M.L.R. Smith
The government ‘does not believe in regime change from the skies’, declared Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, offering a justification for Britain’s decision to stay out of the United States and Israel’s strikes against Iran.[1]
Starmer cited the case of the Iraq war, a campaign that opened with ‘shock and awe’[2] from the air, followed by a rapid ground advance that swept Saddam Hussein from power, only to give way to years of insurgency and attrition.[3] That experience, coupled with the long, wearying effort in Afghanistan,[4] has left a lingering suspicion of promises that war can be conducted cleanly at distance, that precision can substitute for presence, and that a regime can be destroyed from above without the burdens of occupation.[5]
Recent events appear to reinforce the point, at least in the short term. After more than a month of sustained strikes against Iran, the core of the regime, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), has not folded. It has absorbed losses, including the targeted assassination of senior figures and leadership cadres, yet continues to function, retaliate and adapt. The system has proved neither brittle nor easily dislodged.[6]
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