Lessons in Decentralisation From Iran

I'm going to try to write this post from the perspective of an outside observer, but I suspect it's going to be hard to keep my own feelings out of it. I'm certainly not going to say that any of the parties in the recent war are "the good guys", and I'm aware some might see this as a controversial topic !

Image by Farkhod Vakhob from Pixabay

The Western Way of War

The way the West fights wars historically isn't the glorious story Hollywood tries to sell us. Instead, it is an extension of the way Western countries are ruled. Power always resides in a single autocratic ruler. They may be an hereditary king or emperor, or they may be someone nominally elected through a democratic process, but the end result is the same.

Behind that ruler is an unelected support system of civil servants and corporations. Sometimes the ruler is obviously bought and paid for by them, other times they are in thrall to the ruler. But when it comes down to it, the ruler generally maintains firm control over the military, police and judiciary. Only if their control over two or more of these three slips into the hands of the next ruler do they lose power.

Because of this, Western warfare for many centuries has been focused on ruthlessly taking out the opposing power's ruler. By the end of the medieval period, single combat between rulers was seen as too risky, so more aggressive techniques came into play. Both Cortez and Pizzaro kidnapped and then murdered Aztec and Inca rulers. Assassination and poisoning, both often disguised as "sudden illnesses" (or in Napoleon's case as a stomach ulcer, now disproven by recent research) became a frequent way to eliminate rivals within Europe.

The United States has taken this lesson to heart with an almost mafia-like enthusiasm. Noriega, Saddam Hussein, Maduro, Gaddhafi, endless attempts on Castro, the (deniable but obvious) targeting of Putin at Valdai last December and many other cases show it in action. Israel has done likewise, regularly using drone and air strikes to eliminate PLO, then Hamas and Hezbollah leaders.

When the US and Israel attacked Iran in February, their first strikes were on the leadership, killing Khamenei and many others thought to be key figures. It was framed as a way to win a short, sharp war with no risk of retaliation, but it didn't play out like that.

Iran's Planning

Iran had seen what to expect. They'd watched their allies lose leaders, and had been on the receiving end themselves - for example when Trump assassinated Soleimani, or when Israel assassinated so many of their nuclear scientists.

Their response was quietly developed over many years, a mixture of governmental and military organisational structures and doctrines.

Looking at the government first; many in the West suggested it was hopelessly fractured and over-complex, with all kinds of different bodies having overlapping areas of responsibility. But behind the scenes, everyone was expected to nominate not just a successor, but at least three levels of successor, and ensure they had the information to continue their job and their names weren't too public.

The role was what mattered, not the person sitting in the chair on that particular day. The cultural difference here also comes into play; Shia Islam has a tradition of martyrdom and sacrifice very different to the individualism of the West.

There appear to have been (at least) four pillars of authority - the religious, the civil government, the Revolutionary Guard, and the armed forces. Each has departments for every function of government. Sure, that makes for squabbles, but they do also communicate and co-ordinate to a certain extent. Knock out a whole pillar, and the other three are still there able to run things.

The armed forces, again, were fragmented. There were the traditional army, navy and air force. But there were also the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), who have an army, navy and air force of their own, plus the Basij militia who act as a police force.

What was interesting was that when the US and Israel killed senior officers, each unit was "pre-programmed" with instructions on how to continue fighting independently and develop the conflict in the absence of orders from above. It created some weaknesses because there was less focused fire on specific targets and it took a few hours for word of the ceasefire to filter down, but no-one just stopped fighting.

All of the units appear to have followed the doctrine of using older weapons first and working through pre-prepared target lists. It was notable that strikes were attributed to the various services (e.g. when the navy were quoted as launching drones at US bases in Kuwait, long after Trump claimed they'd ceased to exist)), suggesting again a high degree of overlap and duplication of function.

The overall effect was that Iran had a web of authority rather than a unitary government edifice. Each person had briefed replacements standing in the wings. Everyone knew what they had to do to maintain the fight no matter how painful it was.

What Does the Future Hold ?

It is very difficult to predict an exact future, but I think there is a high likelihood of a number of things developing over the next few years.

First, in the near term I can see the US continuing to desperately try to maintain the narrative that they "won" this war. But doing damage isn't the same as winning, and more and more images are emerging of US air defence radars and aircraft destroyed on the ground. The maths falls apart fast when they are using three $5 million patriot missiles to stop each $50,000 drone.

I can see Trump trying for another "easy win" by trying to take Cuba. Not to mention pulling the US out of NATO (even though technically this is another decision which should rest with Congress).

But he won't have thought through how to retain access to all the US bases in Europe, particularly if he decides to take Greenland (he can take it once the US is out of NATO, I doubt he can hold it, but that's a subject for another post). More importantly, Israel has hinted strongly that Turkey is next on it's radar, and the US has to be out of NATO first to avoid being caught by a conflict of interest when Chapter 5 is triggered. I have a suspicion that there's something exceptionally damning in the Epstein files that Mossad is holding over him !

In the longer term, Iran has shown that a decentralised structure can withstand Western decapitation strikes. Other countries are likely to follow the example, although I'm not sure Russia or China will be able to without significant structural changes.

I also see it as quite likely that opponents of the US will return the favour at some point. If the president, vice president and a dozen other senior US government officials were wiped out, I suspect the United States would struggle to show the same resilience as Iran. The US armed forces have achieved Soviet levels of centralisation, to the point that we see footage of presidents directing missions from the War Room. How will that work when most of the seats are empty ?

The mainland US has been largely insulated from the effects of warfare for many years, and even during the recent war Iran refrained from striking New York or Los Angeles. Missile attacks on the US mainland are likely to be a severe psychological shock.

I believe we will see significant levels of nuclear proliferation in the very near future.

The US's security guarantees are seen as shaky now, making countries like Japan, Taiwan and South Korea look to their own defence (and with the technological base to make nuclear weapons very, very fast). The lesson North Korea has shown is that having a credible nuclear deterrent aids safety from US attack as long as subversion by US-funded NGO's can be halted. Conversely, Libya and Iran show clearly that not having a deterrent is a source of vulnerability. I expect Turkey and Saudi Arabia to get nuclear weapons within the next 5 years (quicker for Saudi if it turns out to be true they've already rented some of Pakistan's.....), and Brazil and Germany within 10 years.

We are certainly heading for interesting times, but I think that Iran has set an interesting example of the different approach taken by a civilisation with three thousand years of history and a different culture compared to the brash newcomer with less than three hundred years !