- Ponmala
Trump came to power a second time, bent upon winning the Nobel Prize for Peace by bringing all raging wars to an end within twenty-four hours. Far from any war coming to an end, three more new wars erupted within five months. The first was the trade war Trump declared on all the nations of the world, which is still raging; the second was the 4-day India-Pakistan war, which he claims to have ended by enforcing a ceasefire; and the third was the 12-day Iran-Israel-America war, which too he claims to have ended by enforcing a ceasefire. The method he uses to end wars is abject surrender by the weaker nations to the stronger nations, Ukraine to Russia, Gaza and Iran to America and Israel, and so on. Surrender may end wars, but can never bring about lasting peace. Those who are forced to surrender will bide their time before striking back.
In the case of Iran, Trump torpedoed a nuclear deal that Obama had struck with it with the active involvement of Russia, China, Germany, France and the UK. That deal had brought Iran’s nuclear fuel enrichment programme under the strict surveillance of the International Atomic Energy Agency. That arrangement worked impeccably until Trump pulled out of it at the very start of his first term. Left off the hook, Iran speeded up enriching nuclear fuel to a level at which they would only need ten days to produce weapon grade uranium. Trump reacted by threatening to obliterate Iran’s nuclear facilities unless it agreed to a deal on his own terms. Iran refused to surrender to Trump’s dictates, resulting in the 12-day war. Iran took a severe beating, but Israel received a far more severe blow than it had bargained for. Trump intervened on Israel’s behalf and dropped his giant bunker-buster bombs on three of Iran’s main nuclear facilities. There is still no clarity on what it achieved.
Common sense would say North Korea is a greater threat to America than Iran. It has a stock of nuclear bombs and is fast reaching the goal of possessing an intercontinental missile that could dispatch those bombs to America’s west coast. Why then did America not perceive North Korea as big a threat as Iran and take steps to destroy its nuclear facilities before it acquired a nuclear bomb? Both Iran and North Korea are components of the ‘Axis of Evil’. Why kid gloves treatment for one and battering for the other? It could be because America and its allies believe North Korea does not harbour the expansionists dream that Iran does. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, communist expansionism has ceased to be a threat. China is no more a communist country; for all practical purposes, it is a capitalist country that is ruled by an autocratic regime that carries the communist label. North Korea is too weak economically to entertain communist expansionism. Iran, on the other hand, is viewed as an oil rich country led by a fanatical Islamist regime that believes it has the divine mission to bring Allah’s reign to the entire world, starting with establishing a sovereign Palestine that includes Israel. There are few things as destructive to society as narrow-minded religious fanaticism. Most nations of the world, including Muslim nations, shudder to think of an Iran that has acquired the nuclear bomb.
To fell a tree, you first remove its branches (limbing). Similarly, Israel first cut Iran’s proxies Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis to size. Then they decapitated the top echelons of Iran’s scientists and military top brass. That was followed by the destruction of most of Iran’s air defences and missiles and, perhaps, its main nuclear facilities. But Iran’s trunk represented by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s regime and technological knowhow are still left standing. Iran will grow back rapidly to its original size with the help of Russia, China and North Korea unless it is fully felled. For that to happen, Israel and America will have to put boots on the ground there. But Trump is promise-bound not to do it and Israel does not have the capacity to do it. And so the only way out to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear bomb is to strike a new nuclear deal with it.
The only positive outcomes of the war that brought a lot of destruction to both Iran and Israel are these: 1. Iran may rethink on its expansionist dreams and desist from threatening death to America and Israel; 2. Israel may stop thinking that its Muslim neighbours are an easy walkover; and 3. Trump may learn the wholesome lesson that peace through abject surrender is an unworkable idea
