Description: Considerable US military presence has been registered amassing in the Middle East as tensions between Iran and the US continue to simmer. The US has dispatched the Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group, supported by various aerial assets such as fighter jets and electronic jamming airplanes such as the EA – 18G Growler. Tensions between the two countries have escalated rapidly since Iran’s violent and brutal crackdown on protesters last month. US President Trump has been relatively vague in his public statements regarding a potential kinetic strike on Iran, however, he had consistently claimed that military intervention remains as an option. In recent months the US has repositioned troops, equipment, aircraft carriers and other military assets in and out of regional military bases. The Iranian side has naturally responded with ratcheting the aggressive rhetoric up and threatening to target US military bases in the Gulf states. Efforts to deescalate the standoff diplomatically have been stalled in recent months although the initial postponement of military intervention by US President Trump indicates that backchannel talks are constantly active. Germany and the UK were also moving aerial assets to the region, however, their repositioning was branded as defensively reinforcing the US positions in the Middle East. Kinetic operation options remain on the table, such as surgical strikes on Iran’s rehabilitating nuclear sites, attack on top government officials including the Ayatollah, targeting capacities pertaining to the IRGC, striking the Basij enforcement militia and incapacitating Iran’s air defenses. Another alternative would be a Venezuela – style blockade with a follow up special operation which would target Iran’s top military and political officials.
Impact: The most recent developments coupled with last year’s 12 – day war signal that the US would most likely resort towards imposing a maritime blockade through the dispatching of military assets across water bodies surrounding Iran. Direct kinetic operations and an immediate military confrontation remains an option of unlikely probability in the immediate future considering the fact that backchannel talks and diplomatic efforts are still presumably active and that such kind of operation would necessitate a much larger deployment of troops and aerial assets in the region than the one currently being deployed. The potential blockade would further suffocate Iran’s devastated economy and create favorable conditions for the resurrection of the protests which could further debilitate the regime’s standing. The situation would continue to fluctuate with the potential for a surgical intervention by the US in the form of a special operation or an aerial strike rising as the crisis protracts over time.