Israel-Iran one-sided war

(Link on Daily Trust)

Over the past several years Israel has intensified its attacks on selected military targets in Iran and on Iran-sponsored militias in Syria and Iraq. Iran’s nuclear program sites including the crucial Natanz nuclear facility, other military and sometimes even non-military but equally vital infrastructure have been attacked by Israel. The latest incident believed to be an Israeli attack was the “mysterious fire outbreak" that led to the sinking of Iran’s largest warship in the Gulf of Oman. 

In the wake of each attack, Israel would either maintain “guilty silence” or react in clear terms obvious enough to suggest its responsibility yet ambiguous enough to exempt it from any legal or diplomatic consequences. 

While it's an open secret that Israel is always behind such attacks, Iran is faced with an awkward dilemma. As a regime known for its extremely harsh anti-Zionist rhetoric and threat to “wipe Israel off the Earth”, acknowledging those attacks will definitely prompt the expectation of its admirers to see, at least, its (Iran) appropriate retaliation if not the elimination of Israel as it has always threatened. However, knowing deep down that it's too incapable to confront Israel, Iran has chosen to feign ignorance of the attacks or attribute them to some accidents to tactically save its face. 

On its part, Israel carries on its attacks on Iran and its interests elsewhere capitalizing on that dilemma knowing that Iran can neither dare to retaliate nor even cry out for that matter, because while retaliating would expose it to humiliating defeat and possible collapse of its regime, crying out would expose the emptiness of its ego.

Besides, the clandestine operations conducted but the notorious Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad in Iran have exposed the extent of its strategic vulnerability. Though, Mossad is arguably the world’s most efficient intelligence agency outclassing even the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of the United States, the extent to which it has managed to infiltrate the Iranian regime doesn’t only prove its obvious superiority over its Iranian counterpart but equally exposes the Iranian regime’s structural weakness. 

That’s obvious given the fact that in conducting its covert operations within Iran, the Mossad relies entirely on Iranian officials and security personnel who it has managed to turn into its undercover agents. 

Referring to that high-level infiltration, the former Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad dropped a bombshell recently when he stated that (at a point) the very head of the department responsible for Iran’s counterintelligence operations against Israel who was responsible for tracking down and preventing Mossad’s covert operations in Iran turned out to be a Mossad undercover agent himself. 

Also referring to the assassination of the senior Iranian nuclear scientist and official of the country’s nuclear program, Brigadier-General Mohsen Fakhrizadeh late last year in Iran by a team of Iranian undercover Mossad agents, the former president alluded to the roles of some officials of Iran's intelligence agency in covering the tracks of the assassins and the tracks of other Iranian Mossad agents who assassinated Iranian nuclear officials on various occasions. The Iranian intelligence agency's officials in question were obviously secret Mossad agents too. 

Ahmadinejad also lamented how Mossad managed to steal some 50,000 hardcopy documents and 163 discs of Iran’s nuclear program archive from a supposedly extremely secure Iran’s intelligence agency's warehouse in Turquzabad district near Tehran in 2018. The dramatic seven-hour Mossad operation was a culmination of a two-year preparation and was executed by twenty Mossad agents none of them was Israeli. The details of the operation as recently revealed by Yossi Cohen who lately retired as the Director of Mossad were too embarrassing for the Iranian regime and explained why Iran couldn’t publicly acknowledge the theft until after Israel disclosed it three months later.  

Iran disguises its weakness in a tactical exaggeration of its military capabilities and systematic flaunting of its military hardware and weaponry including the display of prototypes as "real" weapons.

However, Israel’s persistent unprovoked attacks on Iran suggests its (Israel) realization that Iran is a mere paper tiger that’s not only too weak to retaliate but also too vulnerable to defend itself for that matter. 

Interestingly, both Iran and Israel benefit from each other politically in a quite interesting way. On the one hand, though Israel knows deep down that Iran doesn’t pose any threat to it, yet it capitalises on Iran’s rhetoric of eliminating it to get more sympathy, solidarity and support from the international community. Equally, Israeli politicians use the rhetoric in their political campaigns to strike fear into the Israeli electorate then reassure them that only voting for them can guarantee Israel the maximum security from “Iranian threats”. 

On the other hand, Iran has maintained its anti-Zionist rhetoric and empty threats against Israel, for that’s her most effective political tool, which she manipulates to win and keep the sympathy of the gullible among Muslims who are too carried away by their longing for the liberation of AlQuds to realize Iran’s real agenda behind its purported anti-Israel stance.

Anyway, though Arab countries in the region, which are Iran’s real targets equally realize that Iran is indeed a paper tiger, they endure its bullying nonetheless because they are already infiltrated by it through its Shiite loyalists and/or sponsored militias among their respective populaces. There is hardly an Arab country in the region and beyond that’s not threatened by such moles and militias. While in some countries (i.e. Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq and Syria) those militias have already grown stronger than the states, other countries are at various degrees of exposure to Iran-sponsored destabilization plots.  

Capitalising on Shekau’s death

(Link on Daily Trust)

Shekau

I cautiously welcomed the news of the death of Boko Haram’s leader, Shekau to avoid ending up overly disappointed should the news turn out to be untrue as it had on a few occasions in the past.  

However, now that it has been confirmed, and though given the circumstances of his death the Nigerian authorities cannot rightly claim credit for it, they have been presented with a rare opportunity to proactively capitalise on the situation, which, if managed properly, may culminate in the elimination of the terror group. 

Unfortunately, and typical of them, the Nigerian authorities don’t seem to realize the impact of his death on the morale and organizational cohesiveness of the group. From the government’s reactions to the development, it doesn’t appear to realize that Shekau’s death could be capitalised on to make it the beginning of the end of the Boko Haram group.  

Having ruled the group with an iron fist for more than a decade, Shekau had used the method of striking fear into his followers to dominate them. He was also notorious for reckless adventurism and extreme brutality on defenceless civilians and, of course, on captured security personnel. 

His arrogance and dictatorial attitude explained his rigidity and intolerance of his followers’ views and, more so, criticism. It wasn’t uncommon, for instance, that for an allegation of, say, insubordination let alone alleged treachery or any act he considered “corruption on earth”, Shekau would order for the execution of the “accused” or cutting off some of his limbs as a punishment and deterrence to whoever may contemplate committing a similar “offence”. 

With the emergence of the so-called Islamic State West African Province (ISWAP), and the subsequent power struggle that led to the split of the Boko Haram group, many of Shekau’s followers switched allegiance to the ISWAP-led faction of the group.  

Interestingly, contrary to the narrative that the ISWAP is a faction of Boko Haram and that the two are involved in a power struggle, the ISWAP actually wants to bring Boko Haram under it. The ISWAP is a subsidiary terror group under the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS); the notorious transnational terror organization. 

Also, as much as Shekau needed connections with the ISWAP, ISIS and other regional and international terror groups, they equally needed him to expand into territories they couldn’t easily penetrate. Besides, Shekau had indeed initially paid allegiance to Alqaeda then to ISIS through ISWAP, which subsequently found him too extreme and disobedient hence its attempt to replace him. The power-hungry Shekau resisted the attempt and rescinded his allegiance. 

Anyway, Shekau was too power-obsessed and indeed too carried away to groom or appoint a particular would-be successor and thus he left a huge vacuum in the group. While the group may present his supposed successor, he isn’t likely to be inspiring or rather intimidating enough to be like Shekau. And in the absence of a Shekau-like leader, the group with its already growing number of disillusioned members would continue to steadily fall apart while more of its members join the ISWAP or split into opposing factions.  

Now, though Boko Haram is a home-grown terror group, tackling is ironically more challenging than tackling the ISWAP. Because though tackling the ISWAP, being an offshoot of ISIS, necessarily entails involvement in the complexities of global politics, it remains relatively easy anyway though only if the Nigerian authorities are equal to the task. It only takes knowhow in the underlying dynamics and politics behind the so-called war on terror, and, of course, adequate blackmailing tools necessary for successful engagement with the players involved in the politics. I may, in due course, address this issue in a separate piece.  

Whereas the Boko Haram group per se, being a mere local terror group made up of barely literate, gullible and frustrated individuals with a particularly unrealistic, clueless and reckless leader isn’t of any strategic significance to the international players manipulating terror groups around the world for their respective interests. Besides, unlike elsewhere, the international players don’t need to manipulate any terror group to have their ways in the countries where Boko Haram operates. 

That explains the limited if any foreign influence on the group, which makes tackling it relatively less challenging as it only takes basic intelligence-based counterterrorism strategies to accomplish. This equally applies even in the event of negotiations, because decision-making power always lies with the group’s leader with little or no input from a few individuals around him. 

Therefore, with the group now in disarray following Shekau’s death, the security agencies should increase the rate, scope and intensity of intelligence-coordinated attacks on all suspected terrorists’ hideouts within Nigeria and across the Lake Chad Basin region. This should be strictly sustained until the surviving terrorists are reduced to wandering lone wolves before their eventual elimination. 

With the elimination of Boko Haram foot soldiers regardless of their allegiances, the ISWAP and any other foreign terror group will disappear from the region, for they won’t have the local elements they necessarily need to operate.

The imperative of peaceful dissolution of Nigeria

(Link on Daily Trust)

It takes no particular analytical prowess for anyone to conclude that with the rate at which things are falling apart in Nigeria, its collapse as a corporate entity is just a matter of time unless the persistently escalating threats eating away at its existence are eliminated. 

Also, notwithstanding the passionate prayers against that eventuality, as long as those existential threats are left unchecked, they would culminate in the break-up of the country sooner or later.

However, while its collapse per se may not necessarily spell doom for any of its geopolitical zones or its federating states, after all, the circumstances of the collapse would determine the ability or otherwise of each geopolitical zone to stand on its own feet and transform into a viable sovereign state. 

Contrary to the unrealistic assumption of those underestimating the repercussions of the disintegration of a huge country like Nigeria with such enormous, accumulated and complicated challenges, its chaotic disintegration would certainly trigger uncontrollable anarchy within all the geopolitical zones. 

The unrealistically romanticized post-united Nigeria picture painted and promoted by ethnoreligious or regional bigots that their respective geopolitical zones would, in no time, develop into a Dubai of a sort once the country disintegrates, or the assumption that once a particular geopolitical zone(s) is cut out of the federation the country would thrive, is just wishful thinking devoid of realistic considerations.

Besides, even in the event of each geopolitical zone transforming into a sovereign state, it would still end up a mini-Nigeria with the same or even worse challenges, for, after all, the same power elite who have mismanaged Nigeria would end up the same power elite in their respective geopolitical zones.  

Yet, while that doesn’t necessarily mean that the geopolitical zones lack the potential to thrive as sovereign states in a post-united Nigeria, it depends on how and under what circumstances the country ceases to exist as a corporate entity; as it indeed depends on the proactivity and efficiency of each geopolitical zone in dealing with its peculiar challenges in the aftermath.  

However, the unrealisticness, recklessness and growing desperation of separatists, secessionists and other forces hell-bent on ending Nigeria’s corporate existence anyhow suggest the absence of any consideration for the probable repercussions of the country’s chaotic disintegration. This is obvious from the activities of the groups that have adopted terrorism to achieve their respective agendas in this regard, e.g. Boko Haram, IPOB and the Yoruba Nation agitators. Even the supposedly nonviolent campaigners against the continued corporate existence of the country e.g. the purported proponents of restructuring are equally too reckless to consider those probable repercussions.

Despite its serious deficiencies, the Nigerian state has luckily kept in check a great deal of deep-rooted tribal, ethnoreligious, social and other underlying tensions in all the country’s geopolitical zones. This is largely thanks to the tacit elite conspiracy to ignore their ethnoreligious and regional differences when it comes to benefitting from the prevailing culture of nepotism, impunity and corruption in the country.    

Therefore, a chaotic collapse of the Nigerian state against that backdrop wouldn’t only trigger interregional conflicts among the geopolitical zones for resource control but would also trigger intraregional struggles within the zones themselves not only for resource control but for tribal, ethnoreligious and other motives. 

It’s in that context that some Southwestern academics including Prof. Lai Olurode of the University of Lagos (UNILAG), and Prof. Akanmu Adebayo of the Kennesaw State University in the United States recently warned: “against the clamour for the Oduduwa Republic, saying the old wars and rivalry among the micro-Yoruba ethnic groups will be revived, which may lead to catastrophe”. 

Equally, an impulsive dissolution of the Nigerian state would plunge the Southeast into a perpetual struggle for power and resource control. After all, the zone’s political elite is already the most divided compared to their counterparts in the other geopolitical zones. Besides, the IPOB terror campaign for secession is already increasingly growing into a full-scale war. 

Likewise, while amid the ensuing turmoil the zone’s secessionists would attempt to annex the neighbouring Niger-Delta, which they have always been obsessed with for its massive crude oil resources and strategic location, the Niger-Deltans would have already been enmeshed in their own struggles for power, resource control, and tribal hegemony. Moreover, they would at the same time continue to resist the Southwestern secessionists’ desperate attempts to annex their land. 

Also, given the particularly delicate ethnoreligious composition of the North-Central geopolitical zone, its particular notoriety for the worst ethnoreligious conflicts in Nigeria, and its persistently fragile peace, the zone may react to Nigeria’s unplanned break-up with a spontaneous breakout of uncontrollable communal confrontations.  

Similarly, Nigeria’s chaotic disintegration, which necessarily means the sudden collapse of the entire security agencies would plunge the entire Northwest and Northeast into overwhelming chaos under the reign of Boko Haram and ISWAP terrorists, kidnapping gangs and other organized crime syndicates, with each group grabbing as many cities, towns and villages as it can while fighting one another for further territorial expansion. 

In a nutshell, a disorderly break-up of Nigeria would precipitate uncontainable chaos across the land. And while the overwhelming majority of Nigerians would end up trapped in the hellish situation struggling to just cling to life, the extremely tiny elite minority along with their families would escape to their respective alternative bases in the UK, US, Dubai etc. from where they would be appearing on international television channels to “analyse” the situation at home and proffer “solutions”. 

To avert that looming eventuality, therefore, a peaceful dissolution of Nigeria should be considered on the platform of, say, a national conference or any other mechanism that would lead to the amicable and systematic dissolution of the country.