US-Israeli War Games Postponed

Avoiding Aggravation of Growing Tensions in the Region

The US and Israeli militaries have postponed large-scale war games scheduled for April, the Israeli defense officials announced today. The military exercise would be rescheduled for the second half of 2012 [AP, 16 January].

It is believed that the missile defense drill, codenamed "Austere Challenge 12,” was postponed to avoid aggravating growing tensions in the region over Iran’s nuclear program.

Thousands of American and Israeli soldiers were to take part in the exercise, which was designed to test multiple Israeli and US air defense systems against incoming missiles and rockets from Iran.

Iran Will Hit Missile Shield in Turkey if Attacked - IRGC

A senior IRGC commander, Maj. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, who heads the IRGC aerospace command, said in Tehran today that Iran will target NATO missile defense shield in Turkey if it is attacked by Israel or the US.

Gen. Hajizadeh added that Iran believes that the probability of an attack on the country is on the rise, and hitting missile defense shield in Turkey is part of Iran’s new defense strategy to counter the threat. He emphasized that Iran will now respond to threats with threats rather than a defensive position [Mehr News Agency, 26 November].

“Countering threats with threats,” has become a new battle cry in Iran, first espoused by the country’s supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei in a speech last week, presumably also referring to a nuclear threat.

As part of the new strategy, the Iranian senior generals are also warning the West that they would widen any future conflicts by establishing anti-Israeli fronts in Lebanon and Palestine; destabilizing the Persian Gulf; and now attacking defensive missile shield in Turkey.

Mossad Behind IRGC Base Explosions – TIME

The Time magazine, quoting an unnamed western security official, said today that Saturday’s explosions at the IRGC base in west Tehran were the work of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence and special operations agency.

Mossad does not comment on its operations, and the claim could not be independently verified. The Israel Defense Minister Ehud Barak, however, has said that he hopes that Iran would witness similar explosions in future.

The IRGC insists that the explosions were caused by an accident when its personnel were moving ammunitions inside a depot. The IRGC, however, does not explain why one of its most senior generals, commanding the country’s missile forces, and other senior officers were present at an ammunition depot. The base where the explosions occurred is reported to house IRGC’s ballistic missile installations.

Funeral for IRGC Officers and Personnel Held in Tehran

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other high-ranking officials of the Islamic Republic attended the funeral for Maj. Gen. Hassan Tehrani Moghadam and 16 other IRGC personnel who were killed on Saturday’s explosion at their base in west Tehran.

Gen. Tehrani Moghdam was hailed in a eulogy at the funeral as the “architect” of the military’s missile forces.

“Martyr Tehrani Moqaddam was the main architect of the IRGC’s canon and missile power and the founder of the deterrent power of our country,” said IRGC Deputy Commander Maj. Gen. Hossein Salami [IRIB, 14 November].

Gen. Tehrani Moghadam taught at the prestigious Imam Hossein University (IHU). He was the commanding general of IRGC Amir-al-Mo’menin base, believed to be IRGC’s ballistic missile base, which was hit by two explosions on Saturday.

The IRGC has ruled out possibility of any attack or sabotage and has said the explosions occurred when its personnel were moving ammunition inside the base. No independent verification of the cause of the incident was available.

Photo: Ayatollah Khamenei at the funeral ceremonies. The coffin in front is that of Gen. Tehrani Moghadam. Fars News Agency Photo

US, Turkey Sign Agreement to Place Radar Near Iran

The US and Turkey have signed a highly sought-after agreement allowing the installation of a US radar station close to the Iranian border, the Washington Post reported today.

The radar station will be a cornerstone of a missile shield over Europe. The high-power X-band radar station will be installed in Turkey’s Malatya province, some 400 miles from the Iranian border. The radar is intended to provide early warning of missile launches from Iran. Turkey signed the agreement late on Wednesday despite heavy political pressure from Iran. The Iranian foreign ministry had warned the agreement would “create tensions” in Iran-Turkey relations, and would cause “complicated consequences.” [The Washington Post, 16 September].

IRGC Conducts Missile Exercise

Iran's IRGC began a 10-day missile training exercise today. The IRGC’s missile force commander Brig. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh told reporters that the annual exercise in the Persian Gulf region were meant to strengthen the defense capabilities of the country. We will cover the IRGC exercise as we receive the reports in the coming days.

The Iranian Ballistic Missile Hype

By Mark Pyruz

Lieutenant Colonel John D. Johnson, a U.S. Army Senior Fellow assigned to the George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies, has a paper published over at the Small Wars Journal blog, titled "The Iranian Ballistic Missile Threat And a “Phased, Adaptive Approach” to Missile Defense for Europe." Download it here.

There are many problems with this brief. Right off the bat, claiming Iran is a "Persian country" ignores the fact that the country possesses relatively large minority populations, such as Azaris, Turkomans, Kurds and even Arabs. Both Iran's Supreme Leader and Head of the Armed Forces General Command Headquarters are actually Azari, not Persian.

In addition, Iran's threat perception goes beyond the presence of Western militaries in Iraq and Afghanistan. It includes nuclear-armed USAF and USN forces based in Qatar and Bahrain, the use of which President Obama has stated could be used against Iran in a first-strike nuclear attack. And Iran's threat perception includes Israel's nuclear arms stockpiles, deliverable by its own MRBM forces. (Why is this not mentioned?)

Contrary to LTC Johnson's assertion the international community "has gone to great lengths to engage Iran diplomatically," the truth of the matter is that the goal posts for Iran's nuclear negotiations have constantly been shifted by their Western interlocutors. Consider the failure of the 2003 Paris Agreement, as well as the more recent 2010 Tehran Declaration, as just two major examples.

Nowhere in this brief are any credible scenarios provided for Iranian MRBM strikes against Greece, Romania, Bulgaria or Turkey. That's because the threat of such simply does not exist.

The notion that Iran could deploy an ICBM capable of striking the US by 2015 is pure fantasy. More than that, it defies logic. True, Iran is developing larger rockets. But nowhere in this brief is an explanation provided for Iran's need at self-sufficiency in hoisting satellites into space (they've been refused such by a number of commercial rocket-equipped countries). For Iran's defense, which is based on deterrence, the region itself is a target-rich environment. Potential retaliatory strikes are available in every direction. It is logical for Iran's military industrial complex to put resources into further developing its SRBM and MRBM forces, in order to better deter its real adversaries in the region- the US and Israel- than to put massive resources into a ICBM crash program for targets which don't offer anywhere near a corresponding, congruent deterrence value (not to mention the potential liabilities incurred in fielding such weaponry).

It's actually amazing that LTC Johnson didn't mention Iran's deterrent-based defense strategy or provide any credible Iranian SSM first-strike scenarios. Also, references to Israel's WMD capabilities are brief and almost non-associative to the threat of war involving Iran's SSM forces. Are we really to believe that countries such as Greece and Bulgaria constitute a risk factor of war involving Iran greater than that posed by Israel? If so, that would be absurd.