President
Trump is trying to make a deal with a tribe of people
who do not make deals. He is trying to arrive at a
practical settlement with a people who live in an
eschatological ecosystem focused on a divinely appointed
future and not primarily on politics. Money and power
for the Iranian regime may be nice in the interim,
but are essentially means to an end that have little
to do with prosperity and stability. Shia communicants
are committed to the emergence of end-times, to the
culmination of history as we know it. All arrangements
are transitory in the light of an immanent finality.
The deal
itself is not only fragile, as we have seen, but is
an easily predictable failure. The MOU is most likely
not a sop to the Iranian team to allow them to sell
the “deal” to their IRGC overlords —
who may be a pack of nutters, but they are not stupid.
We know — or should — that the IRGC will
never surrender its “right to enrich uranium,”
and the Strait of Hormuz will likely always remain
contentious. For the Revolutionary Guard, the point
of a “deal” is nothing but perpetual deferral
while it solidifies its resources. For Trump, as many
believe, the point of a deal is to bring down gas
prices, put money in the electorate's pocket, and
survive the mid-term elections. Then we’ll see.
Matt Martgolis
and Victor Davis Hanson take a more positive view:
The Regime is in a position of weakness, its industry
and military are in shambles, the nation is effectively
broke, and it is running out of time. I continue to
be skeptical. The fact is that Iran will stick by
its “sacred principles,” it will freely
humiliate the American Vice President by deprecating
him at the negotiation venue, it will close Hormuz
again, and it will walk out of the meetings in a state
of pride and indignation. Of course, it will walk
back in — before leaving again. Trump’s
rhetorical percussion does not intimidate the Iranian
hardliners at home.
What is
the real issue here? Edward Andrews’ Islamic
Ideology: Awaiting Al-Mahdi—The Twelfth Imam
and the Future of Islam is very clear about the
uselessness of political dealings with adherents of
Muslim and particularly Shia ideology. These groups,
he writes, “view their actions as part of a
long historical continuum of Islamic expansion, adapting
their methods to the modern world’s complexities.
Their strategies are deeply rooted in a selective
interpretation of Islamic history and eschatology,
aimed at establishing a global Islamic dominance as
prophesized in their eschatological beliefs.”
For the
Shia faithful amongst the Iranian Revolutionaries,
it is the Twelfth Imam, the hidden Mahdi or Messiah,
who will rise after a millennial period to restore
justice and establish truth, leading Muslims to a
period of ultimate victory. The concept of the Mahdi,
helming battles against the forces of evil, which
include oppressive rulers (e.g., the Americans and
the Israelis), is central to the Shia worldview and
expectations for the future. “This intertwining
of eschatology and realpolitik can complicate the
political landscape in Muslim-majority countries,”
as well as in their relation with other sovereign
states. That goes without saying.
There
is no mention of the Mahdi in the Quran. It is through
the Hadith, or sayings attributed to Muhammad, that
the Mahdi gained ascendancy in the radical Shia branch
of Islam. Shi’ites believe that the Mahdi is
a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad, from the line
of his daughter, Fatima, a lineage underscoring his
legitimacy and divine appointment. Such conviction
will guide the moral decisions of the Shia in their
apocalyptic view of history.
For those
on the other side of the table or the Strait, navigating
these beliefs with understanding, education, contextual
interpretation, and determination is vital for fostering
a successful outcome, some form of enforceable restraint
or submission, in negotiation and conflict with such
rigidly sectarian adversaries.
Richard
Fernandez (the Belmont Club), for his part, does not
fully address the dynamics that are involved. “Contrary
to popular belief,” he writes, “radical
causes are not all about belief; they are mostly about
money.” The profit-making Strait “can
be shut not only by Iran and not only by the USN,
but also by Israel simply by retaliating against Iran's
proxy attacks. This lack of monopoly was the flaw
in Tehran’s calculation. Iran's whole business
model was built around blackmail. What they didn't
count on was others dealing themselves in.”
This is
an interesting speculation but does not go far enough,
and those who cling to it will eventually find themselves
on the losing side of any dispute. The inability or
unwillingness to recognize the occult and vaticinal
nature of Twelver Shia eschatology will lead inevitably
to failure for those who reject, oppose, or contend
with the followers of so oracular and mantic a religious
stance.
A man
like Trump who lives in a world of “deals,”
of business compacts and entrepreneurial enterprises,
is on a different planet from a messianic and chiliastic
enemy, for whom the “obliteration” (Trump’s
word) of their country is ultimately a kind of triumph.
Various traditions claim the reappearance of the Mahdi
will be accompanied by fire and flood, turbulence
and war, and that his parousia can be hastened by
bringing the world, or portions of the world, to the
brink of catastrophe. This would entail even Iran,
which is a hard thing for Westerners to understand.
The mindset is real, as the scholarship and the chronicles
attest. The physical demolition of the country, should
it come to that, is only the first step toward vanquishing
the infidels. Better to nuke them out of existence,
think the Revolutionary Guard, but self-immolation
in critical circumstances can also be the vestibule
to the Eternal Mosque. That is the covenant endorsed
by the Mahdi.
Loss on
the material plane, if necessary, will generate in
the course of time a new Sharia-based Islamic dispensation.
Destruction is reconstruction. Losing can be winning,
which means the Shi’ite canon of thought and
action cannot lose, whatever the consequence of the
arbitration. From the Iranian perspective, this is
what the controversy is fundamentally all about. Whatever
the cost, victory is guaranteed.
If we cannot see this, if we cannot realize that we
are treating with a non-rational actor who is ready
to court havoc and devastation as a stepping stone
rather than a stumbling block, then we are blind to
the momentum of history and the indispensable scriptures
that make up the theology of the faith. We are transacting
out of ignorance.
The sequel
is that the rational side of the proceedings will
suffer frustration at best and an ignominious miscarriage
at worst. There is no “deal” to be had.
The only answer is real obliteration, the elimination
not merely of a leader here and a politician there,
but of the regime itself, down to the last man, if
possible. Assassination is not the answer but only
a stopgap. This is war, not diplomatic paintball or
geopolitical scrabble. There is a job to be done,
and a way must be found to do it, hopefully with the
help of the Iranian people themselves. But in the
current stalemate with the Iranian regime, Trump’s
strength as a dealmaker turns out to be his greatest
weakness.
This is
where the misconceived and misnamed “deal”
is tending.
