Iran's Defense Posture: Not So Dire Straits

Jan 24, 2012

By Andysheh Dadsetan

Crossing the Red Line

The United States, United Kingdom, and Canada imposed new and more stringent sanctions on the Islamic Republic of Iran this past month in reaction to a UN report that indicated that Iran is working on a nuclear weapons program. Iranian Vice President Mohammed Reza Rahimi responded to this overture by threatening that “not even one drop of oil will flow from the Strait of Hormuz” if these sanctions were pursued. However, with about a fifth of all global oil passing through the Strait of Hormuz daily, the prospect of closing one of the most important shipping lanes poses a strategic danger to oil markets and the global economy. Nonetheless, more countries – from Japan and the EU, to Angola and South Africa – have considered joining the U.S. in committing to sanctions against the Iranian Central Bank and the import or transport of Iranian crude oil or petroleum products, albeit gradually. Consequently, Iran finds itself further isolated, even from more traditional allies, and its buying power dwindling.

While these efforts are intended to bring Iran back from the brink of developing nuclear weapons, Iranian rhetoric and actions had only become more aggressive. In an effort to be taken seriously, Iran conducted provocative missile tests earlier this month and its third naval exercise in recent years, with a fourth that began this week actually simulating the closing of the strait.Seen in this current climate, an Iranian gambit in the strait has been taken seriously by analysts and military experts. This possibility prompted U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to declare the closure of the strait a “red line” that would prompt a U.S. military action, likely to be joined by other members of the international community. However, despite their aggressive rhetoric and actions, there remain questions about Iran’s willingness to actually close the strait in the first place, let alone their capabilities to hold the strait if they chose to do so.

A Mosaic Defense

Iranian leaders are well aware that they cannot confront United States forces with Iranian troops head on, as it suffers a significant disadvantage in conventional warfare. Therefore, the use of smaller paramilitary and guerilla forces have become essential to their war planning in order to create a specter of an enduring insecurity in the greater Gulf region at significant and far greater cost to foreign powers – namely the United States – should they intervene. Based on this attrition model, Iranian military tactics are structured and planned to meet a very specific strategic and existential goal: to avoid a war. This doctrine of asymmetric warfare was implemented writ-large by the Iranian military, leveraging Iran’s geography and decentralized paramilitary forces as a strength against larger conventional forces. In 2004, Iran adopted this tactic as part of what has been dubbed the Mosaic Defense which organizes the military into separate commands for each province as well as Tehran – 31 in all – and ensuring that in case of invasion, each unit can operate semi-autonomously. Likewise, the Iranian border terrain is largely mountainous and would prove advantageous for Iranian forces to mount an insurgency and cut invading forces supply lines in case of a foreign invasion; likewise paramilitary Basij forces to launch surprise attacks in urban areas.

These measures, however, seem unlikely to be tested by the United States in this era of economic turmoil, defense budget cuts, and war fatigue, though a naval conflict in the Strait would be unpredictable and could escalate. Both states acknowledge this possibility and Iran included the same asymmetric strategies of deterrence in its naval contingency plans. In the Strait of Hormuz, the Islamic Republic of Iran Navy and the parallel – and politically favored – Iranian Revolutionary Guard Navy are currently equipped with a fleet of agile and highly mobile speedboats that are geared toward unconventional hit-and-run tactics, rather than direct naval battle. This makeup of the Iranian Navy, with very few larger, modern surface ships, makes them inadequate to effectively blockade the Strait of Hormuz, especially in the face of the American 5^th Fleet based in nearby Bahrain and the dispatch of a flotilla of American, French, and UK warships this week. However, the use of these Iranian speedboats in tandem with land and sea-based anti-ship cruise missiles and midget submarines, can confuse and overwhelm opposing forces while the utilization of the Strait’s narrow and shallow waters significantly degrade the maneuverability of larger American ships and submarines. This swarming maneuver and the deployment of sophisticated naval mines can create a significant danger to both intervening forces and maritime traffic that enter the Persian Gulf. What can most effectively be accomplished with these resources, then, is not necessarily to close and hold the Strait, but to make it as difficult and costly to foreign forces and transport vessels who would try to operate there as part of a greater access denial strategy (what’s more, countering these tactics has been noted in the QDR as an essential gap in future U.S. military planning). The use of these strategies would serve as a threat against U.S. and allies’ efforts to take military action in the Strait.

Harmonizing Policy and Production

As part of this tactic of deterrence, Iran’s defense-industrial base has made significant investments in technology and decentralized military assets that would assist them in this defensive posture and allow Iran to project their strategic interests by producing small, more agile vehicles, artillery rockets, training in electronic and cyber defense, and building underground bases.Thanks in large part to reverse-engineering of predominantly Chinese and Russian designs, Iran’s continued development of conventional military weapons and vehicles has grown expansively, demonstrating Iranian ability to copy and develop weapons capabilities including indigenous manufacturing of tanks, ships, mini-submarines, missiles and – they claim – even drones. In fact, even the speedboats that are a pillar of Iran’s naval tactics were reverse-engineered from Italian boat manufacturer FB Design.

Among the most effective of these home-grown technologies are Iran’s cruise missile and artillery rockettechnology such as the Noor surface-to-surface anti-ship cruise missile and Zilzal-3 artillery rockets. In case of an escalation of conflict between the U.S. and Iran, these armaments – with a range of 200 and 250 km, respectively – pose a real and present danger to U.S. bases in the Middle East, including CENTCOM in Qatar and the Fifth Fleet base in Bahrain. Threats to U.S. interests beyond the Iranian borders may be projected in this way, as well as by Iran’s historical and political ties to both paramilitary and Shiite groups. For example, Hezbollah made use of Iranian-made artillery rockets during the 2006 Lebanon War and the organization is even structured by Iranian trainers into self-sufficient autonomous squadrons. This projection of Iranian interests through the use of paramilitary groups in the greater Middle East means that an attack on Iran could mean fighting insurgencies on many fronts, in many states without bringing the battle to the Iranian regime, proper.

Calling Their Bluff?

Iran’s history of threats and coercion dovetails with their military production and deterrence policies. It is very doubtful that Iran will actually close the Strait themselves, though the Islamic Republic has many contingencies in place should the West make the first move. In fact, for Iran to block the Strait would ultimately create greater economic strife within the already-embattled Republic; an estimated $73 billion in annual revenue comes from oil sales, making up 50 percent of the national budget and 80 percent of Iran’s exports. With a large portion passing through the Strait of Hormuz, the closure of the strait would cause just as significant, if not more, damage to the Islamic Republic than to the global oil markets and is likely to foment greater domestic unrest and shake the already weak Iranian economy.

This should be placed within the context of Iran’s overall military structure and doctrine, which reveals a country that has learned to concentrate more on self-preservation than power projection. If Iran cut itself off from oil revenue, essentially its lifeblood, it would cause greater harm to the Iranian establishment than the current sanctions alone. As more countries sign up to sanction Iran, however, the Islamic Republic will find itself in an economic crisis and will likely return to negotiating before committing regime suicide. Despite some critics who see the sanctions as a clear sign of a policy of regime change, the western states have openly declared their intentions of returning to negotiations and inviting Iran to make the first overture toward restoring diplomacy. The threat to close the Strait of Hormuz is just one in a long line of wild claims and misrepresentation by Iranian officials. The military buildup and use of asymmetric naval forces ties into a larger diplomatic strategy, with greater utility in future negotiations rather than in a face-off with western nations. With prudent planning and cooperation with the international community, the United States’ heightened sanctions may avoid a military conflict – in spite of Iranian coercion – and prove to be among the most effective policy tool for putting the squeeze on this bellicose regime.

Andysheh Dadsetan is a research intern for the Defense-Industrial Initiative Group. The views expressed above are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Center for Strategic and International Studies or the Defense-Industrial Initiative Group.