The Next War

This summer I worked on a report for SOAS analyzing US military plans and capabilities to mount a major attack on Iran. The report, Considering a War With Iran?, has been picked up by some jounalists and bloggers. The Raw Story website ran a major piece on the report, and bloggers on the Daily Kos and others also looked at it. I wrote this report with Dan Plesch of SOAS, a long-time colleague.

In essence what we said was that the United States has military doctrine, military plans and military capabilities to mount a short, but massive, offensive against Iran that would destroy all known nuclear targets. It would also destroy command, control, communications and leadership targets, and as much of the Revolutionary Guard, Basij and other mainstays of the Iranian government as possible. We identified supporters of such an attack, including vice-president Cheney. We did not claim that the attack was definitely coming, or claim knowledge of when or how such an attack would be carried out. We merely used open sources to analyze possibilities. We said that such an attack would have horrible consequences, that Iran could not answer militarily except through asymetric warfare, and that such a war would severely destabilize the Middle East.

Now, General Wesley Clark has written in the Washington Post on the same subject. He says in an article called The Next War that:

Today, the most likely next conflict will be with Iran, a radical state that America has tried to isolate for almost 30 years and that now threatens to further destabilize the Middle East through its expansionist aims, backing of terrorist proxies such as the Lebanese group Hezbollah and Hamas in Gaza and the West Bank, and far-reaching support for radical Shiite militias in Iraq. As Iran seems to draw closer to acquiring nuclear weapons, almost every U.S. leader -- and would-be president -- has said that it simply won't be permitted to reach that goal.

Think another war can't happen? Think again. Unchastened by the Iraq fiasco, hawks in Vice President Cheney's office have been pushing the use of force. It isn't hard to foresee the range of military options that policymakers face.
The next war would begin with an intense air and naval campaign. Let's say you're planning the conflict as part of the staff of the Joint Chiefs. Your list of targets isn't that long -- only a few dozen nuclear sites -- but you can't risk retaliation from Tehran. So you allow 21 days for the bombardment, to be safe; you'd aim to strike every command-and-control facility, radar site, missile site, storage site, airfield, ship and base in Iran. To prevent world oil prices from soaring, you'd have to try to protect every oil and gas rig, and the big ports and load points. You'd need to use B-2s and lots of missiles up front, plus many small amphibious task forces to take out particularly tough targets along the coast, with manned and unmanned air reconnaissance. And don't forget the Special Forces, to penetrate deep inside Iran, call in airstrikes and drag the evidence of Tehran's nuclear ambitions out into the open for a world that's understandably skeptical of U.S. assertions that yet another Gulf rogue is on the brink of getting the bomb.

But if it's clear how a war with Iran would start, it's far less clear how it would end. How might Iran strike back? Would it unleash Hezbollah cells across Europe and the Middle East, or perhaps even inside the United States? Would Tehran goad Iraq's Shiites to rise up against their U.S. occupiers? And what would we do with Iran after the bombs stopped falling? We certainly could not occupy the nation with the limited ground forces we have left. So what would it be: Iran as a chastened, more tractable government? As a chaotic failed state? Or as a hardened and embittered foe?

All in all this is an excellent summary of our SOAS report. An attack on Iran might be sold to the public as another counterproliferation war, but it would have a wide range of appalling consequences which would devastate the region for years ahead. Equally, Iran cannot be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons. So, President Bush needs to negotiate without preconditions. Iran needs security guarantees and in return it needs to open up completely to international inspectors and return to full compliance with the nuclear non-prolifeation regime.

Some on the US left, like David Fiderer at the Huffington Post have called our report 'delusional'. So, it's nice to see analysis that I researched and wrote mirrored in the work of a former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, General Wesley Clark. After all, he ought to know.