by Alex Winston
Figures like Kharrazi are trying to write the latest chapter of the Islamic Republic’s story using an old script.
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The 12 days in June in which Israeli jets pounded Iranian infrastructure with devastating results were the closest the Islamic Republic has come to an existential crisis for nearly half a century.
For the first time since the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s, the country faced an external enemy capable of bringing it to its knees. Unlike fighting through its proxies in Yemen, Syria, and Lebanon, in less than two weeks, Israel exposed the fragility of Iran’s air defenses, the limitations of its military modernization, and the gap between the regime’s wartime narrative and its battlefield performance.
In a video released a few days ago on the official website of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, head of the Strategic Council on Foreign Relations Dr. Khamal Kharrazi spoke of the similarities and differences between the two conflicts.
Kharrazi, who represented Iran at the United Nations from 1989 to 1997, before serving as the foreign minister from 1997 to 2005, states that “One of the similarities is that in both wars, we were dependent on ourselves. We provided the necessary weapons with our own resources. Even in the Eight-Year War (Iran-Iraq War 1980-1988), there were many weapons in Iran, but we had to produce and use them.”
The Iran-Iraq War began due to a mix of historical, political, and territorial disputes. After the Iranian Revolution, Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein saw an opportunity to capitalize on Iran’s internal socio-political turmoil. He aimed to weaken his larger eastern neighbor and settle the territorial disputes to Iraq’s advantage. Additionally, the ideological clash between Iran’s new Shi’ite Islamic theocracy and Iraq’s secular Ba’athist regime further intensified the animosity between the two countries.
But Kharrazi’s notion that Iran supplied its own weapons is not strictly true. Despite the fierce anti-Western feeling that permeated Iran at this time, as the revolutionary fervor grew and grew, military help was on hand for the fledgling Islamic Republic from an unlikely source – Israel.
Clandestine Israeli sales of military equipment helped turn the tide of the war and prevent Iran from falling to Saddam’s forces, which was of huge concern to Israel at the time. Strategically, Israel sought to counterbalance Iraq, which was considered a significant regional threat. By strengthening Tehran, Jerusalem aimed to create a bulwark against Iraqi power and influence. Furthermore, Israel hoped to re-establish a foothold in Iran, a connection that had been severed with the 1979 overthrow of the Shah, one of its key allies.
The Iran-Contra Affair
There was also the case of the Iran-Contra Affair. The affair, which came to public light in November 1986, was a significant political scandal during the Ronald Reagan administration. It involved the secret sale of arms to Iran, despite an arms embargo, with the aim of securing the release of American hostages held by Hezbollah in Lebanon. Proceeds from these sales were then illegally diverted to support the Contra rebels in Nicaragua, who were fighting the Left-wing socialist Sandinista government (which also came to power in 1979, some six months after the Iranian Revolution). This was in direct violation of the Boland Amendment, which prohibited US aid to the Contras.“We also had the motivation and the strength to defend our country,” Kharrazi went on to say. “The motivation, the power to defend the country, and the preparedness of the combatants of Islam who were present on the field with high morale were evident in both the Eight-Year War and the 12-Day War.
“We also had the support of the people. In the Eight-Year War, the support of the people was crucial in enabling us to carry on, with their presence felt both on the frontlines and behind the scenes. In the 12-Day War, the support of the people and the national resolve were very decisive.”
Again, this point is disputable. Iranians who spoke to The Jerusalem Post secretly during the June conflict presented a different image - one of an unpopular regime that could have toppled at any moment.
"The opinion of the Iranian people toward the Islamic Republic has changed for years now,” one resident of Tehran told the Post in June. “They see the regime as their enemy.
“Many believe that this war could mark the beginning of the end for the Islamic Republic. “[People] speak about how they are waiting for Khamenei or other senior regime leaders to be targeted. They believe this war is not only the result of the regime’s mismanagement but ask themselves: if we cannot overthrow this regime ourselves, perhaps Israel will eliminate them once and for all.”
Kharrazi’s most striking comments, however, addressed the changing nature of warfare itself and how war has changed in the preceding four decades.
“In the Eight-Year War, it was an industrial war and dependent on the ground forces. The enemy was present on the front, and our forces were on the opposite front. Volunteers were mobilized and fought the enemy face-to-face. The main tools of war were from the military industry — artillery, tanks, and heavy weapons. The industrial paradigm ruled the wars,” the official said.
“Today, this is not the case. Today, it is a paradigm of information warfare and technological warfare. Intelligence plays a very important role in military warfare. Acquiring intelligence depends on new technologies. Artificial intelligence is used in wars to identify, decide, and then act. Today, in fact, AI essentially detects, decides, and then the action is executed in place of a human.”
This idea of the differences between industrial and digital battle is at the center of the June war between Israel and Iran. Unlike the static frontlines of the 1980s, which hardly moved for eight years, the confrontation with Israel unfolded through aerial strikes, cyber warfare, drone swarms, satellite intelligence, and precision targeting. While Iran demonstrated an ability to coordinate drone and missile attacks, Israel demonstrated superior intelligence, cyber capabilities, and air defense systems, including Iron Dome and David's Sling, to blunt Iran’s offensive.
Kharrazi’s remarks acknowledge Iran’s disadvantage in technological warfare. In 1980, both Iran and Iraq relied on heavy artillery and crude missile attacks. In 2025, the war was shaped as much by the battle for information as by the physical battlefield.
The comparison also serves a political purpose. By aligning the short 12-day conflict with the “sacred defense” of the new republic in the 1980s, Tehran seeks to create, yet again, the image of a nation united under siege.
But the 12-Day War exposed deep vulnerabilities in Iran’s defense and domestic unity. The brevity of the war, the intensity of Israeli strikes, and the lack of widespread domestic mobilization all undermined the narrative of heroic resistance.
Iran’s technological disadvantage highlighted the limits of nostalgic war rhetoric in a modern, AI-driven battlefield. Tehran may glorify the Basij-style human wave tactics of the 1980s, but wars fought in 2025 are more the numbers of an algorithm than the numbers of soldiers on a battlefield.
Iran is trying to regain its status by invoking collective memory. The Iran-Iraq War was the foundational trauma and triumph of the Islamic Republic, used to rally support, justify repression, and define the nation’s strategic posture.
By linking that war to the 12-Day War with Israel, figures like Kharrazi are trying to write the latest chapter of the Islamic Republic’s story using an old script.
Alex Winston
Source: https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/article-871258
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