IRAN NEWS POLITICAL DESK

In the current period when Saudi Arabia is busy with consultation with other Arab countries to launch an Arab NATO in collaboration with the U.S. to confront Iran, although the Arab NATO is a psycho operation rather than to be practically a serious NATO, the appointment of an expert in the field of hybrid warfare as the chief of the IRGC was a must and it happened and its effects will soon be appeared in the shift in the tactics and strategies of the IRGC.

When we look at the context of the Supreme Leader’s outlines for the Second Phase of Islamic Revolution”, we find out that this reshuffle in the leadership of the IRGC and the appointment of former IRGC commander Major General Jafari as the head of Baghiatollah Base Cultural Department is a smart and wise countermeasure against the plots of the enemies for infiltration in the virtual world and media which will minimize decrease their social and cultural damages.

Hossein Salami is a brave man with an outspoken and revolutionary rhetoric. Regarding the remarks of the Supreme Leader in a meeting  who said “We are in era that we lack taqiya (a precautionary dissemination or denial of religious belief and practice in the face of persecution)”, his appointment of Salami has a strategic message for internal and external enemies that the major task and objective of the IRGC is to safeguard the achievements of the Islamic Revolution and it is not joking with anyone.

The appointment of Mr. Salami in this critical period for a change in the strategy in the IRGC has been done in accordance with new threats of enemies. And God Willing this auspicious change may lead to the elimination of cancerous tumor of “Zionist Regime” even sooner than its 25 years deadline.

It is expected that due to Major General Salami’s past record and performance, the IRGC creates a new and serious front against the domestic and foreign enemies’ hybrid warfare and God Willing this new front would block all pores for infiltration of the enemies, and the Islamic Revolution would pass safely from this historical turn.

Of course we should take into consideration that after the demise of the late Imam Khomeini, the Supreme Leader decided to limit the time for any appointment and tenure,  and the time of tenure for his appointments are usually between 3 to 5 years. This has been continued after the Sacred Defense era and the Supreme Leader in his decrees appoints commanders of military or enforcement forces for a certain time and he can extend their tenures and missions for one more term. (Mohsen Rezaee was in charge of the IRGC for 10 years and he himself called for a replacement). Mohammad Ali Jafari took the helm of the IRGC for a 10-year term since 2007 and his term was extended for three more years.

Due to the cultural and social morale of Major General Jafari and due to the current critical condition, it seems this change and appointment has been a completely calculated one. The effects of strategic condition of the country and the region in choosing the new commander for the IRGC and the probable confrontation and complicated strategic and tactical conditions are highly considerable.

In such a condition, the role of commander’s personality on military forces and decision-making on disputes and issues is very important and effective. So we should not forget that Major General Salami is an academic, administrative and operational one. He has good command in military knowledge and sciences and he teaches strategy and tactics in the university. He has been for years in top military jobs and before his appointment as the IRGC commander, he had been the second-in-command of the IRGC for ten years.

It seems in the current critical condition and the need for more preparation for strong confrontation with threats and controlling them, the quality of Mr. Salami has been the main reason behind his appointment.

I pray God for the success of new commander and the IRGC, and glory and pride for dear Iranian nation to live in peace, stability along with development.

BY: Hamid Reza Naghashian

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Cairo did not send a delegation to the meeting, the latest gathering held to advance the US-led effort to bind Arab allies into a security, political and economic pact to counter Iran, the source said.

Uncertainty about whether US President Donald Trump will win a second term next year and whether a successor may ditch the initiative contributed to the Egyptian decision, the Arab source said.

“It’s not moving well,” a Saudi source said of the initiative.

The so-called initiative, which Saudi Arabia first proposed in 2017, also is aimed at limiting the growing regional influence of Russia and China, according to a classified White House document.

The Egyptian embassy in Washington and the White House did not respond immediately to requests for comment.

In addition to the United States and Saudi Arabia, the MESA participants include the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and Jordan.

Two days after the Riyadh meeting, Egypt President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi visited Washington for talks with Trump. Before the meeting, Trump said they would talk about security issues, but it was not clear whether they discussed MESA issue.

Two sources said the countries remaining in MESA were moving ahead with the initiative and would press Egypt diplomatically to revoke its withdrawal, with one saying that the decision did not appear to be final.

“We all want them back,” said the other source.

The withdrawal of Egypt, which has the Arab world’s largest military, is the latest setback to the so-called MESA initiative, informally referred to as the “Arab NATO.”

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During the three-day summit, Mattis discussed it all with the foreign ministers of the Persian Gulf Arab states with gloomy future.

In other words, Mattis told FMs what was expected of them by their lord, Trump, before attending an upcoming summit in Washington. The summit is scheduled to take place with the participation of the [Persian] Gulf Cooperation Council (PGCC) plus Egypt and Jordan.
What the U.S. Secretary of Defense dictated to the PGCC states at the Manama Summit Dialogue included financial support for pre-mediated plans for the region and ultimately a renewal of allegiance to the White House that is hungry for the money and plunders the rich Arab states.

Meanwhile, Bahraini Foreign Minister Khalid bin Ahmed Al-Khalifa claimed that Arab NATO plays an important role in the security and stability of the Persian Gulf region, a comment that was described “ridiculous”.

The regional situation, successive meetings and type of attendees all prove preparation of a terrible plan for the region that even the leading participants do not dare to express. And it becomes more dangerous when these meetings are set up by U.S. and Trump’s orders.
These meetings are a series of plots against the region that began seven decades ago with the occupation of Palestine and continued with the war in Lebanon and Gaza. The Zionist actions continued with the backing of anti-protest of the Great March of Return rallies by the Arab regimes.

Arabs tend not to learn the lessons of previous experiences, as they have witnessed the failure of the Great plan of Middle East, the breakdown of Iraq, Syria, and Yemen, and are now witnessing conspiracies against the Palestinian cause.

It seems that reactionary regimes, which face popular protests against normalization of relations, are actually seeking to inflict the latest blow to the Palestinian cause. Will the Arab NATO find a better fate than Camp David?

Abdel Bari Atwan, the famous analyst of the Arab world, wrote: “It is no coincidence that U.S. Secretary of Defense James Mattis was the star of the Manama Summit Dialogue, which was held several days ago with the presence of a large number of foreign ministers of the [Persian] Gulf Cooperation Council, with the exception of Qatar.”

Because the first and foremost goal of this meeting is to provide the political and intellectual context of what the Middle East Strategic Alliance (MESA) called Arab NATO, is doing in practice in early New Year’s Summit in Washington, where the leaders of the six [P]GCC countries along with Egypt and Jordan is being chaired by Donald Trump, President of the United States.

“The Manama Summit completed the military summit of Kuwait held last month when the heads of the Persian Gulf states and Egypt and Jordan were attending it along with the U.S. Central Command commander Army General Joseph Vote.”

Referring to the hostile and repeated anti-Iran position of Adel Al-Jubeir, Atwan stated: “Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir, who has appeared after a month of not being in the public eye, spoke of Iran’s defeat. At the Manama summit, two main approaches were unveiled which could be for the new coalition in the region.

First, the existence of secret communications in the Persian Gulf states led by the U.S. to find a solution to the Qatari crisis, which seems to have had great progress. Al-Jubeir insisted Qatar would be a participant in a new strategic coalition to confront Iran, and referred to the security agreements recently reached at Riyadh Summit in Qatari. Al-Jubeir pointed to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman’s speech at the Davos Summit where MbS praised the Qatari economy as a strong economy in the Middle East region.

Second, Israel will be the main partner in the Arab NATO, and its rapid normalization ties with the Arab states, including the visit of Israeli sports delegations to Doha and Abu Dhabi, and Netanyahu’s visit to Muscat. It is not unlikely that Israel will participate in the Washington summit, where the new coalition begins to work in early January. In particular, Yousef bin Allawi, the foreign minister of Oman, spoke about Israel at Manama summit as a country to interact with and treat just like any other country.

We do not agree with Bahrain’s Foreign Minister Khalid bin Ahmed Al-Khalifa when he said that this alliance will play a role in strengthening the security and stability of the region and will help its countries to confront the challenges. We believe that the Arab NATO will generally ignore the issue of Palestine and will be interrupted by its political, moral and religious affiliation. This alliance is a declaration of the tribal warfare in the region and the implementation of the Israeli plan for the destruction of Iran, similar to what happened in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Yemen.

Sunni Arab NATO will play the same role that the Persian Gulf states and some other Arab countries played in the wars against Iraq, Syria, Libya and Yemen. That means, providing Arab-Islamic coverage for the future American-Israeli war against Iran in the region. But in the impending new war on Iran, the issue is completely different, and the alternative is to do away with the Palestinian cause, basically through the deal of the century.”

Netanyahu went to Muscat a few days ago. It would not surprise me to see him in Abu Dhabi, Manama, Doha or Riyadh tomorrow. We are witnessing the birth of a new regional system as the replacement of the current fragile system of Arab-dominated states, the backbone of which is Israel, transforming the enemy into a strong ally and a friend who supports his new allies. In the next four months, we will see a stop to the issue of Palestine in the Persian Gulf region at the level of governments, not nations.”

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Director of the Center for International and Regional Studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar also adds “Washington has tried many times before to form new regional alliances against Iran and to deepen existing ones, such as the PGCC. But none of these attempts have been successful, largely because the internal divisions and disagreements among the Arab countries themselves are too deep and too many.”

Following is the text of the interview:

Q: Washington has announced the formation of a military alliance in the Middle East against Iran, with the participation of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt, Jordan and Bahrain, which is scheduled to be introduced in the United States soon. Will this coalition be considered as a real coalition or a military organization?

A: There have been other similar attempts at forming military alliances before, and the current discussion of an “Arab NATO” has precedent. But previous attempts at forming such a military alliance have all failed, and there is no reason to believe that this time things will be any different. There are major concerns and issues that each of the individual states have involving operations, logistics, command, equipment, manpower, and, of course, political considerations, all of which mitigate against the possibility of the formation of such a military alliance, at least in the foreseeable future.

Q: Due to the failure of previous coalitions against Iran, such as the Saudi or the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council alliances against Iran, How is assessed the fate of the current U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic Republic of Iran?

A: Washington has tried many times before to form new regional alliances against Iran and to deepen existing ones, such as the PGCC. But none of these attempts have been successful, largely because the internal divisions and disagreements among the Arab countries themselves are too deep and too many. Therefore I believe the current attempt will also be a failure. Even if such an alliance is formed on paper, operationally it will not have much power and significance.

Q: Why is it said that the coalition will be formed three weeks before sanctions against Iran?

A: The Trump administration is trying to use all levers available to it to increase the pressure on Iran. The reason for this is that similar to North Korea, against which Donald Trump made numerous threats and increased sanctions, Trump is trying to increase the pressure on Iran in order to have a summit with President Rouhani. So this is all part of a coordinated campaign to put maximum economic, political, and military pressures on Iran to force Iranian leaders to have a summit with Trump.

Q: Due to the policies of Donald Trump, it seems the U.S.-Arab military alliance is formed to extort from Arab countries especially through spread Iran phobia. What do you think about this?
A: Clearly the United States currently sees Iran as one of its main threats, and this is fueled by anti-Iranian sentiments and propaganda by the governments of Saudi Arabia and the UAE. So we see a convergence of interests between these three actors — the U.S., Saudi Arabia, and the UAE — to put military pressure on Iran. But unlike KSA and the UAE, Trump has a slightly different agenda. He wants to put pressure on Iran so that during the next elections he can turn around and say that he was able to turn Iran from a regional threat to a regional friend.

Q: On the other hand, the current military alliance is with the participation of the Air Force and the Navy. Although the coalition needs the Land Army to succeed. How is this issue evaluated?

A: The goal of the military coalition isn’t to invade Iran but to simply increase pressure and to be able to contain the perceived threat and ambitions of Tehran. Therefore, they do not need land-based forces as much as there is a need to pose threats in the air and in the sea. Also, command and control issues are easier when it comes to air force and naval forces as compared to ground forces, in which larger numbers of soldiers are involved and therefore the potential for casualties are higher.

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Trump administration has renewed efforts to create a new security and political alliance with six Gulf Arab states, Egypt and Jordan, in part to counter Iran.

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