【英语国际】战争离伊朗有多远？

What if it all goes wrong? The US and its allies have spent months painstakingly assembling a coalition behind imposing tougher sanctions on Iran to contain its nuclear ambitions.

Concessions have been offered along the way: last year, the US tried to secure Russia's support by going so far as to tear up its plans for missile defence in Europe.

The drive to maximise pressure on Iran by any means short of military action has absorbed so much effort that it has become the largest single priority of the Obama administration's diplomacy.

Yet the scale of the undertaking also reveals the depth of the fear. Behind today's wrangles at the United Nations lies one harsh and usually unspoken realisation: if everything fails and the US or Israel feels compelled to launch military strikes to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities, the consequences would be profound.

Officials stress war is far from imminent and there is plenty of time for diplomacy to work. But if a conflict were to break out in the years ahead, it could escalate beyond Iran's borders to embroil the region and beyond.

This is partly because of Iran's position at the junction of the Middle East and south Asia and beside crucial oil supply routes. More important, Iran's leaders have sought to guarantee their survival by amassing numerous options for retaliation and so maximising the risks of an attack. Today, Tehran's rulers have so many ways of hitting back that a strike on their nuclear plants could set off a chain reaction, triggering a war that would involve every country in an arc from Lebanon to Afghanistan.

Iran's first response to any US or Israeli attack would probably be to activate the proxy forces it has spent many years building up across the Middle East. The most prominent is Hizbollah, the radical Shia movement in southern Lebanon which possesses thousands of Iranian-supplied missiles, all targeted on Israel. In the event of war, Hizbollah would probably launch its arsenal – and experience suggests Israel's response to any bombardment would include the invasion of Lebanon.

The last time this happened, in 2006, Israel refrained from attacking the supply lines for Hizbollah's missiles, which run through Syria. Israeli officials say this was a mistake they would avoid if events were to be repeated. Next time, the Israeli blow could land on Syria as well as Lebanon.

The Hamas movement in Gaza also benefits from Iranian weapons and its rockets could be used to open another front against Israel in the south. Thus a conflagration that begins in Iran could soon spread, taking in Israel, Lebanon and Syria and moving eastwards to the next country in this new crescent of conflict, Iraq.

Iran has armed and funded Shia militia inside its neighbour since Saddam Hussein's downfall in 2003, rendering Iraq vulnerable to subversion. In the event of war, Iran's allies would probably be used to attack US forces in the country.

Iran may try to spread the arc of turmoil even farther by using the same tactic in Afghanistan. The Sunni Taliban fighters have always been bitter rivals of Iran's Shia regime, but there is evidence that they may have been thrust together by the remorseless logic of “my enemy's enemy is my friend”.

Western officials say convoys carrying weapons for the Taliban have crossed Iran's frontier with Afghanistan. Whether this happened because of a high level decision in Tehran – or because local smugglers paid off border guards – is unclear. But one official in the region said that Iran could use this channel as another means of retaliation. “That is a tap they would turn up pretty dramatically if we were to launch a military strike,” he said.

Iran could also try to turn geography to its advantage, probably by attacking shipping in the Strait of Hormuz at the entrance to the Gulf. Every day, tankers carrying about 17 million barrels of oil, or 40 per cent of the world's seaborne shipments, pass through this vital waterway, only 33 miles wide at its most vulnerable point.

Finally, Iran could try to fire its Shahab 3 ballistic missiles at an array of regional targets, including Israel, the US Fifth fleet base in Bahrain and the US Central Command presence in Qatar.

As US diplomats engage in yet more weeks of costly bargaining at the UN, this is the scenario they are striving to avoid.

如果所有努力都化成泡影，怎么办？美国及其盟友已经花了数月时间，煞费苦心地召集联盟，以支持加大对伊朗的制裁，遏制它的核野心。

整个过程中，美国一直在让步：去年，美国为了获得俄罗斯的支持，放弃了在欧洲部署导弹防御系统的计划。

用军事行动以外的一切手段最大限度地向伊朗施压的举动，已经占用了如此多精力，以至该任务变成了奥巴马政府外交中的最大单个优先考虑事项。

不过，这项任务的规模也暴露出了担忧的深切。目前联合国争论的背后，隐藏着一个严峻但通常不点明的认识：如果所有的努力终成泡影，美国或以色列不得不发动军事袭击摧毁伊朗的核设施，后果将是深远的。

官员们强调称，战争还远未迫在眉睫，仍有大量时间进行外交斡旋。但如果未来几年爆发冲突，它可能会扩大至伊朗境外，使整个中东乃至更远地区卷入其中。

这一定程度上是因为伊朗地处中东与南亚的交界处，并毗邻至关重要的石油供应线。更重要的是，伊朗领导人为了保证他们的生存，已经积累了众多报复选择，将发动军事袭击的风险提高至最高限度。如今，德黑兰的统治者拥有如此多的反击方式，以至于如果对他们的核工厂发动袭击，可能会引发连锁反应，最终引发一场战争，从黎巴嫩到阿富汗这条弧线上的每个国家都将卷入。

伊朗对任何美国或以色列袭击的第一反应，很可能是动员它花了多年时间在整个中东地区苦心经营的代理力量。其中最著名的是真主党(Hizbollah)，这一黎巴嫩南部地区的激进什叶派(Shia)力量拥有数千枚伊朗提供的导弹，均对准以色列。一旦爆发战争，真主党很可能会发射它的导弹，而经验表明，对于任何轰炸，以色列的反应都会少不了入侵黎巴嫩。

上次发生类似事件是在2006年，当时，以色列没有袭击穿越叙利亚的真主党导弹供应线。以色列官员表示，如果类似事件再次发生，他们将不会再犯同样的错误。下次，以色列可能会同时打击叙利亚与黎巴嫩。

加沙的哈马斯(Hamas)运动也受益于伊朗的武器，它的火箭可被用来在南部开辟另一个对抗以色列的战场。如此一来，起于伊朗的战火可能会迅速蔓延，烧至以色列、黎巴嫩、叙利亚，乃至向东蔓延至这一新冲突弧线上的下一个国家——伊拉克。

自萨达姆?侯赛因(Saddam Hussein) 2003年垮台以来，伊朗一直在为其邻国的什叶派民兵提供武器与资金，这使得伊拉克很容易遭到破坏。如果爆发战争，伊朗很可能会利用它的盟友袭击驻扎在伊拉克的美军。

伊朗可能尝试在阿富汗运用相同战术，以进一步拓展冲突弧线。逊尼派的塔利班(Sunni Taliban)武装力量一直是伊朗什叶派政权的死对头，但有迹象显示，“我敌人的敌人是我的朋友”这一残酷的逻辑，可能会把他们拉拢在一起。

西方官员表示，为塔利班运送武器的车队已经跨越了伊朗与阿富汗的边界。至于这是因为德黑兰的高层决策，还是因为当地走私商人买通了边境守卫，尚不可知。但该地区的一名官员表示，伊朗可以将这条渠道作为另一个报复手段。他表示：“如果我们发动军事袭击，他们将会猛地开大这个龙头。”

伊朗还可能尝试利用地理优势，具体战术很可能是攻击海湾入口处霍尔木兹海峡的船舶。每天，装载约1700万桶石油（相当于世界海运石油的40%）的油轮都会经过这条重要的航道，其最薄弱段仅33英里宽。

最后，伊朗可能尝试向一系列地区目标发射其“流星-3”(Shahab-3)弹道导弹，包括以色列、美国驻巴林的第五舰队基地，以及美国驻卡塔尔的中央司令部。

美国外交官还要在联合国进行更多周的讨价还价，而他们在努力避免的就是上述情况。

译者/何黎