Amal Saad a lecturer in Politics from Cardiff
University writing a series of tweets on April 15, 2024 stated inter-alia “Iran
and Hezbollah seem to have mastered the strategy of sub-threshold retaliation—a
type of response that straddles the line between deterrence and escalation”. He
gave two examples:
Firstly, Hezbollah’s attack in January this year on Israeli Meron Air Base dedicated for intelligence gathering. Secondly, the barrage of drones & missiles Iran delivered on 13, April over wide ranging targets in Israel. Both of these demonstrated that there is a new type of strategy bring unveiled which Saad called as “sub-threshold escalation” where the attack does not necessarily entail any counter-attack from the sufferer on one side and targets are chosen on the basis of their strategic value and symbolism to the sufferer in this case the Israeli military.
As regards to Iranian onslaught advance notice was
given to both USA & Israel so that they be ready to counter and to minimise
civilian casualties. This type of sub-threshold escalation is patented by Iran to control the escalation
ladder where both deterrence along with the unwritten ruled regarding ‘battles
within war’ scenario are maintained such that each party can surmount or counter
only if the other party violates the deterrence set.
Most importantly in the latest sub-threshold escalation the willingness to go for full scale war is negated and at the same showcases Iran’s potential capability in military matters and the intent to deliver further punishment should Israel chooses to move up on the escalation ladder. As expected both Israel and her backers got the message and no significant counter was initiated by them against Iran. At this point we have to turn from military to matters of geoeconomics.
But here we have to calibrate this a bit. Instead of calling it as sub-threshold escalation we christen it as ‘sub-threshold action’. Because in geoeconomics any offensive and defensive procedure could be easily described as series of action. Here are two illustrations of sub-threshold action:
Illustration one
There are several countries that are subjected to sanctions regime by the West, notably Iran and Russia. Both are astute in making sub-threshold moves in the area of geoeconomics. Firstly, Russia together with Yemen announced a new partnership in order to strengthen both trade & military relations. Putin personally stated that “Yemen has become an invincible force in the world”. A leader of superpower to accept a country of nomads to be an invincible power there must be quite some aura about Yemen that has not come to light so far. Yemen succeeded where the Eagle has failed. She has interdicted the navigation thru Suez Canal, Red Sea, Bab-al Mandeb, wider Indian Ocean and just few days ago coming out with an announcement that Israeli ships would be targeted in the Eastern Mediterranean.
Illustration two
Slowly but steadily the SWIFT messaging system is being rendered useless as Iran & Russia are said inaugurate funds transmission mode that facilitates all financial & commercial transactions going through a single network. Already sample messages were relayed and executed in each other’s communication network to test the efficacy. Upon full implementation countries in the Eurasian Economic Union, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan would be incorporated into this system. China and many others are expected to join in due course. Thereafter membership would possibly be expanded to include West Asia, East Asia, Africa and Latin America.
Sub-threshold action transcends from military strategy to business strategy and geoeconomics would undergo a sea-change as sun rises in the Global South and sets in the Global North gradually!
Cheers!
Muthu Ashraff Rajulu
Business Strategist
Mobile: + 94 777 265677
E-mail: cosmicgems@gmail.com
Blog: Business Strategist
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