Iranian influence relies on ‘unconventional techniques’

The defining trait of Iranian statecraft has been the extension of Tehran’s tentacles across the Middle East despite all efforts to coax the country in from the cold.

John Raine, a former UK diplomat turned geo-strategic analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, warned there was nothing inadvertent in Iran’s position as the pressure from sanctions and containment policies had taken aim at the wrong issues.

In particular, Iran’s promotion of allies from Hezbollah in Lebanon to the Houthi rebels in Yemen has granted Tehran a strategic windfall.

“This is a chosen way of war for the Iranians. It has not come about by a series of accidents,” he told The National.

“Iran’s using an array of unconventional techniques, one end of which is taking hostages, plus other unacceptable state policies, and the other end is fighting through third parties.

“We have fixed on Iran’s ballistic missiles, nuclear but we have not fixed on this, which, in theatres of conflict, is their main effort.”

Since the bruising experience of the Iraq-Iran war, Tehran has been determined to find alternatives to state-on-state conflict while maintaining an aggressive regional outlook.

With US President Donald Trump walking away from the 2015 nuclear deal and imposing a policy of maximum pressure through economic sanctions, the question of how Iran has stayed its course is at the top of the global diplomatic agenda.

The IISS set out to provide a comprehensive dossier on how Iran’s approach was working despite its weak international position.

Breaking down its regional intervention, Mr Raines said Iran had proven to be highly adaptive. In Lebanon, neither Hezbollah nor Iran have sought to take over the state despite the movement’s strong position.

“What enabled them to make judgments, like to know when they needed to double down or pull back, was closeness to the people they are working with,” he said.

The intervention in Syria allowed Iran to proclaim it was defeating ISIS and protecting the Shiite shrines but it also kept its supply routes open to Hezbollah and gained a “firing base” on the Israel-occupied Golan Heights.

Since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, meanwhile, Iran has gained unrivalled influence there. More recently, Iran has gained a foothold in Yemen.

Where there has been pushback, Iran has retreated. “We point to positive examples of where closing down the space has been effective, like Bahrain,” Mr Raine said.