Iran Sending Warships to Atlantic Ocean Amid Massive New Military Buildup - Adam Kredo -
Iran boosts war spending by $500 million after U.S. issues sanctions
Iran is preparing to send a flotilla of warships to the Atlantic Ocean following the announcement of a massive $500 million investment in war spending, according to Iranian leaders, who say the military moves are in response to recent efforts by the United States to impose a package of new economic sanctions on Tehran.
The military investment and buildup comes following weeks of tense interactions between Iran and the United States in regional waters, where Iranian military ships have carried out a series of dangerous maneuvers near U.S. vessels. The interactions have roiled U.S. military leaders and prompted tough talk from the Trump administration, which is currently examining potential ways to leave the landmark nuclear deal.
Iran's increasingly hostile behavior also follows a little-noticed United Nations report disclosing that Iran has repeatedly violated international accords banning ballistic missile work. Lawmakers in the U.S. Congress and some policy experts also believe that Iran has been violating some provisions in the nuclear agreement governing nuclear-related materials.
With tensions over sanctions and Iran's compliance with the nuclear agreement growing, Iranian parliamentary members voted to increase war spending by more than $500 million. This is at least the second recent cash influx to Iran's military since the landmark nuclear deal that unfroze billions in Iranian assets and saw the United States awarding Tehran millions in cash.
Iranian lawmakers reportedly shouted "death to America" as they passed the measure, which boosts spending to Iran's contested missile programs by around $260 million.
The bill also imposes sanctions on U.S. military officials in the region. Additionally, Iranian officials are moving to set up courts to prosecute the United States for the recent sanctions, which Iran claims are in violation of the nuclear deal.
Meanwhile, following several aggressive encounters with U.S. military vessels in the Persian Gulf, Iranian military leaders announced that they would be leading a flotilla of warships into the Atlantic Ocean.
"No military official in the world thought that we can go round Africa to the Atlantic Ocean through the Suez Canal but we did it as we had declared that we would go to the Atlantic and its Western waters," Iranian Navy Commander Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari was quoted as saying over the weekend.
"We moved into the Atlantic and will go to its Western waters in the near future," Sayyari said.
U.S. military officials reported Monday yet another "unsafe" encounter with an Iranian drone that was shadowing a U.S. carrier in the Persian Gulf region and reportedly came close enough to an American F-18 jet to risk the pilot's life.
As with other similar encounters during the past months, the Iranian craft did not respond to repeated radio calls by the United States. While the drone is said to have been unarmed, it is capable of carrying missiles.
Iranian leaders have been adamant that the country will not halt its work on ballistic missile technology, which could be used to carry nuclear weapons.
The United States has issued several new packages of sanctions as a result of this behavior, but U.N. members have yet to address the issue, despite recent reporting that found Iran is violating international accords barring such behavior.
"Little-noticed biannual reporting by the UN Secretary General alleges that Iran is repeatedly violating these non-nuclear provisions," Iran Watch, a nuclear watchdog group, reported on Monday.
"Thus far, the United States has responded to such violations with sanctions and designations of Iranian and foreign entities supporting Tehran's ballistic missile development," the organization found. "However, the U.N. and its member states have not responded. More must be done to investigate allegations of noncompliance and to punish violations of the resolution."
Rep. Sean Duffy (R., Wis.), a proponent of a more forceful policy on Iranian intransigence in the region, told the Free Beacon that the Trump administration must make it a priority to address Tehran's increasingly bold military activity.
"Iran was emboldened to flex its military muscle after eight years of President Obama's passivity and his delivery of cold, hard cash to the regime, but they should make no mistake: President Trump was elected to put a stop to rogue regimes pushing America around, and the American people know he will address the world's lead sponsor of terrorism with resolve," Duffy told the Free Beacon.
Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon adviser and expert on rogue regimes, said that Iran's recent behavior shows the regime has not moderated since the nuclear deal was implemented. The Obama administration sold the deal in part on promises that it could help bring Tehran into the community of nations.
"Every time the Islamic Republic has cash, it chooses guns over butter," Rubin told the Washington Free Beacon. "What the [nuclear deal] and subsequent hostage ransom did was fill Iran's coffers, and now we see the result of that."
"What [former President Barack] Obama and [former Secretary of State John] Kerry essentially did was gamble that if they funded a mad scientist's lab, the scientist would rather make unicorns rather than nukes," Rubin said. "News flash for the echo chamber: Iranian reformist are just hardliners who smile more. Neither their basic philosophy nor their commitment to terrorism have changed."
Iran's presence in Syria a 'red line for Israel' - Oded Granot - http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=44607
The presence of pro-Iran militias on Israel's northern border is not an existential threat but it cannot be taken lightly * If Western powers negotiating a Syrian deal fail to keep them away from our borders, Israel may have to take independent action.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani owe a great debt of gratitude to the West for its contribution to bolstering the Islamic republic's power, and while neither of them can be mistaken for righteous, their work has been and is being done by others.
The 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and Western powers, led by the Obama administration, has revived the Iranian economy and allowed Tehran to pursue lucrative international contracts. Moreover, despite the agreement, Iran remains a nuclear-threshold state and in the not-so-distant future, when certain limitations outlined in the deal elapse, it will be able to build nuclear weapons unhindered.
Perhaps even more serious is the Western coalition's indirect "contribution" to the Iranians and their allies' territorial expansion in the Middle East. The explanation for this is simple: the West's obsessive focus on the war against the Islamic State group has paved the way for the flow of pro-Iranian Shiite militias into the Iraqi and Syrian spheres, which has emptied of Sunni insurgents. Khamenei could not have hoped for a better outcome.
But as a result of these developments, for the first time since the Arab Spring plunged the Middle East into turmoil in 2011, Israel is facing the actual threat of a "small Shiite crescent" on its northern border, meaning a strip of territory controlled by Hezbollah forces and pro-Iranian Shiite militias, which will stretch from Rosh Hanikra, near the Israel-Lebanon border in the west to where the Israel-Syria-Jordan borders converge in the southern Golan Heights.
While this is not an existential threat, it cannot be taken lightly. Israel has repeatedly demanded that any agreement mediated by Russia and the U.S. to end the civil war in Syria include a specific stipulation keeping pro-Iranian forces away from Israel's border in the Golan Heights. So far, this demand has gone unheeded, underscoring the severity of the problem.
Mossad Director Yossi Cohen, who briefed the Diplomatic-Security Cabinet on the Iranian threat on Sunday, was right when he said that Israel alone cannot curb Iran's nuclear ambitions. If Israel were to launch a strike on Iranian nuclear facilities without coordinating with the U.S., it could spark chaos in the Middle East.
Israel and the international community are not the only ones now carefully monitoring what U.S. President Donald Trump may do -- the Iranians are also watching. If Trump proves hesitant or soft on North Korea, Iran will take it to mean that he is a paper tiger, looking at the U.S. administration as nothing to fear.
This is not true as far as the threat lurking on the northern border. The most effective way of dealing with the possible deployment of Iranian, Hezbollah and pro-Iranian militias not only in Lebanon but also in the Golan Heights, is to prevent their presence in the area altogether.
Given the military abilities these hostile elements possess, this is a red line for Israel. If Western powers fail to ensure their removal from the area near the border, Israel must make it clear that it will act -- independently if necessary. Such action would constitute a departure from the Israel's long-time policy of steering clear of any military involvement in the ongoing civil war in Syria.
Iran's great game -
On Wednesday a report revealed that Iran is likely involved in building missile factories in northern Syria. Derived from satellite images taken from the EROS satellite, ImageSat International reported that "Syria is building missile factories with Iranian inspiration." The detailed images showed a valley full of buildings in Wadi Jahannam, east of the city of Baniyas.
The buildings bear a resemblance to surface-to-surface missile factories in Iran. The complex is not small, but takes up several kilometers in a valley. The complex is also located close to other sensitive military sites including the Port of Tartus where Russia maintains a naval presence and Khmeimim Air Base near Latakia.
The revelations about Iranian plans to build missiles in Syria only add a new layer of evidence to Iran's multipronged attempts to increase its power in the Middle East. The parliament in Tehran recently sought to increase funding for Iran's ballistic missile program by $260 million.
A high level Israeli delegation of intelligence officials is reportedly leaving for Washington in the next weeks.
This also ties into Hezbollah's missile build-up and the close ties between Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Mark Dubowitz, chief executive officer at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and Wisconsin Congressman Mike Gallagher recently detailed in The Wall Street Journal the extent of Iran's projects in Lebanon. "Buried more than 50 meters below ground and protected from aerial attack, these facilities could produce highly sophisticated rockets with ranges of more than 300 miles and equipped with advanced guidance systems."
Dubowitz and Gallagher argue that in reaction to this, the US should make clear to the Lebanese government that it is violating UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which was supposed to make it so Lebanon was free of "any armed personnel, assets and weapons" not under government control. The US and European partners could also sanction Iran for using human shields in Lebanon, and sanction companies controlled by "military entities in charge of Iran's ballistic missile program."
This would be a good start, but the deeper problem with Iran is that its involvement in Lebanon with Hezbollah is, like with the factory near Baniyas, only one layer of a complex attempt to gain hegemony in the Middle East. Iran is also reportedly sending warships to the Atlantic Ocean. It is deeply involved in Iraq, supporting the Hashd al-Shaabi Shia militias that are now part of the Iraqi government. It has played a key role in Syria supporting Bashar Assad. And Iran has less problems attracting foreign investment, especially from Europe, now that it is free from the sanctions imposed prior to the 2015 nuclear deal.
Iran doesn't keep its policies secret either. Press TV, which is related to the regime in Tehran, headlined on Thursday that President Hassan Rouhani's "new pick for defense minister has underlined his resolve to further enhance ballistic missile capabilities." Brig.-Gen. Amir Hatami boasted that "in the next four years, apart from enhancing combat and defense capabilities, we will devote a special effort to boost missile and ballistic power, strategic air power as well as strategic maritime power and increase rapid reaction force."
Iran's defense chiefs have also made frequent strategic visits abroad. In April the defense minister was in Moscow and on Wednesday, Chief of Staff Maj.-Gen. Mohammad Baqeri flew to Ankara to meetings with defense officials.
The larger picture also involves Iran's progress in filling the void left by the decline in Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. As ISIS is defeated, pro-Iranian proxies have filled the vacuum in the western deserts of Iraq and also in the swath of desert in Syria that leads to the Euphrates River. This would create a physical land-bridge from Tehran to the sea, a corridor of influence and power that is unprecedented. Hezbollah has threatened to use Shia Iraq fighters in the next war with Israel, and Israel is concerned that cease-fire agreements along the Golan have empowered Iran, the Syrian regime and Hezbollah.
The reported visit by Israeli officials with their American counterparts should include attempts to get America's defense establishment on board with a plan to confront Iran in the region. This doesn't require reneging on the Iran nuclear deal, because the real Iranian threat today is through proxies and influence in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. It is essential that the defeat of ISIS be followed by a policy for dealing with Tehran.
Iran building long-range rocket factory in Syria -
An Israeli television report said on Tuesday that Iran is building a facility in northwest Syria to manufacture long-range rockets, and showed satellite images it said were of the site under construction.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned last week that Iran was strengthening its foothold in its ally Syria as Islamic State fighters were being displaced, and said Israel was watching developments and would act against any threat.
"Our policy is clear: We vehemently oppose the military buildup by Iran and its proxies, primarily Hezbollah, in Syria and we will do whatever it takes to protect Israel's security," he said in a speech.
The Channel 2 television news report showed images it said were taken by an Israeli satellite showing a site in northwest Syria near the Mediterranean coastal town of Baniyas, saying some of the construction indicated explosives would be stored there.
It compared images of buildings it said were of a rocket factory near Tehran to structures at the Syrian site, and said there was a strong resemblance between them.
Netanyahu has been harshly critical of a 2015 deal that six world powers including the United States under then-president Barack Obama struck with Iran to curb its nuclear program in return for an end to multilateral sanctions.
Iran is Israel's avowed enemy, and Israel argues that the agreement fails to prevent Iranian weapons posing a threat to its very existence. Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only.
The United States last month slapped new economic sanctions on Iran over its ballistic missile program and said Tehran's "malign activities" in the Middle East had undercut any "positive contributions" from the 2015 accord curbing its nuclear program.
US President Donald Trump has frequently criticized the agreement as being too soft on Tehran, which remains subject to a UN arms embargo and other restrictions.
US news reports have said that Israeli intelligence officials will discuss the situation in Syria and Lebanon with US counterparts in Washington this week.
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