Understanding Iran

At the time of this writing, the Trump Administration appears to have walked back from threatened military strikes on Iran. Despite a significant amount of pressure from the pro-Israel set of American foreign policy, especially the neocons who love war, cooler heads seem to have prevailed – for now. Whereas I have very little confidence that the current administration can withstand the pressure to “do something” at the behest of Tel Aviv, I think it is important for Americans to understand “who” the United States would be attacking if we moved forward with such a war. Iran is unlike anything we have ever faced.

For most Americans, Iran is an enemy country that came to prominence during the 1970s due to the capture of the American Embassy in 1979, and a subsequent hostage situation that lasted four hundred-forty-four days. Whereas the hostage crisis seemingly ended the day of Ronald Reagan’s inauguration, the US and Iran would have a complicated relationship throughout the 1980s. The beginning of American-Iranian relations was completely reformed during this critical period in the history of both countries.

Saddam Hussein launched one of the bloodiest wars in world history when Iraq invaded Iran in 1980 with tacit approval from the United States and a pan-Arabic alliance. That war lasted eight years and eventually led to the first Persian Gulf War. Meanwhile, religious and ethnic sectarian violence in Lebanon led to a Lebanese Civil War in 1975, but it reached new heights after Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982. That which would emerge is best described as a bar brawl. The fight would involve Iranian-backed Ismaili Shi’ites (Amal and later Hezbollah), the Arab-backed Sunni Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), the Israeli/Western-backed Lebanese Front, and the Soviet-backed Lebanese Communist Party and Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA). The US would tragically join a peace mission that resulted in the death of 241 service members (mostly Marines) by a suicide bomber. Iran was blamed, but every single piece of evidence suggests Israel was responsible for the bombing (a subject for a future article).  Meanwhile, the US and Iran covertly cooperated on strategic matters related to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, Indian-Soviet cooperation in the Gulf of Oman, and most famously, a weapons smuggling program that involved the anti-communist Nicaraguan Contras. This muddle of confusion in the shadows of the final decade of the Cold War often clouds American judgment. It is time for some clarity.

Iran is more than just an Islamic nation state that hates the West. It is more than an historically Persian imperial territory. Iran has a very complex relationship with the region.

Iran’s Persian identity contributes to its self-preservation and security perspective. Persia is a geographic territory that has withstood multiple attempts by foreign conquerors since it was established in the middle of the 6th Century BC. The Alexandrian Greeks briefly held Persia, but the land has never been conquered.

No one has ever conquered Iran. Even at its zenith, Rome failed. The Mongols failed. The Turks failed. The Russians and the British briefly succeeded in the 1940s but still failed to hold the newly named “Iran” – the origins of the name having derived from the word “Aryan” or more accurately, “Land of the Aryans.” That last point is not lost on the modern Jewish state of Israel.

Coupled with this Persian identity is that of a Shi’ite Islamic identity. The history of the Shi’a is far too broad a topic to send in a single article, but it is important to understand their origins if you want to understand Iran. The Shi’atu Ali (Followers of Ali), or Shi’a, are followers of Ali ibn Abi Talib, a cousin and son-in-law of the prophet Mohammed. By most accounts, Ali was the hand-picked successor of Mohammed.

After Mohammed’s death, the significantly weaker Ali was pushed aside by less devout, but more power-hungry competitors as leaders of the infant faith. Ali’s willingness to step aside in order to keep the peace and allow the faith to grow was viewed as magnanimous by future scholars on either side of the theological spectrum. At the time, however, it caused deep divisions within Islam. One group of Mohammed’s fundamentalists, Kharijites, would reject every single sect of Islam as apostates over that which they considered ungodly compromises. Considering Ali a traitor to the mandate that Mohammed gave Ali to lead, and after some unsuccessful rebellions, the Kharijites assassinated Ali before fleeing to that which would eventually become the Syrian-Iraq border. The group would name itself the “[true] Islamic State (or country)” as early as the late 7th Century. This is the same group we would eventually call ISIS almost 1500 years later.

Meanwhile, the post-Ali Muslim world fell back into immediate division with those who backed Ali’s sons versus Syrian-centered power. The culmination of subsequent events led to a rather valiant yet ill-fated charge by Ali’s son, Hussein, at the Battle of Karbala (Iraq) in which approximately 70 Shi’ites faced off against estimates up to 30,000 members of a new global caliphate of followers, the Sunnah (Sunnis). The early Syrian-led Sunnis were so brutal to the Shi’ites that they would incorporate anti-Ali phrases into morning prayers. This led to an Islamic diaspora of Shi’ites that found refuge in the formidable and religiously tolerant Persia.

As Shi’ism matured as a faith, so did its self-identification as an unjustly persecuted minority within Islam. The Shiites believed they were justified by the words of Mohammed himself to follow the path laid before them. As such, the rest of Islam – the Sunnah – was largely regarded as misguided oppressors. This persecuted theological identity would dovetail with that of Persia’s own security conscience and embattled persona. It would become the perfect blend of both a genetic and theologically besieged ethnicity. At the core of Iran’s understanding of itself is that of a world in which everyone is seeking to destroy them – whether for physical gain (e.g., oil rights, territory, etc.) or enemies of Allah’s uncompromising devotees.

The totality of this blended ethno-religious persecution complex led to a structural design that has guided Persian and later Iranian leadership for centuries. Iran is purposely designed to never fail. Despite reports of a despotic regime, there is no such thing as a hierarchical leadership structure that ends with either a Shah or a Grand Ayatollah. Centralized leadership, be it religious or secular, is hyper-dependent on a unique system of interwoven local religious, financial, and insular tribal connections. Iran’s leadership infrastructure is more like a beehive than a pyramid.  Whereas the country is led by a Supreme Council of Islamic leaders – for Americans, think of a religious version of the Supreme Court as the top of power – and it has a very functional parliament, the real power is disaggregated.

Iran’s localities enjoy an intersecting web of clerical leadership, Bonyads (financial “charities” that act as religiously guided businesses), and Basij (a religiously inspired quasi-militia/national guard). If you break one group down, you have to fight thousands of small units disconnected from a centralized leadership, but capable of running their own affairs. In effect, imagine a swarm of bees coming at an invader from every angle to protect the hive, but no single unit dependent on the other. Even if you destroy the central “hive,” an invader would have to deal with the fact that “the bees” have multiple hives – potentially thousands of religiously inspired independent militant units who have the full support of the locality, to include both faith and finances. Kill the Grand Ayatollah Khamenei, and you have to prepare for a thousand Khameneis.

Like a trap intentionally designed to suck a predator into a compromised position, the Marines may take Tehran, and yet never penetrate the suburbs that surround it before they are systematically destroyed. Unlike Iraq, the populace is generally united in its shared ethno-religious identity. Unlike Afghanistan, there is no segmentation of twelve different linguistic tribes with their own needs. Unlike Vietnam, the geography is not conducive for sustained supply chain support. Unlike NSDAP Germany, the Iranians would not be weakened by some kind of global alliance and two front war. In other words, the American have never met an enemy like Iran.

Of course, none of this is reported on Fox News or CNN. The focus there is on the supposed organic protests and the capital of Tehran’s response. Watching the 2026 Tehran protestors is much like watching the 2020 George Floyd riots in Minneapolis or Portland. It would be easy to assume that the riots of 2020 were an indication that the United States wanted Trump deposed. Obviously, that was not the case. The real divide was between radical leftwing rioters – likely led by an internal color revolution – and your average American citizen who simply wants the country he once enjoyed in the 1980s or 90s. The difference between downtown Seattle and the suburbs of Salt Lake City, Knoxville, or Cincinnati may have been lost on outsider observers, but ordinary Americans know the difference. The same can be said for Iran. The protests of radicals in Tehran are not the generally shared views of the rest of Iran. The rest of “God & Country” Iran have ideals formed by the theological and ethnic constructs I described earlier. The world may see protests against a repressive theocracy. Your average Iranian sees protests led by external forces who seek to attack protectors of their very existence. They have never lost to such forces, even when the odds were against them.

In November 2004, I had the privilege of leading a small team in a wargame as the “leader of Iran,” against approximately 300 of the US Departments of Defense (DOD) and State’s (DOS) best thinkers on regional security. Our little eight person team defeated the United States so badly that by the end of the scenario, the US balkanized along politically sectarian lines, gas prices were nearly $20 a gallon, the US dollar was no longer the reserve currency, the US was demilitarized, and all of the American territories were taken to satisfy global war debt, as well as Hawaii and Alaska. What did I do to make this happen? My team sat back and waited for the Americans to take the bait and invade me. American strategic leadership does not understand the Iranian mindset or its unique construct. Israel does, but it does not care what happens to the United States. When the Americans lose in another regime-change war, like a parasite that killed its first host, it will just attach itself to a new host.