Pedestrians walk past banners of Iranian Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who was killed in Iraq in a U.S. drone attack on Friday, in Tajrish square in northern Tehran, Iran, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2020. Many Iranians say they are relieved that neither their country nor the United States appear primed right now for a more direct military confrontation that could lead to war. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

President Donald Trump’s decision to direct troops to kill Iranian Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani may have been influenced by U.S. military leaders, who reportedly told Trump Soleimani was responsible for the death of an American contractor two days earlier.

That may have been what motivated Trump to order the drone strike that culminated, a week ago today, in the death of Soleimani, the leader of Iran’s secretive Quds Force.

But it’s difficult to know for sure, even among scholars and professionals who study, and teach, courses related to the Middle East, international relations, foreign policy and world history.

“The most difficult question right now, is where are we headed?” said Jeannie Sowers, a Middle East scholar affiliated with the University of New Hampshire’s Political Science Department, said this week.

“There’s no clear strategy … (and) we have very unpredictable players,” Sowers added. Also going unanswered is the question of “what started this cycle of escalation.”

Similarly, UNH political science professor Alynna Lyon, who studies U.S. foreign policy and teaches online courses on the subject, said it’s important that the Trump administration be more forthcoming with the American people.

“For me, I want to know what the goals are … (Americans) need to understand: What is the end game?” Lyon said. “I don’t think the administration has established that. It’s up to the administration to (convince Americans) that this isn’t a ‘wag the dog’ moment.”

Historically, relations between the U.S. and Iran have had their ups and downs over the past six decades, Lyon said, adding the U.S. “has been meddling (in Iranian affairs) since 1956 … sometimes successfully, sometimes unsuccessfully.”

While every administration has faced decisions regarding U.S. military interventions, “this time is different, because it’s unilateral … the U.S. went it alone,” Lyon said.

That raises the question of whether the Trump administration, in moving forward unilaterally, violated international law.

“There was no effort, that I can see, to comply with international law,” Lyon said, adding that historically, she knows of only one other military action “that is somewhat similar” – President Ronald Reagan’s authorization of the 1986 air strikes against Libya.

Reagan, Lyon said, “did notify Congress … he called some of his friends in Congress and said, ‘I’m doing it.'” The strike, called Operation El Dorado Canyon and “seen as retaliation” against Col. Muammar Gaddafi, targeted his palaces, Lyon said.

“He wasn’t specifically targeted, but it did send a message,” she said.

As for the Iran strike, “briefing (Congress) days later” probably doesn’t qualify as seeking, and receiving, consent from Congress as required in the War Powers Act.

As jittery as a U.S. intervention in a Middle Eastern country can make Americans, Sowers, the Middle East scholar, said indications are Iran has no desire to go to war.

“They said, ‘we’re done … we don’t want a war,” Sowers said, referring to Iran’s brief retaliatory strikes of American bases in Iraq.

On the subject of nuclear weapons, Sowers said the reason nations, the U.S. included, put emphasis on developing, and stockpiling, nuclear weapons is deterrence.

“Everyone feels threatened by everyone else,” she said. “So everyone wants as much deterrence power as possible. Iran wants (nuclear weapons) not to destroy the U.S. or Israel, but for deterrence.”

To Nicole Loring, a professor of history and international relations at Rivier University, the U.S. strike that killed Soleimani “was alarming, in the sense it was an escalation” of military force, but it wasn’t “necessarily a vast shift in relations with Iran.

“I don’t believe either country wants a war,” Loring said, adding that “strikes that are limited,” as in this case, amount to “a signaling game” between the nations.

For instance, she said, Iran’s message after its attacks on American bases in Iraq was along the lines of “this is our one attack … we’re not planning others,” she said.

That leads her to believe that both the U.S. and Iran “are being careful not to escalate” tensions. “Iran is not acting in a way (that would) provoke us into a conflict,” Loring said.

Dean Shalhoup may be reached at 594-1256, or at dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.

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