By Justice Markandey Katju
In his latest warning to Iran, US President Donald Trump said in a Truth Social post, “The biggest attack of them all is waiting in the wings, and when it is over, there will be very little left of the Republic of Iran.”
Trump had earlier threatened to bomb Iran into the stone age.
Now what does this mean? Since Trump is often given to hyperbolic talk, I doubt that he intended to exterminate all 93 million Iranians. That would place him even above Hitler, who exterminated 6 million Jews. Perhaps what he meant was that Iran would be hit so hard by the US military that it will surrender, and accept a pro-US puppet government, as in Middle East and Latin American countries (the latest being Venezuela).
But to my mind that will not happen. Let me explain.
Iran is a relatively poor, underdeveloped country as compared to the USA, which has over thrice its population (349 million, compared to Iran’s 93 million), and is the most technologically advanced and militarily powerful country in the world. Then how can it be said that Iran will not surrender?
Here are my reasons :
- Vietnam was a much smaller and poorer country than the United States. Yet it won in the war against the latter. Why?
First because it achieved victory by not being defeated, by simply refusing to surrender. In other words, it won by creating a stalemate, as the American journalist Walter Cronkite said in his famous telecast on 27.2.1968 which led to President Lyndon Johnson’s refusal to stand for a second term, and the ultimate withdrawal of American troops from Vietnam.
Similarly, it is becoming clear now that this war will not end in a quick US-Israeli victory and a regime change and installation of a pro-US regime in Iran, as President Trump and his advisers had expected, but will drag on in a stalemate for a long time. And a stalemate means an Iranian victory.
The killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has, far from breaking the Iranian will, only united the Iranian people, and hardened their resolve never to surrender, but to fight on indefinitely irrespective of the US-Israeli attacks and Iranian casualties, just as the Vietnamese people became united in their fight against the Americans, and were determined to fight on, despite their heavy casualties.
And just as the Vietnamese received military and other aid from the Russians and Chinese, so are the Iranians getting such aid from them.
- Iran is predominantly a Shia country, and Shias regard martyrdom as the supreme crowning achievement for a man. The battle of Karbala of 680 CE in which Imam Husain (the grandson of the Prophet) was martyred along with 72 of his followers is commemorated every year by Muslims, particularly Shias, all over the world on the day of Ashura.
The message of Imam Husain is that it is better to be dead than to surrender, and this is what Shias are taught since childhood.
So how does one fight a people who are not afraid of death? The Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh told the Americans, “You may kill 10 of our men, while we kill only 1 of yours, yet we will win.” The Americans are fighting people who are not afraid of death.
The only way Americans can win is by killing all 93 million Iranians. Is that possible? Even many Americans are protesting against this carnage and bloodbath (165 Iranian girls were killed by American bombs on an elementary school), and these protests will become bigger and louder as the war drags on (as it happened during the Vietnam war).
The entire Muslim world is rallying in support of Iran, whose government has always supported the Palestinians. Their governments may be pro-American, but their peoples are anti-American, and the people of middle eastern countries will soon devise methods of supporting Iran (as Hezbollah, Houthis, and many Iraqis are already doing).
- Iran is fighting a new type of guerilla war, which is the method used by a weaker country to fight a stronger one.
- The war is costing a lot to the Americans, which will become unbearable if it is prolonged.
- Finally, the Iranians will win because they are fighting for a just cause. And that cause is the right of all nations, however poor, of self-determination, which is indeed embodied in the UN Charter. The days of colonialism, when powerful countries could conquer, trample over, and enslave and loot poor countries, have gone, and now the latter, inspired by the spirit of nationalism and patriotism, will put up fierce resistance against these attempts.
By their brave, heroic fight, “undaunted by odds, unwearied in their constant challenge and mortal danger” (to use the stirring words of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in his speech in the House of Commons on 20th August 1940, when England was in mortal danger of Nazi invasion), Iran has become the leader of the entire underdeveloped world.
In the Mahabharat war, the Kauravas had a more powerful army, yet they were defeated by the Pandavas, as the latter had Lord Krishna on their side. Lord Krishna represented justice and righteousness, and the Iranians have justice and righteousness on their side.
