Shifting Gears In Syria - A Calm Before the Storm

What we know: The United States just pulled out of the nuclear deal with the Iranians and is in the process of imposing sanctions on them. This is creating significant pressures on the Iranian regime. Just two days after Trump made his announcement of pulling out of the Iranian nuclear deal, the rial plunged to a record low against the dollar. At this time many stores in Iran have stopped accepting the rial. The exchange rate is now at 80,000 to the dollar.

Mullahs are sentencing government opposition leaders to death for protesting against the Iranian regime.

The National Council of Resistance has been established by Iranian Youth in support of regime change and democratic alternative.

After Israel’s unprecedented bombardment on Iranian military positions throughout all of Syria, Iranians have no choice but to concede the fact that Israel is militarily superior to them.

Iran’s back is clearly against the wall. On Monday (5/14/2018), the EU is set to meet with Iran in London and attempt to reassure Tehran that the nuclear deal is salvageable. The EU ministers understand that Iran will only stay in the deal if they are confident that the promised economic benefits can survive American sanctions assault.

Based on Iran’s current situation, another missile strike on Israel seems highly unlikely at this time. Iran is simply attempting to save it’s regime by leveraging their financial plight with the EU. EU knows that Iran is falling further and further into chaos and many European business stands to lose millions if something isn’t done. “Europe needs to replace the US as the world leader as Washington no longer fits this role”, the EU Commission head recently said following Trump’s withdrawal from the Iranian nuclear deal.

While the EU is attempting to salvage the nuclear deal, expect the Russia military to continue to fortify their positions throughout areas of Syria under their control as the EU remains distracted with the Iranians. Syria will remain a hot bed for electronic warfare between Russian and US forces.

At this time, Putin isn’t interested in intensifying the Syrian conflict with direct military engagements. He knows that Russia’s military still isn’t yet in a position to challenge the US military. Instead, Putin will continue to test Russian military technologies in the highly volatile region. It is believed that Russia has tested over 200 new weapons since the start of the Syrian war. 

There is only one possible scenario that the Russians could undertake against the US military that could potentially work. It should come as no surprise that the Russians have one of the most advanced submarine fleets in the world, most notably, their Husky-Class. It is known that they Russians are capable of tracking foreign naval vessels for days without detection. This includes American submarines. If Russia truly felt threatened, then they could possibly attack the US aircraft carrier U.S.S. Harry S. Truman that is currently stationed in the Eastern Mediterranean, near the coast of Syria. The sinking of an American aircraft carrier would greatly escalate the conflict and this is why I believe that the Russians will refrain from this type of attack and instead continue to buy their time with weapons testing.

Conclusion: For now at least, the Syrian conflict will continue to simmer with all parties continuing to reinforce their positions. Expect Iran to play less of a rold in Syria. Russia will continue to testing US forces in the areas of electronic warefare, naval maneuverability and aircraft engagement tactics. It will be at least another year before these stragegies might take a different turn.