(Part 1) Iran: Who was General Qassem Soleimani?

At the end of 2019 I was contemplating my next post here with the thought that 2020 might be a bad year. Then, on January 3, the USA assassinated General Qassam Soleimani, the leader of the Iranian Quds Force with a drone strike at the Baghdad airport and I knew was I was onto something.

I chose the video above out of a plethora of similar videos because this one is short and to the point. A detail I would add: Soleimani was not a cleric, he was not a religious man that people bowed down to because they think they're supposed to. He was a general, a bureaucrat, a diplomat, a powerful secular man. He was arguably more important than the Iraqi president or even any of the Mullahs. This guy knew where the bodies were buried, he knew the numbers to the bank accounts, he knew all the friends and all the enemies and he moved amongst all of that. For the USA to cut him down in a single sudden move is an amazingly bold stroke that will surely invite a larger war.

....Or will it?

The Trump administration is suggesting that this strike was justified because of reports of possible forthcoming attacks on allied forces. If you will recall, the Brits bristled at similar American paranoia last summer so the idea that imminent danger is a reasonable excuse will be challenged; that said, the Germans did not bristle at such reports and stood by the Americans at the time, so perhaps imminent danger will have its supporters (there's probably a time limit on how long that debate will matter, we'll see if the distinction is even important). The fact that Soleimani was in Baghdad meeting with local militia forces after a similar visit to Syria is probably the only evidence the Americans have (or will offer) to the notion that Soleimani was plotting something big.

Tensions have been simmering between USA and Iran for several months (well, several decades) and I'd say this move is the retaliation for Iran's strike on a Saudi oil refinery back in September (which produced no response at the time).  Look at this picture:



Dude, Tom Brady in his prime wasn't this accurate! When seeing the unbelievable accuracy of Iranian missiles (or was it drones?), the Pentagon must have known some real shit was on the way. (My first thought when seeing this pic was, "Oh shit! They can do that?") And this came, as you will recall, after several months of shenanigans in the Persian Gulf and presaged a series of protests across Iraq. When one of those protests finally got into the American green zone in Baghdad, the Americans acted (*) by taking out Soleimani.

Okay, so what now? Well, as I write this there are reports of Iranian rocket launches on American bases in Iraq. That was predictable. I'd say keeping these Iraqi protests going is the next step for both sides, which calls attention to what I've been thinking all along: in the beginning this is about control of Iraq.

In 2003, George Bush invaded Iraq with the intention (I believe) of establishing 1) a battleground for Arab extremists and Americans to go at it and/or 2) a neutral ground between Iran and Saudi Arabia. The Iraqi Shia threw off American overtures, forcing the Americans to maintain their Iraqi positions by shielding the Sunnis (which was precisely NOT the original mission). Once Obama removed American forces it sent the Sunnis into a freak tornado that produced Daesh (or ISIS, if you prefer). Daesh was able to grab impressive swaths of territory along the Euphrates River across the Iraq-Syria frontier and, in the end, had no allies whatsoever. Indeed, the emergence of Daesh is what brought Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the Kurds, Israel, NATO, Russia and USA all together and set the stage for where we are now.

Since Obama pulled out American troops and Daesh rose, Iraq has been steadily infiltrated by paramilitary units (PMUs) largely supported by Iran. Over the years the Americans have insisted that the Iraqi parliament must decide how to deal with these PMUs, whether to expel them completely (and...how does that get done?) or incorporate them as a national military (also, a probably impossible task). But for Baghdad to truly control Iraq, they must control or dispel the PMUs. The aforementioned Iraqi protests began in the Shia area and spread because....well protestors often don't know what they really want. The Americans were encouraged by this because they interpreted this as anti-Iran (and it may have been). But outside of ousting the Prime Minister in December, I don't see that much else got accomplished except the communication of a basic unease in the face of the powers that be. The PMUs are still out there, supporting the protests in some cases and brutally suppressing them in others.

So how does Iraq deal with the murder of Iran's greatest soldier on their soil? I don't know. But Iran will ramp up its influence on the PMUs and USA will have to find the weaknesses in Iraqi support of the PMUs to fight back. That is undoubtedly the first step for both sides if a full-on war is actually coming.



(*) Ehh...that was the excuse, anyway. Those protests had been raging for months, it was only a matter of time that protestors ended up at the American embassy. The idea that Americans were truly threatened is probably an exaggeration or that Iran had anything to do with it is probably mostly fabricated.

(Part 2) Will a new gas deal fuel regional rivalry?

So let's re-set the scene: Turkey is advancing in the eastern Mediterranean and North Africa (and we must assume the Red Sea is also in play), by force potentially. This is something that the Iranians absolutely want to stop. But USA has just crippled the Iranian response, while doing nothing to stop Turkey.

In short: Turkey is advancing and Iran is shrinking at the hands of the USA. That's what's going on in the Middle East right now. Iraq will become the battleground that Bush envisioned back in the day but the real war will be (or would have been) the oil fields of the eastern Mediterranean but I'm guessing USA and the EU have already decided to allow Turkey to take over (**). As long as the Iranians are sidelined (and the Saudis remain rich and clueless), the West will allow the Turks to reestablish its Ottoman era claims from the Gulf of Sidra to the Gulf of Aden.

Where does the assassination of Soleimani fit into this? It cripples Iran's chances to curtail Turkish advancement. Again: Soleimani was a powerful and knowledgable guy (***), replacing him will be virtually impossible (indeed, the next few weeks will be a referendum on Soleimani's management style: did he leave behind a crew ready to snap into action or no?). Iran has to respond (and the response has begun as of just a few hours ago) but their fighting capability has already been severely limited. One scary part of that calculus is that since their conventional fighting capability is in shambles, they may resort to unconventional tactics, like attacking embassies (and Trump hotels and resorts) or maybe by busting out the weapons we don't know about. Or by attacking Turkey or Saudi Arabia.

How big will the war be? I dunno. Might be huge, might already be over, hard to tell. But look for Russia to be a peacemaker and don't be surprised if this all ends with China expanding its position in the Middle East right as the Americans are eager to leave.

(**) Well, until they agree to see Turkey as a threat and start chopping them back. The Middle East is about on-going battle between Iran, Turkey and Saudi Arabia. The West has chosen Turkey to be the winner (for now). Iran has seemingly already been check-mated.

(***) Unlike, say, Osama bin Laden. When USA finally assassinated bin Laden, he was just a dude living in a house in the middle of nowhere. He had no power of any kind. Soleimani, on the other hand, was Iran's Eisenhower and J. Edgar Hoover rolled into one.

Kurdistan

President Trump's most recent whim is removing American troops (roughly 2200 of them) from Syria, proclaiming that ISIS has now been 'defeated'. While this seems to come out of the blue, actually Trump has been saying he'll do this since he first got into office, so are we to assume that this time he will actually do it? Or is he just continuing his empty rhetoric?

The American position in Syria has always been precarious because outside of getting rid of the Assad regime (to be replace by....?), we've never really had any clear sense of what we want in/from Syria. Syria has never been in the American sphere of influence, outside of occasionally sticking up for the Kurds, so we've never known what to do there.

The emergence of Daesh (ISIS) gave the Obama administration the opportunity to weasel our way into Syria and with the dissolution of any consistent Syrian culture due to ongoing civil war, that was quite a clever grab at influence, I thought. Obama's policy in the Middle East was to steadily remove forces and hand the whole mess over to Russia, which seemed like a bad idea to me at the time but I've very much come to embrace it. I believe that our foes and allies alike in the Middle East share the fundamental American desire: to get oil out of the ground and into markets around the world. Since we're all on the same page, what is the need for American force there any more?

Except for one thing: the Kurds. The Kurds are one of many ethnic minorities in the Middle East and though they are arguably the largest stateless population in the Arab world, they have been divided by the 20th century drive to impose strict borders on nation-states. So there are four distinct blocks of Kurds rather than one unified people.

The Iranian Kurds are a relatively safe population, their place within Iran is minor but well-established and they are more or less left alone as long as they don't enter the political discourse (which they've been doing more than usual lately). The Iraqi Kurds are a large portion of the Iraqi population and while they have had clearly delineated territory for decades, they have long lived in fear of Sunni-dominated Baghdad and seem to have already given up on finding a Shia-dominated Baghdad any easier to deal with (though I suspect as Shia factions battle each other, the Kurds may find succor if they chose wisely). The Turkish Kurds have been at odds with the Turkish polity since...well, since Ataturk, meaning they've been perceived as terrorists and malcontents since the very formation of modern Turkey (they've had forays into mainstream politics and radical violence in equal measure during that time). The Syrian Kurds are perhaps the weirdest of the bunch and given the current state of Syria's civil war, violence is looming in their future.

The Americans relied on the Syrian Kurds to fight Daesh and the two were willing accomplices against these Iraqi Sunni foes. But now that Trump considers Daesh 'defeated' (*), he is willing to forego our Kurd allies and take Americans out of harm's way. Getting out Syria is, for whatever reason, one of the core tenets of Trump's hardcore base (worth noting that Trump's base is paranoid of Muslims more than anything in the world and worshipful of American military power first and foremost...but wants to avoid war in the Middle East at all cost...?) and Trump has been saying he'll do this for well over a year. And the Americans have left the Kurds high and dry before, so by now they have learned that the Americans are fair weather friends at best.

But I think this is a bad move. I think the Kurds are America's best ally in the Middle East and aiding them should be a top priority there.

What Trump doesn't want is a fight with Turkey. I'm not really sure why this is. Trump has happily thrown Erdogan under the bus whenever it suits him (though always properly respectful of Erdogan's ghoulish grip on power) and has happily presided over the ruin of Turkey's economy (largely through the Fed's recent interest rate increases). Until recently the Americans have fought with the Syrian Kurds against Daesh and protected them from the Assad regime and the Turks. But with the Russian-Turkish negotiated cease fire in Idlib, the battle has been moving away from the Turkish-held areas of Syria in the west to the Kurdish-held areas of the east (Erdogan's plan all along). The Americans have been providing cover, less through its 2200 soldiers in country than through the American flag perched on each soldier's uniform: killing even one American potentially brings an apocalyptic wrath. But if the Americans just turn around and leave, the Kurds will be as naked as the day they were born.

Turkey has endured mostly nothing but bullshit from her Western allies over the last 30 years or so. Since the end of the Cold War, Turkey has been patiently awaiting an invitation to join the European Union, jumping through all manor of economic and cultural hoops that the Europeans have largely ignored (though it seems now like the Turks dodged a bullet as the EU is rapidly eroding). Turkey was marginalized through all of the Americans' various shenanigans in Iraq during this period even though those NATO airbases in Turkey would seem like the perfect bases of operation, but because Turkish troops streaming into Kurdish territory would have been even more of a nightmare than Saddam or Daesh the Turks had to be pushed aside. Turkey has been dangerously near the conflict between Russia and Ukraine (**) with little help from her NATO allies. Is it any wonder that Turkey has turned inward and suspicious of her traditional western friends? (This alienation stands to get a lot worse as Turkey pursues energy claims in the eastern Mediterranean, the claims that Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Israel and Egypt are salivating over)

The American rationale for hanging around in Syria has been to thwart the imperialist ambitions of Iran. Apparently the American view of Turkish imperialist ambitions has suddenly changed and letting the Turks thwart Iran, stifle the Assad regime and fight what remains of Daesh now seems to be the plan. The Kurds are collateral damage in this equation as they will not be able to hold their positions without American fortification. This will lead to either immense bloodshed or a Kurdish refugee influx into Iraq (and probably both). If the Syrian Kurds and Iraqi Kurds find common cause (maybe but not necessarily), the long run result could be a boon for Kurdish positions in Iraq but a bloodletting will come first.

Iran's economy is in turmoil and the population seems restless in the face of Iranian foreign policy outlays. Iran's imperial ambitions have generally been fed by finding allies in various parts of the Arab world and if Tehran chooses to pull back funding, then these ambitions go dormant. But they don't disappear completely: if/when Tehran finds the funds to reach out again, then the alliances in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen, even over to Tunisia and Western Sahara, will reappear. Turkey is betting that Iran is waning and that they can slaughter some enemies (Kurds and Sunnis) and claim territory before the Assad regime can reclaim it first.

The Assad regime was pointing its efforts toward Idlib, a chunk of northwestern Syria that has been a rebel stronghold buffeted by Turkish troops to the north. Assad wants all of Syria back and as his grip on power gets ever so slightly stronger, he will eventually march on Idlib and then eventually on the Kurdish regions in the northeast. But he's not strong enough yet and as Iranian influence fades, his grip will get stronger as his territory gets poorer. For so long the Americans were unopposed and now the Turks are aiming to take up that position and hold it with force (whereas the Americans held power with just that flag alone). The war on the Kurds now bodes for war on Assad later (and war with Iran after that).

And what of Russia? I think they'll be eerily silent about all of this. Russia wants Syria for an airbase and Mediterranean port. Well...they have those. Assad was weak, Russia had what it wanted; as Assad gets strong Russia will still have what it wants. So why does it need Assad to get strong? Well...it doesn't. Turkey killing Kurds probably doesn't interest Russia and the farther future of Turkey fighting Iran is a joyous one for Russia. Russia and USA appear to be in agreement on this at the moment. (And what will China think of all this? They'll be fighting these wars eventually)

The American public likes to believe that pulling out of Syria and the recent Congressional action to cease activity in Yemen will bring a more peaceful world. This is far from the case. With minimal effort the Americans saved a lot of lives in Syria and had virtually no influence on Yemen (***). But without that minimal influence, Yemen and eastern Syria will turn back to bloodbaths. (And I wouldn't be surprised to see Israeli incursions into Lebanon, also to head off Iranian advances and/or take advantage of declining Iranian investment) Really what the American public wants is to go back to a time when foreign people used to kill other foreign people and it seemed like none of our business. With American troops out of harm's way, we'll soon be able to pretend like the rest of the world doesn't matter.

The Middle East is (and has long been) the battle of Turks, Persians and Arabians. In the days of the Caliphate (whether in Baghdad or Damascus) the Sunni Arabs and the Persian Shia fought for control. When that completely collapsed (due to raging hordes of Mongols), the Turkish Ottomans appeared on the scene and for a few centuries, the Middle East was as peaceful as it has ever been. But by the 18th century restless Russia began intruding and in the 19th the British appeared and then in the 20th came the Americans. But it was always about the fight between Iran, Saudi Arabia and Turkey and it will be for the foreseeable future.

But the Kurds are the people USA should be fighting for. In Iraq, in Syria, even in Iran if need be. We've abandoned them before, I suspect we'll abandon them again before it becomes apparent that an independent Kurdistan is what the Americans should've been fighting for all along. The rationale of thwarting Iran worked just fine for me and 2200 troops is not a large presence (not enough to take and hold an Ohio State football game), but protecting the Kurds is what we were really doing and now we've given up the idea of protecting once again. 

Idlib was to be the next big battle, but Idlib will wait for now. The Middle East may well change a lot before that finally happens.


(*) You can be sure to expect a variety of takes from the chattering classes about how defeated ISIS actually is. I will go ahead and embody both sides of the debate: as long as there are grumpy Iraqi Sunnis with nothing better to do there will always be the potential for a re-emergent Daesh; that said, unless they have major power support, they'll never be more than, as Obama said, the JV team. So the range of discourse then will be: a) we must be ever vigilant to b) they were never really that dangerous (both of which incidentally are true).

(**) Fun fact: Crimea has actually traditionally belonged to Istanbul. It wasn't until the 1750s that Russia wrestled it away from the Ottoman Empire and the 1950s that Krushchev gave it to Ukraine. In the sticky diplomatic world of what land belongs to who, Crimea goes right up there with Palestine, Kashmir, Nagorno-Karabach, Tibet, etc. (Woe is the day we add Texas, Hawaii, Yucatan, Haiti and Panama to that list)

(***) When Iran pulls out of Yemen, that won't be the end of the fighting. It will usher in a new fight between Saudi Arabia and UAE, with Americans supporting both sides. With or without the Iranians, with or without the support of Congress, Yemen is decades away from anything like peace.