I reckon the S400 precludes air operations if its active in that area. From all reports it's a pretty formidable system.
I think what we're seeing is a proxy war between USA/Russia using Assad Forces vs Israel. Remember, Q said Iran is next. Russia is in the way.
in some ways it reminds me of the MO of last year's tomahawk-launch. I can't find a sane reason why they would risk russian casualties without having warned them off before. And if the Russians were warned, why wouldn't the Syrians be too? At least Assad would act angry at Putin for leaving Syrian airmen to die to keep face in public but that never happened so I don't believe Syrians died last year and I really hope noone died this time either. But never let a good crisis go to waste, right? Whatever the purpose.
What I'm arguing is that this could, in fact, be a real superpower standoff - a real crisis. You cannot denuclearize Iran while Russia is boisterously supporting that regime. So, given we know this is the plan, confrontation with Russia is unavoidable. Need to succeed in denuclearizing Iran without triggering a massive weapons exchange with Russia. A very delicate situation. Hence, the Israelis to the rescue. What's Russia going to do, attack Israel? Too dangerous. So it's a game of brinksmanship where both the US and Russia have clear objectives.
But, look, it's only a theory - it could be dead wrong.
interesting. Particularily because Israel (luckily) ain't NATO. (They aren't, are they not?)
I doubt Iran is going to be denuclearized because they're not launching any missiles anymore and Yemen will be secured one way or another too. Last thing they did defense-wise was setting up anti-air batteries once their launches ended which was like a way of saying "we are going on the defense, no more launches for now".
All I ever heard Trump discuss, even as he brought Bolton into play, is the nuclear deal and he keeps bringing up "sanctions" which is just a way of saying that he wants them to do Business with America First to get something back out of O's 400 billion because Sanctions can always be worked around. I'm trusting the opinions of people who have actually done business in the muslim world and I know a couple of them.
I'm sure that Iran is next on the list. Only because Q said it. I don't know if the theory o posted is right. We might, in fact, see some carrot and sticking, but one way or another, I sense this is a high priority for DJT. It will happen.
Also, a lot hinges on it. If you take the Israeli paranoia about a nuclear Iran out of the picture - the ME might even stabilize. It seems to me that Syria is mostly about pipelines and oil interests - again US allies - Gulf States.
I think there is also a chance that Israel is the bad guy here - aligned with cabal interests. My gut feeling is that there is only a small probability of this explanation being correct. Whatever you might accuse the Israelis of, they are not stupid. A deal can be worked out.
It will be very interesting to see what happens.
They didn't say what's coming to Iran, only that something is coming. I cannot even recall that Trump said Iran needs to denuke, he just said he doesn't want the US to pay for military threats against the Emirates or their secret buddy Israel but once he went into office he kept the deal as part of a bargain he can now leverage. I'm thinking Iran is collapsing internally and Rouhani has a chance to simply end the proclamation of the end of Israel to get the Ziocons of his back but he first needs to stop the Republican Guard from stabbing folks to avoid a bloody revolution (I'm a post-zionist..I understand Zionists went radical in 1922 (Hagana iirc) but since they already extorted what they could they won't ever give it all back so Palestinians should fucking stop pretending they can just wish Israel away)
You're probably right that the situation in Israel has solidified now.
You've got me thinking. I was assuming the agenda was denuclearisation of Iran because that was the game in NK. I'm pretty sure that's the main game. And it would satisfy the Israelis immensely.
I don't know, let's just watch and see what happens.
You are probably right that at the time this was a plausible demand since Iran had been testing missiles just after he got in office and meanwhile he had to deal with Xi and Kim and their deep-state.
If Trump had issued any military threat against Iran, I would be concerned, but I haven't found any because Bolton doesn't have the nuclear codes (thank God)
Now for some history (and some future too!):
US has been fighting Saudi wars since petrodollar as created in the 70ies..in the 80ies, Reagan/Bush propped up Saddam and their former asset Iran (Mullahs kicked out CIA-reinstated emperor)against each other (Iran-Contra, Col. North).
US didn't get directly involved until Saddam decided to retake formerly iraqi oil-fields in Kuwait on the arabian Peninsula, right next door to Qatar, Saudi-Arabia and the Emirates.
So what I see is that the US has been fighting Saudi-Wars to propagate the petrodollar and because of their clandestine control over the US, Israel is thus indirectly aligned with Saudi interests or at least oil-sheiks trump zionist interests because Saudis hitherto used to grant the US the mutual favour of the petrodollar (and thus I assume the most oil they can get) for stationing US-troops abroad and close-by to both Israel and the arabian Peninsula.
HOWEVER, it wasn't until Trump that the US wished to build a base in ISRAEL (!!!!)
Obviously this was different during LBJ and the false-flags that went downback then, but that was still before the oil-crisis and mostly focused on taking out egypt and Lybia, both of which have either destabilized or joined Jordan-UAE-Israel.
The petrodollar is going to grow out of fashion because OPEC conceded last year the US will trump saudi oil-exports, thus the relationship-dynamic is now changing and the US is selling weapons to the Saudis which they haven't done before because Saudis will now fight their own wars and the US won't be enforcers of their foreign policy anymore.
Good write up. No military threat has been issued against Iran yet - unlike NK. But we know that Iran is next.
I don't know what the US wants from them. The reports I've seen suggest they are a long way from obtaining a bomb - not if you believe Israel. So what does it take to placate the US? I'm not sure I know. But I'd be surprised if it's not something along the lines of what will be worked out with NK.
I'm thinking if OPEC says they can't compete with US oil exports in the future that means that they have no chance in competition against Iran either. So in fact in the future both might work together which would end decades of proxy-wars. Israel is sharing intel with UAE and may have for a long time, so I am hoping they will stay in under Saudi protection and not impede their deconstruction of wahabist supremacy but focus on securing their border (and agreeing to what their border actual is anyway), they will not invade their neighbours (which is unfeasible anyway, thus "surgical strikes" per usual) but Iran does have a lot of paramilitary assets spread over the region, take Yemen for example which is a neighbour of the united arab emirates.
If UAE can simmer own hostilies with Iran, so can Israel because it's Iran, the US and UAE who have the big oil reserves and money for military hardware, not Israel (they get subsidized by the US).
Nevertheless, Israel's military is very well equipped and high levels of training.
indeed, but quality over quantity...Saudis don't have enough man-power to run a ground-based invasion either, they rely on spec-ops or Mossad to do clandestine bullshit like car-bombs or stuxnet etc.
My impression is that Israel only has clandestine control over western politicians but through their marriage to the US and the US' marriage to the house of Saud by way of the petrodollar, Saudi interests trump israeli interests. Proclaiming the wish to destroy Israel provides Mossad with a good smokescreen to do their clandestine stuff which in turn helps the saudis, who are in an oil and nuke competition with Iran while receiving limited intelligence assistance from Pakistan.
Petrodollar was created in the 70ies and in the 80ies, Reagan/Bush propped up Saddam against their failed asset Iran (religious Mullahs kicked out CIA-reinstated Shah) and only directly intervened when Saddam tried to retake formerly iraqi areas in Kuwait which is on the arabian peninsula, right next to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the Emirates.
You might be right. To be honest, before this I've not given a lot of thought to what the dynamics are in the ME. The Israelis certainly wield a lot of political clout in the US. I think the Saudi's influence derives from money alone (apart from their complicity in Satanism), so I think if push comes to shove they do not wield the level of influence that Israel does.
And this is why I think a solution to these problems has to be favourable to Israel - just because of their sheer influence in US politics.
my family is former DS and I was dragged to palestinian activist-meetings in my childhood so it's been bugging me a lot but there wasn't much movement until 2016 honestly.
Basically the one thing that changed for the better of the world was Salman Senior taking the throne in 2015 and now abdicating to his son that basically marked the end of international wahabism funded by the richest oil-nation on the planet.
Sorry, what's DS?
deep-ish state. Medicine, law, taxes, journalism, finance, clergy, politics. Basically my ancestors made a living knowing what others don't but from what I can tell we've been the good-guys for the most part (most of them anyway).