Afrasianet - Mahdi Aqeel - Why is this military buildup in the region, the first of its kind since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and is its role limited to being an element of pressure on the Iranian negotiator?
In the rush to analyze what awaits the Middle East region, after the influx of American aircraft carriers and destroyers to the Arabian Seas, the Red Sea, the Arabian Gulf and Aden, and Israel's conduct of several maneuvers simulating the 12-day war, and the preparation of its internal front for the worst-case scenarios, coinciding with the holding of the sixth negotiation session between the United States and Iran, on the sixth of this month, which was delayed by 235 days from its original date (June 15), due to the aforementioned war, and the haste of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to visit Washington and the meeting with US President Donald Trump, for longer than expected, away from the media, ahead of the expected round of negotiations in Geneva, next Tuesday, raises many questions:
Why is this military buildup in the region, the first of its kind since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and is its role limited to being a pressure factor on the Iranian negotiator? Why is Israel expecting the worst, putting the inevitability of the failure of negotiations and a return to war on the American table? Will the occupant of the White House be able to reconcile the Israeli and Iranian red lines on the one hand, and achieve the internal and external interests of the United States on the other?
This complex reality leads us to at least five scenarios
First: Overcoming all obstacles and obstacles to negotiations, and concluding a new agreement between Washington and Tehran, distinct from the 2015 agreement, whether in terms of "zero" enrichment or freezing enrichment for several years inside the Islamic Republic, while the latter retains this right. Or enrichment less than the 3.7% allowed in the previous agreement, while giving the International Atomic Energy Agency more monitoring powers and inoculating it with American monitors.
In addition, the agreement is linked to the preference of American companies over other foreign companies, and their obtaining the lion's share of promising investments in a country that is considered the most virgin of the countries of the whole world. This scenario has a forecast rate of less than 50%.
Second: Maintaining the status quo and continuing negotiations in parallel with the threat of war, which satisfies the Jewish entity if it does not have the conditions to drag the United States into a regional war. The blockade on Iran remains in place, provided that it is not given a break period to recover, and the pressure of the economically exhausted and living street remains on the government's chest limited in its options in proposing solutions.
Third: Despite the Islamic Republic's assertion, from the top of the pyramid to its smallest official, that it will go to a large-scale or regional war at the first military strike on its territory, and that the scenario of symbolic responses is no longer in its dictionary, there are those in Washington who believe that Tehran may return to practicing symbolic responses, such as the response to the assassination of Major General Qassem Soleimani on January 8, 2020, or the recent response to the "midnight hammer" on June 23.
Fourth: The United States should go to "combat days" with the Islamic Republic, where the first will start by targeting strategic military and security sites, factories and warehouses of ballistic missiles and drones, and the second will respond with its power to the naval units and American bases in the Gulf, and strike Israel as well, even if it does not enter the war. In light of the American bet on newly advanced defense methods that prevent Iranian missiles and suicide drones from reaching their targets. Praise be to him.
Fifth: If the United States strikes Iran and its bets that we mentioned above fail, we will be facing the worst-case scenario, which is the outbreak of a regional war involving all the allied forces of the latter, especially Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Iraqi armed factions. At that time, no one can predict where things will go.
