By Shashi P.B.B. Malla

The Trump administration has negotiated with a regime that the president claimed it had already changed, to open a vital waterway that was supposed to be open last month, and to end a nuclear programme that Trump claimed it had obliterated, writes The New York Times columnist David French (May 29).

As more information filters out, the picture of the region gets more nebulous and vague.

For a fact, Iran was able to immediately and decisively close the Strait of Hormuz.

The Iranian regime by using triangular tactics, inflicted significant damage on oil and natural

gas production of the other Gulf countries. The United States has unable to do anything about this Iranian treachery.

In addition, in spite of U.S. air superiority, the Islamic Republic was still able to damage or destroy 42 manned and unmanned American aircraft.

Compounding the problem, its unclear as to how much the U.S. has damaged Iran’s missile programme.

As the NYT reported this month, “The Trump administration’s public portrayal of a shattered Iranian military is sharply at odds with what U.S. intelligence agencies are telling policymakers behind closed doors.”

In concrete terms, this means that Iran may have retained 70 percent of its missile launchers and pre-war missile stocks, and 30 of its 33 missile sites along the Strait of Hormuz.

In contrast, the U.S. has depleted a substantial percentage of its own missile stocks to destroy a small fraction of Iran’s capabilities.

French writes that the Trump administration hasn’t accomplished any of its war aims.

The Iranian regime is intact, perhaps even more hard-line than before the war now that the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps appears to exert greater control.

[There have been reports that the current Supreme Leader has been ‘respectfully’ sidelined].

“There has been no unconditional surrender [as demanded by Trump]; Iran still possesses stocks of highly enriched uranium; it still possesses a formidable missile arsenal; and it still supports terrorist proxies [Hezbollah in Lebanon, militants in Iraq, Houthis in Yemen] that wage war against Israel.” (French/NYT)

The U.S. has weakened the Iranian military, but the regime is unbeaten and unbowed.

If anything, its regional and global position may even be stronger than it was before the war.

Before the war, for example, Iran’s control over the Strait of Hormuz was theoretical.

Now it’s actual and for a fact.

And the Trump administration doesn’t seem to possess a plan – or the will – to open it once again.

How and Why did this happen?

Why did America find itself in a situation in which its military performed its assigned mission with competence and courage, but without achieving the desired strategic effect?

French is of the opinion that the answer is to be found in leadership, history and civics.

As in the events leading up to the First World War, and the war itself, Eliot Cohen, an eminent strategic studies expert, wrote: “Lions Led by Donkeys”, meaning that leaders seemed to lack the imagination to break the stalemate.

The Trump administration was the perfect example of what happens when you put incompetent and corrupt people in charge of dangerous and difficult military operations, according to French.

Consequently, Trump’s performance as commander-in-chief is a perfect illustration of why he was never an acceptable choice as president.

It has now become clear that Trump had a wildly unrealistic Plan A and no viable Plan B.

Trump thought mistakenly that a jihadist regime that endured hundreds of thousands of casualties during the Iraq-Iran war, has persisted with its weapons development programmes in the face of crippling sanctions, industrial sabotage and targeted assassinations, and is a theocracy full of people willing to die for their beliefs, would behave exactly like a corrupt South American regime – as in Venezuela – that shares none of those characteristics.

History

US General Stanley McChrystal speaking about the Iran war listed “three great seductions” that have lead America astray.

The first two seductions, covert action and surgical special operations weren’t so relevant as the third, air power.

The U.S, mistakenly believes that bombing really can win the war.

Civics

French maintains that the US Constitution’s requirement that Congress declare war is no mere technicality.

It reflects a clear understanding of how democracies should wage war, both for the benefit of the democracy and for the good of the war effort.

The process of seeking Congressional support can stress-test the war plan, and if the case for the war can’t survive sceptical questioning, then the war should not be fought.

Moreover, when democratic governments wage wars with public support, they can demonstrate extraordinary resolve and staying power.

In the absence of that support, even a matter as temporary as higher petrol prices can lead to demands for stopping the war – as is now happening in America.

The result is an asymmetric commitment in the two countries – the tyrannical, clerical Iranian regime willing to bear any burden and pay any price (including the lives of its hapless citizens) to maintain its power and Americans unwilling to bear much burden at all.

The beating heart of the American political system is the social contract theory of government, the idea that the country’s leader derives his legitimacy not by divine right, but through the will of the people.

Trump has trampled on this astute principle.

Has Iran won the war by not losing?

Iran’s survival strategy has leveraged a form of warfare grounded in geo-economic calculation (Ibrahim al- Marashi & Tanya Goudsouzian in Engelsberg Ideas, May 30).

After all, is the true measure of victory what was destroyed, or what survived?

For Trump, it has been at best a Pyrrhic victory.

Trump claimed he was playing 4-D chess with his Iranian antagonists.

It has now emerged that Trump is a mere neophyte in this strategic game, while the Iranian leaders are the grandmasters.

Actually, Trump’s approach to foreign policy more closely resembles poker — transactional, improvised and geared toward short-term advantage.

It’s difficult to blame the US military for the present debacle.

It has performed its mission with extreme skill.

Nor can it be presumed that military leaders failed to warn Trump that Iran would respond exactly as it did.

Sone sources do suggest that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Dan Caine, did warn Trump that Iran would try to close the Strait of Hormuz, but Trump brusquely brushed it off (NYT).

French’s pointed and witty remark: “One of the realities of military life is that soldiers are law and honour-bound to refuse unlawful orders, but they have no grounds for refusing stupid orders.”

In this connection, Tennyson’s poem “The Charge of the Light Brigade” is very apt. It describes how the commander of the British cavalry in the Battle of Balaklava in 1854 ( Crimean War) woefully blundered:

       “Forward the Light Brigade

        Was there a man dismayed?

         Not though the soldier knew

         Someone had blundered.

         Theirs not to make reply,

          Theirs not to reason why,

          Theirs but to do and die.

           Into the valley of Death

           Rode the six hundred.”

   The writer can be reached at: shashimalla125@gmail.com