Bloomberg: “It is arguably Iran that has secured the most significant strategic victory … There is every sign that Tehran’s ability to control the Strait is increasing”
The defeats which the West keeps on having “[are] above all … intellectual”. And “not being able to understand what they are seeing – means that it’s impossible to respond effectively to it”. So Aurelien has argued. But “the problem goes beyond the fighting on the battlefield, to seeing and understanding the nature of asymmetric wars and their economic and political dimensions”.
“This is particularly the case for Iran, where… Washington appears to be incapable of understanding that the ‘other side’ does have a strategy with economic and political components – and is implementing it”.
“[In line with the western obsession with trivia], all the media concentration recently has been on the movement of U.S. troops to the region and their possible uses, as though that, in itself, was going to decide something. Yet in fact, the real issue is the development and deployment by the Iranians of a new concept of warfare, based on missiles, drones and defensive preparations, and the inability of the West, with its platform-centric mentality, to understand and process these developments [i.e., fully assimilate the strategy behind asymmetrical warfare]”.
Iran’s security concept and model was planned more than 20 years ago. The trigger for the move to an asymmetric paradigm came from the U.S.’ utter destruction of Iraq’s centralised military command in 2003, as a result of a 3-week massive air assault on Baghdad.
The issue for Iran that arose in its wake was how the country might build a deterrent military structure when it did not have (and could not have) anything resembling peer air capability. And when too, the U.S. could look down upon the extent of Iran’s military infrastructure from its high-resolution satellite cameras.
Well, the first answer simply was to have as little of its military structure out in the open to be observed from above. Its components had to be buried – and buried deeply (beyond the reach of most bombs). The second answer was that deeply buried missiles could indeed, in effect, become Iran’s ‘air force’ – i.e. a substitute for a conventional air force. Iran thus has been constructing and stockpiling missiles for more than twenty years. The third response was to divide Iran’s military infrastructure into autonomous provincial commands – to decentralise command centres, with each having separate stockpiled munitions, separate missile silos, and where appropriate, their own naval forces and militia.
In short, Iran’s military machine – in the event of a decapitation strike – was designed to operate as an automated, decentralised retaliation machine that cannot be easily stopped or controlled.
When unable to understand what is before our very eyes, the easiest thing is to reach for that which one knows – a build-up of troops – and to continue doing what hasn’t worked in the past.
Time moves on, and today, as Ben David writes, the U.S. military juggernaut serves as Trump’s ‘Roy Cohen’. He presents the American military might for display to the Iranians in the expectation that they readily will capitulate; else he, Trump, will let go of the leash. Trump complained to Witkoff after the armada of U.S. naval vessels had been assembled off the Persian coast that he was ‘puzzled and confused’ as to why the Iranians had not already capitulated on sighting the collective naval power assembled.
“[The cause for Trump’s puzzlement is that] this time he faces an opponent different from any he has ever known. These are not Manhattan real estate moguls or Atlantic City mobsters, they are Persians, members of a 3,000-year-old culture, and they have different concepts of time and what victory is”.
Whilst Trump is sending mixed messages about the prospects for talks with the Islamic Republic, Israeli officials believe he is considering three options: First to escalate the war by attacking Iran’s energy infrastructure on Kharg Island and at its South Pars gas field, with a second option being a ground operation to eliminate Iran’s highly enriched uranium stockpile.
A third option being considered would be to negotiate an agreement with Iran – but such a prospect would be seen by Israeli leadership circles as a “clear Iranian victory, opening the path for the Iranian Republic to survive”, Caspit writes. “Israel is focused on weakening the regime to the point where it cannot recover – thus it hopes, maybe encouraging future mass protests. This argument is also being used to convince Washington to continue the war”, Caspit emphasises.
A fourth option could be that Trump just declares victory and walks away.
1 comment:
A new regime could be much worse for others than the current one. Everyone knows some one killed by this war and they will never forget, never ever. Out of the frying pan into the fire. The current regime will be able to control this anger, but a new regime may not.
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