The Tribune

with CHARLIE HARPER

THE IRAN War started 13 weeks ago. A decades long standoff between Iran and the US began with the Iranian revolution that overthrew the Shah’s royal regime in 1979. Meanwhile, aggressive US actions of varying scope and intensity against Cuba have continued since Fidel Castro’s communist revolution succeeded in 1959, but they have increased since the US seized Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro and jailed him in January.

Both situations are significant. Which should command more of our attention?

US president Donald Trump’s justifications and objectives for his Iran war have included, at various times, (1) regime change from a 47-year run of brutal, autocratic theocracy in Tehran; (2) dismantling of the long-running Iranian program designed to create enough enriched uranium to develop a nuclear bomb capability with which to threaten Israel (itself a long time nuclear power); (3) minimizing or even eliminating Iran’s ability to reliably support its radical Islamic proxies in Lebanon, Gaza, Yemen, Syria, Iraq and elsewhere; (4) inspiring and empowering Iran’s substantial middle- and upper middle-class societies to commit to an uprising leading to restoration of a free market economy and relatively democratic form of government in Iran, and finally, (5) sufficiently destabilizing and crushing Iran’s military forces to render them impotent to threaten peace in the Middle East for at least the intermediate future.

There is scant evidence that any of these objectives has been gained so far, despite the president’s continuing confidence that a solution on American terms is nearly at hand. In fact, one of the current most important US aims is not even listed above – keeping open for world oil and gas shipping the narrow Strait of Hormuz that constitutes the mouth of the Persian Gulf and which the Iranians have shown in the current war that they are capable of effectively closing with the threat of mines, drones, and other military means.

Trump has experienced little success so far in achieving his aims in this war. He clearly wasn’t prepared for this current ambiguity, but a similar situation actually occurred less than a generation ago.

Like his Republican predecessors during the first term of the George W Bush administration over 20 years ago, Trump and his closest advisers believed that a massive, overwhelming show of American military force would compel a long-established and well-organized Middle Eastern nation to capitulate.

Bush’s ‘shock and awe’ campaign of 23 years ago certainly presented to the world some awesome, muscular images of the application of American military power. Every day our television screens were filled with terrible fireworks. Buildings in Baghdad and elsewhere in Iraq were getting blown up at a dramatic rate, American air supremacy was quickly established, and US ground forces rapidly gained tactical superiority.

And yet, the Iraq war dragged on for eight and one-half years. There has never been a credible attempt to categorize the Iraq War as an American success story. Instead, it has long been vilified – perhaps most loudly and consequentially by Trump himself – as a misguided failure.

Like Trump with current Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Bush had a defense secretary in Donald Rumsfeld who had served in combat in the military and believed profoundly in American tactical and strategic military hegemony in his world. And like Bush, Trump had avoided the American military draft himself – Trump with a disqualifying health exemption, Bush via controversial service in a Texas Air National Guard unit.

Furthermore, both Trump and Bush surrounded themselves with various aides and assistants who also had no personal acquaintance with either armed combat or even active military service. Most prominent under Bush was his own vice-president Dick Cheney, whose hawkishness and eagerness to commit US forces overseas were defining characteristics of a significant career in government that spanned over 40 years. Cheney received five different military deferments during the 1960s and eventually aged out of the military draft on his 26th birthday.

Trump’s secretary of state and national security adviser Marco Rubio has no prior military service. His vice-president J D Vance served honorably in the US Marine Corps in Iraq and elsewhere, in non-combatant roles. Republican senator Lindsay Graham from South Carolina served for over 30 years in various active and reserve roles in the Air Force, but also with no direct combat experience.

Now, Trump and his team find themselves staring down the barrel of a fate similar to Bush’s. Like Bush before him, the president cannot find a quick, face-saving way out of a war he plunged into without much apparent forethought. The war clearly seemed like a good idea at the time, but there is now a widespread belief among some Americans that the real reason for this war was to create a distraction from political embarrassments at home in the US.

There is also speculation that at least some Republican senators are prepared to break with Trump over his demands for additional outlays of public funds to sustain this US military adventure. House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson, meanwhile, remains steadfast in supporting the president by refusing to allow legislation to reach the House floor that might impinge on Trump’s freedom of action on Iran by limiting or even denying his budget requests.

Meanwhile, while Iran hogs the headlines, the US continues to exert heavy pressure on our immediate neighbor to the south. And Cuba does seem more likely than Iran to collapse under the choke hold applied by the US.

News reports now reveal that many Cubans are resorting to cooking over open wood fires, since there is neither electric power nor natural gas supplies to support normal kitchen preparations. Starvation seems to be looming in parts of the country.

Discontent among Cubans has been mounting from power blackouts as well as shortages of food, fuel, and medicine. Hospitals are struggling to function normally and schools and government offices are having to close.

Protesters have repeatedly taken to the streets in the capital, Havana, an--in a demonstration last week--they blocked roads with burning rubbish and shouted anti-government slogans.

This month the US applied new sanctions on senior Cuban officials whom the US accused of committing human rights abuses or corruption, targeting officials in the energy, defense, financial, and security sectors of Cuba's economy.

And now, according to the BBC and other news outlets, in a move similar to an earlier indictment of Maduro that provided the legal basis for capturing the Venezuelan, the Trump administration has indicted Fidel Castro’s 94-year-old brother Raul, who is still an active politician.

The charges against Raul Castro date back to an incident 30 years ago. In February 1996, Cuban fighter jets shot down two small civilian planes owned by a group of Cuban exiles in Miami called “Brothers to the Rescue.” Four people on board the aircraft were killed, including three US citizens.  At the time, Raúl Castro was Cuba's armed forces minister and one of the most powerful figures in his brother's regime.

Raúl has now been indicted by the US government on charges of conspiracy to kill American nationals, murder, and the destruction of US aircraft. If found guilty, he could face life in prison or even the death penalty. Calling the indictment "a political action, devoid of any legal foundation,” the Havana government said Cuba had acted in 1996 in "legitimate self-defense within its jurisdictional waters" in shooting down the planes.

Leading the current pressure campaign against Cuba is Miami native son and former US senator Marco Rubio, now serving as Trump’s secretary of state and national security adviser.  The Financial Times reports that Rubio has been leading talks with the Cuban authorities since February with the objective of pushing Havana to open up its economy and release political prisoners.

One of the trickiest issues for Rubio is how to deal with his home constituency of Cuban Americans in South Florida, where it has long been an article of faith that the US should try to overthrow the Cuban regime and get rid of the Castro family. Now Rubio, who has long preached overthrow of the Castros in Havana, is reportedly seeking agreement with Cuban Communists, not their demise.

A Miami politician told the Times that “Rubio is like the dog who chased and caught the car.  After all those years of talking about an overthrow, how is he going to sell this now?”