The Iran-Saudi Arabia Proxy Conflict: the Middle Eastern Cold War that’s being fought for Islamic hegemony
The Middle East is without a doubt the most conflict-riddled landmass on our planet primarily because it’s a loosely defined geographic region. They squabble over land, religion, ideologies, buildings, walls, and oil but they never go to war against each other, instead they wage proxy wars.
As with everything related to geopolitical conflicts, history plays a key role in the biggest proxy war in the Middle East which is the Iran — Saudi Arabia proxy conflict. In the first quarter of the 19th century, the Ottoman Empire stretched across the Middle East encompassing a patchwork of tribes in the Arabian Peninsula. In October 1914, the Ottoman Empire entered the First World War on the side of the Central Powers (Austro-Hungarian empire, Germany, Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire) and paved the way towards British entry into the Middle East. Meanwhile, the division of the defeated Ottoman Empire began chaotically among the Allied Powers (Serbia, Russia, France, the United Kingdom, Italy, Belgium and the United States). This left ample room for the Arabian tribes to fight amongst themselves to control power in the region and resist the foreign invaders.
By 1932, an interior tribe known as Al-Saud or the House of Saud conquered most of the peninsula and on 23 September 1932, Saudi Arabia was officially recognized. In 1938, massive oil reserves were discovered in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia. This oil money made the monarchs rich and they financed the development of the kingdom. This paved the way for the US-Saudi alliance. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was thriving.
Where there’s oil, there’s bound to be a fire someday.
Iran also had massive oil reserves but constant foreign influences liked being invaded by the Russians, the Soviets and the British was creating prosperity problems. Owing to American support of Saudi Arabia, the US couldn’t directly buy oil from Iran. So, in 1954, the US secretly staged a coup to remove the democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddegh. In his place, the Shah of Iran Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, popularly known as Mohammad Reza Shah was installed as the proxy king. He was considered to be a progressive who wanted to westernize and secularize his country, and he despised the Soviets on account of being insulted by Stalin once. Unfortunately, his progressivism soon turned into hedonism wherein corruption became rampant and the Iranian secret police the SAVAK started terrorising people. Iran’s prosperity though remained unaffected.
By the 1970s, both Iran and Saudi Arabia were experiencing periods of affluence. However, the Shah of Iran wasn’t as powerful or beloved as the Royal Family of Al Saud. Iranians, instigated by the compelling words of Ayatollah Khomeini, who preached against western, secular monarchies, the Iranian Revolution of 1979 began. Stifled by the radical reforms brought on by the America-installed Shah, a 444-day standoff began between Iran and the United States wherein 52 American diplomats and citizens were held hostage in what is now known as the “Hostage Crisis of 1979”.
Iran won the standoff. Monarchy was ousted from Iran and replaced by a Government that was liked by the people, Islamic, and lead by the clergy. This was a problem for Saudi Arabia which claimed to be the leader of the Muslim World. This ignited another fire, one of ideologies.
A predominantly Sunni Saudi Arabia started fearing a predominantly Shia Iran will try to export their revolution to the Kingdom. According to a 1990 CIA report, their fears weren’t without proof. To stop the progression of the rapidly spreading Iranian beliefs, Saudi Arabia formed the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) in 1981. The GCC is an alliance between the US and the gulf monarchies but it doesn’t include Iran.
The fire turns into a blazing inferno owing to the American interference, specifically with Iraq. When Saddam Hussain set out to invade Iran in September 1990 to gain power and annex Iranian oil reserves, Saudi Arabia helped Iraq by providing Hussain the money, weapons and logistical support he needed. This proxy war ended in a stalemate at a human cost of at least a million dead.
Iraq had then become the buffer state between Saudi Arabia and Iran but all this changed in 2003 when the US overthrew Saddam Hussain, thereby creating a power vacuum and a highly unstable country that was easily driven into rebellion. This trend of Civil War continues well into 2011 when pro-democracy, anti-monarchy protests broke out in Tunisia, Morocco, Syria, Libya, Egypt and Bahrain. We call these protests the Arab Spring.
This leads to the proxy wars taking a turn for the worse, eventually resulting in some of the worst humanitarian crisis of the 21st century. Three major wars broke out. Four failing states (Libya, Syria, Iraq, Yemen) emerged. And anarchical factions like Hezbollah, ISIS and al Qaeda arose.
Saudi Arabia continues to resist revolutions which are to unseat the sclerotic, autocratic governments. They fear the consequences. Should these revolutions knock on their door, their countrymen will be riled into rebellion. Iran, on the other hand, is eager to install clergy-controlled Islamic governments across the Middle East. They are willing to consider every option on the table, including weapons of mass destruction like nuclear weapons.
The Western powers seem to have picked one side or the other in these proxy wars. In Tunisia, Saudi Arabia backed dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali while Iran used social issues like government corruption, social inequalities, unemployment and political repression to anger people into mass rebellion. In a Sunni dominant Bahrain, Iran supported Shia leaders via the Houthi rebels to overthrow the government and Saudi Arabia sent their troops to quench the unrest.
A similar story plays out in Libya, Lebanon, and Morocco as well. In Yemen, Saudi Arabian military with the support of its western allies is on the ground helping the central government fight against the Iranian proxy Houthis rebels. In Syria, Iranians continue to fight besides the militia and even the Hezbollah while supporting Syrian dictator Bashar-al-Assad in fighting against rebel Sunni groups who are Saudi Arabian proxies. In Qatar, Saudi Arabia threatened to cut ties thereby sparking the diplomatic crisis on the sole fact that Qatar and Iran have palpable ties.
This proxy war became the theme of underpinning the Iran Nuclear Deal. Neither Saudi Arabia nor Iran is above considering all options if a war were to break out. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran have never officially declared war on each other so they indulge in proxy warfare. ISIS is nearly defeated in Syria, and Iraq which will without a doubt start a new geopolitical game of tag between the two Islamic nations.
On the one hand, we have Iran where hating the West translates to populism. On the other hand, we have Saudi Arabia which is largely operational on the whims of a Prince. The leadership of both countries is influenced by conservative clerics to whom Qurbanī or sacrifice is a fundamental duty. Israeli presence in the region also tends to muddy the water at times, but that’s a story for another time.
