Operation Epic Blurry
Seeing through the fog of war: How we got here and the road ahead for Iran
Ali Khamenei is dead, along with dozens of officials in his chain of succession. Iran has been asking for it, going all the way back to the founding of the Islamic Republic in 1979, and the main wonder is why the US waited so long. It was only in the 12-Day War last summer, with Israel playing wingman, that the US finally attacked, in earnest, a regime that was behind the Beirut Marines barracks suicide bombing in 1982, the Khobar Towers bombing, the October 7 attacks by Hamas, and countless other terrorist actions by its proxies in which US citizens were targeted and killed. For that entire time, it seems Iran’s only purpose for existing was to pick fights with the United States, and they finally got what they wanted1. There may not have been a single precipitating event to trigger this war, but Iran has been a habitual line-stepper.
The only explanation for America’s restraint towards Iran over the years boils down to two factors: the fear of disrupting oil production in, and transit through, the Persian Gulf, and the post-9/11 focus on the Sunni jihadist threat. Today, the world’s reliance on the Persian Gulf for its oil is significantly diminished due to the increased production from sources such as the US, Canada, Nigeria, and very recently, Venezuela2. The disruption to world oil markets due to a war in the Gulf will be real and significant, but will not last for very long, assuming that Iran’s capability to threaten oil tankers and facilities is eliminated quickly, as indeed seems to be happening. Trump and the military and economic planners seem to have determined that we can live with the short-term consequences of a war today. It’s not like we haven’t had wars in the Gulf before.
The second factor has flipped as well. When George W. Bush lumped Iran in with Iraq and North Korea as the Axis of Evil, it was puzzling for sure, as there was no direct connection between those states and Al Qaeda. Shiite fundamentalist Iran, in particular, might have been seen as an ally in a war against Sunni extremism. However, Bush’s decision3 was cynically but pragmatically designed to draw our attention away from the states and entities - mainly the Gulf States and Pakistan - who were more or less fundamentally complicit in the rise of Al Qaeda and related jihadi movements, but whose cooperation we needed in order to combat these exact same movements. As the War on Terror metastasized into a decades-long endeavor, and the US-led coalition chased jihadis across the globe - Iraq, Pakistan, the Philippines, Nigeria, Yemen, Somalia, and back to Syria and Iraq again, everyone sort of forgot about Iran and North Korea, because their inclusion in the list was performative (although not without merit), and nothing much happened to them at the time. On the contrary, Iraq’s collapse and near-dismemberment along sectarian lines suddenly empowered Iran, which leveraged their ties to Iraq’s Shia majority to become the dominant regional power. The Axis of Resistance (their own moniker) emerged from the newly contiguous Shiite belt stretching from Afghanistan to Lebanon4 as a threat to bring Shiite dominance to the Muslim heartland for the first time in Islamic history. There was mutual support across this Axis, that helped the Syrian Assad regime survive the Arab Spring and the Iranian government to draw on fighters from Iraq and Afghanistan to shoot its own people during recent anti-regime protests. Hezbollah and Hamas, backed by state actors in Damascus, Tehran, and Baghdad, were energized against Israel, and the attacks of October 7, 2023 were a result of their newfound confidence5. But the ascendancy of Shiite power has reached the point where it is perceived as a threat greater than the Sunni jihadi menace. We are back to the pre-9/11 threat assessment, which means Iran is now back to being Public Enemy #1. And in the Middle East, when someone becomes too dominant, everybody else gangs up on that new enemy.
The stage was set for Operation Epic Fury around the time Israel pulled off its Grand Pager Caper6. With thousands of its fighters killed or maimed by exploding beepers in their hands - or, gulp, pants pockets, Hezbollah could not come to the rescue of Syria’s Assad when, a year later, Turkiye-backed Sunni rebels went on a sudden offensive and took Damascus within days. From there, things snowballed. Hamas was finally crushed in Gaza, forced to abide by a ceasefire mediated by, for freaking crying out loud, “Yes Honey” Jared Kushner. Hezbollah, cut off from its most important sources of support, is falling into irrelevance. Russia, the hidden benefactor to everyone in the region besides Israel going back almost 80 years, is tied up in an attritional deathmatch in Ukraine and is headed into failed statehood as a result. China has purged about half of its generals over the last three years, and is in no position to go to war for itself, let alone for a faraway ally. Iran’s fate was sealed when Trump saw fit to pluck Nicolas Maduro from his presidential palace in Caracas and shanghai him to federal prison in Manhattan, and succeeded. The US under Trump had hit Iran once before, and the only question remaining was if Trump thought it was enough. With indications that the regime was deeply unpopular, Trump saw an opportunity on top of the wave of opportunities that have presented themselves over the past two years, and decided to take it.
Iran’s response - striking not only Israel and US bases in the region, but also the Gulf Arab nations who had been asserting neutrality until that moment - is intended to make this into a Shiite-Sunni war that pulls down everybody with them. In a situation where it would be normal to try to make allies, Iran’s leaders are instead making themselves the object of the Gulf States’ anger and vengeance, and drawing armed responses from the Saudis and Qataris. Why? The IRGC and the Supreme Ruling Council (or what’s left of it) will soon be battered to a point where they are at the mercy of the people, and will likely face violent reprisals. They have calculated that their only path for survival is to appeal to the peoples’ fears of their Sunni Arab neighbors, and posit themselves as the only defense against subjugation at the hands of bloodthirsty jihadis7. It is imperative to not allow this narrative to take root, and for that purpose, the US must convince its allies in the region to show restraint, especially dissuading their populace from mob violence against Shia in their territories, and avoiding civilian casualties when striking Iran. More than anything, avoid sectarian violence and rhetoric at all costs.
To the US and Israel, I would suggest not totally destroying Iran’s conventional military capabilities, as they will have to defend themselves in a tough neighborhood after all this is over, regardless of who is leading the country. As much as possible, take out only the instruments of regime control - the IRGC, the Basij, the leadership as well as the foot soldiers - but try to contact the regular Iranian military rank and file and offer them terms of surrender and integration into a transitional government.
Ultimately, the only long-term solution is for the Iranian people - those who have marched in the streets and are yearning for a normal government - to take ownership of their country. For this to happen, not only the US, Israel, and the West, but also the Gulf Arabs, must foster the trust of the Iranians and convince them that they will be protected and brought into the world community as partners and equals, and their worst fears, which their leaders have held over their heads to justify their excesses, will not be realized.
I am not interested in litigating whether this should have gone through Congress or not. It may not be “legal”, but it is completely just. And now that the war is here, I want to see the best outcome.
Russia would be on this list, too, but for the sanctions and its oil industry’s methodical destruction at the hands of Ukraine.
Bush was directly and indirectly influenced by the Saudi royals and other Gulf Arab states with whom he had close oil industry connections.
With branches in Yemen, Kuwait, Bahrain, and eastern Saudi Arabia
I remember that Israel, of all countries, was not happy with the 2003 invasion of Iraq, arguing that it was taking attention away from the threat from Iran. Yup.
Creating a shell company in Hungary selling pagers, stuffing the pagers with plastic explosive, and getting almost all of Hezbollah to buy and use these pagers… this is #1 on my all-time list of covert ops.
People have mostly become jaded to anti-Israel and anti-US rhetoric, but fears of Iran’s immediate neighbors is much more real and tangible to many Iranians.