The Problem with War No One Talks About

There’s no shortage of reasons for people to hate war.  From the mass casualties to the displacement of civilians to the impact on the economy to the famine it can cause, war causes no shortage of problems for humanity.  However, there is an issue that most people don’t talk about when discussing war.

Wars don’t just produce winners, losers, and stalemates.  They also change countries, redefine their culture, build new alliances, and change national or international politics.  War has the potential to destabilize order and create new crises.  For that reason, it is worth discussing how that can (or could) change the political landscape.

After the United States removed Saddam Hussein, the country fell into a power vacuum with a shaky democracy.  As a result, Iran started setting up shop and backing militias that served its interests.  It also managed to build a relationship with Iraq through shared culture and religion.  

On the other end, the terrorist group ISIS rose in the absence of Saddam’s leadership and used hardship in the country to gain supporters.  As a result, his removal also led to the rise of a major terrorist organization in the region that the US also later had to fight.  Unintentionally, the US created an ally for one of its greatest enemies, and a new monster it also had to defeat just by eliminating one of its longtime enemies in the region.

Another example of strange relationships being forged during war would be the Napoleonic wars.  During the war with Napoleon, Prussian, Austrian, and Russian leadership had to come together as allies to oppose his efforts and stop him from conquering Europe.  However, all three nations were historic enemies so once the shared threat was gone, so was their unity.  War can create temporary alliances, but once the threat is gone the status quo will return.

The point is that war doesn’t just result in immediate pain.  It also causes regional crises and destabilize relationships among the populace.  It can also cause weird friendships that don’t last or get replaced when the moment arises.  So, it may be worth considering how current conflicts are already changing the region.

In Iran, the death of the previous Supreme Leader led to a power vacuum among leadership.  Since there’s no confirmation that the current Supreme Leader is even alive anymore, it seems that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is taking over the government and exerting even more control on the government than it already had.  As a result, the pretense of being an authoritarian theocracy is evaporating as Iran is about to become a military dictatorship with a theocratic front.

Meanwhile, there are even further divides in the Middle East.  With Iran’s attacks on regional states, already weak relationships with the country are gone as everyone (deservedly so) hates them.  Also, this is impacting other alliances as the UAE left OPEC, helping grow a rivalry between them and Saudi Arabia.  In short, the Iran War has shifted the balance of power in the middle east and made the Iranian Government even more authoritarian.

Another conflict that has potential to reshape the world order is the Ukraine conflict.  Obviously, what’s happening with Russia matters to Europe as Putin has claimed that many of the regions border it are historic Russian territory, trade between Russia and Western Europe is at an all time low which is impacting multiple national economies, and this is causing infighting across NATO as debates come on who should pay for how much of the military alliance.  So a former superpower attacking a country trying to join the biggest military and economic alliances on the globe shaking up their continent’s economy isn’t surprising.

What is surprising is the possible fallout.  Russia has seen its economy stagnate, especially in its capital city, and become increasingly dependent on China.  There has been a push for Russia and China to join forces, but that has resulted in Russia becoming a junior partner as China is starting to push its influence more into the country and seems to have plans for what it wants to do with Russian territory.  With that happening and the decline in trade, Russia is seeing its influence and connection to Europe shrink.  So it's looking to be another “once great empire” with limited influence and continued military defeats against Ukraine could result in it being seen as not much of a threat to European nations.

The elimination of a European threat may be seen as a positive, but like Napoleon’s downfall, the end of a shared threat brings about old rivalries.  After all, both Ukraine and Poland are historic rivals who have a shared hatred of Russia.  When their common threat disappears, how long might they stay as allies?

This is an interesting question.  Poland intends to have the largest land military in Europe by 2030 while Ukraine has been leading the way in drone technology.  If those countries found themselves both wanting to dominate Eastern European cultural influence, they may find themselves in a Cold War.  So one must wonder what will happen if Russia is defeated like the West wants.

So, will Iran become the Middle Eastern North Korea?  Will Russia become a vassal state to China?  Will Poland and Ukraine go to war?  Honestly, there’s no way to make predictions like that.

There are many factors that can change the outcome of wars, politics, and culture shifts in a region.  There’s the desire to always assume the worst case scenario, but that’s usually unlikely.  Time will tell what will actually happen.  All of this is merely factors to consider in our current world.

Which highlights the actual point of this blogpost.  Though war has obviously terrible aspects, the long term effects it can have on domestic and international politics is staggering.  As a result, it reshapes the world we live in as friends become enemies, enemies become friends, and enemies become even worse enemies.  Time will tell what our conflicts today will lead to, but most likely they’ll lead to conflicts of tomorrow.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps: An Overview

With the President’s decision to start a war with Iran, I thought it would be a good idea to get a book on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the military that seems to be running the Iranian Government.  Fortunately, Amazon didn’t disappoint as they had a book readily available.  That 2023 book was “The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps: Defining Iran’s Military Doctrine.”  The book gave me an overview on the Corps’ history, military tactics, purpose, and overall impact on the region.

Now, the book itself isn’t a thorough history book or overview of the IRGC itself.  Rather, it serves mostly as a literature review of other writings on the military force and a general background on them.  It wasn’t super in-depth, but I enjoyed it as someone unfamiliar with the IRGC because it served as a primer for understanding them and their relation to US policy.  So, I’ll be giving an overview of its contents as I’m hoping that may help others understand it and the current war as well.

To start off on its history, the IRGC was created by Iran’s former Supreme Leader, Ruhollah Khomeini, as a paramilitary organization to defend the revolution that brought him to power and ousted the Shah.  Its primary focus was purging institutions, especially the military, of elements disloyal to the 1979 Iranian Revolution and enforcing edicts passed by the country's leaders.  Over time though, its role greatly expanded as it ended up supplanting the country’s military, the Artesh, and controlling the country itself.

During the Iran-Iraq War, the IRGC saw its role greatly expand in defending the country against the invading forces of Saddam Hussein.  Shortly after that, the death of Supreme Leader Khomeini resulted in his replacement by Ali Khamenei.  According to the book, the IRGC helped with his rise to power and he, in turn, greatly expanded their power in the country.

With the IRGC serving as the institution defending Khamenei’s reign, it played a key role in keeping the government in check.  Almost every President elected in the 90s up until the mid 2000s was a reformer, and the IRGC opposed every attempt at reform.  It sent orders to the President, put down protests, and worked to make sure its own people were constantly in control or running the government.

Then, in 2005, it helped get hardliner and Mayor of Tehran Mahmoud Ahmadinejad elected President.  Despite not being seen as an intellectual heavyweight, Ahmadinejad did continue on his predecessor’s push to privatize the country’s economy.  Unfortunately, Ahmadinejad had a bunch of the government’s companies sold to people with ties to the IRGC, which was not the point of privatization.  So after that, the IRGC started to control the economy and thus the country at large.  The only thing worth consideration is that Ahmadinejad’s successor also attempted reform, and failed, so the history of Iran’s civilian government is to try and fail to reform what is now a military dictatorship.

Now, going back to the Iranian Revolution, the book also chronicles failures in the US to actually address Iran throughout its history.  Specifically, back during the Shah’s reign, Jimmy Carter wavered in his support for the Shah which Khomeini used as justification to return to Iran and that lack of confidence led to the Shah’s overthrow.  The Reagan Administration was equally inconsistent as it on one hand supported Saddam’s war with Iran, and then sold weapons to Iran to fund a war in Nicaragua.

After that, the next three US Presidents, H.W. Bush, Clinton, and W. Bush didn’t really have much of an Iran policy as they all became focused on Iraq.  In the vacuum that was created by Saddam’s removal though, Iran started greatly expanding its military network into Iraq and improving economic ties with them.  So the US didn’t have a consistent policy on Iran until the 2010s, and its actions greatly helped Iran expand its influence in the region.

The book then discussed Obama’s policy of negotiation with the Iranian government and the 2015 deal that was struck and Trump’s decision to withdraw.  The book tended to lean more in favor of Obama’s approach, which is why it notes more flaws in Trump’s proposal like how they started building more centrifuges after the US withdrew from the deal.  The withdrawal was also used by the IRGC to portray weakness by President Rouhani and justify curtailing his attempts at reform.  In short, the US hasn’t had a serious approach towards Iran until 2015 and now we are in the midst of a war with them.

Of note, the book also discussed the IRGC’s approach towards war.  Specifically, they support an emerging tactic known as “Hybrid War” which is still being defined.  The idea is that the IRGC uses a combination of military tactics including conventional war, guerilla war, terrorism, and cyberwarfare to complete its military objectives.  It also supports militias and paramilitary organizations in other countries such as Iraq and the Houthis accomplish its goals internationally.  So it’s not fighting a traditional enemy as they’ll support whoever or whatever to accomplish their military objectives.  As a result, a conventional war is not what’s going to take them down.

Finally, the book discusses what that means for future negotiations and handling Iran BEFORE the US’s invasion which took out Khamenei.  It did have some key points such as that Iran would never abandon its missile program so the focus should instead be on addressing its nuclear program.  It also notes that Islam is, ironically, becoming less of a focus for the IRGC as they become increasingly focused on controlling and maintaining the government.  Similarly, they would prevent the government from doing anything without their approval which meant any actual negotiations would not be possible without their approval so they would be a key roadblock to any meaningful negotiations.  A lot of this is irrelevant now that we are at war and Khamenei is dead, but there is one point that remains clear: the IRGC is the main power in the country, they have no intention of doing anything the reduces their power, and a lot of what they want is at odds with the US’s objectives in the region and the country.

I’m not posting this not to say I agree with every tenant of the book, but more to give a brief overview of it.  A lot of this does explain how we got to where we are, what’s going on now, and what we can expect after the war.  For that reason, I recommend giving the book a read.