Brian M Downing
In the past few years, bombings and assassinations have taken place inside Iran that have killed scores of people. These attacks are almost certainly directed by Israeli, Saudi and US intelligence services which are pressing Iran to open its nuclear research facilities to international inspection.
In recent weeks, Iran has decried terrorism around the world (somewhat paradoxically, to be sure), put up a clumsy plot to assassinate a Saudi ambassador, boasted of its missile strength, and briefly seized the British Embassy in Tehran – an act done not by students as with the US Embassy in 1979, but by toughs of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).
The increasingly aggressive nature of these responses suggest the rising ire of the Iranian government, the political ascendancy of the IRGC, and most ominously, the likelihood of sharper hostilities in the region. Iran is signaling the possibility of violent responses well beyond the quotidian rocket attacks on Israel from Hamas and Hezbollah.
These could include encouraging Shi’ite uprisings in the Gulf, attacking US personnel in the region, and embarking on its own wave of bombings against Israel and its US and Saudi allies.
The Shi’ites in the region
The Gulf region has a large Shi’ite population, many of whom constitute majorities in countries ruled by Sunnis. The Shi’ites complain of discrimination in employment and education and seethe at official policies encouraging foreign Sunnis to immigrate into the country to reduce the Shi’ite preponderance.
Such complaints were oft heard in the Arab Spring demonstrations in Bahrain, where on little if any evidence they were judged acts of Iranian subterfuge and harshly repressed. Similar complaints in Shi’ite parts of Saudi Arabia were tamped down last March before they could coalesce into a movement. A legitimate indigenous civil rights movement was squelched and this has piqued the interests of Iranian intelligence.
Yemen, approximately 50% Shi’ite, is amid an uncertain transition to a new president, which is not the same as a new regime. Saudi Arabia and other Sunni powers have negotiated President Ali Abdallah Saleh’s departure but Yemenis suspect an Egyptian-style ploy and the Shi’ites may be open to Iranian influence.
This is especially so in Yemen’s north, which abuts with a Shi’ite region of Saudi Arabia and which already has an armed Shi’ite movement. These Houthi fighters operate along the border with Saudi Arabia and occasionally engage Saudi forces. Iran may seek to encourage the Houthis to expand into Saudi territory and build ties with Shi’ites there.
Shi’ites in the Eastern province of Saudi Arabia have renewed their demonstrations against discrimination. Whether they have done so under Iranian influence or as a result of encouraging events in Libya and Syria is uncertain. Saudi intelligence, however, will have no doubt of IRGC’s hand, nor will they need evidence to form their conclusion and act upon it.
A Shi’ite uprising in Yemen or Saudi Arabia is unlikely, but so is a judicious response from Riyadh to any unrest that does come about. This in turn may only lead to more covert actions in Iran and harsher oppression in Saudi Arabia.
Iraq
United States troops are scheduled to be out of Iraq in four weeks, which maybe be seen as making them an unlikely target. Alternately, they can be seen as one that should be struck soon. It might be remembered that the last Soviet convoy that exited Afghanistan in 1989 suffered attacks until it crossed into the USSR, though the withdrawal had United Nations sanctioning. Beyond the first of the year, there will be US Embassy staff, training missions, and clandestine personnel.
Another response in Iraq would be against the Sunni forces of the central region which have been waging a bombing campaign on Shi’ite targets – government and civilian – for several months now. The Shi’ite have endured this campaign with remarkable and uncharacteristic forbearance, leading some analysts to think a harsh response may be in the offing once the US ground forces are no longer in position to intervene.
The Sunni forces are likely influenced by Saudi intelligence, which seeks to block a feared Shi’ite axis stretching into Lebanon and to establish an autonomous Sunni region in Iraq if not a wholly independent one, perhaps adjoined to a new Sunni-dominated Syria. The potential for sectarian warfare spilling over into Syria and Lebanon is clear and ominous.
US forces in Afghanistan and the Gulf
Iran already gives limited support, in the form of explosives and training, to Afghan insurgents, including the Taliban. This is not out of ideological affinity or broad strategic interests. Iran despises the Taliban as an intolerant Sunni movement that slaughtered tens of thousands of Shi’ites and killed a number of Iranian diplomats as well.
In the latest atrocity to inflict Afghan, 58 people were killed on Tuesday in a suicide bombing at a crowded Kabul shrine on the most important day in the Shi’ite calendar. At least 150 people were wounded when the bomb exploded in a throng of worshippers, including women and children, in a street between the Abul Fazl shrine and the Kabul River. A second bomb, which killed four people in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif, also targeted pilgrims on their way to mark the holy festival of Ashura.
In this case, Sunni militants from Pakistani group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi al-Alami claimed responsibility in a phone call to Radio Mashaal, a Pashto-language station set up by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. The group has close links to al-Qaeda.
Iran works against the Taliban as well by supporting development programs in the north and west where Tajik and Hazara peoples have long had cultural and political ties to Iran and deep hatred of the Taliban.
Nonetheless, Iran may increase support for the insurgents as a means of punishing the US and deterring further attacks inside Iran, especially on its nuclear facilities. Iran can provide more weapons to insurgents, possibly to include shoulder-fired antiaircraft missiles such as the Stingers given to the mujahideen.
Iran purchased a few Stingers from the mujahideen back in the eighties and copied them, with unclear success. The importance of the Stingers in the Soviet war has been greatly overstated in Central Intelligence Agency cant (Soviet pilots altered their tactics and avoided the missiles) but their use in Afghanistan would be unsettling in Washington.
Iran could venture to deploy Qods Force troops into Afghanistan to destroy aid projects, ambush troops, and interdict International Security Assistance Force convoys coming into the southern part of the country from Chaman and Spin Boldak in western Pakistan, not far from Iranian soil. Such convoys are of course already subject to intermittent stoppages by the Pakistani army.
The US’s present antagonisms with the Pakistani generals offer an opening for Iranian diplomacy. Iran could offer more favorable terms for gas and pipeline projects and support for Pakistani interests and aspirations in Afghanistan. In return, Pakistan could further restrict foreign troop convoys into Afghanistan.
The US naval presence in the Persian Gulf offers numerous possibilities. The Fifth Fleet facilities in Bahrain are within missile range, at least one carrier group is always inside the Gulf, and support ships routinely transit the Straits of Hormuz. All would be vulnerable to Iranian aircraft, missiles, and ships – especially if “swarming” tactics were used. Pentagon war-gaming of such attacks has reportedly been less than assuring.
Even a brief skirmish in the Gulf would send oil prices soaring on world markets, perhaps 15% in a day or two. Many economies would be adversely affected and world opinion might not side with Iran’s opponents in affixing blame. Paradoxically, soaring prices would be a boon for Tehran.
Non-diplomatic efforts to press Iran to abandon its nuclear program have thus far been unsuccessful. They are getting out of control and are leading to violent retaliation and regional conflict.
The efforts are also firming government and popular support for nuclear research. They are also solidifying IRGC power in the state and changing Iran from a theocracy with a zealous military to a military-dominated bureaucracy with a clerical body legitimizing it. And militaries often prefer violent actions to diplomatic ones.
Brian M Downing is a political/military analyst and author of The Military Revolution and Political Change and The Paths of Glory: War and Social Change in America from the Great War to Vietnam.