God’s Battle: Tehran, The Strait and the Mirage of Victory

2026-03-11 - 22:24

E. O. Wilson once warned that the crisis of humanity lies in the contradiction that we possess “a Paleolithic mind, medieval institutions, and godlike technology.” The US-Iran asymmetric war and broader regional tensions surrounding it reflect this contradiction with striking clarity. Israel and Iran—and now the United States’ war planners—find refuge in divine symbolism for strategic behavior, rooted in religious tribalism, historical narratives, and sacred prophecies. There is historical irony in watching a global superpower compress its perception of security under regional anxieties of a powerful yet smaller Middle Eastern ally, Israel. The most interesting theatricality of this war appeared in a medieval-like setting in the Oval Office, where Donald Trump was encircled by evangelical pastors praying for conviction and clarity during a modern military campaign conducted with satellites, precision missiles, and fighter jets taking off from two advance aircraft carriers. The Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates the US is spending 890 million dollars a day on this war, while denying payment of $260m annual arrears to WHO last year. The Oval Office scene appeared days after he announced the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader in a U.S. strike. For millions of Twelver Shias, the killing carries emotional and spiritual shock comparable to what the assassination of the Pope would mean for Catholics, the Archbishop of Canterbury for the British Anglican world, or the head of the Orthodox Church for many Russians. A few days before, the U.S. ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, endorsed Israel’s right to occupy five modern-day sovereign states, remarking that “it would be fine if they took it all.” His “advice” to religious nationalists within the Zionist movement aligns with the Covenant about the “Promised Land” in the Book of Genesis, granting Abraham’s descendants land “from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates”—a stretch including parts of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Iraq. Benjamin Netanyahu frequently wraps modern strategic conflicts—including indiscriminate bombing in Gaza and state-driven land-grabbing campaigns in the West Bank—under ribbons of a long civilizational story. His political discourse carries the burden of a three-thousand-year saga of Jewish history, often using biblical phrases such as “roaring lion” and experiences of ancient kingdoms, exile, and survival. Iran’s current regime has not been an exception to this religious historicity. Since the 1979 revolution, the Islamic Republic of Iran has constructed state identity around a fusion of theology and governance. The country’s constitutional framework reflects this pan-Islamic worldview. Article 154 of Iran’s constitution declares the Islamic Republic supports “the just struggles of the oppressed against the oppressors in every corner of the globe.” This principle has often been interpreted by Iranian leaders as a divine mandate to provide weapons and training to allied movements in Palestine, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen, seen as preparing fertile ground before the advent of Imam Mahdi, the last divine Imam. Iran has spent billions funding these proxies abroad instead of on well-being of Iranian citizens at home. Domestically, the regime has imposed strict religious codes on a historically rich and culturally sophisticated society, enforcing dress codes, gender segregation, moral policing, and severe punishments. Human history is crowded with wars that in retrospect appear tragically inconclusive. Afghanistan is a recent example. The U.S. war machine deals with these complex oriental battlefields so casually that recalls the amusingly tragic statement of British Prime Minister Lord Salisbury when European powers were dividing the African continent at the end of the nineteenth century: “We have been engaged in drawing lines upon maps where no white man’s feet have ever trod; we have been giving away mountains and rivers and lakes to each other, only hindered by a small impediment that we never knew exactly where those mountains and rivers and lakes were.” The United States has now embarked on an ancient theological battlefield where weapon superiority has consistently failed to produce decisive results. The latest war goal communicated by the Department of War is to eliminate Iran’s capability to project force outside its borders by destroying its navy, air force, and missile launching systems. However, why will this war become another inconclusive military extravaganza like Afghanistan? Five reasons: First, the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader has diminished the civil space available to already disorganized, weaponless, yet active domestic opponents challenging the current regime. The non-active, moderate citizens who dislike the regime are left with two choices: destruction through foreign strikes and anarchy, or submission to the current regime. Most likely, at this traumatic moment, they will choose order and submission. Second, Iran is not a post-colonial vague geographical expression like Iraq or Libya. Whether religious or secular, its institutions are deeply entrenched in a state mentality that has endured turbulent periods across thousands of years of Iranian history. Third, geography. Iran functions as the region’s organizing principle, connecting Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Arab world. It touches two of the world’s richest hydrocarbon sanctuaries—the Caspian Sea in the north and the Persian Gulf in the south. Any invading force landing on the Persian Gulf coast would first confront the Zagros Mountains, a formidable chain stretching roughly 1,600 kilometers from the Kurdish regions of north-west Iran to the Strait of Hormuz, forming Iran’s western frontier. Beyond these mountains lies the central plateau, dominated by deserts such as the Dasht-e Kavir, before reaching Tehran, shielded by the Alborz Mountains, a 900-kilometer northern barrier along the southern edge of the Caspian Sea guarding the Tehran–Caspian corridor. Any army attempting to reach the capital would therefore have to fight through successive mountain ranges, deserts, and a mobilized Iranian military numbering several hundred thousand soldiers. In the aftermath of the Supreme Leader’s death, that resistance would likely be most intense—driven by existential urgency and inspiration from the tragedy of Karbala, a narrative of martyrdom and survival deeply embedded in Twelver Shia political psychology. Fourth, even if aerial bombardment and missile strikes were to degrade or destroy Iran’s military infrastructure, the assumption that such campaigns could permanently eliminate defensive capacity of a vast country with complex geography is difficult to sustain. Despite years of advanced surveillance and airstrikes, the United States and its partners have yet to fully neutralize disruption capacity of the Houthi movement in Yemen—a far smaller non-state actor with fewer resources than Iran. By contrast, Iran possesses an established industrial base, dispersed missile facilities, and decades of experience in asymmetric war planning. Moreover, Iran’s coastline lies only a few dozen kilometers from the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints. In an escalatory scenario, even relatively inexpensive tools—such as drones, moored and drifting mines costing tens of thousands of dollars—could threaten shipping or energy infrastructure in ways that impose disproportionate costs on adversaries operating billion-dollar naval platforms designed for conventional state-on-state warfare. Finally, the economic consequences of this war would be immense and global in scope. Much of South Asia, China, Europe, and Southeast Asia depends heavily on Gulf energy supplies through the Strait of Hurmuz. The inflationary pulse from surging oil prices has threatened to raise living costs, and perhaps interest rates, across the globe. Brent jumped 17% to $108.73 a barrel, having already soared 28% last week, while U.S. crude rose 19% to $108.33 per barrel. Nearby European gas futures contracts have soared by close to 70%, while even prices for December 2026 have gained around 40%. Many of America’s closest partners in the Gulf—states such as Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and Qatar—have built their modern economic models on stability, tourism, aviation hubs, and investor confidence. The war has threatened the foundations of these economies. Already, this conflict has led to airport closures, disrupted shipping lanes, and billions of dollars lost in economic activity. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE hold trillions of dollars in global assets, including substantial investments in the U.S. bond market and large holdings of United States Treasury securities. Any strategic reassessment by these states in response to prolonged instability could therefore have consequences for international capital flows and American financial markets. For the United States and its allies, maintaining constant naval protection for commercial shipping through this narrow corridor would require enormous military and financial resources for an indefinite period. (The author is a regular columnist and commentator on global affairs, serving on the panels of the UNFCCC and ICAN. He taught Public Policy at the National Defense University of Pakistan)