beware-of-us-pushing-iran-to-become-failed-state

Tens of thousands of people converging on the Enghelab Square in Tehran on Monday to endorse and support the newly anointed supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of the slain leader Ayatollah Khamenei, is a testimony to the Iranians’ defiance against the United States President Donald Trump in particular, that they are not prepared to buy his excuse of ‘regime change’. In fact, Trump really is not clear about what he actually wanted to gain out of the Iran War. ‘Regime change’ was just an unexplained alibi, which he still is not able to explain and clarify.

 

Interestingly, Trump has not even been clear about the negotiations with Iran. Sometimes he says there is no scope for negotiations and within no time, he claims that Iran has offered to negotiate. But the Iranian regime has been clear and categorical in repeatedly asserting its position and snubbing any suggestions as well as offers of negotiations. Only yesterday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi made it categorically clear that talks with the US were not on Iran’s agenda.

Earlier, on March 2, immediately after the US attacked Iran, Secretary of the Iranian Supreme National Security Council, Ali Larijani, rejected any proposal to hold negotiations with the US.

As the time passes, the Iranian regime, despite suffering heavy losses, has been getting firm on ‘no negotiations’ with the United States. There is a reason for the Iranian regime to spurn any offer of talks. Prior to the attack on February 28, which took Iran off-guard, negotiations were already on between Iran and the US.

Late Iranian supreme leader had adopted a pragmatic approach accepting and agreeing to almost all the conditions that the US had put forth. Despite that the US went ahead with a ‘surprise’ attack while the negotiations were still on and Iran was not stubborn in reaching an agreement.

Having been badly betrayed and backstabbed, the Iranians have a reason not to trust the US anymore. Moreover, now the entire scenario has changed. The US is guilty of killing the Iranian supreme leader, who was a revered religious leader also, not only among the Iranians, but Shias across the globe. It is not just the loss of the country’s supreme leader, but also the deep sense of betrayal and backstabbing that has deeply hurt the Iranians that he (their supreme leader) was killed when his regime was at the ‘negotiating table’.

 

Also read: Iran war could trigger global fertiliser crisis

 

This indeed is the worst betrayal that you engage someone in negotiations and stab him in the back the same moment. That is what the US has precisely done with Iran. As already reported extensively, including in these columns, Iran is giving the US and Israel the proverbial ‘run for their money’. Iran has launched an asymmetrical counter war of attrition against the two countries. No doubt Iran is suffering huge losses in terms of resources and its people, the US and Israel have not remained unscathed either. They, for sure, had not expected this much retaliation and retribution from Iran.

 

Similarly, other gulf countries like Saudi Arabia, UAE, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait have also not remained untouched. The United States had to evacuate its embassy staff from the Saudi capital, Riyadh.

 

The normal life in the Middle Eastern countries, which just a fortnight ago was envied by anyone and everyone across the globe, has been offset by the war. Iran has been continuously targeting these countries also, while offering the alibi that these countries are being used as the base for attack by the US.

It is not only normal life, but the entire economy that is completely dependent on oil exports, has been shattered. Iran knows it too well that the Gulf countries cannot survive like that for long. Eventually, they will have to push the US to beat a retreat. After all, it is these countries that are going to be badly hit by a prolonged war.

While Saudi Arabia and UAE are publicly posturing for de-escalation, it is these two countries, which were equally responsible for prompting and pushing the US to attack Iran. Israel’s stand and position has been known for the last four decades. Israel and Iran hold mutual hostility against each other, as the two countries want one another destroyed. However, two Islamic and Arab countries like Saudi Arabia and UAE wanting the US to attack Iran and decapitate it was a new dimension.

Iran undoubtedly was and so far continues to be among the most stable countries in the region. The western propaganda against the ‘Iranian regime’ notwithstanding, Iran is not a country governed by ‘puritanical or extremist Sharia’ laws. Yes, Iran is an ‘Islamic Republic’ but life there is like any other stable and peaceful country anywhere in the world. There, of course, must be aberrations, like elsewhere. But to judge the country from those incidents will be unfair to Iran.

Even in countries like the US, there are so many cases of miscarriage of justice and brutal abuse of power. The ICE brutalities against the undocumented people in the United States are too fresh not to deserve a mention here. Should that mean that there is no rule of law prevailing in the US, although it actually looks like that right now, the way ICE officials are persecuting people on the excuse of  ‘illegal immigration’.

Although ‘Iranian regime”’ is firmly standing up to the US aggression, and a growing sense of realisation across the globe that it is easier said than done to affect regime change there, if by any chance, the US manages to do that, Iran will end up being another failed state in the region like Iraq, Syria or Libya. That is the last thing the Gulf countries like Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar and more would like to have. That will completely shatter their dreams of glory, which are already threatened, almost fatally.  

Beware of pushing Iran into a state of anarchy and turning it into yet another ‘failed state’.