Iran Is The Real Enemy

So, according to the progress report – and all those fancy charts - delivered by US general Petreus, the surge is working. Impressive percentages are being trotted out about the fall in number of casualties, terrorist incidents and so forth. By that yardstick, I guess the surge is working – well, sort of.

By its very nature, a surge is a temporary measure. It flows and ebbs and, proportionately, attacks by the ‘enemy’ ebb and flow with it. All the political pundits have been mouthing off on the television channels about how the troop build-up cannot be sustained and how the US military is already over-stretched – and you can be sure the enemy is listening; and waiting.

The enemy can afford to wait. It is in there for the long haul. It is the only side that has been making consistent gains throughout the four-year Iraq conflict and, best of all; it is achieving all this without expending its own troops. Its proxies are doing all the fighting and killing. The real enemy, of course, is Iran.

Before George Bush embarked on his ‘great adventure’, there were four major players – apart from Israel – in the Middle East; Iran, Iraq, Syria and Saudi Arabia. The Saudi rulers were quite content raking in their oil wealth and maintaining their absolute power. They had no interest in what was happening outside their borders. Syria kept meddling in Lebanon, but knew it did not have the money, or military capability, to create mischief elsewhere.

That left Iran and Iraq. Iran had ambitions to become the dominant power in the region, but – after the Islamic Revolution of 1979 – its economy was a mess; and its military had been decimated by the eight-year war with Iraq. Iran had, in all probability, resigned itself to the realization that it would never amount to anything more than a regional player – thanks to Saddam Hussein. Saddam Hussein, incidentally, had foregone any global ambitions after his misadventure in Kuwait in 1991. He ruled his country with an iron fist, but he was no threat to the region – and certainly not to the United States. Why would he attack the US? There was no percentage in it for him.

When the US invaded Iraq in 2003, Iran could hardly believe its good fortune. In one stroke, its old nemesis, Saddam, had been overthrown; and it was now free to influence its fellow Shi’ites – who constituted 80 percent of Iraq’s population – across the border. Suddenly, Iran’s big-power ambitions seemed achievable, after all. As an added bonus, it was now in a position to inflict some real pain on the Great Satan.

People in the West, for whom religion is little more than a comforter in times of stress, do not fully appreciate the enormous impact Iran’s Islamic Revolution had on Shia’s around the world. Few in number compared to the Sunnis, they were always the underdogs – often controlled and kept in check by the dominant Muslim sect. (It is one reason Al Qaeda has never managed to gain a foothold in Iran.) Now, in Iran, they had a country where they called the shots – and there was nothing the Sunnis could do about it. The only other country where they were in a majority – albeit suppressed – was Iraq; and now George Bush had obligingly ‘liberated’ them. Not only that, he had conveniently disbanded Iraq’s Baath army’ which had kept them in control. Now, all they needed was leadership; and it was not surprising that they would turn to their spiritual mentors, the ayatollahs in Iran.

The Iranians, naturally, were only too happy to help in spreading their Islamic revolution. And if, in the process, they got to frustrate and inflict damage on the Western infidels – at very little cost to themselves - it was one more proof that they were indeed God’s Warriors. All they have to do now is wear America down. With US public opinion strongly in favor of pulling the troops out, it appears like they are close to achieving their objective.

The major argument in favor of a US pullout is that it has done all it possibly can – and things can only get worse. If the country descends into further anarchy and all-out civil war; well, the Iraqis were given their shot at ‘democracy’ and they blew it. US intervention did not work in Vietnam; and it was not working in Iraq. It was time for America to cut its losses and pull out.

The major flaw in that reasoning is that Iraq is not Vietnam. Apart from thousands of needless young lives, the only thing the US ‘lost’ in Vietnam was its pride. Even a unified Vietnam never posed any threat to America.

Iraq is a different kettle of fish. If Iraq becomes a vassal state of Iran – as it very likely will after the Americans withdraw – the implications for the US are enormous; and potentially catastrophic. It is true that Iran is militarily no match for the United States. However, between them, Iran and Iraq have greater oil reserves than Saudi Arabia. They would become the dominant partners in OPEC and turn off the oil tap when it served their purposes. Some would argue that this would be a double-edged sword – and that Iran (and Iraq) need to sell their oil to survive economically. Don’t delude yourselves. It is true that the US and Europe are the largest oil consumers, but there are many other countries – China and India, for example – more than willing to buy up any surplus oil that may become available. The real sufferer would be America. Oil prices of up to $10 a gallon would not be inconceivable.

Much is being made of the threat posed to America by Iran’s nuclear program. In my opinion, this is more hype than fact. As someone who has been associated with India’s nuclear energy program, I can tell you that there is a gap of several years between producing sufficient plutonium (which Iran is nowhere close to doing) and having a deliverable nuclear weapon. As to the danger of Al Qaeda getting hold of a ‘bomb’ and causing havoc in the US, there is a far greater probability of their acquiring one from Pakistan, which already has a stockpile of atomic bombs.

So, having belatedly come to the realization that Iran is the real enemy, what can the US do about it? According to a US national security expert, the Pentagon has drawn up plans for massive air strikes against 1,200 targets in Iran, designed to annihilate the Iranians' military capability in three days. Alexis Debat, Director of Terrorism and National Security at the Nixon Centre in Washington, has been quoted as saying that US military planners were not preparing for "pinprick strikes" against Iran's nuclear facilities. "They're about taking out the entire Iranian military," he said. His logic is that "Whether you go for pinprick strikes or all out military action, the reaction from the Iranians will be the same."

Iran is cleverly playing up to America’s apprehensions. Their president Ahmedinejad, never short of bombastic rhetoric, declared recently "We have more than 3,000 centrifuges working and every week a new set is installed. They (world powers) were thinking that with each resolution the Iranian nation would retreat. But after each resolution the Iranian nation presented another nuclear achievement."

Many Americans would react with horror at the thought of the US getting embroiled in another war, but an air strike would not be that far fetched. After World War II – and, perhaps, Korea - the US military has usually got itself into difficulties whenever it has put boots on the ground. As long as the US restricts itself to air strikes; focuses on the objective of inflicting military damage to Iran – and abandons idealistic notions of ‘bringing democracy’ to that part of the world, there is not much Iran can do militarily in terms of retaliation. It would probably step up its sponsorship of terrorist activity, of course, but that is likely to happen anyway; and America would need to step up its vigilance accordingly.

It is a dilemma, of course, but it may be the lesser of two evils – an increased security threat, weighed against a resurgent and powerful Iran. But tough times call for tough decisions. Somehow, I don’t think cutting and running is going to make the US any safer.