After the occurrence of the Islamic Revolution of Iran in 1979, the long-term vital interests of the United States in the Middle East were faced with a serious challenge. At the same time, the Iranophobia project was on the agenda of Western countries and the United States in the military, political, economic and especially propagational and media aspects. As a result, Iranophobia was spread among the countries of the Persian Gulf. One of the most important and influential effects of this phobia was establishing the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council which consists of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman.

 

The occurrence of the Islamic Revolution and the formation of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979 led to the emergence of a new player in the field of international relations, especially in the Middle East, who openly opposed the United States’ imperialist policies and challenged its hegemony and domination of the region. In this regard, Western countries and the United States, from the first days of the formation of the Islamic Republic of Iran, have been seeking to isolate Iran in the international arena. One of the most important steps taken by the United States and its Western allies was the Iranophobia project, based on which Iran would be introduced to the world as a serious threat not only to Israel’s survival but also to all countries of the international system, especially its neighbouring countries. such a threat would endanger the peace and security of the international system and disrupt the world order. For many years until today, this notion has been promoted by the United States and the international Zionist current against the Islamic Republic of Iran in various countries around the world.

 

The ultimate goal of this project is to isolate and marginalize the Islamic Republic of Iran in the arena of international relations.

 

These measures were pursued so seriously that the establishment of the Islamic Republic in Iran raised the concerns of the countries on the southern shores of the Persian Gulf and hence they sought more military equipment in order to counter this serious threat – the Islamic Republic.

 

With this understanding of security, the countries on the southern shores of the Persian Gulf tried to form an alliance against the Islamic Republic of Iran. As a result, in 1981, the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council was established. Until now, the member countries of the Council, due to the illusion that the Islamic Republic of Iran is a real danger, have been more oriented towards getting more and more military equipment thereby benefitting largely American arms manufacturers. For this reason, the intensification of the arms race in the region has been in the favour of the American government, a phenomenon that its officials have acknowledged in various interviews.

 

Iranophobia

 

The occurrence of the Islamic Revolution, which put an end to the United States’ exploitation of Iran’s resources and prevented it from having access to Iran’s privileged geopolitical-political position, seriously challenge the United States’ interests in the Middle East and led to a confrontation between the two countries.

 

That is why since the emergence of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the United States has never been able to accept this new political identity, and over the past decades, it has always opposed the Islamic Republic and could not accept the major changes that occurred in the Iranian institutions, and the regulations laid down by the country’s Islamic Consultative Assembly.

 

The Iranophobia project is based on the magnification of some realities in the Middle East and constitutes all kinds of lies, distortions and misrepresentations of other events. This project seeks to show that if the Islamic Republic of Iran becomes strong, the countries of the region will be forced to incur huge costs and face serious risks.

 

Historically, we can study the Iranophobia project within the framework of three stages:

 

1) After the Victory of the Islamic Revolution until 1988:

 

During this period, the strategy of the United States regarding the Iranophobia project was based on military power, and so the United States sought to carry out direct military and security measures against Iran. The failed American military operation in Iran carried out in April 1980 to rescue the embassy staff held captive at the Embassy of the United States in Tehran, known as the Tabas Incident, is the first the United States action that may fall into the first category. This stage includes other the United States actions such as the failed attempt to stage a military coup in Iran in July 1980, known as the Noujeh Coup, encouraging and equipping the Baathist government of Iraq to launch a military strike on Iran, supporting any pro-independence movement in different parts of Iran such as Kordestan, Turkmen Sahra, Azerbaijan, Khuzestan, and Sistan and Baluchestan and the missile attack on several Iranian navies during the imposed war in 1988 and the destruction of half of Iran’s naval power. In other words, it can be said that the United States’ aid to Iraq during the imposed war was so great that many experts consider the Iraq-Iran war as a clear example of proxy war, that is, a war waged by Iraq to serve the interests of the United States.

 

2) From 1989 to September 11, 2001:

 

When the United States’ foreign policy achieved nothing after a decade of carrying out military action against Iran, the American government realized that the military operation will not work and an alternative solution must be sought. In the meantime, Democrats came to power in the United States and Mr. Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani was the president of Iran. During this period, Iranian politics was avoiding any challenges, especially with neighbours, and the government aimed to expand its relations with other countries in a more pragmatic manner.

 

At the end of Mr. Hashemi’s presidency, Mr. Mohammad Khatami’s administration largely continued the policies of the previous government in terms of foreign policy. During this period, Iran put effort into the de-escalation of relations with other countries and expanded its relations with Arab states, especially Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, the United States' actions to promote Iranophobia no longer revolved around military issues, but the United States Democrat politicians realized that with the establishment of the Islamic Republic in Iran and its consolidation across the country’s borders, there is no possibility of carrying out any military action against Iran. Therefore, they undertook political and economic measures thereby creating a heavy and complex structure of economic sanctions against Iran. As a result, they imposed a variety of political sanctions on Iranian officials and leaders in an attempt to isolate the Islamic Republic of Iran from the international community.

 

3) From September 11, 2001, to Today:

 

The third stage of Iranophobia that has continued to this day began after the events of 9/11. The difference between this stage and the previous ones is that in this stage, the United States intensively and comprehensively engages in extensive physiological operations against Iran. However, it should be noted that engaging in psychological warfare does not mean stopping the imposition of political and economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran and the United States, in addition to carrying out unprecedented psychological warfare against Iran, have not abandoned imposing various political and economic sanctions. That is why the third stage is more destructive than the previous ones. One of the main axes of the Iranophobia project in the third stage is closely related to the Iranian nuclear issue. In other words, the Iranian nuclear issue constitutes the main part of inducing fear of Iran in the third stage of Iranophobia. Over the years, the United States has sought to misrepresent Iran’s nuclear activities as a threat to the whole world, especially the countries of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council to the extent that some Western thinkers have used the term Iranophobia to indicate the intense and irrational fear of the Islamic Republic of Iran because of the nuclear threat this country poses.

 

Iranophobia and Arms Purchases of the Member Countries of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council:

 

Given the goals and statutes of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council, which was signed by the leaders of the Members in Abu Dhabi in 1981, one may say that one of the objectives of the Council is to establish a defence organization against a variety of domestic and international threats. By analyzing this goal, we will find that such macro-objective of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council basically addresses a new realist approach and is rooted in a new school of defence-oriented realism which regards security as more dependent on the creation of security organizations than anything else. After the Soviets invaded and occupied Afghanistan, the countries on the southern shores of the Persian Gulf became deeply concerned about Soviet influence in the Persian Gulf region and sought to find a way to counter its influence.

 

Moreover, the emergence of the Islamic Revolution in Iran and the development of the general policies of the ruling government towards the world have also escalated the security concerns of those countries and eventually with the beginning of the Iran-Iraq War, the Arab states of the Persian Gulf region established the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council to confront Iran and provided the Baathist regime in Iraq with full support. The process of de-escalation with the whole world especially the Arab countries of the Persian Gulf region began during the Hashemi-Rafsanjani and Khatami administrations and because of the subsequent adoption of a more pragmatic foreign policy by the Islamic Republic of Iran. However, when the issue of Iran’s nuclear program raised concerns, the relations between Iran and the Arab states of the Persian Gulf region soured and even became more confrontational. This trend has been escalated in recent years due to the spread of the armed conflict in Syria, and while Iran has always opposed the continuation of this crisis and the countries supporting it, some member countries of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council have supplied weapons to the terrorist groups in Syria to defeat Iran.

 

If we consider this approach as the basis for the action of the member countries of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council, then we can understand the reason for the large military expenditures of such countries. Of course, it should be noted that there are no completely accurate statistics on the military expenditures of different countries, but every year, “The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute,” uses non-confidential sources and the questionnaires that the military officials of the countries fill in, provides a formal statistic on the military expenditures of all countries.

 

The Military Expenditures of the Member Countries of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council before the Islamic Revolution of Iran

 

In order to prove the idea that one of the reasons for the rise of military expenditures of the member countries of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council is the emergence of the Islamic Revolution in Iran, one should analyze the military expenditures of these countries before the Islamic Revolution of Iran. In April 1984, the United States’ Arms Control and Disarmament Agency published an important report on the arms transfers between 1972 to 1982. The following tables provide information on military expenditures, the number of military personnel, and the ratio of military expenditures to the Gross National Product (GNP) for each member country of the Council in the above-mentioned period:

 

Table 1: The United Arab Emirates

 

(Source: World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers 1972-1984)

 

Year	Military Expenditures (Million Dollars)	Military Personnel (Thousand)	The Ratio of Military Expenditures to GNP (Percentage)
1972	10	10	0/9
1973	14	11	0/6
1974	21	19	0/3
1975	33	21	0/4
1976	85	27	0/7
1977	525	25	3/4
1978	822	25	5/6
1979	1196	25	6/0
1980	1724	44	6/2
1981	2043	44	7/3
1982	2179	44	8/0

 

Table 2: Bahrain

 

(Source: World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers 1972-1984)

 

Year	Military Expenditures (Million Dollars)	Military Personnel (Thousand)	The Ratio of Military Expenditures to GNP (Percentage)
1972	Unknown	3	Unknown
1973	16	3	4/6
1974	24	4	3/5
1975	15	5	2/1
1976	24	5	2/3
1977	38	2	2/6
1978	107	2	6/3
1979	143	2	6/9
1980	157	2	4/5
1981	214	2	6/5
1982	280	2	8/1

 

Table 3: Saudi Arabia

 

(Source: World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers 1972-1984)

 

Year	Military Expenditures (Million Dollars)	Military Personnel (Thousand)	The Ratio of Military Expenditures to GNP (Percentage)
1972	797	75	11/1
1973	1194	75	13/2
1974	2686	80	10/9
1975	6558	95	17/4
1976	9483	95	19/1
1977	9562	60	15/3
1978	10815	50	15/9
1979	13914	50	18/1
1980	16840	54	14/4
1981	20679	54	13/1
1982	24754	54	15/4

 

Table 4: Oman

 

(Source: World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers 1972-1984)

 

Year	Military Expenditures (Million Dollars)	Military Personnel (Thousand)	The Ratio of Military Expenditures to GNP (Percentage)
1972	77	4	23/9
1973	121	8	39/4
1974	342	10	28/3
1975	698	12	40/9
1976	785	18	39/9
1977	687	12	31/6
1978	768	12	34/2
1979	779	19	26/0
1980	1179	15	24/6
1981	1512	15	26/4
1982	1685	15	28/5

 

Table 5: Qatar

 

(Source: World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers 1972-1984)

 

Year	Military Expenditures (Million Dollars)	Military Personnel (Thousand)	The Ratio of Military Expenditures to GNP (Percentage)
1972	25	2	3/9
1973	60	3	7/8
1974	60	3	2/4
1975	84	5	3/5
1976	141	5	4/5
1977	211	5	6/2
1978	260	5	7/0
1979	474	5	9/0
1980	604	6	9/1
1981	-	6	-
1982	-	6	-

 

Table 6: Kuwait

(Source: World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers 1972-1984)

 

Year	Military Expenditures (Million Dollars)	Military Personnel (Thousand)	The Ratio of Military Expenditures to GNP (Percentage)
1972	219	14	5/6
1973	254	14	5/8
1974	616	15	5/0
1975	724	25	5/4
1976	1075	25	7/0
1977	1032	10	6/3
1978	1064	10	5/9
1979	1068	11	4/3
1980	1301	12	4/0
1981	1254	12	3/9
1982	1638	13	6/0

 

Table 7: Total arms sales of the United States, the United Kingdom and France to the member countries of the Persian Gulf Council from 1978 to 1982 (in Million Dollars)

 

(Source: World Military Expenditures and Arms Transfers 1972-1984)

 

	United Arab Emirates	Bahrain	Saudi Arabia	Oman	Qatar	Kuwait
The United States	20	10	3500	60	5	300
The United Kingdom	60	-	1900	460	310	150
France	380	40	1900	10	190	-

 

The statistics clearly show how the efforts to spread Iranophobia brought substantial economic benefits to the United States and its Western allies. Therefore, the spirit of the fear of Iran created by the Western countries and the United States aims to provide more economic benefits by selling arms to the member countries of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council.

 

Reference: Quarterly Journal of Contemporary Political Studies. Vol. 6, No. 15, Summer 2015, Pp. 19-47.

 

Archive of The Enemies of the Islamic Revolution