Mowing the Grass in Iran

The US-Israeli air raids in Iran raised questions about the reason and objectives of this latest war in West Asia. Various justifications and objectives were shared primarily by the US government which really appeared as an after thought rather than a well articulated justification. Ever changing objectives makes it difficult to predict how far this war will go and for how long. However it should not be difficult for any observer of the Israeli actions in its neighborhood that this is nothing but a "Mowing The Grass" war. The objective of Israel is to reduce the military apparatus of Iran as much as possible while Iran is at its weakest. When both sides are exhausted enough, US and Israel are expected to declare the objectives met and a much weaker Iranian government will survive and will be left licking it's wounds. Iran has indicated that such an outcome is not in its interest as it does not want to be faced with another war a few months or years down the line and hence would like to impose an unacceptable cost on US and Israel before it stops its hostilities. 

While the war has been initiated by Israel and USA it did not take long for other western powers to indirectly or directly endorse this US-Israeli action. Amongst western nations only Spain has has openly opposed this war calling it an illegal war. Opposition from Russia and China was expected who are believed to have joined in to provide direct assistance to Iran's war effort in terms of ISR.

Gulf monarchy's have borne the bulk of Iran's retaliation in this war. Iran had earlier warned that any war imposed on it will result in a regional war and that is precisely what it has hoped to do with its war strategy. Knowing fully well that Israel is better prepared for this war and perhaps calling out the duplicity of the Gulf states which wanted all the benefit of having a weakened Iran in West Asia without necessarily engaging in direct confrontation with it, Iran decided to attack US defense infrastructure in the Gulf states. It has a large number of missiles and drones to effect this strategy which involves using up its old missile and drone arsenal first while dying up the air defenses of its adversaries before moving on the newer age weapons. 

UAE and Bahrain have so far suffered the bulk of Iranian attacks. UAE perhaps because of its recognition of Israel and Bahrain because of hosting the head quarters of US 5th Fleet. Civil infrastructure in these states has not been spared either with Iranian attacks being reported in residential building, hotels, airports, oil storage facilities and even water desalination plant in Bahrain. Oil tankers and commercial ships in the Straits of Hormuz have been attacked by both sides and Natural Gas production in Qatar has been stopped. Russia's energy sector has benefited temporarily from this war since it has emerged as one of the primary remaining viable sources of energy for the energy hungry economies of Asia.  

Ever since the October 7 2023 Hamas atrocities, Israel, with US help has systematically dealt with its neighboring adversaries who were primarily financed and endorsed by Iran in Gaza, Syria and Lebanon. Then last year it went after the nuclear infrastructure of Iran to destroy its capability of developing nuclear weapons. One cannot reliably say whether Iran did not have stockpile of nuclear weapons already when Israel attacked its nuclear infrastructure in June 2025 in the so called "Twelve Day War". However one can reliably say that if it did have a bomb, the numbers were perhaps not substantial yet. Leaving only a small window of opportunity for Israel and USA to destroy Iran's nuclear infrastructure before it could enrich sufficient quantities of fissile material for creating a bigger weapon stock pile. 

One should also not overlook that this action took place not so long after India's operation Sindoor which demonstrated not only that there is room for limited war even between two nuclear weapons states but it also showed the limit of how far such a conventional war could proceed between established nuclear powers. The deterrence ability of nuclear weapons are never in question. Hence for Israel it would have further raised the now or never question for dealing with the nuclear ambitions of its adversary.

It is possible that Iran really does not have any nuclear weapon and has not enriched any fissile material to weapons grade and was merely using its fissile stockpile as a bargaining chip to lift western sanctions. At the same time and a more likely scenario is that perhaps Iran wanted to eat its cake and have it too. It wanted to be an ambiguous nuclear weapons power like Israel while being fully integrated in the world economy rather than be an overt nuclear pariah state like North Korea. The prospect of Saudi Arabia, Israel and perhaps even Turkey becoming overt nuclear weapons state as a response to Iranian nuclear weapons testing and strong opposition by the partners of Iran namely Russia and China to such a scenario in West Asia  perhaps made the choice of overt nuclear testing a difficult one for Iran.

The 2003 Fatwa placed against nuclear weapons by Ayatollah Khamenei which was issued soon after the US invasion of Iraq made it impossible for Iran to openly test a nuclear device, however the west continued to suspect that a clandestine Iranian nuclear weapons program was well in progress. This lead to the enhanced US economic sanctions on Iran the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act of 2010 (CISADA), signed by President Obama on July 1, 2010. These Obama era sanctions and India's nuclear deal with USA made it difficult even for India to continue its purchase of Iranian oil and India progressively stopped oil imports from Iran. This was perhaps the first such occasion in recent memory when US was so brazenly able to inject itself into India's foreign policy though its domestic laws and enforce compliance by India in its sanctions regime against Iran which until then was its second largest oil export destination.

The economic sanctions on Iran had its effect and it resulted in US lead nuclear deal between the P5+1 and Iran called JCPOA in 2015. Iran agreed to reduce uranium enrichment to apprx. 3% and to IAEA monitoring of its nuclear sites. Thus allowing Iran to regain access to international markets and financial system. However the Trump administration in 2018 unilaterally withdrew from the deal and reimposed sanctions on Iran. India also once again left Iran in lurch by complying with the US  unilateral sanction on Iran and stopped purchase of Iranian oil in 2019. As a side effect to this Iran-US tussle it was revealed for everyone to see that India's foreign and trade policy was now increasingly being determined by the US domestic law and US interests and not by India's national interests. Its much touted strategic autonomy was progressively under stress.

With this latest war imposed on Iran by Israel and USA India's position in West Asia and Indian ocean region has been much weakened. Not only are its millions of nationals in the gulf states in the firing line as civilian casualties of its war, its energy security and fertilizer imports are at risk due to the Gulf region being the primary source of these commodities. Already LPG supplies in India are under stress. The sinking of Iranian Naval ship which had been participating in naval exercises in India and had participated in the International Fleet review in February, so close to Indian waters just off the coast of Sri Lanka has caused embarrassment to India. GOI has tried to play down this incident but this brazen action by US Navy has dented Indian Navy's often touted claim of being the net security provider in the Indian Ocean Region. PM Modi's state visit to Israel and acceptance of Knesset Speaker's medal just on the eve of this War has been bad optics for India. The delayed and muted reaction to this war by India is also noticeable. India by not condemning this war stood out from its BRICS partners, Russia, China and Brazil.  

The cost of this war is not limited to West Asia alone but has global ramifications. Gulf being the energy center of the world and a region with overwhelming number of immigrant population, any instability in this region directly or indirectly affects every household in the the world. Given such a large impact of this war, it is essential that the west should have had very well thought out reason for engaging in this war. Regime change was not a likely outcome of this war without out right invasion which was unlikely from the outset. The prospect of another mowing the grass war every few months or years will plunge West Asia into another crisis and the world economy will continue to remain hostage to instability in the Gulf. India will have to find its feet and break from Israel and USA on this issue and stand with those bystander countries whose economies are being damaged by this war to ensure that this war now comes to an end and a repeat war of this nature is not imposed by Israel and US again. 

The risk of Iran now overtly becoming a nuclear weapons power by testing a device and causing a ripple effect in the region with Saudi Arabia, Israel and Turkey following suite also exists. Iran has every incentive to test a nuclear device now if it still has the capability left. In a such a scenario it would become necessary for India to resume open ended nuclear testing and develop a robust thermonuclear arsenal and much longer range delivery systems to secure itself in a changing world order.