Iran has been on a hit list of seven countries in a geostrategic plan for the reconfiguration of the Middle East first drawn up by the US in 2001 following the 9/11 attacks.

The subjugation of the countries on this list, the acquisition of their fossil fuel and other natural resources and, in the cases of Sudan and Somalia, their strategic locations have been, and are, deemed to be essential to US domination and control of the region and hence to the maintenance of its global hegemony.

The first six on the list — Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Syria — have already received the standard treatment, that is, full doses of the broad-spectrum antibiotic of “democratic reform” administered insidiously through the fomenting of internal insurrection and/or more directly with the shock and awe of some combination of targeted assassinations, regime change, and military invasion. Like many other countries before them that have been subjected to these tender embraces of US imperialism, the death and destruction and the chronic failed state conditions that ensued — and persist — are testament to the treatment’s efficacy and side effects and the real intentions of the perpetrators.

The rise of China and the global spread of its Belt and Road Initiative and the resilience and growing strength of Russia in its war with Ukraine have increased enormously the already considerable geostrategic significance of the last country on the list, Iran. A country whose geographic location and size, its resource wealth, its possession of nuclear technology and knowhow, and its active support of anti-US/Israel militant groups in Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, and Iraq had always made it the prime target of US and Israeli aggression in the region.

This essay explains, first, why it is that in the aftermath of the 12-day war, and despite claims to the contrary, from the perspectives of the US and Israel, the Iran threat is undiminished; second, that if Iran is afforded too much breathing space, the threat that it will be seen to pose by Israel and the US will increase exponentially; and third, that the likelihood that Iran will be attacked again soon by the US and Israel will therefore rise accordingly.

The effects of the 12-day war

What can be made of the latest act of the macabre vaudeville that is the government of the richest and most powerful nation in human history? The abandon with which the two nuclear armed aggressors — the US and Israel — have behaved in the choreographed bombing of Iran’s largely evacuated nuclear facilities is surprising only in the extent to which the attacks by the US and the tepid “retaliation” by Iran were telegraphed deliberately for the purposes of political theatre.

But what of the results? By now, everyone surely knows that Trump, his voluble and vituperative Defence Secretary, Pete Hegseth, and the US Government as a whole protest too much when they proclaim that Iran’s nuclear facilities have been “obliterated”. The Israeli and US intelligence agencies, who, no doubt, know better, are doing as they have been told to do politically and are keeping silent on the subject (and plugging the leaks – see below). Obligingly, and clearly with a view to humouring Trump and buying time, even Iran is playing its part in the charade – having warned the US of its retaliatory strike on the US airbase in Qatar, the Iranian foreign minister has since declared that the bombed nuclear facilities have been “seriously damaged”.

However, while, for now, all of the participants are saying more or less the same thing publicly, they will have very different reasons for doing so and, of course, what they say in private will be another matter entirely. In particular, Israel’s flattery of Trump will be designed to keep him as amenable as possible to what they will want him to do next. Iran, on the other hand, will be keen to maximise the time it has to regroup and prepare for the next attack, which they will doubtless see as being inevitable. Their willingness still to negotiate in the full knowledge that any sureties from the US or Israel will be largely meaningless also indicates their strong desire to buy time.

Among the most important and likely substantive effects of the confrontation are these. First, at most, Iran’s ability to make a nuclear weapon has been set back a few months. It now seems certain that Tehran will develop one as soon as it can. Second, if pressed and cornered, its ability to obtain a nuclear weapon, say from Pakistan or North Korea, is the same as it was before or better. Third, its massive arsenal of missiles and its manufacturing capability are still largely intact. Fourth, if anything, the position of the Iranian regime has been strengthened by the attack. Fifth, seemingly without using its most lethal missiles, Iran has demonstrated that the Israeli aerial defence system (the “iron dome”) is far from impregnable. Sixth, if it wasn’t already so, it is now abundantly clear that the US and Israel cannot be trusted. Signed agreements with them are worthless. International law is treated with disdain. Seventh, vocal and material support for Iran from the Global South is substantial and growing. Eighth, Iran’s relations with Russia, China, and North Korea have solidified. Ninth, Israel is probably more vulnerable economically and militarily now than it has ever been. And tenth, while untested, Iran’s chokehold on energy supplies and trade via the Strait of Hormuz seems likely to be no less than it was. The fact that all affected parties will have been preparing for such an eventuality for decades does not detract from the significance of this effect, as considerable and long-lasting disruption could be caused to shipping by relatively low-tech measures such as the sowing of underwater minefields.

The ingredients of the post-war Iran threat

For the US, Iran is still the lynchpin of its strategic plan for the Middle East, made more so by Iran’s growing economic and military ties to Russia and China. In particular, as Michael Hudson points out, Iran provides China’s overland route to the Persian Gulf and the construction of a rail link for that purpose is well underway.

It is plausible also, according to Hudson, that Russia will want to develop trading routes to the south via the Caspian Sea and through Iran that bypass the Suez Canal.

More important still for Hudson is the strong likelihood that the prospect of these developments, the growth of BRICS, the precariousness of the family-controlled regimes of the Gulf Arab states, and, as Yanis Varoufakis suggests, the possibility that China could establish a New Bretton Woods are seen as significant contributors to the acceleration of the de-dollarisation of the world economy. The heavy dependence of the world economy on the US dollar underlies US global hegemony.

For these reasons alone, the dismantling of Iran and the replacement of the current regime with one that is accepting of US demands will remain priorities. Objectives that both the US and Israel are bound to see as becoming more difficult to achieve with the passage of time. If, as the outcomes of the 12-day war set out above suggest, Iran has emerged stronger and somewhat emboldened or, at the very least, relatively unscathed, then further delay in bringing it to heel is bound to be seen by the US as being highly undesirable and risky.

The other major ingredient of the post-war Iran threat is, of course, the fact that the largely fake 12-day war provided enormous incentive for Iran to develop a nuclear weapon of its own as quickly as possible. A task that the discussion here suggests should be straightforward.

Conclusion

From the above, and in the view of other informed commentators such as Douglas Macgregor, it would seem that the devil’s dance with Iran has only just begun and, while for the moment it is on pause, it will not take much encouragement from Israel or the warmongers in the US Government for the “music” to recommence. Something that Trump has said he is “absolutely” prepared to do and his innate proneness to rash behaviour suggests that he will.

Most critically, the discussion shows that both the acknowledged grounds for renewed conflict (the threat of a nuclear armed Iran) and the less openly acknowledged — but arguably more significant — ones (a destabilised and compliant Iran as the fulcrum for US hegemony in the region and globally) are much more pronounced now than they were before the unprovoked and unwarranted attack on Iran and the “brave men and women” of the US armed forces delivered their payloads of bunker-busting bombs and cruise missiles.

The views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.