The goal is to obtain proxy control over Iran’s enormous oil and gas reserves so that they can be weaponized as leverage against China for coercing it into a lopsided trade deal that would derail its superpower rise and therefore restore US-led unipolarity.
Andrew Korybko
Trump claimed that the US’ military campaign
against Iran is to “defend the American people”, while many critics
have alleged (whether in jest or not) that it’s to distract from the
Epstein Files, but few observers realize that it’s actually all about
China. It was explained here
that Trump 2.0 “decided to gradually deprive China of access to markets
and resources, ideally through a series of trade deals, in order to
imbue the US with the indirect leverage required to peacefully derail
China’s superpower rise.”
To elaborate, “The US’ trade
deals with the EU and India could ultimately result in them curtailing
China’s access to their markets under pain of punitive tariffs if they
refuse. In parallel, the US’ special operation in Venezuela, pressure on
Iran, and simultaneous attempts to subordinate Nigeria and other
leading energy producers could curtail China’s access to the resources
required for fueling its superpower rise.” The resource dimension that’s
relevant to Iran is a major part of the US’ “Strategy of Denial”.
That’s the brainchild of Under Secretary of War for Policy Elbridge Colby, and it was expanded on in this analysis here
from early January. As was written, “US influence over Venezuela’s and
possibly soon Iran’s and Nigeria’s energy exports and trade ties with
China could be weaponized via threats of curtailment or cut-offs in
parallel with pressure upon its Gulf allies to do the same in pursuit of
this goal”, which is to coerce China into indefinite junior partnership
status vis-à-vis the US through a lopsided trade deal.
Most observers missed it, but the new National Security Strategy
calls for ultimately “rebalance[ing] China’s economy toward household
consumption”. This is a euphemism for radically re-engineering the
global economy through the previously described means, namely curtailing
China’s access to the markets and resources responsible for its
superpower rise, so that it no longer remains “the world’s factory” and
thus ends its era of being the US’ only systemic rival. US-led unipolarity would then be restored.
Circling back to Iran, “[it] represented about 13.4% of the total 10.27 MMbpd of oil [that China] imported by sea” last year per Kpler,
hence why the US wants to control, curtail, or outright cut off this
flow. ‘Plan A’ was to achieve this through diplomatic means for replicating the Venezuelan model that entered into effect after Maduro’s capture. Iran flirted
with this but didn’t commit since it would entail the country’s
strategic surrender, ergo why Trump authorized military action for
achieving this instead.
In pursuit of this, Trump promised the IRGC in his video announcing his country’s military campaign against Iran that they’d have immunity
if they laid down their arms. This reinforces the abovementioned claim
that the US wants to replicate the Venezuelan model since it strongly
suggests that he envisages newly US-aligned IRGC running Iran in the
political interim before new elections just like the newly US-aligned
Venezuelan security services run their own country during their own
current political interim.
Such a scenario would avert Iran’s possible “Balkanization”,
thus preserving the state so that it can then resume its prior role as
one of the US’ top regional allies, which might then aid the Azeri-Turkish Axis’ efforts to project Western influence along Russia’s entire southern periphery.
In that event, the US would simultaneously obtain unparalleled resource
leverage over China via proxy control of Iran’s oil and gas industries
while tightening its encirclement of Russia, which would deal a powerful blow to multipolarity.