The United
States’ decision to involve its military so heavily in the Middle East has been
driven by the underlying motive of
countering Iran since the U.S. lost complete control of the country following
its 1979 revolution. Not long after the revolution, the U.S. backed Saddam
Hussein’s invasion of Iran in a brutal eight-year conflict that nearly killed
off an entire generation of Iranians.
The U.S. also secretly armed Iran,
which is unsurprising considering the U.S. has a habit of maximizing chaos in the region.
Even
though Saddam Hussein was using chemical weapons against Iranians, the U.S. turned a blind eye.
In the years following the Iran-Iraq war, America’s focus then turned mainly to
Iraq after the U.S. government decided to betray its
Iraqi ally, launching an invasion into Iraqi territory. The U.S. then slapped
sanctions on Iraq, which the U.N. estimates resulted
in the deaths of approximately 1.7 million people, including 500,000 to 600,000
children. These democracy-spreading American politicians were well aware of
these figures and still thought the
price was “worth it.”
When the
U.S. invaded Iraq again in 2003 and overthrew Saddam Hussein, the
establishment’s focus immediately shifted back to Iran. Bush stated in 2007 that he had
authorized his military commanders in Iraq to “confront Tehran’s murderous
activities.” He also famously claimed it was in everyone’s
interest “that there be a stable Iran, an Iran that is capable of rejecting
Iranian influence.”
“I mean
Iraq,” he added, correcting himself.
Bush’s
incessant gaffing may be laughable in that he confused Iran with Iraq when he
was clearly referring to one as a newly formed ally and one as a long-term
rival, but even if he had spoken correctly, the statement would still have been
somewhat laughable. Some years later, Iran is one of Iraq’s closest allies and
has been integral in ousting
ISIS from Iraq’s major cities. Iranian-backed militias were even drawn into the
recent chaotic fight in Mosul – a U.S.-backed operation – and were also major
players in other strategic areas, like Fallujah.
Iran has firmly supplanted itself into Iraq and doesn’t appear
to be leaving anytime soon – unless the U.S. is willing to drive them out
physically.
So how did
Iran get so involved in Iraq? To put it simply, the U.S. ousted a Sunni Iraqi
leader they had backed to wage a brutal war against Iran and replaced him with
a government that was majority-Shia —
meaning the new government was capable of aligning itself with Tehran. If the
U.S. wanted to truly isolate Iran, they should never have removed the most
anti-Iranian president the Bush administration could ever have hoped for, let
alone replaced him with a Shia-dominated government in their effort to destroy as much of Hussein’s legacy
and support base as possible.
Similarly,
before the Syrian conflict erupted in 2011, Iran and Syria had strong ties and good relations, but
there was no need for Iran to establish itself
as a large and permanent military presence. (Similarly, Russia had no
underlying reason to inject itself so strongly into Syria, either, even though
they had a military base there already.)
But now,
by backing and arming fanatical
jihadists over the course of the conflict and threatening the
Syrian government with war for the past six years, the United States has forced
Syria to look elsewhere for support. This support has come mainly from Iran and
Russia, and now Iran has thousands upon thousands of
troops on the ground there. Trump’s national security advisor,
General H.R. McMaster, estimates that 80
percent of Assad’s forces are “Iranian proxies.”
And as the
Syrian conflict grows ever closer to what can only be described as a looming victory for
Assad in some way, shape or form, the Iranian presence in the Middle East is
about to be significantly bolstered. If a single border crossing, which is located in al-Tanf,
is opened up to Syrian forces and Iranian proxies, then Iran’s amalgamated arc
of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon will almost be complete. This is the ultimate nightmare of
countries like Saudi Arabia and Israel, which have invested heavily in preventing such a
scenario from unfolding.
Further,
Iran is repopulating areas of
Syria with Shia families so it can produce a fully fledged Shia-dominated
bridge between itself and the wider Middle East. This arc of influence won’t be
just a political alliance — it will literally represent the people and the
families on the ground, further tightening Iran’s grip on the region.
Make no
mistake: Iran is emerging the victor from the U.S.-backed wars in Iraq and
Syria even though these wars were designed to weaken Iran.
Would Iran
have such a stranglehold over Syria if it weren’t for the Syrian crisis, which
was instigated as part of the U.S.-NATO agenda? Even if it did, would this
pro-Iranian axis also extend to Iraq if the U.S. hadn’t toppled Saddam Hussein
in 2003?
The same
can ultimately be said of the recent Qatar crisis. Saudi Arabia and a handful
of other countries have attempted to isolate Qatar in the hopes that they can
forcefully bring the Gulf state to complete submission and force it to cut all
ties with Iran. Instead, because Qatar cannot realistically meet Saudi Arabia’s
demands, Qatar has been thrust into the open arms of Turkey
and Iran. Turkey, a NATO ally, is also strengthening its
ties with Iran.
If the
ultimate goal of U.S. foreign policy has been to crush resistant states and
isolate and target Iran, thereby weakening it, the strategy has backfired quite
dismally. Iran now has a very strong presence in Iraq and Syria, and the Saudis
are becoming increasingly concerned that
it may have also found a way to expand its influence in Yemen, which is right
on Saudi Arabia’s border.
No matter
how one assesses this dilemma, America’s regime change operations in the
Middle East have been failures. Forget the fact that these operations help extremism
spread like wildfire, kill millions of civilians, and provide little
security for the region. The U.S. can’t even claim these strategies have helped
prevent emerging threats such as the one allegedly held by Iran.
In this context, if you still believe Iran truly is a great
threat to global security, it’s time to question how it could be that
Washington’s strategy to date has only empowered Iran to manifest itself as a
major player in the region.
Sounds like it’s time for a new strategy altogether – one that
doesn’t involve warmongering and geostrategic games that only prolong the
suffering of innocent people. You can only try the same failed strategy so many
times before a cognitive revolution becomes imperative.
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2017 Creative Commons, The Anti-Media
