Standoff in the Middle East

Ziauddin Choudhury

Cynics opined that the latest salvo from President Trump that led to stealth assassination of an Iranian
military leader in Baghdad was designed to divert attention from his impending impeachment trial in US
Senate. This usually is a favorite ploy of a beleaguered political leader which sometimes pays off. This
tactic, when tagged with a label for national defense, detracts people’s focus away from the cauldron
that the leader is boiling in, and instead attempts to create a national hysteria against a foreign enemy,
real or not.

Whether or not the assassination of Maj. Gen. Soleimani of Iran’s elite force was a diversionary tactic by
the US President, the Middle East is once again reverberating with war cries as a consequence. The
assassination, which US claims was a justified action because Soleimani had been responsible for
thousands of deaths in Iraq, Syria, and Iran itself, was a culmination of a series of tit- for-tat killings in
Iraq over last few weeks. The series began when Iran backed Shiite militia launched a bomb attack on US
military camp in Iraq killing a US contractor (who ironically was actually an Iraqi who had become a US
citizen only a couple of years ago). In retaliation the US launched a counter attack on Shiite Militia
caravan killing more than two dozens Iraqis. This led to a much wider protest in Baghdad for a couple of
days resulting in attacks by the militia on the heavily guarded US Embassy located in the safest zone of
the capital known as the Green Zone. The embassy building became a scene filled with a rioting mob
that eerily reminded people of a similar siege of US Embassy in Tehran forty years ago. Fortunately, Iraq
avoided a repeat of the Tehran incident when the rioting melted and the militia departed with after
intervention by Iraqi government. The US also showed restraint in handling the situation.

But what was cooking behind the scene when the fire was burning in the Embassy ground in Baghdad
was the soon to happen killing of the Iranian military leader. The incident happened without any early
signal, because until it happened very people knew who this alleged organizer of Iran backed militias
and mastermind of Iran’s proxy war in in the region was. There was little mention of his alleged anti-US
activities in the media, not to speak of any attempt to take him down as in the cases of now deceased
Baghdadi, the ISIS chief, or Bin Laden of Saudi Arabia. Therefore, the announcement of his killing by a US
drone in Baghdad along with his Iraqi foil was a bit of a surprise.

Soleimani may be a relatively unknown figure to the average person outside of Iran, but in Iran he was a
revered figure. To the Iranians, rank and file, he was a national hero. So his death orchestrated by a
power that is viewed by Iranian authorities and people at large as a cause of the country’s ills has given
the country a new resolve to fight. So, once again Iran and US are engaged in a battle of attrition, who
can do how much damage to each other without getting into a formal war.

In fact, although from the war of words hurled by the US President and the Iranian Supreme Leader at
each other it would seem that we could see the US Fleet rushing toward the Gulf of Iran and hundreds
of Bombers carpeting the country with shells. But this will not happen, because US cannot afford to have
a fourth war in its hands (after Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria). A new war in that region will not go
unchallenged by Russia, and China. Even the NATO allies will be unwilling to get into a new conflict, that
too with Iran. Globally, this will be so unwelcome that many in the US including the Democrats will
renounce any new war.
What may happen is that a war of attrition or a low grade conflict will continue to afflict the region for
many more years. Iran has vowed that it will retaliate to avenge the death of Soleimani without
specifying how and where to which President Trump has responded that any action by Iran on US assets
or citizens will be met with more severe answers. Iran made its first move a couple of days ago by
launching a mid-level missile attack of US Army bases in Iraq. Although the missiles did not harm any US
personnel or property, the signals are enough that in the region Iran can cause harm to US interests if it
wants to. Again, we may see a tit-for-tat action for some time in the region.

This battle between Iran and US is but a new addition to the saga of strife that has been going on in the
region for the last few decades that reached a peak with Iraq war in 2003. No sooner this war ended
with pullout of last troops in 2011 (except for a token presence of a few thousand as observers), much
of the region was engulfed by a new upheaval albeit to topple dictators. These upheavals gave rise to a
different kind of war in Syria and Iraq, that between embattled government and newly aspiring Islamic
militants seeking to establish a Khilafat benefiting from the chaos.

When the conflagration from Arab upheaval and battle with Islamic State seemed to abate, the area
witnessed a new battleground in Yemen with proxy wars between two leading contestants for
domination in the region—Saudi Arabia and Iran. In fact, much of the oxygen for the ongoing battles in
the Middle East is provided by the rivalry between these two, one claiming leadership for the Sunni
world and the other the Shiite. The US, which has forged a strong defense relationship with Saudi Arabia
and has assured the Kingdom’s security, is a natural ally of the country. Iran, Saudi Arabia’s adversary, is
therefore, also an adversary of US.

This need not have been this way, and the relationship between US and Iran which had soured since the
country was overtaken by Iran’s Mullahs, was on way to mending, with the international pact on Iran’s
nuclear program. But the pact which was an anathema to the Republicans of USA was annulled in one
fell swoop by Donald Trump when he came to power rather unexpectedly. This turned the clock
backward, and the animosity between the two countries began anew.

Now with this latest development between the two countries the miasma of hopelessness for peace
has engulfed the region once again. Although the prospects of a full scale war in the region are slim to
none, the war attrition will tear the region for more years to come unless good sense prevails in both
countries, and they make accommodation to each other for negotiations. The world cannot wait
endlessly.