The rain of iranian missile in the early hours of Wednesday has fallen on two u.s. military bases in Iraq may allow that Tehran and Washington to take a step back in his dangerous escalation of the war. The supreme leader of Iran, ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has managed to show his followers that he has fulfilled the promise of revenge for the murder of general Soleimani and his “slap” the Great Satan fill the headlines around the planet. At the same time, the absence of fatalities americans allow the president the Donald Trump enfunde their guns and do not feel compelled to respond.
once you have ceased the sirens of the alarms anti-aircraft guns, and that with the first light of dawn has made the count of the material damage, there are data that indicate the willingness of both sides to encapsulate the crisis. In the absence of that Trump start his offensive tweets, his “all is well” Tuesday night, shortly after the attacks, points in that direction. On the other hand, the iraqi Government has acknowledged that shortly after midnight (an hour before the commencement of this attack), the Islamic Republic informed him of the operation (which “had begun or would begin right away”). The message needed, in addition, that “would be limited to the locations the military of the united STATES in Iraq”, though without mentioning any specific site.
That gesture allowed the iraqi authorities, alerted to their military chiefs, and implicitly their allies and guests are americans. “We do not seek an escalation or a war, but to defend ourselves against any aggression”, was quick to tweet the iranian minister of Foreign affairs, Mohammad Javad Zarif. His justification for the attacks as “proportionate measures of self-defence under article 51 of the Charter of the UN” reinforces that idea.
If in the next few hours, Trump does not respond with a new reprisal or Iran expands its operation, it will have avoided the tsunami. Another thing different is that it has been closed by the crisis. The tide fund is going to take much longer to calm down. In an area of the world that takes several decades to the edge of the abyss, the rhetoric inflamed that during the last few days have used the rulers to iranians and iraqis has given wings to the sectors most anti-american and radicals of both countries, and by extension to all his allies in the so-called “axis of resistance”.
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The battle now becomes a battle of wills on the military deployment of the united States in the region, but especially in Iraq, the weakest link and the most affected country by the last scuffle iranian-american. “The presence corrupting of the US in west Asia must cease,” he proclaimed with his grandstanding usual Khamenei. The highest authority in iran also has a great ascendancy over the islamist groups, shi’a in the neighbouring countries (also on the palestinian Hamas and Islamic Jihad who, although sunni, they share enmity towards Israel). His words open the door to any leader militiaman sits backed up to harass the american soldiers.
Not only that. Khamenei is expected, and so he has said, that “elected Governments” to reject the us forces, a clear message to Iraq (the majority of the bases are in countries run by autocrats). That sharpens the huge gap that already divides the country and which has become more evident since you are going to burst the popular protests last October 1. The denunciation of the corruption and of the system as a sectarian on the part of the protesters has been underlined from the beginning by the refusal to the penetration of iran in the structures of government, beyond its undeniable historical roots, religious and cultural.
Of time, what happened has changed the focus of the debate. The hopes of democratic renewal of the iraqi civil society have been suspended (and the attacks this Wednesday at protesters in Naseriya announce that the groups proiraníes feel supported to end with the critics). In addition, the economic and social difficulties that they reported can only be aggravated if the pressure of that “axis of resistance” achieves the hasty departure of u.s. troops, is at the request of the Government of Baghdad or by the decision of Washington.
In the last instance, a sudden security vacuum, which without doubt will take advantage of the self-styled Islamic State, could lead to the sunni arabs and the kurds to recalibrate your lace in an Iraq completely in the hands of Iran. For many iraqis is another version of the abyss. Here they expect that, in addition to avoiding a new war, the alarm international that its mere possibility has sparked serve to push Washington and Tehran to find if not a regional arrangement, at least one mode of civilized co-existence.
