By Emran El-Badawi
Washington appears to be itching for a war. It seems that every day tension is “ramping up” between the U.S. and another country — Mexico, North Korea, China and now Iran.
On May 13, the Pentagon presented the Trump administration with a plan to deploy up to 120,000 ground troops to Iran. President Donald Trump later denied any plan to send ground troops, leaving us all baffled as to what policy Trump will roll out next. Then on Sunday night, he tweeted, “If Iran wants to fight, that will be the official end of Iran. Never threaten the United States again!”
Amid the noise and uncertainty, it is safe to say that the American public has tuned out.
That’s dangerous. Congress is right to make a stand against more war and to ask for justification in the meantime. There is no credible intelligence yet linking the sabotage of Saudi and Norwegian oil tankers in the Persian Gulf to Iran.
The first Gulf War in 1991 and the second in 2003 were sold to the American public based on false intelligence. Since the 9/11 attacks in 2001, wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan have killed an estimated half million people, including 14,000 Americans. The wars cost U.S. taxpayers more than $6 trillion. They destabilized the region and birthed the Islamic State group, contributing to global terrorism.
In these wars, we are not the good guys. We are the bull in the china shop.
Iran is already encircled by U.S. military bases throughout the Arab Gulf states, Iraq, Turkey, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan and Pakistan. U.S. airstrikes have intermittently pummeled countries in the region since 1991. Since 2006 we have punished the Iranian people with economic sanctions in hopes the Islamic Republic would dismantle its nuclear program.
The Iran Nuclear Deal signed by President Barack Obama in 2015 succeeded in de-escalating tensions for some time, and it afforded Iran some much needed sanctions relief. According to the State Department, the International Atomic Energy Agency and other international watchdogs, Iran was in compliance with the agreement. This did not stop Trump from breaching the agreement in 2017 and re-imposing sanctions in 2018.
The irony is that Trump campaigned on a platform of “America First,” which included pulling out of wars in the Middle East.
Now, the Syrian Civil War is winding down, and ISIS is all but defeated. Furthermore, Iraq’s security situation is fragile but holding. So who in Washington is hell-bent on making war with Iran?
In short, the president’s inner circle. It includes National Security Adviser John Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who both made a career out of war with the Middle East.
There is no denying Iran’s wide and controversial influence across the Middle East. However, its tentacles spread across the region only between 2003 and 2006, after the U.S. toppled Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and dismantled the Iraqi armed forces, creating a power vacuum. In the wake of the Arab uprisings of 2010 and 2011, Iran entrenched itself in the carnage in Syria and Yemen as well. And it famously supports Hezbollah and Hamas against Israel. It is no surprise that the Arab Gulf states — especially Saudi Arabia — and Israel are best friends with us, and worst enemies with Iran.
Still, we cannot forget that geopolitics is inextricable from energy security. In this age of climate change and divestment from fossil fuels, the oil and gas industry has invested millions of dollars to elect politicians to do their bidding. Washington’s enduring policy to divide and conquer the Middle East means we are always one air-strike away from another oil war.
Iran sits on the fourth-largest proven oil reserves and the second-largest proven natural gas reserves. It controls the Strait of Hormuz, the volatile choke point for the global energy market. Twenty to 30 percent of the world’s oil and gas supplies squeeze through an international waterway just 21 miles wide. Is it any surprise that Washington’s hawks are suffocating Iranian oil exports and sending aircraft destroyers to Iranian shores?
We cannot allow another reckless administration to drag our country back into war in the Middle East. Such a war is a crime against humanity, plain and simple. And though it may be profitable for Lockheed Martin and Halliburton, it would drain America’s economy dry.
Despite all the noise, Americans must not tune out.
El-Badawi (@EmranE) is the program director of Middle Eastern Studies at the
University ofHouston.