Qasem Soleimani

The remains of a vehicle hit by missiles launched from a US drone outside the Baghdad airport.
Iraqi Prime Minister Press Office, via Associated Press

Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the Quds Force and by all accounts the second most powerful person in Iran after the Supreme Leader, was killed yesterday by a US drone strike as he was being driven away from Baghdad airport. The Quds Force has been responsible for training and supporting Shia militias in the region and has been in important component in Iran's exercise of regional power. It seems not coincidental that he was arriving in Baghdad just as the demonstration that resulted in the storming of the US embassy was winding down.

US allies and Congress are both upset that such a significant decision was taken without consultation. The ramifications of Soleimani's killing may be enormous and are very hard to predict. Informal norms of international behavior suggest that while extrajudicial killings of foreign nationals are not unusual, what makes this so shocking is Soleimani's position. While low level operatives and civilian terrorists have been targeted in the past, it is unprecedented in modern times for a top government official to be targeted.

The implications are many; a precedent has been set that makes it 'acceptable' to target foreign leaders. Diplomacy is now off the table when it comes to the US' relations with Iran. Any chance of a new nuclear deal has been quashed. Iran may now accelerate its development of atomic power and weapons. Support for US policy in Iraq will decline and its role as a US regional partner has been severely diminished.  Americans in the region, both military and civilian, will be at much greater risk of coordinated and lone wolf retaliation.

Further afield, authoritarian regimes around the world will see this as a green light for the increased exercise of regional power though military action. Russia will be emboldened, putting Eastern Europe and the Baltic states at greater risk. China will expand its military activities in the South China Sea, further polarizing and already fracturing world order. Europe will face in increasingly difficult position between Russia on its Eastern doorstep and the US to the West, not to mention the China-US divide.

The decision to kill Qasem Soleimani will certainly change the course of history. It is too early to say whether this will be for the better. By upsetting generally accepted norms, significant decisions affecting the world order will now rely less on precedent and more on political power and calculus, making the future far less predictable.