USA vs Iran | Explained by Sohail khan

USA vs Iran | Explained by Sohail khan 

 Hello friends

Come, let us talk about the conflict ongoing between America and Iran

What happened? Why did it happen?

How does it affect Pakistan? And is this the beginning of World War 3?

This last question was mere jest

Don't worry, things haven't escalated to that level. This is only done by some media houses to scare you.

USA vs Iran | Explained by Sohail khan 

Come, let us understand the entire situation

First, I will give you some background information

There are two main regional powers in the middle east

One is Saudi Arabia and the other is Iran.

USA vs Iran | Explained by Sohail khan 

These two countries are rival countries and enmity brews in between them

Although, these two countries haven't directly been in a war,

but in all the other conflicts in the middle east amongst the rest of the countries,

These two countries use them to indulge in a proxy war.

Proxy war means that two countries are not fighting directly with each other

but are fighting indirectly in a third country.

For example, proxy wars are ongoing in Yemen, Syria, and Iraq

-amongst Saudi Arabia and Iran

What happens in these is that there is a government and then there are rebels that oppose it

So on one hand, Saudi Arabia would support the government by funding weapons.

Iran, on the other hand, would support the rebels and supple weapons to them.

And the battle among them would continue.Iran has a majority of Shia Muslims

and Saudi has a majority of Sunni Muslims

So you could also call it a religious divide between the two countries.

(which) further stokes the conflict between these two countries

The matter of fact here is that the USA is a good ally of Saudi Arabia

And Saudi Arabia is a rival country of Iran. So basically, there is enmity between the USA and Iran too

There have been anti-government protests in Iraq in huge numbers in the past few years

because the people there are upset with the rising corruption and unemployment as well as other issues

The establishment- the government is supported by Iran

USA vs Iran | Explained by Sohail khan 

So basically, the governments of Iran and Iraq are against the protesters

And the countries of Saudi Arabia and the USA indirectly support the protesters

Recently, what was happening was that a lot of protesters were being killed

The Iranian government and the government of Iraq were shooting the protesters

More than 20 protesters have been killed.

Relations between the USA and Iran have been sour for the past 40 years

But the present conflict can be traced back to the time since Donald Trump got elected

In 2015, when Obama was the President, then the USA signed a nuclear deal with Iran.

"After two years of negotiations, the United States.. together with our international partners

has achieved something that decades of animosity has not

a comprehensive, long-term deal with Iran that will prevent it from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

This deal demonstrates that American diplomacy can bring about real and meaningful change.

On 8th May 2018,

Donald Trump backed out of this nuclear deal suddenly and said that now the USA will not participate in the nuclear deal

"I am announcing today that the United States will withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal

We will be instituting the highest level of economic sanction

Today's action sends a critical message"

Donald Trump alleged that the government of Iran supports terrorism, exports violence

and the widespread chaos and bloodshed rampant in the Middle East-

Iran is responsible for that

A lot of people that criticize Donald Trump say that

Donald Trump backed off from the nuclear deal due to one reason-

because Obama had signed that nuclear deal

Trump envied this fact and he had to upturn whatever Obama had done

Therefore, Trump restarted the enmity with Iran and declared economic sanctions

After that, there was the constant escalation of tensions between the two countries

For example, in one instance there was a drone attack on the oil tankers of Saudi Arabia

The USA alleged that Iran had orchestrated it.

USA vs Iran | Explained by Sohail khan 

For example on 20th June 2019, a US drone was shot down by Iran on charges of it flying through Iranian territory

The USA claimed that it was flying through the international territory

On 8th April 2019, Donald Trump took a decision that has never been taken in American history to date

There is a branch of the Iranian Military which is called the Islamic Revolutionary Guard corps

(They) declared it a foreign terrorist organization

This was for the first time that another country's military was labeled as a terrorist organization

After that, on 28th December 2019, a rocket attack was launched on a US military base present in Iraq

in which an American contractor was killed.

USA vs Iran | Explained by Sohail khan 

The US held the Iranian military and the general of Iranian military- Soleiman- responsible for this

The US retaliated on 29th December 2019

by conducting airstrikes on a weapon center of the Iranian militia organization

in which more than 25 people were killed

In retaliation to this, a pro-Iranian mob attacked the US embassy in Iraq on 31st December 2019

Although no one was killed and neither did anyone sustain serious injuries,

but Donald Trump tweeted after this attack saying, Iran will have to pay a very big price

This is not a warning, it is a threat.And this threat was witnessed when on 3rd January 2020,

America killed one of the topmost Iranian generals- Soleiman by conducting drone strikes

General Soleiman was the Major General of the Quds force in Iran

He was one of the people belonging to the topmost level in Iran

In Pakistan, you can compare him to the Pakistan Air Force general or the Pakistan Army General

The Quds force is the most elite of the elite force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Force in Iran

Donald Trump said that they had killed the general to prevent future attacks from taking place

and they had got the news that General Soleiman was planning an attack against Americans

"Soleiman was plotting

imminent and sinister attacks on American diplomats and military personnel

But we caught him in the act

and terminated him

Under my leadership, America's policy is unambiguous to terrorists

who harm or intend to harm any American"

US officials believe that while there was a war ongoing in Iraq, then General Soleiman was supplying weapons

to the terrorists present there

But Iran denies anything of that sort

General Soleiman was considered a national hero in Iran

because he had helped fight against ISIS and to secure the Iranian borders

So the interesting thing here is how one country considers a person a national hero and a freedom fighter

while another country, on the other hand, considers him a terrorist

This happens very often, by the way

Wherever there are conflicts and fights in the world,

if often happens that one section of the population considers someone to be their freedom fighter

and the other section of the population considers him to be a terrorist

So, there's one thing I'd like to say here - whenever you read about such complex geopolitical issues,

then do not try to fit someone in a good or a bad category

Nothing's black and white here that one person is 100% good and that person is 100% bad- it isn't so

Judge people by their actions

A lot of people accuse Donald Trump of wanting to go on a war with Iran deliberately

to boost his popularity before elections

Elections are upcoming in 9 months so people believe that Donald Trump is doing this for publicity

Also, Donald Trump's hypocrisy is evident here because back in 2013,

he tweeted that "I predict that President Obama will, at some point, attack Iran to save face."

Then he tweeted in 2013 again: "Remember what I previously said? Obama will someday attack Iran

to show how tough he is."

Now people are accusing Donald Trump of the same thing that Donald Trump is attacking Iran to save his image

This is a very similar thing that happened in the US, 17 years before today

when President Bush had declared war on Iraq and killed Saddam Hussein

Then, a lot of people had noticed that the USA did not have a huge reason to go to war

but the USA went to war, nevertheless. And it was due to this one decision

that the image of USA is still tainted all across the world

that the USA goes on deliberate wars for oil and goes to war to maintain peace in the Middle East

It encourages wars all about the world to reap benefits for itself.

The Iranian government has said that it is going to retaliate fully after this airstrike

but it does not consider a common American responsible for this

The Iranian government puts the sole blame on Donald Trump

The Iranian government has also placed a bounty on Donald Trump

and they have said that an average American need not worry because they have no enmity with them

They are only against Donald Trump

Due to this, The Iranian presidential advisor listed down the business properties of Trump all across the world

to attack Trump's real estate empire

In response to this Donald Trump issued a threat that he would launch an attack on the Iranian cultural sites

-the world heritage sites and due to this, Donald Trump received a lot of flak

that he was talking of deliberately attacking the heritage and cultural sites in a fight

On the other hand, the parliament of Iraq has voted to root out all the American troops from the Iraqi soil

and the Iranian Parliament has passed a motion designating the US Army as terrorists

Donald Trump has also said that if Iraq indeed wants all the American troops to leave the country

then Iraq will have to pay for the Air Force base which cost billions of dollars to construct

And if Iraq does not agree to pay, then huge economic sanctions will be levied on Iraq.

And if this happens, then its worst effect will befall India

The reason for this is that most of the crude oil imported by India comes from Iraq

as of 2019, Iraq is India's number one oil supplier

if the US imposes sanctions against Iraq

then the US will force its allies like India to stop importing oil from Iraq

If it so happens, then India will have to import oil from elsewhere- which is going to be many times costlier

This will have a very bad effect upon the Indian economy

Infant its effect is already perceptible- the day general Soleimani was killed

the Indian markets crashed so drastically the very next day

that investors had to suffer a loss of total 3 lakh crore rupees

Another detrimental effect was that when Donald Trump escalated his enemy with Iran,