Iran & U.S: From Containment to Strategic Deterrence (Bush Era)

Abstract

As Bush get into power in 2001 and as the Conservative ruled his administration, the US administration's perception of the structure and nature of the international system and its dynamics was shaped by 9/11. These perceptions were theorized in the form of the Bush Doctrine, an inconsistent approach to the nature and structure of the post-Cold War international system, which resulted at first in a military invasion of Afghanistan and the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001, and then a dramatic invasion of Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003. Under these circumstances, many thought that the next goal of the Bush administration is military action against the Islamic Republic of Iran, which has never been achieved. Relying on this inconsistency (intervening variable), this article addresses the issue of why the United States did not invade the Islamic Republic militarily after the Iraq war. This issue is examined in the strategic literature under the theory and strategy of deterrence. Accordingly, the hypothesis is that the increase in Iran's power and influence (independent variable) as the most important consequence of the Iraq war in US-Iranian relations led to the Bush administration preventing a military invasion of Iran (dependent variable). The finding of this study is to achieve a bifocal model of deterrence of Iran against US aggression.

Keywords

• deterrence
• deterrence stability
• international system
• iraq war
• two-pronged deterrence