Transitioning from War to Crime

The statement by the U.S. President about destroying civilian infrastructures "bridges and power plants" shifts the war as one of the tools of relations between countries using military force; to achieve political ends in light of the failure to reach solutions through peaceful means, to a crime when it involves the deliberate targeting of civilians and civil infrastructures that civilians depend on to ensure their lives and sustain their livelihoods. This is something that human progress has tried to hinder or refrain from using by developing international organizations like the American United Nations and enhancing international law rules focusing on resolving disputes peacefully to prevent resorting to the use of military force.

International humanitarian law, known as "the law of war," has established a set of rules aimed at mitigating the effects of armed conflicts for humanitarian reasons, protecting individuals who do not directly or actively participate in hostilities or who have ceased direct or active participation. It also imposes restrictions on the means and methods of warfare. Meanwhile, international criminal law has prohibited certain categories of behavior, generally viewed as serious atrocities, and holds perpetrators criminally responsible for committing acts such as genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and aggression.

The goal of the U.S. President in using this type of crime is to compel Iranian citizens to protest against the ruling regime in Iran by depriving them of the essentials of life and increasing their daily suffering, whether through inability to move or obtain energy in all its forms. This often fails under pressure due to reasons relating to national dignity and sometimes attributing the direct source of their suffering to American-Israeli aggression. This situation hinges on rules of individual and collective human behavior, which rely on a complex mix of factors in shaping attitudes and behavior.

Moreover, the use of this method "destroying civilian infrastructures" by the U.S. President to pressure the Iranian leadership into submission through this type of crime, forcing them back to the stone age to accept American conditions, may also not realize its intended effect. This type of pressure could provoke a decisive Iranian response targeting energy facilities in the region, which have previously been threatened, thereby increasing the burdens on the populations of the Middle East as a whole, not to mention the potential for radiation leaks if nuclear facilities or locations where enriched uranium is stored are bombed.

It could also lead to an escalation of war, which appears to be an implicit American-Israeli objective, involving Arab countries beyond merely defending their territories. This is something Arab countries, especially those in the Gulf, reject for various reasons, asserting that this war is not theirs, having not been consulted. They also refuse to slip into a military alliance with Israel that exceeds desired political relations without a resolution to the core conflict in the Middle East issue, "the Palestinian cause," which is a primary condition for Arab countries, particularly Saudi Arabia. This may well be intentional on the part of the current U.S. administration, standing alongside Israel against an Islamic state, while Gulf countries are looking to the future regarding their relations with Iran as a neighboring country sharing their Gulf shores, ensuring freedom of movement there despite the dark clouds currently overshadowing the region.

 

In my view, achieving American demands may not yield the desired results through this type of pressure or crime; as war and its repercussions, alongside the instruments of power and pressure possessed by each side in confronting the other, play a significant role. Not to mention that the economic repercussions of war, both internationally and within the American and Iranian contexts, are not a fixed mathematical, physical, or chemical equation, but largely depend on interrelated complex factors in human social behavior that pertain not only to the degree of military power but also to how it is used, the ability to withstand, the resilience of the domestic front, the strength of popular support, and the conflicting interests of other powers at times, keeping this war open to various scenarios.