Tag Archives: Iran

“Midnight Hammer” and “Epic Fury”: A Macabre Farce

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“…But what I see today, from the frozen solitude where observing the world becomes a torture for the mind, is not a tragedy: it is a farce. A sinister farce, to be sure, but a farce nonetheless, played by second-rate actors on a stage where the scenery is collapsing.”[1]

Over the last one year between 22 June 2025 and 16 June 2026, a grisly farce of a war has been fought between the world’s lone superpower and its ally Israel against a second rate power, the Islamic state of Iran. The latter with neither the technological backing nor the military heft but only it’s civilizational resolve to not succumb. It began with a pre-emptive pummelling of all Iranian nuclear facilities particularly at Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan.  The conflict was neither a form of a “Great Power” struggle nor was it a brutal act of upbraiding of an errant state failing to fall-in-line with the will of a hegemon; while it was a barbaric act it was also, clearly, a lesser state expressing its will not to subordinate its sovereignty.

Iran’s Nuclear Ambitions

Iran’s nuclear saga long preceded the 1979 revolution and a look back at its tumultuous 20th century-history is fitting.[2] In 1921, Reza Khan, then a military officer serving in Persia’s Cossack Brigade, staged a coup against the government of the ruling Qajar Dynasty. Thereafter, in 1926, he adopted the name Pahlavi and was crowned Shah. Reza Khan Pahlavi’s eldest son, Mohammad Reza, was, in turn, named crown prince. The Shah began a program of modernization and also became increasingly autocratic. In 1935 he renamed Persia as Iran. Iran remained neutral during World War II, but Britain and the Soviet Union occupied Western Iran in August 1941, using the country as a means to secure wartime logistic lines to Moscow. The Allies were unsatisfied with Reza Shah’s cooperation and orchestrated his abdication that same year, placing his son, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, on the throne to maintain the façade of Iranian self-rule. Some years after the end of the war, in 1951, Mohammed Mossadegh, long time politician, relation of the Qajars, and member of parliament opposing the Shah, was elected prime minister. To his peril, in a flush of patriotism Mossadegh attempted to challenge the weighted mercantilism being practised by Britain and the US at the time by nationalizing the oil industry and demanding that Iran be the prime beneficiary of its vast oil reserves which had, hitherto, been exclusively controlled by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, British Petroleum (BP). Britain did not take kindly to this act; perceiving the policy to be in defiance of their authority. In order to bring about a regime change more pliable to their wishes, in 1953, they conspired a coup d’état in collaboration with the CIA, urging the latter to embark on one of its first covert operations to topple an existing legitimate government and supplant it with a puppet administration. The CIA and the British first undermined the Iranian government through bribery, libel, a vicious media campaign and then orchestrated riots. Agents posing as communists threatened religious leaders and faked attacks on American nationals. After a short bloody fire fight in the streets of Tehran, Mossadegh was overthrown and sentenced to three years in military prison and thereafter was placed under house arrest till his death in 1967.  

In the wake of the 1953 coup, the United States catalysed Iran’s nuclear program by signing a nuclear cooperation agreement under President Dwight Eisenhower’s Atoms for Peace Program in 1957. This program envisaged the provision of a five-megawatt-thermal (MWt) Tehran Research Reactor with plans for building more than 20 nuclear power reactors. Their stated purpose was for power generation; however given the unbounded nature of the ‘Cold War’ there was no telling when nuclear power collaboration would reconstitute to a weapons agenda. For his part, as literature now reveals, the Shah pushed hard for domestic development of the full nuclear cycle, in particular the ability to reprocess spent fuel. The crushing of Iran’s first democratic government led by Mossadegh ushered in more than two decades of dictatorship under the Shah, who relied heavily on American policy support, aid and arms. By 1967 a confident Reza Pahlavi donned the twin mantles of Arya mehr (Light-of-the-Aryans) and Shahanshah (King of kings).  

The Shah’s autocratic ways, disregard of the power of the clerics and a misplaced sense of the civilizational reality of his people severely estranged him and his ruling coterie from the citizenry. This led to the popular uprising in 1978–79 that resulted in the collapse of the monarchy and a violent backlash against American political influence. On 11 February 1979, an Islamic Republic was established. It involved the participation of a wide range of Iranians—from the secular left to the religious right. The revolution found expression in the form of Shia Islam, supporters of the faith considered themselves to be the key unifying element of Iranian identity and culture. The popular acceptance of leadership by Ruhollah Khomeini, an accomplished religious scholar critical of the Shah, put in perspective the widespread recognition of his role of Velayat-e-Faqih (Custodian and Protector of the Islamic faith) amongst Shias of Iran. He was responsible (in the absence of the twelfth Prophet), for Islamic order and was the de-facto “Conscience-Keeper” of the government.  

Weaponisation: The Pakistan Connection

After a brief interregnum following the 1979 revolution, the Iranian government resumed its pursuit of the previous regime’s nuclear aspirations, albeit slowly. Criticism of the Shah for having pursued a programme of nuclear development on grounds of “theological” reasons had painted Ayatollah Khomeini in a corner which, apparently, explained his reluctance to progress the nuclear programme more vigorously in his lifetime. Following his death in 1989, the new supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, had no such compunctions and he expanded Iran’s nuclear activities. The extent to which the programme had progressed became apparent in 2002 when the AQ Khan affair broke. Iran, with clandestine support from Pakistan through its ‘Nuclear black markets’ (see IISS report titled “Nuclear Black Markets”, a net assessment dossier, 2007, Pgs. 50-54 and 93-94); had built at Natanz a uranium enrichment facility with the capacity to house a cascade of 50,000 centrifuges.

Washington’s ambivalence to the IISS report, and indeed its tacit ‘wink’ to the affaire-AQ Khan, as well as to its outcome and its dubious liaison with Pakistan buttressed accusations of the White House indulging in nuclear hypocrisy of a dangerous kind. The United States offered humiliating and unrealistic ultimatums while dithering in its resolve to enforce nuclear non-proliferation policies, instead of making it clear to the people of Iran that a democratic, law-abiding government could have easily, and at much less cost, achieved the enrichment rights guaranteed under the NPT. Was it because this narrative gave the White House the opportunity to not just mischaracterise, but also create its own “nuclear reality” of the nature and orientation of the Iranian nuclear programme and its shadowy links with Pakistan’s  illicit nuclear programme? The very few prosecutions in the AQ Khan affair, indulgence of the US establishment, lenient punishments, ‘blind-sided’ investigations of the Pakistan establishment and the scale of proliferation have left world opinion alarmed at the duplicity of purpose, and indeed the insincerity of the entire fact-finding process and its intended objectives.

Fallout of the AQ Khan affair and the outward proliferation from Pakistan to Iran took a critical turn in 1987 at the meeting of the chairmen of the Iranian and Pakistani atomic energy commissions. They entered into a clandestine agreement for joint development of centrifuges which included specifications and material to set up a cascade of 2000 centrifuges along with all auxiliaries necessary for the enrichment of weapon grade uranium (see IISS report titled “Nuclear Black Markets” pg. 68). British and American agencies’ suggestion that the deal was struck between Iran and AQ Khan without the knowledge of the Pakistan military is not only preposterous but is inconsistent with what is open knowledge of who commands, administers, holds the purse strings and indeed steers the Pakistan nuclear programme. Not forgetting that General Zia-ul-Haq was Dictator, Chief Martial Law administrator and the President of Pakistan from 1977-1988. It was under his watch that Pakistan performed its first fissile “cold test.” And that Zia famously remarked (in the year under the glass, 1987), that Pakistan possessed the capability to build a (nuclear) weapon. He maintained absolute state and military control over its “clandestine nuclear weapons programme” as did subsequent Army Chiefs and military dictators. This should lay to rest the entire substance of the IISS report on Pakistan’s nuclear black markets and its assertion that the entire enterprise was a “Cash-and-Carry” private handiwork of Abdul Qadeer.

Iran and the NPT: Hear no Evil

By 1970 Iran had not only signed the NPT but had also ratified it, agreeing not to seek nuclear weapons in exchange for the promised technologies that were concomitant to the Treaty. While this obligation remained a foundational precept even after the Iranian revolution of 1979 that deposed the Shah, the country initiated a uranium enrichment program and the creation of underground nuclear facilities. These critical infrastructures were developed at Natanz, Fordo and Arak. Iran maintained that they were intended to play a role in civilian nuclear power generation and were within the purview of the NPT in terms of Article IV that govern inalienable rights of signatories to“…research, develop and use nuclear energy for non-nuclear weapon purposes.” However, in 2005 and 2006, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors alleged that Iran’s covert development of nuclear facilities and concealment of nuclear material violated its NPT Safeguards Agreement. In the meantime the White House, that had persistently repudiated and suspected Iran’s intentions of nurturing a secret programme to weaponise their nuclear wherewithal, also questioned critically the grounds for why an oil and gas rich country needed the frame of reference sanctified in Article IV; declaring maleficent intent to use the Article as a cover for developing nuclear weapons.

The sum and substance of Pakistan’s involvement with the Iran’s nuclear weapons programme was that the latter were enabled to establish underground manufacturing facilities through the AQ Khan Black market network at Natanz for 54,000 advanced centrifuges along with all requisite auxiliaries. The critical factor was that from 2003 onwards Iran had the “potential” of producing enough Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU) for twenty nuclear bombs of 20Kt yield per year; if it chose to break out of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) Agreement of which it was a signatory nation since 1968 (see IISS Report ibid pgs. 70-71). 

By January 2007, Washington’s “hear-no-evil policy” had one unanticipated salutary effect; The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, solemnly, pushed the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock two minutes closer to midnight, the symbolic end of civilization. Eighteen Nobel laureates declared “the danger of apocalypse is closer now than at any time since Hiroshima and Nagasaki”.     

Unremitting Retribution

The complexity of the Iranian case stems from the fact that it inflames the right to nuclear energy and the extent to which this “right” can be expanded. Some states point out that fuel-enrichment activities, which are at the centre of the Iranian crisis, are not forbidden by the NPT, and should be considered as part of the “inalienable right” stated by Article IV of the treaty. While others suggest that Article IV puts the emphasis on the need to demonstrate the “peaceful purposes” of nuclear activities, which the IAEA cannot confirm for Iran’s nuclear program. Underlying the many circumscriptions and debilitating restrictions that were piled upon Iran over the years is the embarrassment that Washington suffered for the 444 day hostage crisis (Nov 1979-Jan 1981) which included the mortifying debacle of the bungled rescue mission. The crux of the Iran nuclear quandary and Washington’s obsessive quest for unremitting retribution is centred on the loss of national pride that the USA suffered in the crisis as its foreign policy was seen as weak and its leadership in a state of paralysis. It also became the central cause for the Carter administration not being elected for a second term.  

Over the next three decades Israel and the USA systematically indulged in clandestine activities to paralyse Iran’s nuclear programme. Measures included assassination of Iran’s nuclear scientists and the use of computer malware to sabotage Iran’s nuclear programme.  All this was in addition to the sweeping and economically crippling sanctions that had been imposed on Iran since 1979.   

Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA)

Hassan Rouhani was elected president of Iran in 2013. He inherited a country in financial recession and an economy that was shrinking by 1.9%. The nations heavy reliance on oil revenues was strangled by Washington led sanctions enforced during the previous four decades which had pushed the economy over the precipice. More than 50% of its oil exports had been embargoed while the currency had lost more than 200% of its value against the dollar. In these circumstances, Rouhani was forced to find a solution to reduce the burden of sanctions on his collapsing nation. He began negotiations with the United States and other countries to find a solution to resuscitate the economy.

There was a belief amongst the five permanent members of the UN Security Council along with Germany that not only were the sanctions and economic restraints, hitherto imposed on Tehran, having ruinous impact on the economy but was devastating the very viability of that nation (despite being oil-rich). Add to this the conviction that President Rouhani was more moderate in his political outlook than his predecessors. It was seen as an opportune moment to not just capitalise on the dire condition of the failing state, but also to ensure that Iran did not break out of its restraints and achieve a rogue nuclear weapon status. It was also feared that strategic desperation may push it irredeemably into the embrace of China and Russia. The JCPOA was conceived as an instrument that capped Iran’s nuclear programme, assured transparency and verifications of nuclear activities and in return provided the much needed, sanction relief to the financial, banking, commerce and trade sectors. There was the unwritten assumption that in the middle term, conditional removal of sanctions coupled with the ‘pressure-push and carrot’ policy would entice Iran into the Western fold.   

The JCPOA was signed in Vienna on 14 July 2015 between Iran, on one side, and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council (China, France, Russia, UK and US) plus the EU and Germany, on the other. It included reciprocal commitments regarding the lifting of all UN, multilateral and national sanctions together with limitations and monitoring of Iran’s military nuclear programme. At the time, JCPOA was hailed internationally; at least notionally as a deal between (near) equals, as a great diplomatic coup. The objective to limit capabilities of Iran’s military nuclear programme through periodic inspection and verification reinforced security in West Asia was in exchange for the Iranian government’s pressing need to rid itself of the crippling sanctions. The integrity of the Agreement, it was felt, was assured by the indigent nature of the dispensation in Tehran. Between July 2015 and May 2018, for over two years, the IAEA routinely verified in quarterly reports that Iran remained in full compliance with all of its JCPOA obligations. However the ‘Iran Deal’ did not take into account the capricious nature of the new occupant of the White House.

Untimely Burial of the JCPOA 

President Trump in May 2018, following through on a campaign pledge, made more out of a visceral aversion of his predecessor’s policies, withdrew unilaterally from the JCPOA. European allies who so recently had greeted and touted the Plan, stood submissively-by. The US Supreme Commander declared “this was a horrible one-sided deal that should have never, ever been made.” He re-imposed heavy sanctions on Iran and turned Obama’s “pressure-push and carrot” policy to a “maximum-pressure” campaign. Relations between White House and Tehran plunged to a new low as military escalation was ramped-up. The harsher and less discerning of humanitarian considerations of the additional sanctions targeted Iran’s financial, oil, petrochemical, and shipping sectors to further cripple the economy. Supplementary embargoes were coupled with a series of provocative maritime incidents in the Persian Gulf, attacks on shore installations, assassinations which included General Soleimani head of the IRGC and key nuclear scientists involved in their nuclear programme in addition to other vital figures in the Iranian Command hierarchy. The grisly deaths were planned, coordinated and executed between Israel and Washington.

Without access to economic relief enabled by the JCPOA, Iran on its part, reneged on the matter of re-starting nuclear operations. It did so with less noise and more substantively. It first obstructed and then circumscribed IAEA access to nuclear infrastructure, engaged in non-compliance of the terms of the Nuclear Agreement while stepping up enrichment of uranium at its facilities in Fordo and Natanz. UN sanctions on ballistic missile production and acquisition, UNSC Resolution 2231 were unilaterally overturned. The JCPOA’s short lived mortality only served to underscore the fickle nature of Washington’s Iran policy. By overturning the framework of the Agreement, Washington lost regulatory oversight of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, ability to influence decision making and gutted diplomatic channels for addressing regional security. These events, as it rapidly turned out, were to escalate to open conflict and disrupt energy security world-wide with its consequent fallout on the global economy. 

 Between 2018 and 2024, US-Iran relations transformed from diplomatic collapse into direct military action, as a part of Washington’s “maximum pressure” policy. But, if at all there was a pivotal moment during the conflict it was the regional fallout of the 07 October 2023 Hamas assault on Israel which was followed by the Israeli saturation bombing of Gaza, a series of missile exchanges with Iran and the largest ever direct Israeli strikes targeting Iranian air-defences and ballistic missile production infrastructure. Intensification of combat operations was clearly intended to bring Tehran to the table not as an equal, as the terms of the now dead JCPOA suggested, but as a vanquished supplicant.

Operation Midnight Hammer

Operation “Midnight Hammer” was Washington’s military operation to strike at Iran’s nuclear facilities launched on 21 June 2025 amidst the on-going Israeli strikes on Iran. It involved over 125 U.S. aircraft, including seven B-2 Spirit bombers, and the use of approximately 75 precision guided weapons including 14 GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOPs) over the course of 25 minutes. The MOPs were deployed against underground nuclear facilities at Natanz and Fordo. U.S. submarines launched over two dozen Tomahawk cruise missiles at the nuclear facility at Isfahan. In announcing the outcome of strikes, President Trump asserted that “Iran’s key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated” and that Iran “must make peace,” saying, “If peace does not come quickly, we will go after … other targets.”

Despite Washington’s declaration of “total obliteration,” experts continue to debate the extent to which the operation set back Iran’s nuclear program. Contradictions, concerning damage assessment and indeed, the very purpose of Iran’s nuclear programme, abound. To add confusion to the muddle, in the run-up to the Operation, American intelligence assessed that Iran “is not building a nuclear weapon” (as of 25 March 2025) and that the Supreme leader, Khamenei “has not reauthorized the nuclear weapons program that he suspended in 2003.” World leaders had urged restraint and de-escalation while underscoring the grave potential for escalation spiralling out of control.

Iran’s kinetic retaliation to Washington’s air-strikes was, in a sense, largely low-key in destructive impact but it signalled a disturbing willingness to enlarge the scope of conflict while severely damaging the credibility of the security umbrella that the USA had promised the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states. It, first, announced to the IAEA that the air strikes on nuclear facilities had in no way destabilised external radiation levels at Natanz, Fordo and Isfahan before formally suspending key cooperation and oversight of the Agency (IAEA); suggesting that critical elements of their nuclear programme were intact, particularly their stockpile of highly enriched uranium ( 60% +). Retaliatory strikes were launched in the form of drone and missile strikes to inflict damage on Israel together with kinetic attacks on the US base at Al-Udeid in Qatar to underscore its resolve to all stake holders particularly the regional players of the GCC states.

Targeting Qatar had left the GCC nations in a state of great anxiety; they had and continue to express formal statements of alarm in the wake of continued combat operations. Concerns have centred on the collapse of the principle of territorial sovereignty as enshrined in the UN Charter. All GCC states ironically, are clear that they do not condone US military strikes despite the prevalent hostility of Iran; while there is the strategic dilemma in attempting to balance this with the reality of their reliance on US security guarantees. But perhaps the most impactful fallout was Iran’s move to close the Strait of Hormuz.

The total Iranian casualties of the 12-day war (13 to 25 June 2025) included 1,190 killed and 4,475 injured, of these there were 35 assassinations of Iranian Commanders and 11 nuclear scientists.[3] While social scientists have underscored that the most pressing and, indeed, disturbing behavioural problem of our times is aggression and warfare; assassination continues to remain an unlawful murder or potential war crime in international law.

The Strategic Perspective

From a strategic point of view the conflict had global ramifications. Significant to our study is the impact on India and China. For India, which imports nearly 2 million barrels of oil daily through the Strait of Hormuz, instability translates to supply shortages, spiralling energy costs, rising inflation, uncertainties in markets and the commercial environment all having a detrimental fall-out on economic growth. 

India is highly vulnerable to global oil price volatility; a sustained surge in the conflict could trigger higher inflation, strain the fiscal balance, retard economic activity and shift investor sentiment towards more fungibles such as bonds and gold that not only offer more stability by serving as a hedge against inflation but also retains liquidity.

Demographically over 66% of India’s 1.34 crore non-resident Indians live in West Asia, mainly in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, and Bahrain. The large population could face hazards from regional tensions, making their safety a key priority for New Delhi. India’s key connectivity projects like the Chabahar port in Iran, which provides links to Afghanistan and Central Asia, is adversely affected by regional turmoil.

The India-Middle East-Economic Corridor (IMEC)  a visionary project faces risks from the conflict, threatening its progress and impacting global trade and regional economic dynamics. Additionally, disruptions and insecurity of the sea lines of communications cause delays, run-a-way insurance premiums, higher shipping costs and lead to instability in global trade. India has built robust relations with Israel, especially in areas like defence, technology, and innovation. However, as tensions escalate, India could find itself in a challenging position, facing pressure to take sides –an outcome it would prefer to avoid. 

 China as the largest purchaser of Iranian oil provides it with a vital economic lifeline amidst international sanctions. With the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, that supply line was severed leaving China to search for alternate sources; secondly the credibility of Beijing’s recently launched Global Security Initiative (GSI) that announced with much fanfare the normalisation of relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran now appeared rather fragile as Iran retaliated to the 25 June bombings by missile and drone attacks on American bases in the Persian Gulf including those in the Saudi kingdom. China’s aspirations for greater international leadership, central to the GSI, will remain an important feature of their diplomacy, at least as long as Xi Jinping remains in power. Although its vision of security governance, much less a future ‘world order’, remains vague and in many cases quite situational, its broad and flexible scope may have allowed Beijing to be opportunistic in finding ways to link it with the BRI. However this grand plan did not reckon with the White House’s intentions in West Asia. “Midnight Hammer” not only underscored Washington’s predominant influence in West Asia but it also put-paid to the GSI and very firmly left Beijing in the side lines.

There was to be no rapid end to the economic woes of the world caused by the conflict. For no intelligible reason (that has so far emerged), Washington, on 28 February 2026, launched Operation “Epic Fury” initially intended to bring about a rapid “regime change” in Iran.  

Operation Epic Fury: A War of Capricious Aims

On 28 February 2026 the United States of America along with Israel unleashed a massive military strike on Iran. Both allied Presidents of America and Israel called it a “pre-emptive strike”; what was being pre-empted and to what reasons has not so far been declared other than that the USA was pre-empting a strike by Israel on Iran  that would provoke an attack on US military installations in the Persian Gulf region (?). But to the world at large there neither was any compelling cause for the rapidly escalating carnage nor was there any apparent motivation for the scale of disruption and devastation being meted out to the entire region. Particularly so considering the magnitude and intensity of the joint military exertion that the two brought to bear on Iran. Within a matter of a week the inconceivable conflagration spread to the entire West Asian region shutting down, completely the flow of over 20% of the world’s energy demands. The Islamic Republican Guard Corps (IRGC) immediate response was closure of the Strait of Hormuz and persistent missile and drone strikes on American military bases in the hitherto neutral Gulf States. This foreseen yet unexpected development confounded Washington and Israel, while the global community was astounded at its ramifications; this despite American security guarantees to the Gulf Cooperation Council . Notwithstanding the assassination of Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and a host of targeted members of the Islamic Consultative Assembly, Military and Security leadership; the Regime did not fall. Washington then sought to justify the conflict as a ‘jus ad bellum’ a Just War, by calling to attention of the world community of the incidents when the Iranian regime over the previous four decades “engaged in a clear pattern of unprovoked aggression and direct and proxy attacks against Israel and the United States, while spending billions of dollars to operationalize its promise to destroy the former and continuously calling for death to the latter”; that conduct established the basis and operative context for combat operations Midnight Hammer and Epic Fury. But the Regime refused to fall; so the war aims were quickly altered, it now reads “to destroy Iranian offensive missiles, destroy Iranian missile production, destroy [Iran’s] navy and other security infrastructure,” and, finally, ensure that Iran “will never have nuclear weapons” (but had not Iran’s nuclear capability been totally obliterated in operation Midnight Hammer?)

Between 28 February and 05 May 2026, operation Epic Fury was prosecuted with great combat vigour by USA and Israel. Air-power and to a much lesser extent Sea power were committed to pulverize hundreds of command, leadership, military, strategic and economic targets all across Iran. While the IRGC responded with intensive drone and missile strikes on American logistic and operating bases in the Gulf region, West Asia and Israel. Operations were conducted in four phases:

  • Phase I (28 Feb to 08 March 2026) was dedicated to “assassinate top government and military leaders to bring about a situation when the regime would collapse,  eliminate once and for all Iran’s ambitions to obtain a nuclear weapon, to destroy its ballistic missile infrastructure and its offensive war-making potential.
  • Phase II (08 Mar to 23 Mar 2026) Efforts to open the Strait of Hormuz unconditionally to free maritime passage. This objective was never there initially since the Strait had never been closed, but soon after combat operations were launched control of the Strait became the primary aim of operations.
  • Phase III (23 Mar to 07 Apr 2026) The “Stop-Box-On” campaign. On 23 March USA announced that “war aims having been achieved discussions were on to end the conflict. Iran was given five days to reopen the Strait and was offered a 14-point plan to end the war.” Awkwardly neither was Israel included in the peace process nor was termination of on-going operations in Gaza and Lebanon a part of the Deal. Iran had till 07 April to accede and conform. In the event Iran did neither and came up with a deal of its own.
  •  Phase IV (07 Apr to 05 May). The end of a civilization-declaration, an unreal blockade and a chimeric peace. Washington’s 14 point agreement presented on 23 March included terms to lift all sanctions, reopening the Strait and re-building the nation.  The deadline for accession was to expire on 07 April. On that day peeved at the lack of response, Mr Trump declared on social media to the people of Iran “a whole civilisation will die tonight”. This declaration by any interpretation is an ‘incitement to genocide and as history has shown, words directed at the destruction of a people carry criminal weight’. In response Iran generated a counter agreement that dealt with three salient; lifting of all sanctions, war damage compensation of $300b and release of all frozen assets. As to the opening of the Strait, Iran’s position was that it was never closed prior to the conflict; closure was a function of America’s hollow distant blockade of Iranian ports. Notwithstanding, sporadic strikes and counter strikes continue.     

Wagging the Dog: Madness of this War

Although an attempt has been made to frame the furtherance of the conflict within four chronological phases of operations, clearly there were no such distinct boxes. The fact is that the conflict seems to be been driven not by the most dominant antagonist but by Israel. The aims of the allies differ in scope, geography and intensity. To Israel it was a continuation of what started on 07 Oct 2023 when the terrorist group Hamas carried a deadly assault on Israel  and therefore the scope of conflict included all of Iran’s proxies and the geographies of operations where they had moved into; portentously their nomadic concept of combat involve practically all sovereigns of West Asia.  On the other-hand for Washington it was payback-time for the strategic humiliation of the past and its consistent failure to bring Tehran to heel. Wisely, none of Washington’s traditional allies wanted any part of this war. Far too many such anomalies existed to find common cause when trying to make-sense of this on-going conflict.

To begin with what was Washington’s aim? And who was pre-empting who, not amongst the antagonists, but between the allies; Israel and the USA? If Iran’s nuclear capability had been obliterated on 21 June 2025, during Operation “Midnight Hammer” why had it become central to the conflict in February 2026? Opening of the Strait of Hormuz and its control was never a part of the strategic aim, since it was never closed at the start of the conflict; so why is its control dominating the course of combat today? Why was the girl’s school at Minab struck in the horrific aerial bombardment of 28 February, it caused the massacre of over one hundred and fifty six children and staff, was this an accident? Particularly since it was the result of deliberate planning, preparation, intelligence gathering and targeting; it was significantly to be hit in the first wave of strikes.

An F-15 E fighter aircraft was shot down on 03 April in the vicinity of Isfahan; during the next two days, a massive “supposedly rescue” operation was launched which involved the loss of 2x Special Forces C-130 each with troop carrying capacity of up to 92 combat troops each, 4x combat rescue helicopters. A total of 155 aircrafts participated in the operation which included fighters, bombers and surveillance aircrafts; what is not clear is the size and disproportionate make-up of the force for a rescue mission particularly since the mission on 03 April by the F-15 E remains a mystery.

Casualties in the on-going operations include over 3,500 Iranians dead and about 26,500 injured and on the American side as of July 2026, seventeen military personnel killed and 420 injured.[4] While material and economic losses on the Iran side exceeds $270 billion which includes military and civilian infrastructure the bulk of their Navy and Air Force; while America lost over $30 billion in terms of military hardware including 42 combat aircrafts and excessive damage to 17 military Bases in West Asia valued at approximately $800m. Israel on the other hand has suffered structural losses to infrastructure of close to $11.52b. On a global scale, world GDP has reduced roughly by 0.3%. Worst hit are oil dependent nations whose growth is powered by consistent supply lines and stable oil markets such as China, India, Brazil and the European economies.

While speaking to reporters on 05 May 2026, amidst children, President Trump ranted, “We would have had Iran with a nuclear weapon, and maybe we wouldn’t all be here right now, I can tell you, the Middle East would have been gone. Israel would have been gone, and they would have trained their sights on Europe first and then us, because they’re sick people. These are sick people, and we’re not going to let lunatics have a nuclear weapon. The power of a nuclear weapon is something I don’t even want to talk about. It’s not going to happen. And we have beaten them badly.” Surely then, the 07 April “promise that a whole civilization will die tonight” must equally be the words of lunacy.       

 Logic of Limited Wars: Unfortunate Conclusion of King Pyrrhus

The logic of a limited war is the use of military force to bring about a change in specific behaviour, seize control of action in a specific domain, all in a limited time period, using limited resources and waging the war within restraints of intensity. All five considerations have either not been met or just partially in the on-going war and awkwardly White House leadership cannot make up its mind whether the war is over or not. The seemingly aimless nature of the sporadic yet intense conflict may have left the observer in awe, but facts suggest to the dominant protagonist that the conflict is going in no controllable direction and the motivation to pursue the engagement is fast fading.

Can this be a modern day variant of the battle of Asculum (279 BCE) which has been immortalised in the phrase a ’Pyrrhic’ victory? In which case it is time for POTUS to realise, at least now, as the Greek King, Pyrrhus put it so lamely “If we win another (victory) like this, we will be ruined.” That ‘another-such-victory-like-this’ for Washington, will bring about not just a fall in its standing; but also a collapse in its economy and the nation’s will. Perhaps it is time to once again declare victory and bring about a closure to this conflict (the efforts to a ceasefire are heading nowhere). The alternative being a redux of yet another endless, futile and a wasteful war such as was in Vietnam, Iraq and more recently in Afghanistan.  

And what of Iran? Will it fall into the dystopian Political Geography of 1984?  Into the grips of Oceania, Eurasia and Eastasia? A region of perpetual low grade warfare to feed into Orwell’s Newspeak narrative of ‘permanent peace’? Or will it stand-up as a true civilizational state and lift itself from this self-destructive morass and find its destiny in an era of reconciliation and progress?                            

[1] This quote is from French foreign affairs analyst Joël-François Dumont, writing in the online journal https://european-security.com/. The writing here is in the style and “orientation” of Charles de Gaulle. Of this quote Dumont writes, “This text was put into perspective for our series “Great Witnesses of History.” It is intended as a synthetic restitution of Gaullist thought applied to current issues, developed from the memoirs and landmark speeches of General de Gaulle.” For more see https://european-security.com/en/the-twilight-of-nations-memoirs-of-a-foretold-disaster-2/ 

[2] See here for a concise timeline of events: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/middle_east-jan-june10-timeline

[3] These numbers are from HRANA, Human Rights Activists in Iran, a “non-political and non-governmental organization comprised of advocates who defend human rights in Iran.” HRAI was founded in 2005. https://www.en-hrana.org/twelve-days-under-fire-a-comprehensive-report-on-the-iran-israel-war/

[4] See Al Jazeera report on casualites https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/7/20/what-we-know-about-us-soldiers-killed-in-iran-war-and-iranian-casualties

Economic Warfare: Keeping Visible the Iron Fist

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Vice Admiral (retd.) Vijay Shankar

This article is forthcoming in the Centre for Joint Warfare Studies’ Journal Synergy.

Download full article here: Shankar_Economic_Warfare

Keywords: Economic Warfare, Economic Sanctions, Sanctions: Cuba, Iraq, Iran, Perpetual peace, Military and Political Economy

Abstract: The foundational weakness with all ‘open-access’ nations to this day is that Markets do not work well unless governments get out of them, at the same time Markets do not work at all unless governments get into them using power to stabilise. Herein lies the inseparable linkage between Markets and Power, both are joined at the hip and any system that seeks to operate one without the other or recognises one for the other is destined to crash.

Excerpts: 

Perpetual Peace: Economics the Rejoinder to the Waste of War

By 1793, a Europe sickened by colonial massacres and the bloodshed of the past three centuries of debilitating imperial wars saw in the aftermath of the American Revolution an impulse to transcend war. George Washington wrote from his experiences of the war of independence “it is time for the age of Knight-Errantry and mad heroism to be at an end,” because “the humanizing benefits of commerce, would supersede the waste of war and the rage of conquest; … as the Scripture expresses it, ‘the nations learn war no more’.”[i]

Washington’s declaration inspired the German philosopher Immanuel Kant to pen an essay in 1795, titled Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical sketch. The essay, in its preliminary articles, described a proposed global order that in inception was defined by a renunciation of arms, strategic military treaties and violence as an arbitrator of conflicts. His succeeding formulations were founded on three pillars; firstly, the civil constitution of every nation be democratic, similar and based on open-access egalitarian principles; secondly, law of nations would be founded on a federation of Free Sates and thirdly guarantees of discord resolution between States would be settled through the “natural course of human propensities” identified as restraints intrinsic to the mercantile spirit, the power of money, the weight of majority commercial interests and should the need arise, economic injunctions. Central to Kant’s treatise was the belief ‘that war would be no more’[ii].

Perpetual Peace, attempted to underscore the indispensible condition for lasting peace. Even to this day despite its idealism it remains very influential. However, in its day, before the ink was dry on Kant’s thesis, ground realities asserted that there was something drastically skewed with the arguments. Far from ushering in perpetual peace, the economics of republicanism plunged Europe into competition and wars. France, without too much deliberation, transformed its internal peoples revolution (which in 1794 had slaughtered a quarter of million of its citizenry) to a peoples war of imperial conquest. While the continuing carnage in the ‘new lands’ built colonial empires which generated wealth to fund wars and surpluses which gave rise to new and lethal technologies. This in turn demanded innovative military doctrines and developed organisational skills that set off a string of irresistible revolutions in military affairs that eventually paved the way for the World Wars of the 20th century. So much for the reality of commerce and economics providing a basis for bloodless conflict resolution.

Marriage of the Invisible Hand with the Very Visible Iron Fist

Laissez-faire was a political as well as an economic doctrine of minimum governmental interference in the economic affairs of individuals and society. The origin of the term is uncertain, but folklore suggests that it is derived from a reply given by a French industrialist when asked what the Louis XIV government could do to help business: “Leave us alone” he retorted. Laissez-faire is usually associated with the economists who flourished in France from about 1756 to 1778. The policy of laissez-faire received strong support in classical economics as it developed in Great Britain under the influence of economist and philosopher Adam Smith. The pervading theory of the 19th century was that the individual, pursuing his own desired ends, would thereby achieve the best results for the society of which he was a part. The function of the State was to maintain order and security and to avoid interference with the initiative of the individual in pursuit of his own desired goals. But laissez-faire advocates nonetheless argued that government had an essential role in enforcing contracts as well as ensuring civil order. Smith also laid the intellectual framework that explained the free market. He is most often associated with the expression “the invisible hand,” which he used to describe the self-regulating behaviour of the marketplace and demonstrate how self-interest guided the most efficient use of resources and provides balance to the economy of a country, with public welfare coming as a by-product.[iii] To underscore his laissez-faire convictions, Smith argued that the State and personal efforts to promote social good are ineffectual compared to unbridled market forces.

In the context of the vast, and for most, savage imperial enterprise that Europe unleashed in the 18th and 19th centuries, the matter of unbridled ‘market forces’ had manifold meanings. To the colonies where, Europe’s expansion into their worlds had transited from commercial and cultural equality to exploitative hegemony and finally to direct rule; market forces translated to loot, subjugation, slavery, lopsided indigenous economies and monopolies; making conquest and denying it to competitors, the new and most copious source of wealth.

The ‘invisible hand’ of the 19th century had a curious handmaiden, ‘the very visible Iron fist’. This lethal combination created capital on an inconceivable scale along with vast undivided apathetic governments (Hobbes’ Leviathan), organised armies and massive bureaucracies. Significant to our study is the emergence of another power tool of coercion and this was ‘political economics’.

Political Economics: A Branch of State Craft

The phrase political economics is not new, however it lost its essence through history and was replaced by ‘economics’ (literally in Greek to mean ‘run the household’) a more precise and formal scientific notion which stood for the mathematical study of the processes that govern production, distribution and consumption of goods and services. And yet, what differentiates is that political economics as an idea places economics in a position inseparable from politics and gives it a much more expansive span as an essential branch of state craft organised within the larger scope of a nation’s comprehensive power. It endows states with the capacity to selectively influence economic processes both internal and external; with it comes the potential to coerce and control political orientation of challengers and competitors.[iv]

Political economic analysis examines the strategic pressures and interests that affect policies and how these pressures influence the political process, taking into account a range of interests, international environment, competing strategies and philosophical perspectives. In particular, analysis takes into account how non belligerent aspects of national power can be leveraged as a strategy to influence the pattern of economic growth or bring about sought after biases in the global system. This terminology in large part reflects the belief that economics is not really separable from politics. More than just a semantic classification of disciplines; it arose from the widespread view that economic factors are crucial in determining political outcomes. Hence, as a discipline political economics historically viewed economic forces not only as influencing politics, but often as the principal determinant when military power reached its “Culminating Point”. Our examination will therefore be better served by keeping this framework in perspective.

Culminating Point of Military Power

Success in the application of power results from the availability of superior strength. However, as Clausewitz pointed out, when power is a function of physical force only, then it gradually diminishes with continued application and beyond a point the scales are turned and the reaction that follows is with a force stronger than that of the original force applied.[v] Events in Vietnam, Soviet Union and more recently in Afghanistan and Iraq would suggest that not only had military power extended beyond the culminating point, but reached a chapter when reaction resulted in strategic losses that outweighed gains originally envisaged.

Indeed the history of contemporary wars has made planners question the efficacy of violence as an unconditional arbiter of friction between states. This is not because of any abstract concepts or illusion of happy endings but more on account of three very good reasons:

  • The disproportionate destructive and disruptive promise that violence holds to all sides.
  • The diminishing existence of any such thing as a productive war.
  • The mounting reluctance of rational governments to employ radical means to alter the status-quo.

The dilemma about wars that societies face today are twofold, while wars in the past created larger, wealthier and more organised communities and governments, “it today has got so good at fighting and our weapons so destructive that war is beginning to make further war of this kind impossible”.[vi] The utility of military power may have reached a culminating point when the suppression of violence demands less destructive solutions than what brute military power offers. In this context it would be interesting to examine if the concept of economic autarky provides a satisfactory retort.

[…]

The Curious Case of Cuba

The United States embargo against Cuba is a commercial, financial and economic ban. It began on 19 October 1960 (almost two years after the Batista regime was deposed by the) when the US prohibited exports to Cuba. On 7 February 1962 this was extended to include almost all imports. Currently, the US embargo is enforced through six statutory US instruments: the Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917, the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, the Cuba Assets Control Regulations of 1963, the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992, the Helms-Burton Act of 1996, and the Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Act of 2000.[vii] The Cuban Democracy Act was signed into law in 1992. This was significant for its opprobrium, for not only did it degrade the idea of choice of self governance but was also intriguing in rationale. The Law stands in direct opposition to the right of self determination, a cardinal principle of International Law, which has been sanctified by United Nations General Assembly Resolution1514 (XV). The Cuban Democracy Act’ stated purpose is to maintain sanctions on Cuba so long as the Cuban government refuses to move towards “democratization and respect for human rights”. Quite clearly the law was expected to be defied and Cuba was condemned to a slow economic haemorrhage.

To understand the magnitude of the embargo certain macro economic figures make the enormity clear. In 1958 US investments in Cuba amounted to near $ 2 billion, which was more than 25% of all US investment in Latin and South America; Cuba’s GDP at that time was $ 20 billion and per capita GDP was $3170 (approximately the same as Japan in that period).[viii] The economic blood loss becomes clear.

Despite the Cuban government referring to the embargo by the Spanish term bloqueo (blockade) which by international law is an act of war there was neither a formal declaration nor public censure. The embargo includes foreign countries that trade with Cuba who could be held liable and penalised by the U.S. However Cuba has and continues to conduct international trade with many third-party countries. The awkward irony is that Cuba has been a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) since 1995.

To date, US-Cuba relations remain frozen and the latter also remains designated as a State Sponsor of Terrorism by the United States Department of State. The UN has with ineffective monotony, passed a resolution every year since 1992 condemning the ongoing impact of the embargo and declaring it to be in violation of the Charter of the United Nations and international law. Human rights groups have also been critical of the embargo as too harsh, citing the fact that violations can result in 10 years in prison. In an absurd reversal, some critics bemoan the economic price on the United States itself, as 10 different agencies are in charge of overseeing the embargo resulting in further government bureaucracy and debt. Despite the massive effort the U.S. puts into the embargo, Cuba still benefits from trade and tourism from all other major countries, making the embargo a pointless egoistic labour. Still others say that the embargo places an unnecessary stress on Caribbean politics, and that the U.S.’s resources would be better served through re-establishing relations with Cuba. In short economic warfare waged against Cuba has been an utter failure on all counts despite having been imposed by the global ‘policeman’.

The Cuban case suggests to any prospective instigator of economic warfare six critical considerations:

  • In a globalised and networked world, economic warfare does not work when stretched over protracted periods (half a century in Cuba’s case) even when a vast differential in power and influence exists between protagonists.
  • Economic sanctions and embargoes must relate to a strategic environment and must be linked to time and effects if they are to produce a desired outcome.
  • There must also be a Plan B that defines conditions when a back down becomes the best option.
  • Protracted embargoes can be frustrated by increased trade between defiant nations unwilling to cooperate. In the absence of objectivity and resolve, economic warfare loses meaning, promotes sanction busting, has a reverse deleterious effect and degenerates to ineptness on the part of the instigator of the embargo. Both Cuba and Iran are studies in point. In a multi-polar world the situation gets further vitiated.
  • Although economic warfare is often considered a relatively inexpensive complement or alternative to military engagement, it imposes costs on the initiating country by denying it access to economic exchange with the targeted country.
  • The brunt of the impact of economic sanctions is unfortunately and ultimately borne by the civilian populace.

Military Power a Necessary Adjunct to the Invisible Hand

Relying just on the invisible hand of the market rather than integrating it with the Iron fist of military power in the hope that the target dispensation will crumble and alter its political and economic orientation, is a forlorn expectation. Far from breaking the country apart the crisis becomes an opportunity to push political centralization further and a rallying point that polarises international opinion as in Cuba’s case.

Under certain circumstances, introducing military power deliberately combined with an embargo may offer rapid results, provided its entry is marked with a focussed aim that targets the oppositions centre of gravity.[ix] The effectiveness of economic warfare is also limited by the ability of the adversary’s government to redistribute sufficient domestic wealth toward the military or other institutions to compensate for reductions in capability caused by the loss of the restricted goods. In the 1990s, for example, economic warfare against Iraq and North Korea did not substantially reduce the military threat posed by those countries because both were able to direct their limited economic resources toward their militaries. Critics of economic warfare have argued that it often imposes greater costs on the general population of the adversary e.g., through starvation, the spread of disease, or the denial of basic humanitarian goods, as it did in Iraq, than it does on its political or military leaders. At which time military power may be the more appropriate instrument to bring about political reorientation.

Conclusion

A resurgence of the concept of Political Economics puts into stark relief the contemporary state of global order and the stresses that competing interests place on it. The reluctance of nations to willingly subordinate their regional concerns to stability, well and truly, hammers the last nail into the coffin of a universal system that is defined by a renunciation of arms and an acceptance of the mercantile spirit as a strategic arbitrator of conflicts. The foundational weakness with all ‘open-access’ nations to this day is that Markets do not work well unless governments got out of them, at the same time Markets do not work at all unless governments got into them using power to stabilise. Herein lies the inseparable linkage between Markets and Power, both are joined at the hip and any system that seeks to operate one without the other or recognises one for the other is destined to crash.

Military power and its application has not quite reached that point of culmination when it is good for nothing; at the same time economic power does not have the gravitas to bring about perpetual peace, at least not quite as yet. In the circumstance prudence will suggest that the interest of stability would best be served if the Invisible Hand of economic power be tempered by the Visible Iron Fist.

Download full article here: Shankar_Economic_Warfare

End Notes

[i] Washington, George. Letter to Marquis de Chastellux, 25 April, 1788.

[ii] Kant, Immanuel. Perpetual Peace a Philosophical Sketch 1795, translated by M Campbell Smith. George Allen and Unwin Ltd London, 1903, p 106-158.

[iii] Smith, Adam. The Wealth of Nations, W Strahan & T Cadell, London 1776,Book IV Chapter 2 Para IX.

[iv] Author’s definition.

[v] Clausewitz, Carl Von. On War, Princeton University Press, 1976, p 528.

[vi] Morris, Ian.War Profile Books, London 2014, p 9, 65-111 and 259-271.

[vii] Amnesty International. The US embargo on Cuba its impact on economic and social rights. Amnesty International Publications,2009, UK.

[viii] Statistics extracted from UN,WHO and ILO figures for 1958. Other sources: Bank of Cuba,US Department of Commerce and Investments in Cuba by HC McCcllelan 1956.

[ix] Clausewitz, Carl Von, in his work On War develops the concept of Centre of Gravity of a State as the source of power that provides it moral or physical strength, freedom of action, or will to act.

Syria: “loosening the blood-dimmed tide”*

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by

Arundhati Ghose

This article was first published in the August 2012 issue of Defence and Security Alert. 

An anniversary issue gives one an opportunity to step back from viewing the ebb and flow of the current and to take a wider view from a not-too-distant shore, and to try and read the portents of the welling of the sea, the threatening of a tidal wave. A ‘tide’, for some accuracy, has been variously described primarily as ‘the alternate rising and falling of the sea due to the attraction of the moon and sun’ and ‘a powerful surge of feeling or trend of events.’ Today, events in the Middle East in general, and in Syria in particular, is viewed  by most commentators mainly through immediate and bloody events, with different interpretations of these events by countries with differing goals. India’s votes in the UN, with the Arab League and the West in the Security Council and abstaining in the vote in the General Assembly, have been judged from this perspective, reflective of a short or medium term judgement of India’s interests. But what if the tide swells and spreads, what if it becomes a global tsunami and the “Syrian moment’, as it were, becomes as portentous as the assassination, almost a hundred years ago, in Sarajevo? The likelihood is no longer only a probability; there are currents that would seem to make this a near and ‘blood-dimmed’ certainty.

Without going into pre-history, which one would have to if the issues were related purely to religious sectarian rivalries, or indeed only political and ideological ones, (after all, it has long been conventional wisdom that the next world wide war would start in the Middle East)-it would have to be admitted that the faultlines becoming apparent today might be traced to  years more recent, when ambitions for power and control began to be stoked by the sudden and almost unexpected wealth created by the first oil shock in the 1970s and the interventions by outside powers upset delicate balances in complex regional rivalries. What started as diplomatic jostling for leadership  within the Ummah between Saudi Arabia, made newly powerful not merely by immense oil wealth but  by its courting as a power in global affairs by the established old powers of the West, and the Iran of the Shah who saw a revival of dreams of the Persian Empire of old, injected the concept of ‘political Islam’ into international discourse. The use of ‘political Islam’ to oust the failing Soviet rule over Afghanistan, encouraged in part by the Iranian revolution that saw the establishment of a purely theocratic State, engendered the arming and funding of disparate groups, which were led to believe they were in the vanguard of defending Islam against the atheist. As the Soviet Union withdrew, these groups were lauded as ‘mujahideen’ victors of the war for Islam.

Into this fragile situation, the second Gulf  War and the invasion of Iraq led to consequences which are today determining the outlines of the current crises- in the Arab world in general and in Syria in particular. Whether the US could have, should have or whether it ignored the possibility of these consequences is not the issue here: there is no doubt the there were at least three major consequences which unsettled such stability as had existed in the region before the invasion. These were , at a level, the  so-called Arab Spring, the hardening of the Shia-Sunni divide within the Ummah and the  emergence of Iran as a regional power.

According to some  influential Arab commentators, the ease with which Saddam Hussein’s regime was dismantled-with foreign intervention, to be sure, was an important factor in the impulses which resulted in the revolt of the peoples of Tunisia, Egypt and Libya-three neighbouring but very different countries – against the dictatorial though secular regimes in these countries. Iraq had also been a ‘secular’ country, though a Sunni minority formed the elite in power and the majority Shia were ruthlessly suppressed.  The equally ruthless dismantling of the structures of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq by the American occupation forces, turned Iraq into a Shia majority country closely allied to Iran. The introduction of religion, specifically the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood into the governing structures of these countries was also presaged by the changes in Iraq. The new element making the mixture more complex has been the use of the social media when mainstream media faced controls; this has caused concerns in other States, and not only those of centralized States such as China.

All these trends have coalesced in Syria, where the Shia-Sunni divide has divided the Arab world and threatens to spill over world-wide. Turkey, which had envisaged a leadership role for itself following the early days after the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, presenting itself as a ‘model’ of a democratic, modern Islamic State, has found its support for the Sunni rebels in Syria being challenged not only among its Alevi (Alawite-Shia) minority- 15% of its population, but threats from Syrian Kurds who have been trying to make common cause with the Turkish Kurds (20% of its population). Syria is reported to have ceded control over several areas in its north to its Kurds, with the latter raising the Kurdish flag over governmental buildings. Turkey has reportedly joined Arab Sunni States like Saudi Arabia and Qatar in funding and arming and providing ‘safe havens’ for the opposition ‘rebels.’ There are credible reports that many of these ‘rebels’ are not Syrian, but an unholy mix of  Sunni  Chechens. Pakistanis, Bangladeshis and Yemenis, with groups of al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood among the more organized elements in the otherwise  disorganized Free Syrian Army. It cannot be discounted that the Kurds are similarly supported by Syria and Iran. Shia Iraq has its own problems with its Kurds, but the country has been more supportive of Arab Shia Syria than other Sunni members of the Arab League. Sunnis and Alawites are already fighting in Lebanon with Hezbollah threatening armed retaliation if Syria were to be attacked and Jordan is on the edge.

Syria’s strongest regional supporter is, of course, Iran. The strengthening of Iran is also a direct consequence of the collapse of the Sunni led regime of Saddam Hussein. That the current hostilities between both major sects poses a threat to Islamic unity, vis-à-vis the US and the West for Iran, and from movements to topple established regimes from Saudi Arabia, seems to have been recognized by both countries; the recent personal invitation to the Iranian President from the Saudi King to the emergency session of the OIC, the high level composition of the Iranian delegation, the seating of Ahmedinejad on the right of King Abdullah might indicate some back-room efforts to stabilize the situation. Iran is also reported to have announced that it had a proposal to sort out the situation in Syria at (at the time of writing) the forthcoming NAM Summit to be held in Iran would seem to be a pointer in this direction. However, given that the situation has now several non-regional countries and non-state actors involved, any such attempt might be difficult to implement.

Iran of course faces challenges on two fronts- in the Syrian situation and, long predating even the invasion of Iraq, with Israel, the US and the West over  Iran’s alleged determination to develop nuclear weapons. Today, whether for domestic political reasons or not, Israel appears to be straining at the leash to mount an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities; faced with an impending election, the US, in an effort to restrain such a disastrous step, has tightened sanctions on Iran almost effectively isolating Iran economically. In Syria, the US sees an opportunity to weaken Iran further and has supported the Sunni Arabs and Turkey, even threatening military action in the event Syria uses or even moves its chemical weapons, in addition to other support already being extended to the so-called ‘rebels’. Action against Syria under the aegis of the UN has been effectively stalled by vetoes by both Russia and China. Apart from Russia’s close friendship with Syria, the experience of NATO action in Libya and its fear of Chechen militants becoming empowered to act in Central Asia, the many initiatives taken by Russia would seem to signal a more assertive global role by Putin’s Russia. China has been less active, but has consistently opposed the involvement of outside powers to effect regime change using the UN for military action. Some China watchers feel that China is being cautious , as officially, at least, it has cited the Libyan case; it is possible that it would change its stance once its change of guard is smoothly accomplished in October. Others feel that not withstanding its global stature, there is a degree of nervousness about possible external incitement in its restive provinces of Tibet and Xinjiang. Whatever the reasons, the world is gradually becoming divided as the impact of the trends in the Middle East as a whole but in Syria in particular, starts spilling over outside the region, even into Africa.

The tide has started lapping at our shores; Malaysia has suspended its diplomatic relations with Syria after the OIC suspended Syria’s membership and Pakistan, where sectarian violence is endemic, and which has been seen by many commentators as the epicentre for the export of terrorists, has seen a rise in the hunting down of minorities especially Shias. Indeed, India’s stake in stability in the region has increased manifold.

The Syrian crisis cannot be easily disentangled from the ones facing Iran; if one looks at some of the albeit worst case scenarios, any military action against Iran or against Syria even be declaring ‘no-fly zones as proposed by France, would have major global spill-over effects. The forces that have been loosed would almost certainly spread to territories outside the Middle East. This would also be the case if the perilous geopolitical situation described earlier, continues at the current bloody levels. Taking an overview of the situation, it appears that, unlike other recent crises-Iraq and Afghanistan, the major powers are no longer the major determinant of a possible solution: today, most US positions seem to be taken in the throes of Presidential election fever, tempered into trying to ensure that while Iran can be weakened by a Syrian implosion with the provision of a limited number of arms to the ‘rebels’, Israeli hawks need to be restrained from actually attacking Iran. The UK and France are merely mischief-makers, with little power to act on their own; given the stalemate in the Security Council, they (and Turkey) may try to energise NATO, as in the case with Libya. In the Lybian case, however, the centrality of the West in settling disputes in the Middle East had already started to erode, presaged by the split within NATO on the issue of Iraq. Russia and China may have the veto, but China is unlikely to get directly involved, given its clashing ideological and economic interests in the region and Russia is hardly likely to have the stamina of facing down the West and the Sunni world alone. The crucial countries in a possible solution are Iran and Saudi Arabia.

The forces of extremist groups which were let loose in Afghanistan, have gained in power and ambition. India has been subject to their vicious depredation for decades. There is no doubt that in addition to India’s own economic interests and its expatriate population in the Gulf, the dangers of a Global War of Terror would pose extreme challenges to India’s security, should it, as it is bound to, if the worst case scenarios happen- unless India, having first-hand experience of dealing with these forces, at least tries to do more that merely ride out the storm. One possible direction could be for India to mediate between Iran and Saudi Arabia- the countries that have the power to limit the stalemate or escalation.  It is just possible that, notwithstanding the public action of the OIC, given the unusual cordiality of the interaction between the King of Saudi Arabia and the Iranian President at the OIC meeting in Riyadh, some deal was negotiated; at the very least, it is clear that both countries would see a continuation of the Syrian crisis as being harmful to themselves and to the Ummah. All India would need to do would be to support the initiative and press for its implementation-on whatever lines agreed to – by both countries. If there is any give on the part of both, and, India could use the challenges she faces at the moment in the current situation, as bilateral leverages for encouragement, other countries, the US and Russia, for example ,could also be asked to support an Iranian-Saudi led solution.

If we fail, there is near certainty that the war will go global- and unlike any of the earlier World Wars, it will be a war without clearly defined armies, State against State, State against non-State actors and non-state actors against other similar groups with no loyalties except to their own ambitions. It will be a war without end.

[*] W.B.Yeats: The Second Coming

“Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.”

About the Author:

Ambassador Arundhati Ghose joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1963. She worked in various capacities in the Embassies of India in Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium and The Netherlands; and as Ambassador of India to the Republic of Korea, Ambassador and Permanent Representative to UNESCO; Ambassador of India to Egypt; Ambassador and Permanent Representative of India to UN Offices in Geneva, and the Conference on Disarmament. After retiring from the foreign service in November 1997, Ambassador Ghose served as Member, UPSC (1998-2004); Member and Chairman of UN Secretary General’s Disarmament Advisory Board (1998-2001); Member from India on Committee for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (2004-2005); Member of Executive Council, IDSA (2004-2007) and functioned for two years as Chairman of its Programme Committee and as member of the task force on non-proliferation and disarmament set up by the MEA in 2007. She is currently Adjunct Fellow at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bangalore and on the editorial Board of the journal Faultlines, New Delhi. The Ambassador has contributed chapters to books and articles in journals and newspapers on nuclear issues, disarmament and has been invited to speak at various fora on these and related topics.