By mounting air attacks across Iran, Israel and the US have invited Iranian retaliation against US bases and allies in the Gulf.
Explosions have been reported in northern Israel, Qatar, Bahrain, the Emirates, Iraq, Kuwait and Jordan.
While the US has 13 military bases around the region, the largest is al-Udeid in Qatar, which was a target of Iranian missiles.
If they wished to pre-empt and prevent Tehran’s retaliation, the US and Israel should have given priority to eliminating Iran’s arsenal of ballistic missiles and drones.
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Military actions have torpedoed Monday’s resumption of protracted, Omani-mediated negotiations on Tehran’s nuclear programme. The US-Israeli offensive could put an end to negotiations for the foreseeable future.
In advance of the attack, Gulf states had rejected the use of force as too risky and destabilising.
Iran’s retaliation could involve mining or blocking the Strait of Hormuz through which up to 25 per cent of the global oil supply is shipped daily from the Gulf.
This would not only punish Iranian and Gulf oil exporters but also precipitate an “oil shock” comparable to that of the 1970s by depriving the West of the oil needed for manufacturing, commercial and personal consumption.
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US civilian installations and interests in the Gulf could also come under Iranian attack from drones or ballistic missiles.
US president Donald Trump declared the objective of the aerial offensive was to effect regime change rather than prevent Iran from restoring nuclear installations bombed and put out of action by the US and Israel last June.
However, without the commitment of ground forces to battle regime defenders in Iran, Trump’s objective is unlikely to be attained.
He has repeatedly called for the overthrow the regime by the Iranian people whose mass antigovernment protests were brutally put down in January. Regime change would involve the ouster of the Islamic Republic’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who, according to Iranian official reports, left Tehran and is in a safe location.
Anticipating his abduction or death, Iran has named the secretary of the supreme national security council, Ali Larijani, as his temporary successor
Regime change by popular revolt rarely succeeds unless local armies intervene, as happened in Egypt during the 2011 Arab Spring.
The essential contributors to regime change in Iran are defection from or division of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and a unified domestic opposition ready and able to assume power.
The IRCG is not only loyal but is also a pillar of the regime and a stakeholder in the political system and economy.
Iran’s security forces have suppressed the domestic opposition while external opponents are divided between monarchists, secularists, nationalists and communists. With this in mind, regime change in Iran appears extremely unlikely.
