Beijing, eventually leading to full diplomatic relations.

 

However, historic precedents may not always be applicable to every conflict situation.

 

And, on balance at this moment, I find it hard to imagine the Islamic Republic, under Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's weird leadership, ever sacrificing its ideological pretensions in order to advance the interest of Iran as a state.

 

Yet, although it is hard to imagine, provided the current level of pressure is maintained both by internal opposition and from the outside by its many enemies and adversaries, Iran may be forced to ponder other options besides destructive defiance.

 

The Second Imam has made a spectacular comeback within the Khomeinist establishment. Last month, a biography of him, written by an Arab author and translated by Khamenei, with a preface, was re-published and used as an excuse for extensive debates in the official media and intellectual circles. Last Tuesday, the Islamic Security Minister, Ayatollah Mahmud Alawi praised Imam Hassan's strategy as "divinely inspired". "The Imam of Ummah need not always rise," the minister said. "There are times when the Imam's kneeling is a source of inspiration for their followers."

 

There are other signs that Khamenei may be contemplating what he has called "heroic flexibility". The official propaganda machine is already geared up to claim victory for the Islamic Republic. The official news agency reported on May 21 that "the world is already hearing the sound of breaking of America's bones."

 

Another sign is that the date fixed by the "Supreme Guide" for Israel to disappear from the face of the earth has been extended to 2050. More importantly, we are now told that Israel's "disappearance" will come at the same time as "the end of America".

 

"Islamic Iran shall witness the fall of the Satanic and earth devouring America and the usurper Israel in 2050," General Hamid Abazari, one of Islamic Revolutionary Guard's strategists, assured an audience last week.

 

Should one regard all that as good news?

 

Not necessarily. The madness that is Khomeinism has always had its method, which includes abject surrender when pressed too hard and brazen aggression when pressure is eased. The challenge facing Iran is to get rid of that madness altogether as every episode of cheat-and-retreat makes the eventual cure that much more difficult. Contrary to claims by the pro-mullah lobby in Washington, the choice isn't between surrender to Khomeinist madness and full-scale invasion of Iran. Only when the threshold of tolerable pain is reached the "Supreme Guide" may well reconsider his options. We are not there yet.

 

 

Israel's not-so-subtle message to Iran that it is watching and poised to strike - By Yaakov Lappin -

https://www.jns.org/israels-not-so-subtle-message-to-iran-that-it-is-watching-and-poised-to-strike/

 

Recently release satellite photographs of Iranian construction along Iraqi-Syrian border indicate Israel is closely watching Iran's efforts to build a land bridge from Tehran to the Mediterranean.

 

The Israeli satellite imagery company, ImageSat International (ISI), released photographs in recent days showing what it described as "Iran's land bridge from Tehran to the Mediterranean."

 

The images show Iranian construction work on a new crossing on the Syrian-Iraqi border, which, according to ISI, would allow Iran to transfer weapons, armed personnel and oil into Syria.

The images are from an area that has been in the headlines in the past. An older border crossing in the same area, known as Albukamal, was destroyed in airstrikes attributed to Israel by international media reports a little more than a year ago.

 

The 2018 strikes were unusual not only because they demolished an Iranian-run border crossing, but also because they destroyed a building that served as a headquarters for Iranian-backed Shi'ite Iraqi militias-just the kind of forces that Iran wants to inject into Syria, along with weapons and oil to bypass U.S. sanctions.

 

According to reports from last year, dozens of Iraqi militia operatives, most of whom were members of an organization called "Hezbollah Battalions," were killed in the attack.

 

Now, it seems, Iran's Islamic Republican Guards Corps (IRGC) is trying again. It is building a new land corridor in the very same area. The satellite imagery can be interpreted as an Israeli warning to Iran to cease its activities or face additional strikes.

 

This state of affairs reflects the fact that Iran remains committed to its long-term objective of turning Syria into an Iranian military zone and a future base of attack against Israel.

 

A Fox News report from last week quoting "Western sources" said that "Iran increased its presence in the area last summer, adding that after the 2018 airstrikes on the old Albukamal crossing, the Iranians have put a lot of effort and resources into building the new one."

 

Iran has been involved in a stubborn and patient effort to turn Syria into a base of operations. But it has run into a brick wall, in the form of an even more determined Israeli effort to disrupt this threatening process.

 

Hundreds of Israeli airstrikes in the past few years alone have put a major dent in Iran's plans, destroying missile bases, weapons production sites, military bases and weapons' transfer stations. This mission, of preventing Iran from taking over Syria, has become a top objective in the Israeli Air Force. The campaign, known as the "War Between Wars," is continuous, and requires 24-7 intelligence-gathering, precision strikes and calculated risks.

 

But the latest satellite imagery suggests that Iran's leadership is far from giving up. Iran has two central objectives in Syria: The first is to turn the country into an Iranian-controlled war machine against Israel and the second is to use it as a weapons trafficking zone for supplying Hezbollah in neighboring Lebanon.

 

Israel watches activity in the Persian Gulf

 

Despite being under major American economic pressure and facing bruising Israeli strikes on its assets in Syria, the Iranians are not walking away. They are merely tweaking the "volume" of their activities, turning the dial up and down in line with conditions, but never switching their Syria project off.

 

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the IRGC remain committed to building capabilities in Syria, so that they can fire missiles and rockets at Israel, create terrorist cells and send armed formations to the Syrian-Israeli border. Tehran wants to create a "second Lebanon" on Syrian territory.

 

In order to achieve that aim, its leaders cannot rely on cargo flights to deliver weapons and fighters alone. Those flights are under close Israeli surveillance. Repeated strikes on Iran's weapons depots at Damascus International Airport are proof of that. Iran, in response, reportedly moved its air-smuggling operations earlier this year to the T-4 Syrian air-force base in the central Syrian desert. But that base is also vulnerable to reported Israeli strikes, as an attack on it in July 2018 has demonstrated.

 

A land corridor would enable Iran to keep building its bases in Syria, to nourish Hezbollah, and to expand its destabilizing influence.

 

The question then arises as to why Israel appears to have chosen to warn Iran to stop building the crossing via media reports that show that Israeli intelligence is on to Iran's activities, rather than directly striking it.

 

One reason seems to center on the effectiveness of "information campaigns" in the use of intelligence to disrupt enemy activity via media warnings, as a complimentary tactic alongside kinetic airstrikes.

 

This provides Israel with some flexibility, allowing it to try and diffuse a threatening situation without the associated risk of fire strikes, which can snowball into larger conflicts.

 

Israel may have opted for this tactic due to the rising American-Iranian tensions in the Persian Gulf. Israel may wish to lower its profile during this time to see how the tensions play out and to avoid taking action that can further inflame the region.

 

As the White House mobilizes additional troops to the region, as well as naval ships and missile defenses, Israel appears to be turning down the volume on its own preemptive strikes in Syria. But only up to a point.

 

This month alone, media reports claimed that Israel conducted a missile strike on a target south of Damascus. In April, Israel reportedly struck a major Iranian weapons' facility in the northwestern Syrian city of Masyaf.

 

Such strikes presumably occur in response to urgent and critical intelligence of threatening Iranian activities, which, if left, unchecked, will expose Israel to the risk of guided missile attacks from Syria.

 

Another risk stems from Syrian President Bashar Assad's repeated and reckless attempt to attack Israeli Air Force aircraft from surface firing stations. The latest example of this occurred on Monday, when a Syrian anti-aircraft system fired on IAF jets that were on a routine flight in northern Israeli airspace. The IDF in response struck the launcher, reportedly killing one Syrian soldier and injuring another.

 

The Assad regime's policy of firing on Israeli jets risks dragging it into any future Israeli-Iranian escalation.

 

 

 

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