COMMENTARY: By Lim Tean
US President Donald Trump has been obsessed with seizing Iran’s Kharg Island for more than 35 years — way before he became a politician. In 1990, he wrote in an American newspaper that the United States should seize Kharg.
Trump thinks that by seizing Kharg, he would get hold of Iranian oil, which he has admitted he wants badly. Either he is deliberately misleading the world or he is not well informed.
Kharg is nothing more than a loading terminal. It is a small island, only about 90 sq km in size, some 28 km from the Iranian mainland.
- READ MORE: Trump says war could end in ‘two to three weeks’ — Iran’s Araghchi confirms no negotiations
- Will China join Pakistan-led efforts to mediate US-Iran peace?
- Other US-Israel war on Iran reports
It’s main advantage is that it is surrounded by very deep waters which allows what are known as Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs) to come alongside and load huge quantities of crude oil. A VLCC can easily load up to 2 million barrels of crude.
At today’s price of US$116 per barrel, the value of the cargo would exceed $232 million.
Kharg itself is not an oilfield. It does not produce crude. Every drop of oil which is stored in its many storage tanks are piped there from the mainland through underwater pipes.
All the Iranian oil fields are on the mainland. Now that the Iranians have known well in advance that Trump might seize the island, do you know what they will do? They will turn off the spigot.
No more oil flow
No more oil will flow from the mainland to the island. What oil there is stored in the tanks on the island would have been loaded onto vessels which would have departed Kharg.
I am willing to put a wager that if the Americans seize the island, they will not find any oil. Maybe there will be some residue left in the tanks but the amounts would be so miniscule that in law it would be known as de minimis.
Trump can seize the island and I am sure the Iranians will allow him to do so. But what will happen after that?
The marines and the paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division will be slaughtered by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). I pity the American mothers and wives who will be receiving the bodies of their sons and husbands.
Iranian missiles and drones will descend on the American troops like fire and brimstone. There is absolutely no way the Americans can hold the island. The Iranians know this and have dared the Americans to come because they know that it is an invitation to hell for the enemy.
The trouble with the Americans is hubris. They think the rest of the world can easily be walked over by their unbeatable marines and other elite troops.
Napoleon too thought that his Old Guards or Imperial Guards were invincible until they came up against the British Grenadier, Coldstream and Scots Guards at Waterloo. And for the first time ever in the Napoleonic Wars, the agonising cry from the French generals of “En arriere!“ meaning “backward” or “retreat” was heard in the ranks of this legendary unit.
Best trained, fanatical
When the Americans face the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, whether at Kharg or Hormuz, they will be coming up against some of the best trained and fanatical soldiers in the world, who are equipped to the hilt with modern weaponry.
All their generals are veterans of the bloody 8 year Iran-Iraq war. If there are soldiers who know what war is, it is the IRGC.
And to me it is the height of absurdity for the Americans to think that they can accomplish their missions with only about 17,000 ground troops.
I think the scale of the slaughter is going to be gut-wrenching and awful. It will be the modern day equivalent of the battle of Cannae where Hannibal destroyed the entire Roman army, killing 80,000 enemy soldiers in a single day and taking another 10,000 as prisoners.
In 1980, America was humiliated when their military helicopters floundered in the failed Operation Eagle Claw rescue mission to extract the embassy hostages. Nearly half a century later, I fear America will again be humiliated in Iran.
Lim Tean is a Singaporean lawyer, politician and commentator. He is the founder of the political party People’s Voice and a co-founder of the political alliance People’s Alliance for Reform.
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.