Modern Imperialism
Banned
I’m not trying to say post revolution Iran is a chaotic evil that always want to start conflict. Sometimes countries get dragged into long feuds or conflicts due to third party factors. I’m saying if Iran goes theocratic I can see them getting into conflict with US, USSR, or unstable Afghanistan and India gets dragged into it and Iran and India come into a conflict that is based around alliances and conflicts in interest but Iran and radicals slowly add in more religious and ethnic issues over the course of it. Let’s say the US comes into conflict with Iran over the gulf. India who is cordial to the US(after Cold War) and has financial interests in the gulf countries might get upset when they think Iran is expanding into their sphere of influence. Iran alliance with China could cause conflict between both of them. If India is Soviet leaning they could also become allies with Iraq. If they help Iraq in its war against Iran they are likely to hold a grudge. India in otl was friendly with the USSR. A bigger India might become even more friendly with them even if they aren’t socialist. Maybe they go more towards social democracy and play it up as a middle ground between socialism and capitalism. When Iran comes into conflict with Indian allies India becomes more and more hostile towards them and start acting against them in a variety of way. Maybe pro-Iranian groups start trying to stir up anti-Indian feelings in Kuwait or Qatar then you have a nativist riot against Indians in the country. The Indian people see or hear about this and public opinion turn against Iran. These people might not have better conditions in India but that isn’t important to Indians and their media when they see their people being jumped by mobs in Qatar or working to death. Media depictions will always have biases.Ok, why do you keep usuming Iran would want to fuck with India of all countries? Their border is a worthless dessert inhabitated by sunni balochs in both sides and neither Iran nor ttl India would care for them, so its not a tension zone. In otl Iran only influences the shia pakistani minority because they are persecuted so they can found an ear there, and yet Iran never founded a shia armed group in Pakistan. Post revolution Iran is not a chaotic evil entity desperate to mess with countries stronger then them for no geopolitical gain. Why would India want an alliance with Israel or in fact any direct participation in middle east politics? Chances are that with such a high % of muslims in the country the israel palestinian issue may become too controversial for the hindus to care about it so they would probably stay the fuck away from that mess, its not like this India would be desperate for allies. If India complains about mistreatment of indian workers in the gulf (and I guess those workers would never be mistreated in India, right?), then the gulf countries could just hire instead poor and desperate people from other countries or restrict guest workers to muslims.
I’m assuming India is a rising power in this pod(much more so then now and at a faster rate) so expansion of influence overseas likely. The Middle East will probably be the region they expand their influence into first. Last example, let’s say a corrupt organization or person within the Indian government or military is secretly helping drug lords in Afghanistan for their own gains and goals separate from the government who many of don’t know what’s going on or kept out of the loop. When Iran who has a serious drug issue in the country somehow finds links between drug traffickers coming in from Afghanistan and people within the Indian military/government what do you think would happen even if that group acted separately?