It’s Now or Never in Iran
Toppling a fanatically genocidal regime armed with sophisticated weapons has never been an easy task. But America’s current overwhelming air superiority, combined with Israel’s extensive intelligence penetration of Iran, could break the power of its murderous Mullahs and help control the ensuing chaos if launched on time before a probable rearming by China. (RELATED: Iran and the New Domino Theory)
The two weeks given by Iran to present a “final proposal” at peace talks in Geneva may be a ploy by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to gain time for Chinese deliveries of new air defense systems capable of detecting stealth aircraft, and AI-powered drones that could threaten U.S. warships. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would have informed President Trump of China’s expected reinforcement of Iran’s air defenses at urgent White House talks last week, in which he reportedly urged the U.S. administration to strike soon. (RELATED: US–Iran Talks Only Lead to Uncertainty)
Meanwhile, the largest U.S. military buildup since the 1991 Gulf War continues in the Persian Gulf with a second aircraft carrier strike group arriving this week, along with additional U.S. Air Force fighters, including 50 F-35s and a squadron of top-performance F-22 Raptors. (RELATED: Two Regimes, One Reality)
A fleet of midair refueling tankers seen parked at U.S. bases in the region also indicates plans for a long-term air campaign. Giant C-17 and Galaxy transports keep landing regularly at airfields in Qatar, UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, and Jordan, unloading tons of military equipment, including special operations Chinooks and MH-60 Black Hawk helicopters.
Pentagon plans for a massive air blitz to destroy Iran’s missile capabilities, remaining nuclear sites, and the Revolutionary Guard Corps would be conducted in multiple waves of precision strikes that could stretch out for weeks. Saturation bombings could be followed by limited special forces raids to secure key strategic objectives with the aid of clandestine Israeli Mossad teams that are already on the ground, providing crucial support and intelligence.
Taking out Iran’s ballistic and cruise missiles prior to launch would be the main objective at the initial stages of an air campaign to protect Israel and U.S. bases from Iranian retaliation. Long-range Fattah missiles, which caused severe damage to Israeli cities and struck a U.S. base in Qatar during last July’s twelve-day war, have been enhanced with advanced Chinese and Russian precision and stealth technology, according to Israeli intelligence reports.
Chinese cargo flights landing in Tehran in recent weeks could be delivering components to assemble an upgraded air-defense network…
Chinese cargo flights landing in Tehran in recent weeks could be delivering components to assemble an upgraded air-defense network of YLC-8B and HQ-9B radars capable of detecting stealth aircraft. Iran’s current air defenses largely consist of Russian S-300 systems that were instantly neutralized by U.S. electronic jamming during Operation Absolute Resolve in Venezuela for the capture of Nicolás Maduro.
Iran’s domestically produced Bavar-73 SAMs based on S-300 technology that failed to intercept any of 150 U.S. aircraft controlling the skies of Venezuela on the night of January 3 would be similarly vulnerable to U.S. Growler electronic warfare fighters, unleashing HARM anti-radiation missiles to open air corridors for precision strikes by F-35 Stealth fighters, F-18 Super Hornets, F-15 Eagles, and the newly arrived Raptors as well as Tomahawks launched by destroyers offshore.
The large number of KC-135 and KC-46 air tankers on station in the Gulf indicates provisions for midair refueling of hundreds of fighters needing to gas up fast for continuous bombing runs. Hidden mobile missile launchers emerging unexpectedly together with Iran’s ample supply of Shahed kamikaze drones, many of which are now jet-powered and whose launch sites are easier to conceal, would remain a threat.
As the air campaign moves on to targeting the IRGC and Basij militias to degrade the regime’s capacity for internal repression, popular revolts might erupt, organized by Mossad cells, which may be arming anti-regime groups with drones and other precision weapons to conduct assassinations and take out key installations. Despite recent mass killings of protestors, flash manifestations continue as an organized, clandestine opposition movement takes shape inside Iran.
Explosions and sudden fires at regime-linked installations in Tehran and other parts of the country reported recently seem to be acts of sabotage or strikes by easily assembled quadropler drones launched internally. Dozens of Iranian air force and IRGC commanders were systematically assassinated during last year’s twelve-day war in operations attributed to Mossad agents working with locally recruited resistance cells. They might now be activated for even more intense guerrilla attacks to wrest control of some parts of the country, aided by U.S. air strikes targeting IRGC headquarters, transport, and communication systems.
In an interview for the British newspaper The Sun, retired U.S. Special Forces Colonel Ron MacCammon, with extensive experience in Central Asia, said that it might be “highly feasible” at advanced stages of the air war for Special Forces to establish “air heads” at certain locations around nuclear sites such as “Pickaxe Mountain” under construction in the Zagros mountains where nuclear material has been moved recently from installations struck last year. “They could control the area at least for long enough to make sure everything there is obliterated,” he said.
But he warns that “Iran is a beast which won’t be easy to kill. They believe in martyrdom. A regime willing to slaughter thousands of its people to remain in power is capable of anything.”
B-2-delivered GBU-57 deep penetration bombs may be ultimately required to take out Khamenei in his multilayered underground command bunker. Even after that, remnants of the IRGC and Basij militias numbering in the hundreds of thousands may cling on to key parts of Tehran and other areas of the country.
A Syrian-type civil war scenario may evolve in which rebel forces take control of regions bordering Kurdistan, Azerbaijan, and Armenia, where ethnic minorities long opposed to the Islamic regime could be supported by American Special Forces, infiltrating arms and other assistance from U.S. bases in the neighboring states that include NATO ally Turkey.
It may not be an endearing prospect for MAGA isolationists imagining a return to some idyllic past of American noninterventionism that never existed. The U.S. has been conducting worldwide military operations since President Thomas Jefferson landed Marines in Tripoli, and America’s westward expansion was secured through war with Mexico in subsequent decades. Possibly violent opposition can be expected from the far left, which courts radical Islam and stages riots in support of Hamas. Many Trump advisors may naturally balk at the specter of an “endless war,” especially in an election year.
But the alternative is a stronger Iran with an annihilated opposition and nuclear weapons. The Mullahs would show off some half-baked diplomatic “deal” on nukes to gain influence internationally while China rearms them with fifth-generation weaponry, which may even include JL-20 stealth fighters, whose model China’s military attaché in Tehran symbolically displayed at a recent public event.
A resurgent Iran under Chinese control would seal the fate of Israel and diminish U.S. leverage in the Middle East and Central Asia at a moment when America has been making great strides in the strategically critical region. “The time to hit Iran is now,” says Washington Institute for the Study of War director, General Jack Keane, “before it’s too late.”
READ MORE from Martin Arostegui: