
Expect Iran To Answer US Attacks With Asymmetrical Warfare
Israel's air assault on Iran has focused largely on degrading the Islamic Republic's military and would-be nuclear capabilities.
In the space of several days, Israel has totally or partially destroyed at least two nuclear sites, destroyed numerous air defense capabilities in a number of cities and killed at least 14 nuclear scientists and several senior leaders of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The Israeli operation has compromised how Iran can wage conventional warfare – through the use of military hardware, missiles, drones and aircraft. It has also likely curtailed any progress Iranian scientists had made in enriching uranium to a weapons-level grade, at least in the short term.
But conventional military weapons are only one tool in Tehran's arsenal. As a researcher who studies how Iran partners with militant groups , I know Iran still has the means to target its enemies. Despite the degradation of its military capabilities, Iran can leverage proxies, criminal organizations abroad, and cyberattacks to hit Israeli, and possibly US, targets.
Forward deterrence doctrineThe Islamic Republic is well suited for asymmetric warfare , or conflict between two countries that have different conventional capabilities and that is below the threshold of conventional war.
It fits a central tenet of Iran's forward deterrence policy. In short, the doctrine holds that Iran should target its adversaries before their threat reaches the country's borders. As Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said in 2019 , Iran“must not limit ourselves within our own borders. It is our duty to recognize and confront threats that lie beyond our walls.”
The“forward deterrence” doctrine was seeded from the early days of Iran's Islamic Republic after the 1979 revolution.
Notably, forward deterrence originated from a need to cultivate proxies to target Saddam Hussein during the brutal eight-year war Iran fought against Iraq in the 1980s. To that end, Iran raised, equipped and trained groups like the Badr Corps to support its fight against Hussein, and it continues to support the militia and its political arm to the present day.
In more recent years, Iran has cultivated violent non-state actors like terrorist and rebel groups as well as criminal gangs to target adversaries – both the US and Israel, but also regional rival Saudi Arabia. These non-state groups are primarily coordinated through the Revolutionary Guard's Quds Force, its extraterritorial missions arm founded in 1988 .

Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and his military leaders face an enemy with superior military hardware. Photo: Anadolu via Getty Images / The Conversation
Recent Israeli strikes have degraded both Iran's conventional military capability and killed members of Revolutionary Guard leadership . Israel also allegedly hit a Quds Force nerve center in Tehran, and it's unclear if its leader, Esmail Qaani, is dead.

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