Iran is fighting for its Sovereignty and not Shia Islam

Picture of Protestors in Islam. (Picture Courtesy BuzzFeed)

I did some reading on Iranian history to get a perspective on the current conflict and also put in some of my analysis.

This thread was first posted by me on Twitter but here is its blog version. 

It emerges that unlike popular perception Iran is not fighting to defend Shia Islam but its current tensions with the west has its roots all the way back in 1891 starting with colonial Britain. 

Iran had weak foreign backed Shahs who did what foreign powers told them to.

In 1890 Nasir al-Din Shah granted concessions to the British to be sole growers and exporters of tobacco in Iran impacting 200,000 Iranians.
Protests backed by influential clergy led to its withdrawal. 

The Anglo-Persian Oil Company owned by British had monopoly on Iranian oil from 1901. It was Britain's most profitable company but Iranians who were largely impoverished did not see that money.

In 1952 the popularly elected Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh nationalized it. The British sent warships, put sanctions and removed him through a coup with CIA help. 

The coup in 1953 not only removed the popular PM Mosaddegh, seen as a hero by his people, but it also installed back on the throne Mohammad Reza Pahlavi Shah who functioned from then as an effective puppet of the Americans and British.
The Iranians never accepted him as legitimate ruler.

It did not help that the Shah and his family were weak, corrupt and ineffective in addition to being seen as puppets of much despised foreign powers.

Shah launched the 'White Revolution' of land reforms, nationalization of factories, aggressive westernization etc aimed to prevent a 'Red Revolution' but the trickle down economics did not work. 

The ‘White Revolution’ instead backfired in other ways. It increased the numbers of the intelligentsia and urban working class who opposed the Shah as they did not see benefits and instead saw a corrupt system where the elite benefitted.
The land reforms created independent farmers and also landless labourers with no loyalty to the Shah. 

The White Revolution which attempted to do a Turkey in Iran with aggressive westernization also backfired with a still largely conservative society who saw the top down attempted changes as foreign influence from a foreign backed Shah.

On other hand, as people were alienated from the rulers and the ruling class, the clergy were seen as being close to the people and concerned for them. 

The popular opposition to the Shah was not just Islamists but also many from the urban middle class, intelligentsia, students, left, liberals, marxists, leftist clergy etc.
But none of them had the street power, mass appeal, unity and organisational power of the followers of the Shia cleric Khomeini.

Khomeini was tactical enough to work with all of the above minus the Marxists. Khomeini was also shrewd enough to not share his real intent of Islamic Clerical rule to preserve opposition unity.


This was the start of a full blown revolution and the core concerns were not Islam but Iranian sovereignty, internal mismanagement by Shah and Co and about preserving Iranian culture and way of life. 

Ironically, the most effective blow against the Shah regime in the final days was struck my armed Islamic-Marxist rebels who raided an arms factory and captured and distributed 50,000 machine guns. 

But before that, the one final straw for Shah regime was the oil boom of the 1970's. However, the Shah family and members predictably grabbed most of this money in billions of dollars.
The oil boom sent inflation through the roof and made inequality worse. 

The Shah towards the end tried various liberal concessions, including allowing political parties and a critical press and rolling back enforced westernization but it was too late.

The final event was a violent crackdown in protests that led to bigger protests.

The key turning point was when a demoralized and confused military stayed neutral. 

The Iranian Revolution was successful with 11th Feb 1979 as the fateful day and Khomeini became the Supreme Leader.

From 1979 to 1982 Khomeini turned against other Opposition elements including the moderates and crushed them.

Newspapers critical of theocratic rule were shut down. 

November 1979 also saw the ‘hostage crisis’ as young radicals entered the US Embassy and held 52 US diplomats hostage of 444 days.

This led to a nadir in ties with west but also hugely helped the Khomeini to gain prestige and sideline any moderates and rivals. 

One tectonic impact of the Iranian revolution was its impact on mostly neighbouring Sunni Kingdoms with significant Shia populations.

Given the popular nature of the Iranian revolution there was real fear of similar uprisings in other parts of the middle east. 

An Iraq under a Sunni govt of Saddam Hussein armed and supplied by the USA, including with Chemical weapons facilities by western companies, launched an invasion of Iran in 1980 leading to the 8-yr Iran-Iraq war.

Iran quickly gained back territory and fought much of the war after Iraq offered truce. 

Right from the 1979 revolution days and hostage crisis Iran and US had hostile ties and sanctions started from then getting tougher by the decade and especially under Bill Clinton. 

Given the importance of oil and especially after collapse of the Soviet Union, the US cultivated close ties and at times almost client state relations with many Sunni Kingdoms.

Shia Iran which was the biggest and most powerful in the region stuck out like a sore thumb for the US. 

Shia Iran party out of self-defence and partly to spread its influence created powerful proxies and allies over the decades in Lebanon, Palestine, Syria and with the US invasion of Iraq in Iraq and later Yemen too among others.

Along came George W. Bush (junior) and his axis of evil speech followed by invasion of Iraq in 2003.
The Iranian regime was initially spooked by the Iraq invasion and even shut down its nuclear weapons programs in 2003 and clandestinely offered to normalise ties through Switzerland but the US did not pay attention. 

Over time, Iran saw a huge opportunity in the removal of the Sunni government in Iraq and worked overtime to arm and strengthen Shia proxy militia and parties who are now dominant in Iraq.

But one impact of the Iraq invasion was Iran discussing and opening up its nuclear program with the west and the IAEA. 

However, Iran's talks and cooperation with west and IAEA on its nuclear program, which it said was peaceful, went up and down.
President Obama brought in tougher sanctions on Iran aimed to hurt its economy but left the doors open for negotiations.

This led to the Iran nuclear deal also called JCPOA in July 2015. 

Under JCPOA Iran would significantly downgrade its nuclear program and open up to thorough inspections in exchange for sanctions relief that was badly hurting its economy.

President Trump, who made the deal an election issue, walked out of it in May 2018 and brought back sanctions in Dec 2018. 

The sanctions hit Iran's oil sale, access to international financial system making payments for imports including medicines more difficult, there was no access to airplane parts, the manufacturing industry got badly hit, the government budget was badly impacted, salary payments were delayed, food prices went higher and there was massive suffering for its people. 

After the failure of the deal and sanctions, Iran has taken up a path of escalation.

It announced increased production of Uranium in 2018 and in 2019 it said it exceeded the allowed levels of production.

6 oil tankers attacked in Gulf near Iran in 2019 but Iran denied responsibility.
Iran also shot down an advanced US drone in June 2019.

Trump nearly launched a strike on Iran but cancelled at at the last minute. There were more sanctions instead.

In July Iran seized the British tanker near Hormuz. It also arrested 17 Iranians for spying for the US.

In September 2019 Iran backed Houthi rebels launched a sophisticated attack on Saudi Arabia’s biggest oil field impacting five percent of the world’s oil supply.

In Dec 27 Iran backed militia killed a US contractor and hurts troops in an attack in Iraq. 

The US hit back on 29th Dec bombing three sites in Iraq linked to the militia killing 25.

On Dec 31st protestors backed by the militia attacked the US Embassy and burnt its outer perimeter.

On 2nd Jan 2020 Qasem Soleimani, the head of the elite Quds force was killed in a US airstrike. 

So to recap some main points.

1. Iran's core struggle is not about Islam but about its sovereignty.

2. There are deep historical reasons and angst in Iran against the west which hugely contributed to 1979 revolution.

3. Iran is too big and powerful to fall in line to the US unlike pliant Sunni Kingdoms 

4. Iran is hugely influential in the middle east more so after Iraq invasion.

5. The 2015 Nuclear deal offered real hope of downgrading Iran's nuclear program and Iran joining the mainstream.

6. Trump & Neo-cons started the escalation by walking out of the deal and reimposing sanctions. 

For additional reading this article offers a comprehensive profile of Qasem Soleimani and Iran's influence operations in the middle east.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/09/30/the-shadow-commander

As to what Iran will do now nobody can say but here are some factors.

1. In an unpopular regime Soleimani was a popular mythical figure seen to be defending Iranian interests.

2. The regime has faced domestic discontent and so it cannot afford to not react given Soleimani's appeal. 

3. Iranian youth and pro-democracy and reform forces will unite behind the country in an external threat or attack like this and so domestic discontent will take a back burner for now.

4. The regime also cannot afford to start a war with the US as the regime wants to survive. 

5. Trump faces an impeachment proceeding and so he may want to take bigger risks to distract attention without a plan B.

6. Iranian backed militias while being controlled by Iran are also fairly autonomous and all that is required is for one or two of them to go overboard. 

7. There will be huge pressure on the Iraqi Parliament to now show US forces the door.
This move may calm temperatures in Tehran.

8. Iranian response id likely through proxies but a direct hit also cannot be ruled out.

9. Watch the strait of Hormuz very closely through which a  large portion of the World’s oil passes.

10. The biggest playground though will be Iraq as it gives Iran deniability, Iran has a lot of assets there and there are plenty of American targets.

The article is not to give Iran or Soleimani a moral halo but to place their actions within a historical and geo-political context. If the US has committed atrocities in the middle east, Iran and its proxies are also not clean. States are never moral in their actions but it is important to understand what drives them.

And what drives Trump right now is a need to assert toughness, take away attention and political power from his impeachment proceedings and ensure re-election. Bush got re-elected after his Afghanistan and Iraq wars. He just called Iran chicken in this Tweet and this is a wrong strategy.

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1213593965838163968

Going by the Tweet below it is becoming clearer by the minute that Trump thinks he can win a fight based on the logic that he can fire a few missiles and launch air strikes from the US and get away.

He is yet to learn the lessons from Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq.Iran is bigger and has more capacities than all of the above and war with Iran would be far more expensive for the US and the world economy.

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1213689342272659456

It goes without saying that main beneficiaries of a US-Iran war are at the global and regional level.

At the global level the main beneficiary will be China given that the Iraq war cost the US $ 1.1 Trillion. Such a war will also significantly downgrade US appetite for intervention in the South China sea and other areas of Chinese conflict with US backed neighbours like Japan and others.

Russia will benefit with a weakened US but it will also lose a close and powerful ally in the Iranian regime with which it is working in Syria etc.
Regional players like Israel, Saudis, Gulf countries (minus Qatar) and Pakistan will also benefit with a weak Shia Iran after a war.

The writer is the Editor of The Bhutanese paper but the views here published in this personal blog are entirely his own .