Picture this in your head. You are the leader of a powerful country, and are in a state of limited war with a nation which has threatened your allies with annihilation and has attacked the supply of resources critical to your country’s economy.
Your embassy in an unstable nation has just been attacked by paramilitary groups loyal to your enemy, and your security forces have barely staved off a repeat of a tragic massacre of your citizens which occurred several years earlier. A single General on the other side is responsible for coordinating terrorist groups against you and your allies and is responsible for the attack on your embassy. You have an opportunity to assassinate him, and remove a key threat to your interests for the near future. Do you pull the trigger?
Any rational leader would weigh up the risks and benefits to such a strike. Of course, a successful assasination would mobilise the enemy population against you, and could risk escalating the conflict into a full blown war. However, if you possess such an overwhelming advantage in conventional military might where you are a military hyperpower, no country would want to declare war on you. No rational leader would want to commit national suicide, and after all, all global leaders are rational and want to maintain their leadership.
So a strike makes perfect sense.
One, you eliminate a person who has coordinated terrorist and paramilitary groups against you and your allies, staving off attacks in the imminent future. Two, there is minimal risk of escalating this conflict into a full scale war because the enemy nation does not stand a chance against you in conventional warfare.
This is exactly why Trump’s decision to assassinate Iranian General Qasem Soleimani makes perfect strategic sense. America’s status as a conventional military hyperpower (a status attained following both Gulf Wars) would mean that Iran’s military forces and infrastructure would be crushed within several weeks. After all, Iraq had the world’s fourth largest military in 1990, numbering over 900,000 active troops, 900 aircraft and over 3,000 tanks, a definite military powerhouse. Yet, Iraq was crushed in an air campaign which lasted 5 weeks and a ground campaign that lasted 100 hours by a US-led international coalition. Any Iranian retaliation against the US that could lead to a war would be essentially national suicide. Further, there would be no guarantee to the Iranians that China or Russia would back them against the US. China and Russia might even welcome a US-Iranian war, as it would distract NATO from the South China Sea and the Ukraine.
The Iranian regime recognised the futility of their position. For all the rhetoric calling for revenge against the US, even pushing for the assasination of Donald Trump, the official retaliation on Thursday the 8th was small, with only ‘tens’ of missiles fired against well protected targets with plenty of warning given. It is no accident that there were no casualties in the attack. The missile attack was deliberately planned out to carry out a symbolic revenge to save face, while deescalating at the same time.
In all honesty, while I definitely do not agree with many of Trump’s policies, Trump’s decision to assassinate Soleimani was a well calculated and even a brilliant strategic move. Trump kept his promise, and seemingly avoided another war in the Middle East, even though there was no threat of one in the first place.
