Pakistan and the Kurds: key actors for the ceasefire in the Iran War

Despite the official announcement, attacks have not completely stopped. This morning, Kuwait, Bahrain, the UAE, and Iran recorded incursions by enemy drones and missiles.

Small-scale attacks occurring shortly after an official ceasefire is announced happen very often in warfare. In Iran's case, the military command is highly decentralized, which leads some military sectors to act on their own, ignoring official instructions.

The reason the United States is unable to achieve a complete victory and force Iran into a total surrender despite having destroyed almost its entire fleet and air force is due to the following three factors:

1) There will always be the possibility for any Iranian combatant force of laying mines in the Strait of Hormuz or launching drones against any Western vessel.

2) To avoid sending American soldiers and risking a disaster similar to Vietnam or Iraq, the United States needed the civilian population and Kurdish forces to rebel and topple the Ayatollah regime.

a) Civilians lack a unified opposition with visible leaders, they have no weapons, they fear being massacred by the one million members of the Iranian security forces, and it is difficult to take to the streets while Israeli and American bombs are falling.

b) Trump and some US officials have stated that the United States sent many weapons to the leaders of various Kurdish militias operating in Iraq, Iran, and Turkey so they could attack Tehran simultaneously with the Israeli/US bombings, but intermediaries allegedly never delivered those weapons. Moreover, Kurdish forces are splitted in different ideologies and leaderships, and they have been deceived many times by US and western promises regarding their state-building.

This reportedly sabotaged Trump’s plans to topple the Iranian regime without the need for American ground troops.

3) Pakistan, which has a long birder with Iran, possesses nearly 200 nuclear bombs and had remained relatively neutral at the beginning, declared two days ago that if the war escalated, it would intervene actively to defend its ally Saudi Arabia in case of a bigger attack from Iran into their energy and water facilities. This made Iran more willing to accept a deal with the US.

The deal is not very detailed regarding Iran’s military capabilities or nuclear activities but irlt was also accepted by Israel. However, the ceasefire doesn't include the clashes the Jewish state has with Hezbollah, an ally of Iran, in Lebanon.

The ceasefire can be considered a victory for the Ayatollahs, as it halts attacks from much more powerful militaries and gives Iran the possibility of charging tolls to use the Strait of Hormuz, something that did not occur before the war due to international maritime navigation agreements.