By Shayan Fallahi, December 2023.
Realist theory contends that factors such as Power and Security are crucial to understanding state behaviours in international relations. A myriad of sub-theories makes up Realism. However, they all generally contain six similar points. These points are that the international system is anarchic. Power is a critical factor within it; states are unitary and rational, understand one another mainly through their power and capabilities, and make up the most important aspects of the international system.[1]
Several of these contentions, which are standard to basically all sub-theories of Realism, directly contradict the understanding of Iranian policymaking this paper will present. It will suggest that Iran follows an ideological foreign policy based on objectives defined by its Islamic and resistance-based understanding of the international system, with the elimination of Israel being one of particular significance. The different goals that Iran’s institutions pursue, as discussed in a previous essay, also go against the notion that states are always unitary. Consequently, utilising Realism to explain Iran’s foreign policies, especially its most ideological, such as its hostility to Israel, is ill-judged.
Nevertheless, several have attempted to make such a connection. The Swedish Iranian analyst Trita Parsi is one such example. Parsi has challenged the narratives that Iran’s hostility to Israel and broader policies in the region are ideological.[2] He uses the “Power Cycle” theory to suggest that Iran’s strategic rivalry with Israel is caused by the international structure of the region and not ideology.[3] He asserts that Iran was Israel’s natural ally in the 1970s and 1980s, even after the Islamic revolution, due to the strength of the Arab countries that threatened both states. He believes that Israeli-Iranian relations deteriorated only after the weakening of the Arab states between them due to Israeli victories against the Arabs and the subsequent Oslo Accords and Iraq’s violent expulsion from Kuwait in 1991.[4] As Iraq was then invaded in 2003, the Arabs were further weakened, meaning Israel and Iran had to vie for regional hegemony to balance out the new power vacuum. Parsi contends that this natural characteristic of the international system, more than anything else, has pushed Iran and Israel to clash.[5] Hence, the Iranian foreign policy establishment is not acting ideologically. In Parsi’s opinion, Revolutionary Iran’s Incessant Anti-Israeli rhetoric was only a tool to illicit Arab support.[6] Iran’s policies were aimed at simply preventing the Middle East from being dominated by a state that would threaten Tehran in the future, as expected by Neorealist theories.
On the face of it, Parsi’s attempt to explain Iran’s hostility through the power cycle theory and Realism appears accurate. As the Arab states weakened, Iran and Israel’s direct hostility increased. Though this paper was written in 2005, events in the region up until 2020 could be seen to support such a thesis. As the Syrian and Iraqi states crumbled, Iran moved more significant forces closer to Israel, and the two sides began conflicting directly.[7] However, this does not mean that Parsi’s thesis is accurate. Indeed, it only demonstrates that correlation does not imply causation.
Parsi’s account is inaccurate and is heavily criticised by other experts such as Abedin.[8] He leaves out any significant conversation of the impacts Iran’s Ideology could have. Still, more importantly, he forces events to fit his narrative and leaves out crucial occurrences which go against it. One of the cornerstones of his argument is that Iran, in the 1980s, after the Islamic revolution, remained de facto a partner to Israel against the Arabs.[9] His reasoning was that during the Iraqi Invasion, Iran purchased weapons from Israel, while Israel simultaneously took military action against Iraq, such as bombing its nuclear reactor.
Utilising these facts, however, to contend that Israel and Iran were not enemies is unfair. Iran was fighting a desperate battle in the Iran-Iraq war. Iraq was acquiring far more weapons than Iran due to Baghdad’s extensive international support, especially in the Arab world.[10] To counter this, Tehran sourced weaponry from the black market, a murky domain where weapons’ origins were purposely elusive. Iran’s weapons acquisition programs throughout the war were also poorly organised and lacked good intelligence. They were almost certainly unaware they were buying Israeli weapons in most cases. Moreover, Tehran was buying weaponry at as much as six times their market price, so Israeli dealers had a clear incentive to maintain Iranian ignorance of their origin.[11] In any case, Iran was desperate and contended that the war was a step on the road to Jerusalem, so the weapons they received from Israel to aid in that very state’s destruction isn’t an example of Iranian support for Zionism.
Parisi also failed to adequately explain Iran’s direct intervention into Israel’s northern Neighbour Lebanon while the Arab states remained strong, and so, according to him, when Tehran lacked any incentive to go against Israel. This was Iran’s effort to set up Hezbollah, a proxy force displaying an identical ideology to Khomeini’s and saw its primary purpose as the destruction of Israel.[12] These Shiite Militias soon clashed with Pro Israeli-Christian militias in Lebanon.[13] They would later become one of Israel’s foremost military opponents and clash in major wars in the 1990s and 2006.[14] How it can be asserted that Iran was not Israel’s enemy in the 1980s while using its scarce military resources to set up an armed group to fight it in another country is inconceivable.
Parsi’s overall assertion that the characteristics of the international system determine Iran’s hostility to Israel is his primary inaccuracy. Iran’s Ideology is inherently anti-Israeli, a factor that represents a cornerstone of the Islamic republics’ national identity. Moreover, this animosity towards Israel is comprehensively institutionalised. The IRGC is free to carry out almost any policy it sees fit to combat Israel. Consequently, suggesting that the weakening of Arab states is the primary cause of Iran and Israel’s strategic competition cannot be correct. In any scenario, whether the Arabs remained strong or weak or whether Iran’s Power was preeminent or irrelevant, the Islamic Republic would retain its pursuit of Israel’s dissolution.
Marzieh Kouhi-Esfahani makes another attempt to suggest that Iran’s foreign policy is security, not ideology-based. Esfahani utilises defensive Realism to explain his concept. He contends that Iran’s aggressive regional foreign policies result from frequent interference by foreign hegemonic powers like the US.[15] He believes that Iran’s infiltration across Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen is primarily to gain a deterrent capability against the United States, which possesses the world’s greatest military and so constitutes a threat to the continuation of the Islamic republic.[16]
In some senses, Esfahani’s analysis is correct. Iran does utilise its strengthening position in the region to act as a deterrence to the United States and other regional foes. This is achieved as Iran’s foes understand that a conflict would necessitate them to fight Iran in several other states simultaneously.[17] Consequently, Tehran’s regional policies boast a rational purpose supported by a clear understanding of security.
However, where Esfahani stumbles is his assertion that Iran’s policies are becoming less ideological and that this deterrence capacity is Iran’s primary objective. Esfahani believes Iran’s national identity and worldview are important, but these factors have been extensively watered down since the revolution.[18] The evidence he uses for such views is that Iran has supported Christian Armenia over Muslim Azerbaijan and that Iran has strong ties with communist China. Such realities, however, in no way suggest Iran’s policies towards Israel and the wider region are not ideological. Indeed, the IRGC delegates non-ideological foreign policy matters to institutions such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA). This enables Iran to pursue ideological and non-ideological objectives in different regions simultaneously. Ideology does not play a substantial role in Iran’s interest in the Caucuses and East Asia. So, in these areas, Iran, under the guidance of less ideological institutions and policymakers, can act very pragmatically. However, this does not degrade the ideological zeal the IRGC possesses in pursuing its objectives regarding Israel.
Esfhani’s also suggested that Iran’s policies towards Israel and America were only sporadically ideological and were often pragmatic. The reasons he gave for this were Israeli arms supplies to Iran in the Iran-Iraq war and the nuclear deal with the US. These claims are also shaky. If Iran worked with Israel in that war, it was out of desperation and, in any case, it had simultaneously set up Hezbollah to combat Israel. Regarding the nuclear negotiations with the US inside Iran, these were framed as a way to improve Iran’s capabilities to pursue its ideological policies against Western powers through the relief of sanctions and economic improvements.
Esfhani is also incorrect in assuming that Iran’s primary motivator is the deterrence and strategic security gained from infiltrating the wider region. He states that “Despite their many differences, Iranian leaders have, throughout the modern era, pursued similar foreign policy goals that can be summarised as the three ‘S’s: survival, sovereignty and security.”[19] This interpretation is too simplistic. First, he is referring to Iran’s presidents, and as demonstrated in a previous essay, these officials may have limited influence over areas of foreign policy the IRGC controls.
Second, Iran’s policies in that region are not based on the survival, sovereignty, and security of Iran alone. The IRGC ideological purpose is the resistance to Western activity in the area and the liberation of Jerusalem, the latter having little to do with Iran’s conventional security. Indeed, it undermines that security. Relentlessly pursuing Israel has led to extreme diplomatic pressure by Western states to isolate Iran. This pressure has included crippling sanctions.[20] Moreover, Israel’s military action against Iran has also been counterproductive to Iranian power and security, weakening Tehran’s position in Syria due to the intensity of Israeli airstrikes.[21] Had Iran confined its conflict with Zionism to rhetoric, as many other regional Muslim powers have, they would not need to deal with such security complications.
With this being said, realism remains helpful in understanding Iran in some ways. Indeed, the IRGC, despite its ideological leanings, does care about the security of the Iranian state and maintains nationalistic aspects. Outside of its resistance to Israel, conventional security remains paramount. Consequently, many actions they have taken to defend Iran can be explained by realism.
Indeed, several claims by authors analysed earlier suggesting Iran’s anti-Israeli actions also benefit Iranian power and security are partly valid. It could be argued that Iran’s campaign against Israel is based on its wish to expand its regional influence and defend itself against Western interference in its domestic affairs. Indeed, Iran’s anti-Zionist rhetoric grants it a unique capacity to generate regional legitimacy, as no other regional power can boast the same level of commitment to combatting Zionism. In a region where the population remains almost entirely anti-Israeli, this is a crucial factor that has granted Iran much further influence over Arab populations than could have otherwise been possible. Tehran enjoys the benefits of the resulting power and security such legitimacy grants it, a behaviour typically understood by realism.
However, Iran’s willingness to risk its power and security to further its cause against Israel, including a war with the United States, if necessary, as proved by its bombing of American military installations in 2020 (an attack which certainly had the possibility to kill US service members even if it incidentally did not), demonstrates Iran’s preference for ideology over power and security. Iran’s utilisation of anti-Zionism to build an impressive expanse of influence across the region doesn’t prove that it couldn’t have built a robust sphere of influence by following a more pragmatic and less risky path. Consequently, Iran’s genuine belief that combating the West and Israel is an essential cause for the Iranian state is as important to it as more straightforward notions of power and security.
In conclusion, Iran’s ideological foundation is solid and infiltrates the core of the republic’s foreign policymaking. This ideology does not always prioritise Iran’s security. Indeed, its pursuit of Israel may lead to a war with the collective West, a conflict that could entail severe consequences for Iranian security. Though power and security remain important to Iran, they do not reign supreme and have conceded much of their significance to the Islamic republics’ ideological objectives. As a result, realism can only partially explain Iranian actions, and ideology-focused theories of international relations, such as constructivism, are better placed to explain contemporary Iranian policies.
[1] Glaser, Charles L. 2021. “Realism.” In Contemporary Security Studies, 6th ed., edited by Alan Collins, 23-37. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
[2] Abedin, Mahan. 2018. Iran Resurgent: The Rise and Rise of the Shia State. London: Hurst & Company.
[3]Parsi, Trita. 2005. “Israel-Iranian Relations Assessed: Strategic Competition from the Power Cycle Perspective.” Middle East Journal 59, no. 4 (Autumn): 643-663.
[4] Ibid
[5] Ibid
[6] Ibid.P.257
[7] Abedin, Mahan. 2018. Iran Resurgent: The Rise and Rise of the Shia State. London: Hurst & Company. Israel Friend or foe? chapter, 2018
[8] Ibid
[9] Parsi, Trita. 2005. “Israel-Iranian Relations Assessed: Strategic Competition from the Power Cycle Perspective.” Middle East Journal 59, no. 4 (Autumn): 643-663.
[11] Abedin, Mahan. 2018. Iran Resurgent: The Rise and Rise of the Shia State. London: Hurst & Company. Israel friend or foe? Chapter 2018
[12] Ghattas, Kim. 2020. Black Wave: Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Forty-Year Rivalry That Unraveled Culture, Religion, and Collective Memory in the Middle East. New York: Henry Holt and Co.
[13] Abedin, Mahan. 2018. Iran Resurgent: The Rise and Rise of the Shia State. London: Hurst & Company. Israel 2018
[14] Azizi, Arash. 2020. The Shadow Commander: Soleimani, the US, and Iran’s Global Ambitions. New York: One world Publications.
[15] Kouhi-Esfahani, Marzieh. 2020. Political Realism and Iran: Geopolitics and Defensive Realism. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.P.431
[16] Kouhi-Esfahani, Marzieh. 2020. Political Realism and Iran: Geopolitics and Defensive Realism. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. P.440
[17] Abedin, Mahan. 2018. Iran Resurgent: The Rise and Rise of the Shia State. London: Hurst & Company.
[18] Kouhi-Esfahani, Marzieh. 2020. Political Realism and Iran: Geopolitics and Defensive Realism. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, P.437
[19] Ibid, P.442
[20] Kaye, Dalia Dassa. 2023. “Israel’s Dangerous Shadow War with Iran: Why the Risk of Escalation Is Growing.” Foreign Affairs, February 27.
[21] Ibid