Escalation of the 'Cold War' in US-Iran Relations

With statements made on Friday, October 13, by Donald Trump, the President of the United States, regarding the nuclear agreement, a different era has emerged in the political relations between the US and Iran, characterized by the complete specifications and features of a 'Cold War'. The US President referred to the Iranian government as a dictatorship and emphasized a strategy to counter the IRGC as 'the vanguard of a crisis-generating government'. The 'Cold War' is a state of confrontation between governments without direct and comprehensive military conflict, while increasingly utilizing soft powers, including economic and financial leverage, political pressure, media capabilities, reliance on covert actions by intelligence agencies, and preparing proxy wars by countries and third-party forces (allies) to gradually weaken and force a retreat and 'change behavior'. The first 'Cold War' began after World War II between the two military superpowers of the time, the former Soviet Union and the United States, starting in 1947 and continuing until 1991 with the collapse of the Soviet Union. The fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War have been referred to as the 'end of history', resulting in the end of bipolarity in the world and the beginning of a 'new order' dominated by capitalism, the establishment of a free economy, and the development of Western-style democracies. George Orwell, the English writer, used the term 'Cold War' on October 19, 1945, to depict a world where armed peace is experienced under the shadow of the atomic bomb and enduring tension. In his later writings, Orwell elaborated on the ideological and political confrontation and economic clashes of the Eastern bloc with the free world. Walter Lippmann's book 'Cold War', published in 1947, addresses the dimensions and aspects of this war during the initial stages of the confrontation between communism and the capitalist world. The religious government ruling Iran, although it came to power in 1979 with the political silence of the then-Democratic government of the US, began its 'Cold War' with the United States at that time. On November 4, 1979, with the hostage-taking of 66 diplomats and embassy staff in Tehran, referred to as the 'den of spies', the Cold War between Tehran and Washington began and lasted for 444 days; an event that became one of the most sensitive global developments, which the current US President also referred to on Friday while reviewing the headings of the Islamic Republic's hostilities with the US. Developments related to the eight-year Iran-Iraq war (tanker wars, the US attack on two Iranian oil platforms in the Persian Gulf, and the downing of a passenger plane over Iranian coastal waters), the Islamic Republic's actions to form Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, participation in the Syrian civil war, and military presence in Iraq, which has now expanded to the Yemen war and Afghanistan conflicts, can be framed within the context of the forty-year confrontation between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the US. Israel, America's strategic ally, has apparently been one of the independent and direct targets of the Islamic Republic's attacks at least until 1991 and the fall of the former Soviet Union. Alongside Israel, the active involvement of Saudi Arabia in the Iran-US Cold War in recent years, especially after the emergence of the 'Arab Spring' and the beginning of the Syrian civil war, has added a new dimension to this regional challenge. The larger Cold War of the free world with the ideological regime of the former Soviet Union ended in 1991 with the defeat of Moscow and the declaration of victory by Washington, as economic commitments, military aid, and regional wars—from Africa to South America and West Asia—had depleted the capabilities of the Soviet Union and unbalanced the resources of the communist empire with its actions. The Red Army's military invasion of Afghanistan a few months before the fall of the Iranian monarchy, which was America's largest regional ally, was in fact the swan song for the communist empire, at a time when Moscow's leaders saw themselves at the peak of power and invincibility. After the Cuban Missile Crisis in the 1960s and the escalation of the Cold War, a period of détente began between East and West to avoid a full-scale hot war, with Richard Nixon, the then US President, and Henry Kissinger, the Secretary of State, being among its two architects; the latter was summoned for consultation with Donald Trump just days before the release of the new US political guide regarding the Iranian government. The US and Iran experienced a period of détente during the Cold War in the last two years of the Obama administration, with the signing of the nuclear agreement, but this experience did not lead to a 'change in behavior' of the Islamic Republic—just as détente with Moscow had not yielded results, evidenced by the Red Army's invasion of Afghanistan. Over the past 38 years, the US has consistently pursued the goal of 'changing the behavior' of the ideological-revolutionary Iranian government without having a regime change plan, albeit with fluctuations. During the Obama administration, especially during the two years of détente in the nuclear agreement period, the goal of changing the Iranian government's behavior was pursued based on the expectation of a change in the political dynamics from within and the predominance of the views and behaviors of pragmatists and moderates over extremists. The expansion of Iran's military presence in the region and Tehran's increased use of proxy wars showed that the Obama administration's détente did not lead to a change in the power equation internally and changes in the Iranian government's behaviors. It appears that under the Trump administration, without resorting to direct military action for regime change, the long-standing goal of 'changing the government's behavior' as a strategic policy has been reactivated, with the difference that instead of continuing the period of détente and keeping the account of 'changing dynamics' from within Iran and within the government, the escalation of the Cold War with Tehran and the imposition of increasing external pressures have become Washington's agenda. The new Washington administration expects that intensifying the Cold War against Tehran, as Donald Trump emphasized, 'in all areas and using all means and involving allied countries', will gradually weaken the capabilities of the Tehran government and unbalance its resources with the commitments it has taken on; a scenario that had previously worked in relation to the former Soviet Union and led to its fall in 1991.