The onset of the ceasefire on the 40th day of the attack is another signal of higher powers that the believers and the atavistic will not miss. A mourning period of 40 days is customary in Islam, especially for Shias, who mourn the lives lost at Karbala. Arbain—forty in Arabic—denotes a pilgrimage, a holiday, and a date to mark resistance against tyranny.
In this light, Trump’s unreal language and justification for war resonate at similar levels of confrontation with an unjust power, elevating the status of those killed by Israel and the US.
The conduct of military operations by the two allies followed largely predictable patterns of warfighting first seen during the 1991 Gulf War. It involved waves of aerial attacks against key infrastructure and military targets, with an occasional decapitation strike on an important official. Ground attacks came only after the targeted country had already been pulverised. Iraq and Afghanistan followed this script. But Iran turned out to be a different story altogether—bruised and battered but not defeated. Iran conducted its operations as though it was anticipating the patterns of US-Israeli attacks even before they unfolded. Especially on social media.
The scale of sophistication and speed in Iran’s social media campaign during the war suggests planning that not many could have foreseen. The Iranian message was conveyed on every platform that matters in the US, and in a pedestrian style. The use of suggests a well-coordinated information campaign that raised the bar considerably, blunting US military gains.
Ironically, nobody saw this coming with a sharper foresight than Ali Khamenei. At a Persian poetry event two years ago, he extolled the value of .
Iran has been under some form of sanctions since 1979, when university students took some US diplomats hostage at the embassy in Tehran. The pauses have been few and far between. The sanctions were only tightened over the years and could well be the most far-reaching ever. The European Union and the US have their own set of sanctions over and above those mandated by the United Nations. Despite such severe restrictions, the fact that the US largely accepted the ceasefire conditions set by Tehran is an assertion with serious long-term regional security implications.
“We received a 10 point proposal from Iran, and believe it is a workable basis on which to negotiate. Almost all of the various points of past contention have been agreed to between the United States and Iran, but a two week period will allow the Agreement to be finalised and consummated,” Trump’s Truth Social post.
This, after most of the US troops in bases across the Gulf were moved to safer locations, and its two carrier groups against Iran were anchored in waters more than 1,000 km from the Strait of Hormuz.
Despite severely unequal military and economic conditions, Iran managed to preserve its limited operational objectives. And in the ceasefire agreement, it retained enough of a threat to compel Washington to announce a truce, albeit for two weeks. Given the battering in the markets and serious economic stress caused by the closure of the Straits of Hormuz, it is no surprise that the US accepted Iran’s 10-point proposal. Diplomacy must now take over and finish where the Omani intermediaries had left off. The military can only do so much, as Washington has realised 40 days too late.
(Edited by Prasanna Bachchhav)
