The explosion that recently rocked an Iranian port may sound like just another industrial accident, but is it a harbinger of a seismic geopolitical shift? Iran is one of the most enduring ancient civilisations of the world, a Bronze Age superpower that has continued to be a pivotal power to this day, mostly due to being an epicentre of hardline Shia Islam.
Is the Islamic Republic of the Ayatollahs, though, on the verge of collapse – and will the explosion at Shahid Rajaei port be the straw that breaks its back?
Now, a port explosion on the surface doesn’t sound like a geopolitical event of epic proportions, but in the case of that port and in the case of Iran it’s a whole different story.
Iran’s major export is, of course, oil. But topographic and geopolitical constraints (i.e., sanctions) mean that ports like Shahid Rajaei are critical. The port is Iran’s gateway to the world – or, at least, that part of the world that still buys its oil. As it happens, China, which as Iran’s only customer, has been buying at a steep discount.
But now that gateway is in ruins. Add that to an economy that’s already crippled by sanctions and suddenly the Ayatollahs are finding themselves in much the same situation as the Shah in the 1970s: corrupt, broke and with an increasingly angry populace.
By an odd coincidence, the explosion that crippled its economic lifeline had its epicentre at a facility owned by a ‘charitable foundation’ overseen by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s office.
That foundation, known as Bonyad Mostazafan, faces American sanctions over it helping the 86-year-old Khamenei “to enrich his office, reward his political allies and persecute the regime’s enemies,” the US Treasury has said. Its top personnel also have direct ties to Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which oversees Tehran’s ballistic missile arsenal and operations abroad targeting the Islamic Republic’s enemies.
Those associations come as authorities still haven’t offered a cause for the blast Saturday at the Shahid Rajaei port near Bandar Abbas. The port reportedly took in a chemical component needed for solid fuel for ballistic missiles – something denied by authorities though local reports now increasingly point toward a mysterious, highly explosive cargo being delivered there.
Bonyad Mostazafan, or the “Foundation of the Oppressed”, is believed to control assets worth billions. A 2008 report estimated that it represented 10 per cent of Iran’s entire GDP. Its presence in the port comes via its ownership of Sina Port and Marine Services Development Co.
Satellite photos analyzed by the Associated Press show the epicenter of Saturday’s explosion struck just next to Sina’s terminal at the port, shredding the facility and the containers stacked nearby.
While China buys Iran’s oil, China sends Iran sodium perchlorate, a precursor chemical to make solid rocket fuel. You know: those rockets. Sodium perchlorate is a hazardous substance that can cause fires or explosions.
The Financial Times in January first reported that two loads of sodium perchlorate were coming to Iran from China. Tracking data showed that one of the ships identified as carrying the load was near Shahid Rajaei in recent weeks. The private security firm Ambrey separately said that the port received the sodium perchlorate, which is described as a white, sand-like solid […]
A reddish cloud could be seen in surveillance camera footage before the blast Saturday. That suggests a chemical compound like ammonia being involved in the blast, like the 2020 Beirut port explosion, in which ammonium nitrate caught fire and exploded.
That cloud also resembled one seen in footage from a 1988 massive explosion in Nevada at the PEPCON plant that killed two people and injured hundreds. PEPCON, or the Pacific Engineering and Production Company of Nevada, made rocket fuel for NASA and had accumulated ammonium perchlorate that went unused after the Challenger disaster, leading to the blast.
Similar reddish smoke could be seen just before a 2013 explosion at a Texas fertilizer plant filled with ammonium nitrate that killed 15 people.
So, where does this leave the Iranian regime? Not just economically crippled, but increasingly isolated. Russia is bogged down in Ukraine. China, thanks to Donald Trump’s economic warfare, is less inclined to keep propping up the Ayatollahs.
Well [China] could help: they have the capacity to help, but China right now has been basically backed into a corner by the US. The US administration basically told the Chinese, “Hey you want access to our markets you got to pay, and you got to come to the table and play ball on the geopolitical stage based on our rules, if you want us to bring down the tariffs.” Make no mistake about it the Chinese need the US market now. Its leadership must choose negotiation or collapse. Not a good time for China to piss off America. They’re trying to cool the jets, not make America angrier. So China isn’t going to help Iran right now at all.
If anyone wanted to bring down the Islamic regime in Iran, they couldn’t have asked for a better target to just happen to explode than the port. Oh, dearie, dearie me.
