There has been much recent hype around the issue of Iran, but an all-out war remains unlikely. Militarily, Iran would be hard to dominate. This challenge exceeds any the US and the West have faced in many decades. Ever since the Iranian revolution in 1979, the Middle-Eastern country has been preparing for war. Iran is far more powerful than Iraq, Syria and even Saudi Arabia. The Iranian military capabilities were shown recently when Iranians shot down a $100k state-of-the-art RQ-4A Global Hawk surveillance "stealth" drone. That fact alone proved two things: that the Iranian radars are far more advanced than previously believed and that their domestic-made missiles are accurate enough to shoot down an advanced flying machine. Moreover, just two weeks ago, what are believed to be Iranian-made drones originating from Yemen, hit two key Saudi oil installations, with the Saudi multi-billion dollar defence system ineffective at protecting the site. This left the Middle-Eastern kingdom reduced to 50 per cent of its oil production. To put this in context, that same week, the Aussie media was in a state of panic, upon realising that the oil reserves of the country, which imports 90 per cent of its oil from the Middle East, would last as little as 27 days! But Iranian radars, missiles and drone attacks are not the only troubles America has to contend with. NATO's Turkey and Iraq have stated that they won't permit any attack to Iran from their territory, leaving the U.S. military without essential allies in the region. Furthermore, up until this week, only one out of ten American aircraft carriers is in the Middle East, with most of them undergoing maintenance. It is noteworthy that two military hits from Iran were carried out without response from the U.S., and that is most likely because Trump is more likely to be reelected if he maintains peace rather that starting another war, with the potential to halve the oil transit through the Strait of Hormuz. While the US already struggles to manage the Sino-American trade war and situations in the South China Sea, Hong Kong, Ukraine, North Korea, Syria, Afghanistan, Yemen and Venezuela, a war with Iran would be more than it could handle. In light of all this, the U.S. will have to abstain from starting another war, one that certainly wouldn't be winnable or short, with China and Russia on the outskirts, not simply watching from behind the fence, but actively participating, supplying weaponry, intelligence and even funding. Let's not forget that for China Iran is the chessboard's bishop for its Asian trillion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative and for Russia, a key ally right under its southern flank beyond the Caspian Sea.
2 Comments
Recommended Comments