Cordesman/Wilner, Iran & The Gulf Military Balance
AHC 6/3/12
105
nuclear and missile programs. This would give the US an indefinite ability to restrike, suppress Iran, and attack other types of Iranian targets if a covert Iranian program was suspected and Iran did reveal its actions. This would give the US a very different kind of credibility in preventive operations from Israel. Israel may only be able to carry out one major wave of strikes – which would be far more limited than those the U.S. can conduct – before Israel faced political constraints it cannot ignore, and Israel must consider threats in terms of non-state actors with ties to Iran. It is important to note, however, that US success would depend heavily on partnership with key southern Gulf and other Arab states and the extent to which they felt Iran’s nuclear and missile programs threatened their vital interests. The US confronts the problem that a limited Israeli strike might create conditions where the only the US could effectively finish the job, but where Arab states would either not feel threatened enough to support such a strike or would not support any follow on action to Israel. Any current judgment about Gulf perceptions has to be speculative. Neither the public statements of Gulf leaders, nor the kind of material available from sources like WikiLeaks, provide a clear indication of the links between U.S. and Gulf perceptions of the Iranian threat at the official level, or their willingness to act. Moreover, current Gulf perceptions are certain to change over time just as Israeli and U.S. perceptions will evolve as the Iranian threat alters and becomes more tangible. It is far from clear that today’s threat perceptions provide a clear picture for the future. Moreover, the U.S. must deal with the legacy of its invasion of Iraq after totally mischaracterizing the Iraqi WMD threat, and would have to deal with the negative political consequences of the military aftermath of any US preventive strike. Unless its Arab, major West European, and other allies saw that it had exhausted diplomatic options, it could face serious problems with its closest friends. The US must also seek to minimize the cost it will have to pay in terms of reactions from states that do not support its policies on sanctions -- which include major powers like Russia and China, and important regional allies like Turkey. The US must consider the impact strikes will have on the US role in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the war on terror. The US must also balance the need for restraint in attacking Iran against whether limit US action would provoke Iran into a massive new covert effort; and how Iran might react in using its other forces to attack energy exports in the Gulf, Israel, and other US interests in the region. It is also important to point out that whatever US contingency plans and military capabilities exist today will change steadily over time. Given the timing of Iran’s actions, these are also areas where a different set of key actors in the US, Iran, and the Gulf may be in office by the time Iran has significant nuclear capabilities. Iran may also define its goals in ways that raise or lower US perceptions of threat, and the 5+1, Gulf, and other regional states may change their perceptions as well. US Strike Options Against Iran US senior officials and officers have regularly made it clear that the US has developed serious military contingency plans to carry out preventive strikes on Iran, and has improved its intelligence and targeting coverage. It is also clear from media sources that the US is steadily developing better ordnance to kill underground and hard targets, has developed regional missile 105