What Happens Next in the Middle East?

Major wars are most certainly anxiety-inducing, especially when your enemy is as organized, well-armed, and militant as ever.

Like the rest of you, I have spent much of the past week and a half in a state of heightened anxiety. If any of you have endured any restive, sleepless nights worrying about the Strait of Hormuz or other dangers fueled by a cornered Islamic Republic of Iran, this author can certainly prove you are not alone. Ever since American and Israeli bombs started falling across Iran, it has become abundantly clear to the world that the Middle East was on the verge of a historic shift, even if the besieged Iranian regime, or rather what’s left of it, hangs on in Tehran. The old regional order, where Iranian-backed proxy militias comprising the notorious “Axis of Resistance” and controlled by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) would combat the United States and Israel in the shadows as Arab states kept their heads down while hedging their bets among the region’s three most powerful actors, is over. Now the world wonders, what comes next?

While I am no Nostradamus, nor do I carry any supernatural skill to gaze into the future a la Doctor Strange, I will attempt my best effort at diagnosing what comes next in the Middle East.

Of course, the ideal scenario, the future we all hope for, is that the Islamic Republic of Iran collapses into the dustbin of history a la Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union. For a regime responsible for the deaths of thousands of Americans and many more thousands, if not millions, of people elsewhere, this would be a most deserved fate. However, you don’t need me to tell you that short of a messy, Iraq-like ground invasion, a no-go for the American public, expert opinion has presumed that Tehran’s revolutionary apparatus is likely to remain intact. The logic behind this sobering conclusion is simple: so long as the IRGC has guns, and lots of them, and the opposition has none, they will remain atop their bloody throne on the backs of sheer brute force. Even the CIA seems to agree. That is why Washington appears set to wander down the risky path of a domestic insurgency, with naturally unpredictable consequences.

While less than ideal, another positive outcome, at least from a strategic perspective, would be a Venezuelan scenario. You may remember, as chronicled on this blog, the day Delta Force operatives deposed Venezuelan narco-dictator Nicolas Maduro. Immediately following the operation, Caracas, led by President Delcy Rodriguez, embarked on policy U-turns unthinkable just months ago and in a direction far more friendly to American interests than Maduro ever entertained. If you listen to the remnants of the leadership in Tehran, however, the outlook again turns grim. According to one of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s lieutenants, Supreme National Security Council chief Ali Larijani explicitly warned, “I think the most important problem the Americans have is that they do not understand the context of West Asia, especially Iran. Their perception was that it would be like Venezuela— they would strike, take control, and it would be over— but now they are trapped.”

Remember, Khamenei was offered survival in exchange for concessions on the Iranian nuclear program and still rejected the American terms with full knowledge that doing so would likely mean his demise— as a martyr in a system where dying for a cause is framed as a sacred duty. And with the recent appointment of hardline IRGC loyalist and Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba Khamenei, as the next Supreme Leader (at least until another Israeli bomb finds him), it is more clear than ever that the regime is intent on fighting to the bitter end, or at least until Trump wraps up the war by declaring a quick victory. After all, the younger Khamenei witnessed his entire family killed on February 28. Natural human instinct will thus radicalize his mind in full pursuit of revenge, not diplomatic off-ramps.

So long as nothing breaks in Tehran, the world may be stuck with a far less benign future: the Hamas scenario. No matter the many tactical defeats inflicted on these Palestinian militants at the hands of the Israeli Defense Forces since they seized control of the Gaza Strip in 2007, Hamas somehow remains in control of the largely obliterated enclave. In this bleak future, a defeated, beleaguered Iranian Security Establishment would still be in control of a shattered nation but surrounded by enemies on all sides. Iran would no longer function as a state, with the resources to provide public services to its population. Instead, it would become a massive fiefdom for an international terrorist organization, the IRGC, hidden away in mountain hideouts while harassing the urban population with sheer terror and force alone. While no longer the powerful regional heavyweight of the past, the IRGC would still have enough dirty tricks up their sleeve to raise anxiety and uncertainty in the region.

The big loser in this scenario, besides the Iranian people, would be the Arab states, which are constantly caught in the crossfire between three resolute and determined actors with inflexible red lines and the constant threat of preemptive action to neutralize the slightest signal of reconstitution. In the long run, I would not close the door on the hope that the Islamic Republic of Iran, through a process of death by a thousand cuts, eventually does collapse and opens the door to a truly brighter future. But for now, we just have to wish our US Armed Forces success in removing the Iranian threat lest we remain stuck fighting them over and over again.