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| Rogue warlord General Qassem Soelimani commander of Quds Force killed in a US drone attack |
Iran, a nation plunged into crisis of competency, legitimacyQasem Soleimani
The aura of solidarity after General Qasem Soleimani's assassination temporarily created across
Iran soon gave way to hostility after a Ukraine Airlines was shot down by an Iranian missile.
The clerics of the Islamic Republic of Iran have finally plunged into a series of crisis faced internally and externally.
Never before the tens of thousands of Iranians in self-exile have stepped outside their abode to protest Islamic Iran's erroneous political policies and appalling human rights status meted by street protesters demanding democracy.
Iran's role in the geopolitics of the Middle-East since the Islamic Revolution in 1979 the religious fundamentalism plays as a catalyst in the formulation of Iran's foreign policy.
Iran's proxy war strategy which is practiced through hybrid Shia militias in the region. The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and its Quds Force, plays an important role in Iranian politics and security decisions.
The Quds Force engaged in hybrid war has been authorised by the Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to punish the most hated countries in Middle-East.
The assassinated Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani by US drone attack has shown success in waging proxy wars in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen to punish American allies Israel, Saudi Arabia and Emirates.
In the early 1980s only, when Ayatollah Ali Khomeini, who spearheaded the Islamic Revolution had been facing a war with Iraq, it started its policy of recruitment and mobilisation of Shia Muslims to raise rag-tag militias in all over the Middle-East to counter its arch-foes, Saddam Hussein's Baathist Iraq.
Iran backed Hezbollah involved proxies in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan have always remained involved, either directly or indirectly, in every conflict of Middle-East.
These proxy groups became immensely active after Baghdad fell to the United States in 2003. This hybrid warfare strategy immensely benefited Iran, by avoiding direct military confrontations and therefore hiding Iran's conventional military weaknesses and reshaping the politics of Iraq in its favour.
One of the very important factors regarding how Iran has been able to maintain his influence in the geopolitics of the Middle-East is due to its properly systematised network of proxies and its state actor IRGC and Quds Force.
Iran has always used these hybrid militias for strategic purposes, strengthening of its national security and its revolutionary agenda.
The conventional threat to Iran is mainly posed by the United States and its allies in the Middle East, but mainly Israel and Saudi Arabia.
Another threat that Iran faces is by Jihadist groups like Islamic State and Al-Qaeda affiliates in the Arab countries and Afghanistan.
If we talk about Syria, Iran's influence in the balance of power and politics of the Middle-East has accelerated to a new level after the eruption of civil wars in Syria and Yemen.
Syria has been a steady ally of Iran since the inception of the Islamic Republic in 1979 and has always supported the father and son duo of Hafez-al-Assad and Bashar-al-Assad respectively due to their allegiance to Alawite sect of Shia Islam.
Iran's support to the Houthis started in 1990 with an objective to protect the Zaidism sect of Shia Islam in Yemen.
Evidence of Iran's support and military assistance to Houthi rebels came to surface in 2012 when the United States found the Quds Force providing training to the Houthis in Saddah, a small town in Yemen.
Through these proxies, Iran has successfully encountered Saudi Arabia, American and Israeli influence in the region. The influence became unpredictable in the region and the USA had to redo its policy for the Arab states.
First published in The Asian Age, 25 January 2020
Saleem Samad is an independent journalist, media rights defender, recipient of Ashoka Fellow (USA) and Hellman-Hammett Award. Twitter @saleemsamad: Email: saleemsamad@hotmail.com
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