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Trump: There were no injuries in the Iran attacks
(CNN) - President Donald Trump's decision to attack Qasem Soleimani has left the international community reeling.
As diplomatic crises pass, this marks many boxes. The United States killed an Iranian general in Iraq, a country where he has maintained a constant military presence since the 2003 invasion to overthrow Saddam Hussein.
But despite the bad relations between the US and Iran under Trump's mandate, the death of a military officer from a drone attack surprised everyone, including the closest US allies.
Iran's decision to retaliate by firing missiles at US targets in Iraq has left those interested in the region holding their breath. Iran may claim that it does not want war, but it also says that any retaliation by Trump would be considered an escalation and would respond as such.
- LOOK: Minute by minute: the latest on Iran's attack on the bases with US troops
This is what you need to know to understand this developing story.
What is the background of this crisis?
The weeks before Soleimani's death had been difficult in Iraq. "Since the beginning of October, there was a tense confrontation between the Iraqi protesters [and the Iraqi government], opposing the Iraqi establishment backed by Iran," says Chris Doyle, director of the Council for the British Arab Understanding, an independent laboratory of ideas that promotes Conflict resolution, civil society and human rights in the Middle East.
For months, thousands of Iraqi citizens have protested against government corruption and growing Iranian interference in the Iraqi political establishment.
Security forces have taken strong measures against protesters, killing hundreds and injuring thousands.
Read more about how these protests developed.
Days before Trump ordered the drone attack that killed Soleimani, hundreds of pro-Iranian protesters attempted to storm the US embassy. in Baghdad, climbing the walls and forcing the gates of the complex. They protested the US airstrikes at facilities in Iraq and Syria which, according to the Pentagon, were linked to the Iranian militias responsible for attacking US service personnel in Iraq.
- READ: Donald Trump: "No American was injured in the attack last night by the Iranian regime"
Doyle believes that the assault on the US embassy was part of a broader Iranian strategy to distract Iraqis from the months of protests, which began in October, against Iranian interference in Iraq.
"The protests had obviously worried the Iranians," says Doyle. "I think many of the activities, including the assault on the embassy, were to distract us from the protests."
Why didn't Soleimani get attacked before?
Trump was not the first president of the United States to consider what to do with Soleimani.
Dr. Leslie Vinjamuri, director of the United States and America program at Chatham House, explains that “the previous administrations had considered the possibility of depressing Soleimani, and made a very clear decision not to do so. Although it clearly threatens the interests of the United States and is reprehensible, they did not think the cost would be worth it. ”
Soleimani was in charge of administering Iran's militias abroad, which in the case of Iraq, meant acting as a direct challenge to the United States for being the most important foreign power in the country.
Doyle explains that “the attraction of Iraq is that it is the only country in the Arab world with oil, water and human resources. But since the 2003 war, the external powers have been feeding on the corpse of the Iraqi state. ”
For some time, Iran has managed its priorities in Iraq better than the Americans, whose influence is considered to be diminishing. "This death has simply accelerated the disappearance of American influence in this region and beyond for the benefit of Iran, Russia and China itself," says Professor Arshin Adib-Moghaddam at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.
One of the reasons why Iran has often been wrong with the United States is that the two nations have not had diplomatic relations since 1979. And as Vinjamuri says, this has created “an absolute absence of knowledge and understanding” of the Iranian vision .
Why are relations between the United States and Iran so precarious?
Two key moments have shaped the entire conflict between the United States and Iran.
In 1953, the CIA helped orchestrate a military coup that overthrew the then democratically elected Iranian leader, Mohammad Mossadegh. At the height of the Cold War tensions, Mossadegh pledged to nationalize the oil fields of Iran, which were considered popular in Iran and a victory for the then USSR. The British, who controlled the oil fields, requested the help of the CIA to overthrow Mossadegh.
After overthrowing Mossadegh, the United States supported the Iranian monarch Mohammad Reza Pahlavi to rule as Shah of Iran.
Firmly in power, the Shah forced critics of his modernization reforms such as Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini into exile in Iraq, and developed a reputation as an authoritarian playboy.
In 1979, the party came to an end. The Iranian revolution ended the government of Sha. Secular protesters opposed their authoritarianism, while Islamist Protestants opposed their modernization agenda. Khomeini returned from exile and formed an Islamist government.
Something that united many Iranians was distrust of the United States. This distrust was supported when in October 1979, it was reported that Shah had been allowed to enter the United States to receive cancer treatment. This led to weeks of demonstrations outside the United States embassy in Tehran.
In November of that year, protesters stormed the embassy and took dozens of American hostages. They demanded the extradition of the Shah to Iran, and received Khomeini's support.
- MORE: Iran defies Trump's wrath with retaliatory missile attacks
The hostage crisis in Iran lasted 444 days. This was the beginning of the end. Over a period of time, the United States severed all diplomatic ties and imposed crippling financial sanctions. The crisis only stopped when Iran agreed to release the hostages in exchange for Iranian assets unfreezing.
The bad blood caused more conflicts between the two, including US support for neighboring Iraq in its decision to go to war with Iran during the hostage crisis in 1980.
How was Iraq caught in this?
Iraq saw its own coup in 1958, which overthrew the monarchy and created the Iraqi Republic. This led to the eventual leadership of the Ba'ath party in 1968 and Saddam Hussein in 1979, which lasted until the US-led invasion removed him from power in 2003.
While there was a lot that the United States disliked about the Ba'athists, the memory of the hostage crisis was fresh. This meant that during most of the 1980s, the United States "faced Iraq and Iran in an act of double containment," says Doyle. He did so by supporting Iraq in the war while simultaneously selling weapons to Iran, in what is now known as the Iran-Contra issue.
All that changed in 1990, when Hussein invaded Kuwait. The United States supported its Gulf allies and led the response to Iraq, in what is now known as the first Gulf War.
During the following decade, the West began to suspect Hussein's ambitions and fear that he was developing weapons of mass destruction. After the attacks of September 11, 2001, Hussein's Iraq was considered to represent an excessive security risk, then the United States invaded.
After Hussein left power, Iraq was an ungovernable disaster. The US strategy of treating Iraq in sectarian terms, encouraging people from all groups to participate in the division created by the government, failed to unite the country.
The Shiites, who had been politically excluded under Hussein's Sunni government, seized the opportunity and dominated the post-war Iraqi government. But the state shattered, leaving it open to interference from Iran, China, Russia and turning it into a breeding ground for terrorist groups.
Iraq also remained to become a perfect place for a power war between Iran and the United States. Doyle says the Iraqi population is not convinced either and that incidents such as the attack on Soleimani "highlight the total absence of sovereign control," while two more powerful actors take over.
Why is the international community so worried?
First, there is a real concern among US allies over Trump's imprudence and unpredictability.
"This decision to attack Soleimani was ad-hoc, probably for Trump to position himself more as a male president who faces international challengers," says Adib-Moghaddam. "In the United States, war still gets votes, being tough is cool."
Since Trump will face elections in November this year, this is a serious concern. While Adib-Moghaddam does not believe there is a conventional war, he does fear "a prolonged struggle between Iran and its powerful regional allies and the United States and its camp."
Vinjamuri says that, as regrettable as Soleimani's actions against the US have been. and his allies, his death could set a “precedent for others who might eventually have the ability to execute similar types of attacks. Drone attacks as a mechanism to eliminate state officials are a very serious precedent. ”
For its part, Iran has several ways of responding. First, directly, as we have seen in the attacks against US targets in Iraq.
Iran-backed militias also operate in many countries where the US It has strategic interests in the Middle East, including Syria. And it could cause the United States an almighty headache by enriching uranium beyond the limits agreed in the nuclear agreement.
We know that the Iranians intend to stop complying with the agreement agreed under the Obama administration and under the auspices of the European Union. Trump campaigned in 2016 to end American participation.
The problem for those who want the situation not to spread is that the only part that seems to have international credibility to re-route things, the EU cannot do much about it, apart from creating a forum for Iran and the United States. to talk. And at this time, there is very little chance of that happening.
IraqIran