Is the Lack of a War Plan Trump’s ‘Plan’?
The Iranians have a say in when the war ends. And they say that they have only just begun.
The American-Israeli model of warfare, based on air strikes from a safe distance, is being challenged by a very different form of strategic asymmetrical warfare – a war that Iran first planned more than twenty years ago.
This is important to understand when trying to assess where the balance of the war truly lies. It is like comparing apples and pears; they differ fundamentally in nature, writes
Alastair Crooke .
The US and Israel are dropping a lot of stand-off ammunition on Iran. But to what point and with what effect? We do not know.
We do know, however, that Iran has its asymmetrical war plan. And that has only just begun, evolving step by step towards full implementation. The full arsenal of Iranian missiles has not yet been revealed – neither the newest missiles, nor the underwater drones and anti-ship missile-equipped speedboats that have yet to be deployed. We therefore do not know the full potential of Iran – and we cannot yet say what effect its full deployment might have. Hezbollah is now fully operational , and the Houthis (it seems) are waiting for the ‘green light’ to close off Bab el-Mandeb, in combination with the blockade of Hormuz.
The cause of this shift towards the Iranian asymmetrical paradigm lies in the total destruction by the US of Iraq’s Centralized Military Command in 2003 – the result of a three-week massive air attack.
The question that arose for Iranians after the war in Iraq was how Iran could build a deterrent military structure while it had nothing – and could not have – that even remotely resembled an equivalent air force. And while, moreover, the US could look down from space with its high-resolution satellite cameras on the extent of the Iranian military infrastructure.
Well, the first answer was simply to have as little of the Iranian military structure in the public eye as possible, so that it could not be observed from above – from space. Its components had to be buried, and buried deep (out of range of most bombs).
The second answer was that deep-buried missiles could in fact indeed become Iran’s ‘air force’ – meaning that they could become a replacement for a conventional air force. So, Iran has been building and stockpiling missiles for more than twenty years.
With Iran’s intense research focus on missile technology, it reportedly produces some 10-12 models of cruise missiles and ballistic missiles. Some are hypersonic; others can deliver a range of explosive submunitions that are steerable (to evade defense interceptors).
The large missiles are launched from deep underground silos scattered across Iran (which is as large as Western Europe and rich in mountain ranges and forests). Coast-to-ship missiles are also spread like a honeycomb along the Iranian coastal strip.
The third response was finding a solution to the successful ‘shock and awe’ attack of 2003, in which Saddam Hussein’s military command was eliminated.
The Mosaic doctrine was introduced in 2007 .
The idea behind the doctrine was to split Iran’s military infrastructure into autonomous provincial commands — each with its own stockpile of ammunition, its own missile silos, and, where necessary, its own naval units and militias.
Commanders received delegated battle plans in advance, along with the authority to undertake military action on their own initiative in the event of a decapitation battle on the capital. The battle plans and protocols would automatically come into effect upon the decapitation of a Supreme Leader.
Article 110 of the 1979 Iranian Constitution grants command of the armed forces exclusively to the Supreme Leader. No one, and no institution, can set aside or revoke his directives. Should the new Leader subsequently be assassinated, the previously delegated instructions would take effect and could not be undone by any other authority.
In short, the Iranian military machine functions – in the event of a decapitation battle – as an automated, decentralized retaliation machine that cannot easily be stopped or controlled.
Military commentator Patricia Marins notes :
Iran is waging a nearly perfect asymmetrical war, absorbing attacks, rendering surrounding bases strategically unusable, destroying radars, and maintaining control of the Strait of Hormuz, while simultaneously preserving its missile launch capability.
The US and Israel find themselves in an extremely difficult situation because they know only one type of war: indiscriminate aerial bombardments of largely civilian targets, as they fail to destroy the underground missile cities. Now they face a strategically well-positioned Iran fighting on its own terms and schedule. What has Iran done? It focused on resilience against bombardments – and kept nearly its entire arsenal in large underground bases where the US and Israel have already spent enormous amounts of ammunition in an attempt to penetrate them.
Another important lesson Iran drew from the 2003 war in Iraq was that the American and Israeli ‘way of warfare’ is entirely focused on short-range aerial bombardments to disable leadership layers and command structures. The vulnerability of a centralized command structure was countered by the mosaic structure, which distributed command broadly and across multiple commands – so that it would not grind to a halt in the event of a surprise attack to eliminate leadership.
And a further strategic insight that Iran drew from the war in Iraq was that the West is militarily structured around short, intensive air wars.
The antidote in the Iranian analysis was to ‘go for the long term’: the strategic decision of the current Iranian leadership to opt for a long war stems directly from this insight – that Western armies are built for the ‘shoot-and-scoot’ approach – plus their conviction that the Iranian people have more resilience to bear the pain of war than the Israeli or Western public.
The mechanisms for choosing to let a war last longer than Trump might want essentially come down to logistics.
Iran’s logistical ‘stranglehold’
Israel and the US had initially prepared and equipped for a short war. In the case of the US: very short – from the Saturday morning Khomeini was assassinated until Monday, when the American stock markets were due to open.
Iran responded to the prepared Mosaic plan within an hour of the assassination of Imam Khamenei by attacking American bases in the Persian Gulf. The IRGC reportedly used old ballistic missiles and drones from the 2012/2013 production cycle. The goal of deploying old missiles and drones so extensively was clearly to reduce the stockpile of interceptor missiles held by American bases in the Gulf.
A similar process to deplete Israel’s stockpile of interceptor missiles was carried out simultaneously. The depletion of the stockpile of interceptor missiles in the Gulf and Israel has become evident. This formed the first layer of the logistical ‘snag’.
The second layer is the economic and energy squeeze caused by closing the Strait of Hormuz to all ‘opponents’ but not to ‘friends’. Closing Hormuz is intended to cause a financial and supply crisis in the West, thereby ‘limiting’ the financial prospects that the war could offer the West. Weakening markets equate to a weakening of Trump’s resolve.
The third ‘trap’ focuses on public support for the war in the US. Iran’s refusal to accept a ceasefire or negotiations, but instead opting for a protracted war, undermines public expectations, challenges consensus expectations, and generates fear and uncertainty.
What are Iran’s likely strategic objectives?
What, then, could be Iran’s ultimate objectives? First: the removal of the ongoing threat of a military attack; the enforcement of the lifting of the ongoing siege of the Iranian people through sanctions; the return of its frozen assets; and the end of the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the Palestinian territories.
Iran may also believe that it will ‘flip’ the geopolitical balance in the Persian Gulf region to remove the region’s maritime bottlenecks and sea corridors from American hegemony and open them up for the passage of BRICS vessels, without sanctions, seizure, or blockade by Washington. To launch, as it were, a reverse ‘freedom of navigation,’ in the original sense of the expression.
It is clear that the Iranian leaders understand very well that the successful execution of their asymmetrical war plan could turn the geostrategic balance of not only West Asia, but of the entire world upside down.
And what about Trump’s plan, then? President Trump’s biographer, Michael Wolff, said just yesterday :
“He [Trump] has no plan. He doesn’t know what is going on. He is not really capable of formulating a plan. He creates a cliffhanger, and in his own mind, that becomes something to be proud of: no one knows what I am going to do next. So everyone is afraid of me – and that gives me maximum influence. Not having a plan becomes the plan.”
The metaphor is one, Wolff suggests, of Trump as a performer:
He stands on the stage and he makes it up as he goes along and is very proud of that fortune, which is a considerable fortune.
Wolff characterizes Trump as follows:
“We are going to stop the war. We are going to start the war. We are going to bomb them; we are going to negotiate; we are going to force an unconditional surrender. Nothing happens without it coming from him [Trump]. And that changes from moment to moment.”
In reality, the only measure that counts for Trump is being seen as a winner. Yesterday, he declared that the US has “won” the war — “We won. We won the bet. In the first hour .” But within a few weeks, the vulnerability of his fickleness could become clearer as the oil, stock, and bond markets spiral downwards. Trump is calling around looking for someone who can offer him a winning “way out” of the war he has started.
But the Iranians also have a say in when the war ends. And they say that they have only just begun…
https://www.frontnieuws.com/is-het-ontbreken-van-een-oorlogsplan-het-plan-van-trump