Understanding Iranian Foreign Policy In the middle east

​​Iranian foreign policy.  over the last 20 years have changed drastically. To understand how, its best to give a brief history so everyone is kept up to speed. To do this, I would like to divide Iranian history into 3 sections.  Pre Iraq war, Post Iraq war and post Arab spring.
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Pre Iraq war

​Before the Iraq war, Iranian foreign policy was quite simple, survive. After the revolution, the regime found itself in a not so friendly neighbourhood. The motto “Not east, not west” had much of the world thinking “then where?”. In a bipolar world dominated by the Soviet Union and America, a Islamic theological system arising in one of the most strategic areas in the world raised eyebrows. None more so than perhaps Saddam Hussein (which would be difficult because he had some bushy eyebrows, seriously google them.) Saddam, in his attempt to crush the Islamic republic, invaded and unwittingly helped to shape Iranian foreign policy. A policy which has lasted till today.
 
Iranian foreign policy was essentially to hold off Saddam Hussein and America. The Iran-Iraq war which lasted over 8 years and took the lives of 1million people and provided a traumatic cause to gather around. The fact that Saddam provided backing by America and other gulf states pushed Iran into a corner which it felt it could not overcome. The gulf states treated Saddam as a buffer against the Islamic republic and hoped he would be enough to contain them. Tit for tat attacks against America became habitual. The Hezbollah attacks on American barracks, the downing of Air flight 655, hostage crisis’s and embassy attacks, Iran was acting like a rabid animal backed into a corner lashing out at what it saw as American imperialism. Iran was under siege. People were wondering when the regime was going to fall. And then help came in an unlikely ally.
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Iraq war

The American invasion of Iraq was perhaps the best thing to ever happen to Iran. The toppling of Saddam Hussein was akin to taking a rabid dog off the leash and to the vet to be put down. Finally the Iranians found an opportunity to expand their influence. However it was not all celebrations in Tehran. Upper leadership were terrified that they were next on the bush administrations hit list. After being labelled part of the axis of evil and watching its two neighbours get invaded by simultaneously, I can image the supreme leader not feeling quite so supreme. Nevertheless, once the Iranian regime felt confident they were not going to be invaded, they set out constructing a new foreign policy which involved more than just surviving.
 
The first aspect was extremely important to them. This was to make sure that Iraq never again grows powerful enough to threaten Iran’s existence. This was primarily done in two parts. The first attempted to flip the status quo on power. Prior to the invasion Sunni politicians had been in power. Iran sought to change this by allying with Shia politicians and elevating them into positions of power. By doing this, Iran hoped to create a government which was more pro-Iran then its predecessors. Politically Iran tried to ensure its influence was always heard. Militarily it sponsored the funding and training of Shiite militias such as Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq which is believed to follow the Iranian Wilyat al-Faqhi ideology. By doing this the Iranians were able to create hard power within Iraq which could fulfil their objectives if political power was not sufficient.
 
However, this also provided another avenue to achieve a different objective, to remove the Americans from the region. By arming militias which caused causalities on America, the support for the war and middle eastern interference would decline massively. Removing America from the region  would allow Iran to take on a fully expansionist role.
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Post Arab Spring

​The Arab spring changed everything in the middle east. The landscape change dramatically, and subtle power plays became much more overt. Nowhere more so than Syria where gulf states saw the opportunity to reverse what had happened in Iraq. From the Arab perspective, Saddam Hussein Baathist Sunni party had been overthrown and replaced by Shiite pro-Iranian government. The Gulf states wanted to recreate their own version of this in Syria. The Shiite Al-Assad family (which ruled Syria) had been pro-Iran for decades. In fact, it was Hafez Al-Assad which helped train Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corp. The Gulf States saw the Syrian revolution as an opportunity to overthrow Assad and deal a major blow to Iranian influence by funding and arming Sunni extremists. The Iranians, however, were not going to allow this to happen and came to Assad’s aid.  It was this moment in which Iran decided it could again, like in Iraq, slowly entrench itself into another nation’s territory.
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 In Iraq it relied on militia groups to give it influence and power, and in Syria it wanted to do the same thing. In 2011, the Iranians asked Hezbollah to fight in Syria, and began sending IRGC operatives to aid in strategy and tactics. The regime sent billions to Assad to help fight off Sunni extremists and insurgents. Its said that Qassem Soleimani’s meeting with Putin and other Russian officials was the reason for Russia’s entry into the civil war. Iran then began to create militia’s in Syria (such as Fatemiyoun and Zeynabiyoun) and asked its Iraqi militia’s to join the fight. During the fight against ISIS, Iraqi Shiite militias helped to defend Baghdad and other Iraqi cities from attack at the order of Soleimani after the Iraqi army fled. When Grand Ayatollah Al-Sistani issued a declaration to fight against extremists, many joined the ranks of Iraqi militias which labelled themselves PMF’s (Popular Mobilisation Forces). While not all were under Iranian influence, much of the larger more powerful organisations such as Kataib Hezbollah were. Over time analysts began to see the outline of a new state being created in the middle east and fulfilment of Iranian Foreign Policy.
 
Iran’s foreign policy today is the same as it was 40 years ago, and that is to expand its power. It does so by taking advantage of chaos to implement its will. With Major General Qassem Soleimani spearheading Iranian expansion, the General has finally created, in the space of 20 years, something of a geopolitical masterpiece. The Wilayat Iman-Ali.
 
The Wilayat Iman-Ali is refers to the land corridor between Tehran and Beirut. The fact that this land bridge is called Wilayat Iman-Ali (meaning state of Ali) means the Iranians and co give it great importance The Iranians have been attempting to create a land bridge between themselves and Hezbollah in Lebanon in an attempt to further push their influence. They have been doing this by taking advantage of instabilities in Iraq and Syria to create Shiite militia organisations. These organisations are then trained by IRGC quds force and given advanced weapons capabilities. Organisations such as Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq, Khataib Hezbollah and Khataib Nujaba act as Irans foreign legion in the middle east, extending its power and reach. Soleimani has been indisposable at creating and maintaining such ties, frequently travelling to frontlines of Iraq and Syria to pose with fighters. He has been photographed numerous times with Akram al-Ka'abi and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis. This connection between Iran and its proxies means that the Islamic republic is able to request extreme loyalty from its pawns, trusting them to conduct operations and act on behalf of the Iranian state. However, as stated earlier, Iran seeks to conquer not such militarily, but also politically. After instructing its proxy forces to fight against ISIS, Iran now seeks to push its militias into the political arena and seek election. The fight against ISIS and other Sunni extremists have gained Iranian backed militias huge amount of praise and resting on the back of Grand Ayatollah Al-Sistani’s fatwa to push back such terrorist organisations, Iranian militias have become popular in some parts of Iraq. They seek to use this popularity to infiltrate state institutions and become the dominant political and military entity. Iraqi politicians are feeling Tehran’s foot on their neck and are unable to wiggle free. In January 2018, Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq, Khataib Hezbollah, Badr organisation and other Iranian backed organisations came together to form the Fatah Alliance political party.  The alliance won 47 seats in parliament making it, and by extension Iran influential in the Iraqi parliament.

​Iran also has a second goal to achieve via the Wilayat Iman-Ali. The Iranians aim to place themselves at the centre of Shia theology. However their strain of Shi’ism (Wilayat al-Faqhi) is not massively popular across the middle east. Despite their best attempts to export it via proxies (Hezbollah, Asaib Ahl al-Haq) it is still not the dominant form of ideology for Shias. Iran seeks to first place itself as the epicentre for Shia thought throughout the muslim world and to transform the city of Qom into more of an intellectual/theological hub, to further expand its influence. However, this is no easy task. Prominent Shia’s such as Iraqi Grand Ayatollah Al-Sistani have spoken against Wilyat al-Faqhi. He and his resident city of Najarf presents an alternative to Iranian Shi’ism in both ideology but also in practice. He rarely interferes in the action of the government and actively dislikes doing so. This is in contradiction to Wilyat-al Faqhi which believes in control via the religious clergy. The only figure to rival supreme leader Khamenei is Al-Sistani, and when he dies, the epicentre of Shia intellectual thought will move ever closer to Qom and away from the city Najarf. Thus further expanding Iranian power in the region.
 
Iran is preparing for such a transfer of power. Across the middle east, it seeks to push Shia’s to reject their national identity and embrace their religion. In simpler terms, to reject their national identity and embrace Iranian Shi’ism. The Wilayat Iman-Ali is instrumental is making this a reality. Throughout the land bridge, the Iranians have been relocating Sunnis and replacing them with Shia’s particularly in southern Syria. It sponsors classes for those wanting to convert from Sunni to Iranian Shia’s. It creates militas such as Liwa-Fatiemiyoun composed of Afghan Shia to fight in Syria,  and uses Lebanese Hezbollah radio stations to push propaganda. This moves are indicative of a regime attempting to push Shia’s living in the land bridge to reject nationality and embrace religion, in particular Iranian Wilayat Iman-Ali.
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A new Persian Empire

​Henry Kissinger once said, “Iran has to decide whether it is a country or a cause” and I think that we are finally starting to understand which path it chose. After the 79 revolution, there was hope that once the dust settled, that Iran would begin to behave. Not necessarily become an ally but at least conduct itself civilly and join the rest of the world. 40 years later and I think its clear which path the Islamic republic has decided to take. Unleashed by the instability of the Iraq war, and given a lifeline in sanctions relief after the nuclear deal, the regime has bolted down the path of aggressive behaviour throughout the middle east, choosing not to invest in its own people, but rather violent militas which serve to expand Iranian influence. Perhaps Iran had always known what it was, and the west was kidding itself, only now accepting what it had feared. Iran is not a country but a cause, and its cause, is revolution.