Russia-Iran security relations and military cooperation as a counterbalance to Western hegemony

doi:10.17223/1998863X/80/23

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DOI Доступ к ресурсу на сайте издателя			10.17223/1998863X/80/23

Title: Russia-Iran security relations and military cooperation as a counterbalance to Western hegemony
Creator: Khavarinejad, Saeed
Date: 2024
DOI: 10.17223/1998863X/80/23
Description: The dynamic between Russia and the West, specifically the United States and the European Union, has seen significant changes in the past three decades, resulting in notable impacts on the international system. Russia’s revisionist response to Western hegemony in key sectors involves leveraging friendly states like Iran to counterbalance Moscow’s perceived threats. This essay examines Russia and Iran’s security and military cooperation as a means of resisting the perceived threat of Western hegemony in vital regions for these two countries. By researching Russia and Iran’s security and military relationships, the author examines Iran’s engagement in Russia’s revisionist policies regarding Western dominance, particularly the United States, in areas of mutual interest for Moscow and Tehran. The author employed an explanatory design, a post-positivism paradigm, and a deductive approach, followed by an archival study strategy, to investigate qualitative and secondary data related to security and military cooperation between Russia and Iran in the Middle East and Eastern Europe over a cross-sectional time frame. To analyze various parts of the research hypothesis, the author based his research on the premises of the structural realist theory of balance of threat. The research purpose was aligned with the statistical population–cases of cooperation in Nagorno-Karabakh, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Syria, and Ukraine–which allows for purposive non-probability sampling and limits the sample size to two instances of cooperation in Syria and Ukraine. The evidence examined in the present research validated the influence of four key factors on Russia’s response to perceived threats from Western hegemony in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, namely aggregate power, offensive power, proximate power, and offensive intentions, as outlined in Stephen Walt’s balance of threat theory in 1987. This study confirmed the hypothesis that there is a relationship between Russia’s threat perception toward the West and security relations and military cooperation between Russia and Iran by analyzing operationalized variables and comparing research findings with the propositions of the chosen theory. The relationship is becoming increasingly strong, according to the evidence as predicted by its theoretical basis. Finally, the author concludes that Iran offers Russia a viable prospect for security and military cooperation. This cooperation helps Russia oppose Western hegemony in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, fitting with Russia’s revisionist position against Western domination. Russia and Iran have intensified their relations, notably in the sphere of security, as a result of common beliefs, a firm resolve to maintain supremacy, and a sense of isolation from the rest of the world.