To the many political and military assets he oversaw in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen, he was the ultimate authority and arbiter. He was the most influential Iranian official in the region and a powerful and extremely popular figure within Iran itself.

Pentagon rejects Trump threat to strike Iran’s cultural sites

WHAT HAS THE ASSASSINATION ACHIEVED?

No matter Soleimani’s considerable influence, effectiveness and stature, the capabilities and networks that he built since taking command of the Quds Force in the late 1990s will survive his death.

Likewise, the IRGC and the Quds Force have institutional depth that will allow them to carry on despite the loss of an exceptionally capable commander.

Rather than a one-man show, the IRGC’s web of proxies, assets and allies is run by a network of mediators and commanders (Iranian and local). This is unlikely to be diminished by the death of Soleimani.

The assassination will definitively kill the nuclear deal – Iran has already announced it will end its commitments under the deal. In a statement on Sunday, the government said it would remove all limitations in “production, including enrichment capacity”, for its nuclear programme.

This effectively kills the prospects of diplomacy and meaningful negotiation between the US and Iran. We are hence nearing the logical end point of “maximum pressure” versus “maximum resistance”: A dangerous slide towards conflict.

Trump’s strike on Soleimani: Abe embarrassed, Kim Jong-un laughing

In terms of domestic Iranian politics, the assassination will galvanise hardliners. Opponents of President Hassan Rowhani’s diplomacy with the US have already felt vindicated.

Wounded national pride, evinced by the hundreds of thousands of mourners who took to the streets to mourn the general, US-imposed economic hardships and the patent redundancy of diplomacy will work in the hardliners’ favour in legislative elections scheduled for February.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

Where Iran can flex its muscles best is in the hybridised security and political environments that have emerged in the wake of the conflicts that have devastated the Middle East in recent decades: Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen. However, Iran’s options are not restricted to these countries. An obvious retaliatory measure would be attacks on US embassies and personnel.

There have already been reports of such attacks on Baghdad’s Green Zone and on the Balad airbase north of the capital (which also hosts US troops). As in similar attacks previously, the impact was superficial, with no casualties reported.

The paradox Iran finds itself in is that, on the one hand, it needs to respond in a manner commensurate with the magnitude of the assassination.

In that sense, the Iranian response cannot be restricted to having proxies throw unguided missiles at the vicinity of US troops/personnel as it may well signal Iranian feebleness more than anything else.

On the other hand, however, the need to stage a meaningful retaliation will have to be balanced against the fact that the Iranians are dealing with an administration that has demonstrated a willingness to strike hard.

President Donald Trump has already warned Iran against retaliation, doubling down on his threat to strike 52 targets – one for each of the hostages taken during the 1979 US embassy seizure in Tehran – including cultural ones, if US interests are attacked.

Nato suspends Iraq training mission amid fears killing could trigger conflict

Launching new tanker attacks in the Gulf, kidnapping American citizens in the region or targeting American facilities and embassies beyond Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen are also potential options. So too would be a mobilisation of Lebanese Hezbollah against Israel. However, all of these, and especially the latter, would achieve little beyond momentary shock value, and could invite a devastating response.

A LONG-TERM RESPONSE

The pressure created by Soleimani’s assassination may already have upended Iraq’s perpetual balancing act between its relations with the US and Iran in favour of the latter. Iran will be very sensitive to Iraqi opposition at a time like this, when it will be expecting and demanding solidarity and support.

The prospect of an American withdrawal carries the risk of rupturing Iraq’s political and security establishments between pro-Iranian actors and more US-aligned ones. In extremis, this could lead to a civil war – precisely the context that Iran has proven most capable of exploiting.

Iraq’s value to Iran makes such a scenario a suboptimal one for Iran; however, if nothing else, it can be used to bleed the US in Iraq, as happened at the height of the Iraqi insurgency after 2003.

ISIS benefits from the diversion of American preparedness in Iraq and Syria towards countering a potential Iranian threat – the US has already announced it is suspending operations against the group to focus on protecting like targets of an Iranian retaliatory strike. Likewise, an American withdrawal from Iraq will grant ISIS greater room for manoeuvre.

The continuing fight to destroy ISIS will be severely handicapped if American air power, intelligence sharing and training are withdrawn.

However, in addition to these unintended consequences, the Iranians may see it in their interests to support an ISIS comeback in certain areas of Iraq to pressure the Americans and to consolidate its control over the country by using a renewed threat to revive the sectarian entrenchment of previous years. Such a scenario would also give the ruling elites a way of outflanking and isolating Iraq’s protest movement.

An ISIS comeback could also be beneficial to Iran’s interests in Syria. It would place further pressure on US and US-aligned forces that could result in an eventual withdrawal of American troops.

The likelihood of the US withdrawing from both Syria and Iraq is small but should not be discounted, given Trump’s repeated calls for precisely such a move. The fact that this is a US election year adds further urgency to the issue.

The dangers that lie ahead are real but should not be exaggerated. For all their promises of imminent and massive vengeance, Iran and its allies are relatively limited in how far they can push. They may have the ability to set Iraq ablaze, but the country is a vital economic lifeline for Iran at a time when it is under economic siege.

Far more likely is a gradual response combining political and military measures. Thus far, the most significant response has been a political one: mobilising Iraqi political assets to begin pushing for a US withdrawal from Iraq.

The first step in this move came on Sunday, when the Iraqi parliament voted to pass a resolution to end the presence of foreign troops in the country. Iran seems intent on consolidating its control of Iraq and marginalising America’s presence and influence in the country. If it succeeds, Iran’s political response would be a far more effective one than any military option it could realistically deploy.

Iran has shown its capacity to threaten global oil flows through its tanker attacks in the Gulf and the strike on Aramco facilities, yet how far can it go before attacks on oil and shipping begin to harm its own interests?

Likewise, Iran can directly strike at American interests and at Israel, but this option invites annihilation. All of which points to a careful long-term response, replete with deniability at every stage, rather than an explosion of climactic violence.

Fanar Haddad is a Senior Research Fellow at the Middle East Institute-National University of Singapore