No one should assume that a neocon-driven attack on Iran would be a mere walkover of an internationally isolated pariah state with little capability to respond, any more than any sentient observer should have thought that invading and occupying Iraq would be a quick and painless "walk in the park."
What does a hair trigger look like? Pretty much like what the U.S. is now building up in the Persian Gulf region.
To help follow the debacle blow-by-blow, consider bookmarking this zoomable map of the Persian Gulf.
Below the break is a prewar program guide with numerous links pointing to some of Iran's more formidable military capabilities, especially missile and naval resources, as well as likely intelligence capabilities.
Especially significant will be Russian and Chinese covert and overt intelligence and material support to Iran, which has observer status in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). Note the nine days of war games conducted by SCO in the Urals in August, as well as the SCO summit meeting, which was attended by Iranian President Ahmadinejad..
To what degree does Russia provide intelligence support to Iran? In October, 2005 Russia launched a satellite on behalf of Iran. The Iranian satellite appears to have a "camera." If so, the Iranians already have at least a rudimentary satellite photoreconnaissance capability. They would surely be keeping close watch on the exact coordinates of any U.S. carrier strike forces currently deployed in the Gulf and on any others that may be approaching the Arabian Sea.
Iran also is collaborating with China on a Small Multimission Satellite project (SMMS). Note that China is scheduled to launch the first SMMS this fall, either in September or November. The SMMS will significantly enhance Iran's satellite photoreconnaisance capability.
If the Iranians are themselves not yet up to the task of tracking the U.S. carrier strike forces in real-time, it seems likely that the Russians and perhaps also the Chinese would consider it in their interest to provide such direct intelligence support. The Russians could pinpoint the coordinates of the carrier strike forces and monitor U.S. military chatter, just as the U.S. helped Saddam Hussein keep track of Iranian troop deployments and activities during the Iran-Iraq War.
The Russians have supplied 29 Tor-M1 (SA-15 Gauntlet) surface-to-air missile (SAM) systems to Iran. Each mobile battery contains eight SAMs. The radars for these systems are reasonably sophisticated. The SA-15 even has some capability to engage cruise missiles. The deliveries were completed in early 2007, and the Iranians have successfully tested the Tor system.
A massive U.S. air strike would likely initially make heavy use of cruise missiles to target Iran's SAM installations just before targeting suspected nuclear facilities and key infrastructure and communications targets. Alexis Debat of the Nixon Center alleges that 1,200 Iranian targets have been selected for a massive three day air offensive. A thorough and credible British analysis suggests that the U.S. has identified 10,000 Iranian targets.
The Iranians, with their anti-ship missiles cocked and ready, might be able to fire off a few salvos at the U.S. carrier strike forces at the very onset of hostilities, even before the initial salvoes of U.S. Tomahawks have hit their targets. The Iranians are not likely to hunker down and just absorb a beating, day after day, as the Iraqis did. Check out the results of the massive Millennium Challenge 2002 war game to see what can happen if the "Red Team" enemy is intelligent and not inclined to act exactly as the war gamers expect. Former Marine Lt. Gen. Paul Van Riper as commander of the "Red Team" managed to use "swarming" techniques and anti-ship missiles to "sink" most of the "Blue Team" (i.e., U.S. Navy) fleet at the onset of hostilities. The war game managers "refloated" the Blue Team fleet in order to proceed with the exercise, and Van Riper walked out in disgust.
Here is a summary of the capabilities of Russian Moskit, Yakhont, and Alpha anti-ship missiles (ASMs). Iran may also have the updated Chinese Sizzler anti-ship missile in its arsenal. Even if the Iranians have not managed to purchase the ultra-lethal Yakhont or Sizzler, they indigenously produce the Noor ASM, which is based on the Chinese C-802. The Iranians may have extended the range of the Noor out to 200 kilometers--more than enough to span the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman. The Noor ASM, by the way, is what Hezbollah used to hit the Israeli missile corvette Hanit during Israel's invasion of Lebanon in July, 2006. In short, with their ASM capability alone, the Iranians probably have the capability to close the Strait of Hormuz. They may even have the potential to turn the entire Persian Gulf into a "killing pond" for sinking U.S. ships.
Although the Iranian Navy and Air Force are modest in size, they would likely have enough surviving capability to offer a painful response even after a massive "shock and awe" first strike by the U.S.
If even one of Iran's three Kilo Class submarines could survive a massive U.S. first strike to launch a salvo of ASMs, the results could be unpleasantly surprising. Besides approximately 250 small patrol craft, the Iranians also have at least five high-speed Chinese Cat-14 attack catamarans and a handful of Ghadir and Nahang class mini-subs, which can deliver high-speed torpedoes based on the Russian Shkval design.
The Iranians also have a robust surface-to-surface missile (SSM) capability with an arsenal far more sophisticated than the old, inaccurate, and militarily useless SCUD SSMs. The Iranians mass-produce the Shahab-3, which can carry a nearly one metric ton conventional warhead 2,100 kilometers with a CEP (circular error probability) of 30 meters, sufficient accuracy to be a threat to U.S. land-based command posts and weapons depots throughout the Middle East. Perhaps this range explains why Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan of the United Arab Emirates announced in March, 2007 that he would not allow the U.S. to use UAE territory for strikes against Iran.
The Russians have not forgotten the U.S. introduction of shoulder-fired Stinger SAMs into Afghanistan in 1986. The Red Army and its Afghan clients were actually doing rather well against the Afghan insurgency at that point, and the Stinger missiles served as the catalyst to turn that conflict around and ultimately send the Russians packing across the border, their mission unaccomplished. Putin and many in his inner circle may well blame the U.S., the Stingers, and that Afghan war for being the proximate catalyst for the dissolution of the Soviet Empire. Perhaps the Russians would see a conflict between the U.S. and Iran as an opportunity for payback: a proximate catalyst for the dissolution of American global hegemony. If so, we may see a flood of the very capable Russian SA-16 Gimlet and SA-18 Grouse SAMs into the battlefields of Iraq and Iran. Iran produces its own shoulder-fired Mithaq SAMs. These shoulder-fired missiles would be especially effective if used by Iraqi resistance or Iranian conventional forces against U.S. helicopters providing close ground support. Iran could also, of course, expand the conflict by sending the Mithaq to its clients in Lebanon and Gaza.
If the neocons are contemplating ground action, the Iranian Army and Revolutionary Guards should not be taken lightly, as Saddam Hussein discovered during the Iran-Iraq War.
Remember that the senior Iranian military commanders had substantial battle experience as junior and mid-grade officers in the Iran-Iraq War. They have been observing the habits and tactics of U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf and in Iraq for decades. And they have the advantage of the Shiite mentality of martyrdom among their troops: the Iranians will be willing to accept casualties in air, sea, or land-launched kamikaze missions against U.S. targets.
Another net geopolitical setback or outright debacle--first Iraq and then Iran--for the U.S. would be another net geopolitical gain for the Russians, and at minimal cost to them. (Question: is the recent Russian resumption of long-range strategic bomber patrols a reaction to a U.S. military buildup directed against Iran?)
Remember too that China is heavily dependent on Iran for its energy needs. Indeed, China imports approximately 13 percent of its oil from Iran and would be unlikely to stand idly by if the U.S. were to try to seize the major Iranian oilfields by implementing OPLAN 1002-04, the "Khuzestan Gambit."
For more details on the U.S. military focus on Iran, look at this summary of the study by two British security experts cited above.
In short, it seems unlikely that either China or Russia would simply sit passively if the U.S. were to attack Iran. The "correlation of forces," an old Russian concept similar to "balance of power," could swiftly turn sharply against U.S. interests in the Middle East.
Of course, the U.S. military will have a far better appreciation of Iran's potential to retaliate than can be reflected in these open sources. But we can probably rest assured that after spending a few minutes exploring the links listed herein, we mere observers shall likely have a reasonable appreciation of Iran's ability to project military force throughout the Gulf region even in the wake of a massive U.S. assault.
Will the neocon theorists and policy-makers who wish to attack Iran in yet another preemptive war have the same level of appreciation of the potential consequences?
And we have not even considered the potential consquences for U.S. and British troops on the ground in Iraq; for the U.S. and world economies; for metastasizing of the conflict to Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Afghanistan, and Pakistan; and for geopolitical rearrangement in the Middle East and the entire world. Neither have we discussed Iran's capabilities to respond with a cyber attack on the U.S. information infrastructure or with terrorist attacks against U.S. interests around the world. Have the neocons looked ahead two or three steps to consider such consequences? Is there any reason to think that their vision will be any better this time than it was before invading and occupying Iraq?
Unfortunately, if Bush and Cheney signal the attack, it will not really be a conflict between neocons and Iranians. It will be U.S. Air Force, Navy, Marine, and Army personnel used by the neocons as toy soldiers in what they seem to regard merely as a bloodless board game against Iran--rather like playing Risk in a college dormitory room.
Thomas Fowler to Alden Pyle: 'Don't go on in the East with that parrot cry about a threat to the individual soul. Here you'd find yourself on the wrong side--it's they who stand for the individual and we just stand for Private 23987, unit in the global strategy.'
...Alden Pyle discussing civilian casualties caused by his operations: 'They were only war casualties,' he said. 'It was a pity, but you can't always hit your target. Anyway they died in the right cause.'
--Graham Greene, The Quiet American
Protagonist Thomas Fowler discussing Alden Pyle's ideological theorist, the fictitious York Harding, author of the equally fictitious The Role of the West:'He's a superior sort of journalist--they call them diplomatic correspondents. He gets hold of an idea and then alters every situation to fit the idea. Pyle came out here full of York Harding's idea. Harding had been here once for a week on his way from Bangkok to Tokyo. Pyle made the mistake of putting his idea into practice. Harding wrote about a Third Force. Pyle formed one--a shoddy little bandit with two thousand men and a couple of tame tigers. He got mixed up.'
--Graham Greene, The Quiet American
Don't you think we are probably living Orwell's 1984?
Nineteen Eighty Four posits a world wherein the government is totalitarian in word and deed. All mass communications media are subordinate to the government's interpretation of reality. Television, as technology and as communicated content, is the principal means of thought control, buttressed by the press and publishing. Through such, the population - the ruling Party, its government employees, and the proletariat - are controlled through perpetual war and all of its concomitant material and intellectual shortages. According to the government, this life must be endured for the collective good, until the war ends; the war ends when the government says so.
The essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labour. War is a way of shattering to pieces, or pouring into the stratosphere, or sinking in the depths of the sea, materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable, and hence, in the long run, too intelligent.... And at the same time the consciousness of being at war, and therefore in danger, makes the handing-over of all power to a small caste seem the natural, unavoidable condition of survival.War, it will be seen, not only accomplishes the necessary destruction, but accomplishes it in a psychologically acceptable way. In principle it would be quite simple to waste the surplus labour of the world by building temples and pyramids, by digging holes and filling them up again, or even by producing vast quatities of goods and then setting fire to them. But this would provide only the economic and not the emotional basis for a hierarchical society.
--George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four
