The Goals of the U.S.-Israel War Against Iran Participants

Today I will share some thoughts about the war, particularly the goals of the various participants. I don't know if I need to provide the following caveat, but I guess it doesn't hurt. I have an academic background studying the Middle East and I consume a lot of news. As a result, I am probably better informed about the war's developments than the average person, but I am still far from an expert. Therefore, you may not want to give much credence to my musings. On the other hand, there are likely bigger wastes of your time than reading this short post. The bottom line, as far as I can deduce, is that the U.S.-Israel war against Iran has reached the point where the participants are realizing that they will not be able to accomplish their original objectives and, hence, are struggling to redefine their goals.

The biggest problem with discussing the goals of the war is that none of the participants have made believable efforts to explain their goals. My analysis is that on the U.S. side, there is not an agreed-upon list of objectives. Rather, there are cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump's goals and there is a separate list supported by Secretary of State Marco Rubio. In all likelihood, Rubio has attempted to coordinate with Trump, and probably believes that Trump has agreed with the goals established by Rubio. However, Trump is simply incapable of staying on script.

Based on things that Trump has said, I am comfortable asserting that Trump's goal for the war was to follow the so-called "Venezuela model," in which the leader was removed but the regime was kept in place in exchange for concessions to Trump, particularly the provision of millions of barrels of oil. Trump has subsequently sold the oil and deposited the proceeds in a bank account in Qatar that he essentially controls. Trump appears to have believed that killing Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei would bring a new leader to power who would be willing to cut a deal with Trump. According to some reports, there were, in fact, some Iranians who were believed to be moderates and perhaps open to reaching an agreement, but they were also killed in the initial attack. That is the sort of planning that we have come to expect from the Trump administration.

Trump has repeatedly stated that he expects to be involved in choosing Iran's next leader. Trump is transactional by nature. Therefore, the most important attribute of a leader chosen by Trump would likely be a willingness to provide Trump with concessions. Again, that would probably be oil. Trump has also said that he expected that after the war the U.S. would be involved in managing Iran's oil production. However, it is increasingly apparent that the "Venezuela model" is not going to work in Iran. Without Trump's approval, Khamenei's son Mojtaba Khamenei was chosen as Iran's Supreme Leader. Mojtaba is thought to be even more radical than his father.

As Trump has appeared to come to an understanding that Iran would not be like Venezuela, he has also seemed to lose interest in the war. He has started referring to the war as an "excursion" that he emphasizes will be short. The original timeline for the war outlined by Trump was four to five weeks. We are nearly at two weeks, and Trump has said that things are ahead of schedule. This could signal that Trump would like to wrap things up. As I have written before, Trump frequently seems to be influenced only by the stock, bond, and oil markets. The more that things go poorly in those markets, the more likely Trump is to declare victory and end the fighting. Given that oil prices have risen steeply and the stock market is dropping, Trump might be willing to accept any solution that would result in oil prices dropping to their pre-war level.

Just after the U.S. and Israel launched the war, there was considerable criticism of the Trump administration due to its inability to articulate why the war was started, what goals the administration hoped to achieve, and how the war was expected to end. Probably in response to this, the administration came up with a list of objectives. I suspect that this is a list created by the State Department, likely with Trump's input. However, because it does not mention anything about a post-war government that is conciliatory towards Trump, I doubt that Trump really has much interest in these objectives. At any rate, the four goals provided were:

1. Destroy their missiles, and raze their missile industry to the ground.
2. Annihilate their Navy.
3. Ensure the regime's terrorist proxies can no longer destabilize the region or the world and attack our forces, and no longer use their IEDs or roadside bombs, which have gravely wounded and killed thousands and thousands of people, including many Americans.
4. Ensure that Iran can NEVER obtain a nuclear weapon.

More recently, Rubio outlined another list that had the following items:

• Destroy their ability to launch missiles
• Destroy factories making these missiles
• Destroy their navy

It is especially notable that there is no longer any mention of Iran's nuclear program, particularly because Trump has continued to talk about the importance of ending Iran's nuclear ambitions. This appears to be a tactical list aimed at providing achievable goals that would allow the United States to declare victory.

At this point, it appears that the U.S. simply wants to create a situation in which Iran is not a threat to its neighbors, in which oil flows freely through the Persian Gulf, and in which Iran is a relatively stable country. Any goals that the U.S. may have originally had beyond these have been cast aside.

The Israeli agenda is just as oblique as that of the U.S., and as such, requires a considerable amount of tea leaf reading. One thing that is clear is that Benjamin Netanyahu, in his own words, has dreamed of this war for 40 years. He was instrumental in convincing Trump to join Israel in the war. Netanyahu wants to remove Iran as a threat to Israel, but his vision of doing so appears to be much different than that of Trump. Based on Netanyahu's words and Israel's actions, the Israeli leader favors the "Syrian model" in which the ruling regime is so weakened that it eventually collapses and is replaced. The Israelis don't seem to be concerned whether the end result is a civil war or a failed state, just as long as Iran is left too weak to be a threat to Israel.

Simultaneously, Israel is in a war with Hezbollah in Lebanon. When Israel has attempted to confront Hezbollah directly, it has not fared well, paying high costs in personnel and equipment. Therefore, as I wrote earlier this week, Israel prefers to pursue the Dahiya Doctrine in which civilian infrastructure is targeted. The goal is to provoke the population and the Lebanese government to pressure Hezbollah to stop its fighting. In the current fighting, Israel has forced over half a million people to abandon their homes and then bombed them in the places in which they have taken refuge. Israel has seen success in motivating Lebanese government officials to demand that Hezbollah be disarmed. It is likely that Israel will want to continue to pursue its goals in Lebanon regardless of what happens with Iran.

In Iran, Israel is likely to be constrained by the United States. There have been examples of Israel pursuing its Dahiya Doctrine in Iran, for instance when it bombed oil storage facilities throughout the country. However, there were reports that the U.S. was surprised by those attacks and reacted negatively to them. There are already reports from Israel that the leadership has accepted that it will not be able to achieve its goals in this round of fighting and will have to prepare for another round in the future.

This brings us to Iran's goals, the least easy to decipher and, therefore, requiring the most guessing on my part. It appears that Iran's objective is to create a deterrent against future attacks. It hopes to do this by demonstrating to the U.S. and Israel that the cost of attacking Iran is simply too high. Iran has closed the Strait of Hormuz, which has drastically increased the price of oil. In December, oil was selling for less than $60 a barrel. As I write this, West Texas Intermediate Crude is nearly $95, and Brent Crude is almost $100. These prices will put tremendous pressure on the world's economy. But it is not just oil that Iran is restricting. Much of the world's fertilizer normally traverses the Strait of Hormuz and is now bottled up. This is exactly the time of the year when farmers need fertilizer. Without the Gulf's supply, they will either pay more or go without. Both options will be economically bad and reflected in higher food prices.

Iran is also measuring its attacks to be equal responses to attacks on itself. For instance, when an Iranian desalination plant was attacked, Iran responded by bombing a desalination plant in Bahrain. After Iran's oil storage facilities were attacked, Iran struck oil facilities in Oman, two oil tankers in waters near Iraq, and oil facilities in Bahrain. This tit-for-tat procedure may make the U.S. and Israel think twice about their targets. But it has a more important impact on the Gulf states. Iran is sending the message to the Gulf states that the United States cannot protect them. The Gulf Arabs have spent billions on military equipment purchased from the U.S., host American military bases, and invest heavily in the U.S. economy. After all of that, this is what they get? There are reports that this is having an impact and that the Gulf states are already rethinking their investments in the United States. It would not be surprising if they are also pressuring Trump — in whose personal businesses many of the Gulf countries have heavily invested — to bring the fighting to an early stop.

There is an obvious dilemma presented by the Iranian strategy, however. The more Iran makes itself a threat in order to present a deterrent, the more convincing the argument that Iran is too dangerous and must be defeated becomes. Iran has shown that it is willing to attack its neighbors. Do they want to continue to live with that threat? If the Gulf Arabs start whispering in Trump's ear that regime change is necessary in Iran, something that Netanyahu is surely doing already, Trump may agree to go along. That may well be why yesterday Trump brought up the possibility of destroying Iran's electrical system. That would be something directly out of the Israeli Dahiya Doctrine playbook. It would also be an indication of all-out war against the Iranian people, rather than simply the regime. It would markedly change this conflict.

One thing that is obvious to anyone who has paid attention is that the Trump administration did almost no planning for this war. They did not fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, there are no plans for how to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, they have no idea what to do about the coming fertilizer shortage, and there is even a shortage of military-use rare earth metals. If this war continues long enough, it may not be possible to replace some munitions. We are rapidly reaching a critical point where Trump will need to decide whether he declares victory and stops the fighting or whether he ramps things up, possibly including the deployment of troops on the ground, in pursuit of a more complete victory. The smart money is on Trump TACOing, though that is not a sure bet.