Combating Iran’s “Mutually Assured Destruction” Doctrine: Lessons from History
The principle of mutually assured destruction (MAD) that emerged during the Cold War disincentivized aggression by making adversaries scared that an attack would result in total global annihilation. During the 21st century, Iran has developed an economic version, whereby its response to an existential threat is for it to induce a catastrophic contraction in the world economy. The Arabian Gulf countries can draw important lessons from historical analogues on how to counter this extreme defense doctrine.
The destruction caused by the two atomic bombs dropped by the US on Japan in 1945 had many profound consequences. One of the most important has been the development of the MAD framework: countries with nuclear weapons facing what they perceive to be an existential threat can respond with a credible threat to destroy their adversary, even if it means leaving both parties in a state of complete devastation. In principle, therefore, any prospective aggressor with a sense of self-preservation is forced to think twice before threatening to conquer a nuclear-armed state.
Iran does not have the nuclear weapons necessary to adopt a MAD doctrine, but it has leveraged its geography to develop an economic analog. Its ability to block the Straits of Hormuz – and potentially Bab al-Mandab with the help of its Houthi allies – is extremely disruptive to the global economy, given the importance of the two chokepoints to international supply chains, including energy and petrochemicals. Theoretically, the ensuing devastation would be so acute as to discourage any aggressor from excessively infringing on Iranian interests.
The genesis of Iran’s idiosyncratic defense doctrine suggests that the Middle Eastern state has learned lessons from the failure of its spiritual progenitor, the Confederate cotton embargo. When the American Civil War erupted in 1861, the South was in a similar situation to Iran today: it was economically and militarily overmatched by its Northern opponent and would lose a traditional contest, forcing it to look toward asymmetric means. Taking inspiration from Napoleon’s Continental System of economic coercion that the French emperor deployed against the British, Confederate leaders assessed that the British empire – and the global economy more generally – were critically dependent upon Southern cotton exports. Accordingly, to force a favorable external intervention, the South decided to abruptly suspend its own cotton exports, inducing an economic crisis that has been echoed today by the Iranian blocking of the Strait of Hormuz and the complementary attacks on GCC energy infrastructure.
Unfortunately for the Confederacy, Britain – perhaps building on its previous success in confronting the Napoleonic embargo – did not yield, as it quickly found new cotton sources in Egypt and the East Indies. This failed gambit contributed to the South’s ultimate defeat in the Civil War.
In 2026, Iran has been careful to avoid the Confederacy’s miscalculation by picking a group of commodities with far less substitutability than mid-19th century cotton: oil, liquified natural gas (LNG), and petrochemicals. Moreover, it has exploited the far higher levels of global supply-chain interlinkages that have emerged since the latter half of the 20th century. An additional plank in Iran’s strategy has been the lower levels of political resilience that incumbent governments exhibit in the West today when compared to 1861: 160 years ago, an administration being forced to localize its production and instructing its citizens to “suck it up” would have suffered significant political pressure, but would still retain control due to the absence of universal suffrage. However, as we approach the middle of the 21st century, voters will express their displeasure in the voting booths.
For the GCC countries, the lesson to draw from the Confederate cotton embargo is decidedly not for them to encourage the development of substitutes for the hydrocarbon products that their economies depend upon. Instead, it is to systematically eliminate the chokepoint as a tool of geopolitical blackmail. Just as the Confederacy’s fate was sealed by its inability to force Britain to choose between assisting the South for facing economic collapse, Iran’s “Economic MAD” logic is only effective as long as the world’s energy flows through a single, narrow valve.
By investing in hardened, cross-peninsula infrastructure – linking the Arabian Gulf’s heartland directly to the Red Sea and the Gulf of Oman – and shielding these assets with a new generation of low-cost, automated counter-drone technologies, the GCC states can build a structural shield. This strategy does not seek to replace oil, but to decouple its transport from the geographic vulnerabilities Iran seeks to exploit. In the 21st century, the most effective defense against an economic doomsday doctrine is not just military deterrence, but the creation of an energy architecture so redundant and so resilient that reaching for the economic red button induces a contained and transient recession rather than an economic black hole.
Omar Al-Ubaydli, Director of Studies and Research
