Clouds of war

The assassination of Quds Force leader and Iranian national hero General Qassem Soleimani in an American airstrike in Iraq has created immense tension across the region. There are predictions from angry US representatives that the murder will come back to haunt Trump and Washington. The mission to kill Soleimani while he was being escorted from Baghdad’s airport by Iraq’s popular mobilization units, was taken by Trump, apparently almost alone, while the US parliament was in recess. Trump tweeted a US flag immediately afterwards and has insisted that Soleimani was feared and hated in Iran as well as in other countries.

This will be disputed. Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei has strongly condemned the killing of a man who was seen as the most powerful in the country after him and had played a key role in the Middle East, chiefly by building informal armies to battle anti-Iranian elements in Iraq, Syria and other places. Many forget that Soleimani had first come to popular notice when he was enlisted to coordinate with the US in its 2001 invasion of Afghanistan and combat the Taliban. He also played a role in the 1980s’ Iran-Iraq war at a time when Saddam Hossein enjoyed the support of Western and Arab powers. The brief alliance between Iran and the US ended in 2002 when Iran was branded part of the ‘axis of evil’. Following this, Soleimani went after the US military in places like Iran. It was partly pressure from his forces which forced a US withdrawal from Iraq in 2011. He then went on to prop up anti-US regimes such as that of Bashar al-Assad in Syria. He also converted Hezbollah into a force capable of significant operations outside Lebanon’s borders, and successfully halted Islamic State from taking charge in Iraq.

It is uncertain how Iran will react to the death of a hero. While it has threatened action to wipe out American forces in Iraq, including the 3500 additional armed forces personnel who are set to be posted there under the Trump administration’s plans, there is uncertainty among international analysts regarding Iran’s capability in this respect. However, there is no doubt that Iran is able to threaten US shipping through the Strait of Hormuz and by creating even stronger proxy armies in some countries such as Yemen and Syria. For Pakistan, the situation is an extremely delicate one. Its allies, Saudi Arabia and the US, are likely to exert pressure to support their mission against Iran. Pakistan however hosts the world’s second largest Shia population after Iran and in strategic terms the significance of maintaining good ties with its close neighbour has been emphasized. There may be no World War III – but undoubtedly, the deliberate killing of Soleimani will have a deep impact on an already unstable region and throw a deeper, darker shadow over it.