John Robb, over at his Global Guerrillas blog, says U.S. confrontation with Iran is “now unavoidable.” [link courtesy Rafe Coburn]
According to Robb, it will be an air attack only, given our overcommitment of ground troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. It will aim not simply at taking out the nation’s embryonic nuclear capability, but rather at toppling the current Iranian government.
To accomplish this regime change under the given restraints, the US will utilize a rapidly evolving method of air warfare called the “effects-based operations” (EBO). The EBO is a process that incapacitates a nation-state’s systems (typically critical infrastructure) and organizations to achieve desired strategic outcomes.” In the past this has meant a combination of precision-guided munitions, special operations, and stealth technology to precisely target critical nodes in national infrastructures and systems. The destruction of these nodes, due to the power of network dependencies, will typically cause sustained system collapse (in much the same way a downed power line can cause a regional blackout, but in this case intentionally). A good real world example can be seen in the first Gulf War. During that war, a US EBO shut down Iraq’s critical infrastructures to separate Saddam’s leadership cadre in its Baghdad bunkers from its army in Kuwait. It worked nearly as desired. With Iran, the effect desired would be much more complex: regime change. |
Robb says he thinks the operation will succeed, in the short term:
Iran will be torn apart from within. To accomplish this, the US will conduct the EBO under the pretense of forcing Iran to dismantle its entire nuclear program — a condition that the Iranian regime will find impossible to accept. Simultaneous with the air campaign’s suppression of Iran’s minority Persian government, the US will arm and actively support ethnic guerrillas (Kurds, Balochs, Azeris, etc.) to turn sections of the country into autonomous zones. Without the ability to utilize any of the capabilities of conventional warfare (from airpower to armor to massed formations), let alone command forces in the field or marshal a nation for war, the Iranian government would eventually collapse and its successor will accede to the growing set of US demands. |
But the whole thing is “rife with downside risks and uncertainties”:
…rocketing oil prices, global terrorist attacks, and severe diplomatic fall-out. Further, Iran’s government may prove to be more resourceful than anticipated and outlast the attack, only to resume production of nuclear materials with the intent of revenge. Worse yet, the US might inadvertently collapse the US-led post cold war environment as countries, distrustful of US intentions, scramble to safety amid rapidly gyrating economic and social instability. |
I’d thought that the collapse of our effort in Iraq, the continued failure to capture Bin Laden, and the growing peril to our achievements in Afghanistan might have left the Bush team feeling a little overextended on the military side. If Robb is right, we’re in for an extremely rough ride from a president who has always rebounded from popular-approval lows by fanning war fever.
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