US officials claimed Iran was secretly positioning short-range ballistic missiles in Iraq, within range of Israel and US bases in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. One year on, Iran’s continuing defiance suggests that the policy is not working, and is hastening a new confrontation. The US policy of “maximum pressure” on Iran through sanctions was launched last year after Trump reneged on the 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran. Likewise, Iran’s apparent calculation that Trump, seeking re-election next year and averse to waging foreign wars, will not attack is dangerously complacent. If Tehran is pushed too far, if the regime’s survival is in doubt, if ethnic and regional cracks begin to show, and if fundamentalists in the clergy, IRGC and judiciary seize control of policy, Iran may hit out in ways that could be utterly disastrous all round.

Source: The Guardian December 07, 2019 12:56 UTC