Sullivan met with Prime Minister Bennett and Defense Minister Ganz
(Photo: Itai Beit On, GPO, Tal Oz, Ministry of Defense)
The move is intended to get the Iranians to come down from the tree and recalculate a route in the negotiations that are taking place in Vienna between Iran and the powers. The purpose of the move is to persuade Iran to agree to restrict uranium enrichment and increase UN oversight of its nuclear facilities in exchange for a U.S. agreement to lift sanctions imposed on it by President Trump when he withdrew in 2018 from the original nuclear deal.
Additional elements during the American-Israeli course launched this week were the speeches delivered by President Herzog and Defense Minister Bnei Gantz at the graduation ceremony. The speeches provided a determined political framework for the picture of the capabilities to attack in Iran that were outlined by the outgoing and incoming Air Force commanders.
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Uniform front against the US. Ganz, Bennett and Lapid with Sullivan
(Photo: Shlomi Amsalem, GPO, Ariel Hermoni, Ministry of Defense)
For the threat of an attack on Iran, which the generals are talking about, to be credible it needs to be backed up by a clear statement from the political echelon, indicating a willingness to make the decision to carry out the kinetic threat if and when it is needed. This is exactly what Herzog, Bennett, Lapid and Gantz did in the messages they issued after their meetings with Sullivan. The interviews he gave in the chain of the American National Security Adviser to the Israeli and American media were the United States’ contribution to the media-conscious move, which was apparently initiated by Washington.
The Israelis happily cooperated, including in press leaks about the strict demands Israel made on the Americans to present them to the Iranians during the negotiations in Vienna. A classic game of the good researcher and the bad researcher, when Israel is naturally cast in the role of the threatening factor who begs “Hold me”.
But Sullivan was not dairy either. For example, in one of the interviews he revealed that the Biden administration has already made a decision “in closed rooms” when the US will withdraw from the negotiating table in Vienna and add sanctions to those already in charge of Tehran. .
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Representatives of the superpowers and Iran in Vienna
(Photo: Reuters)
Sullivan also added an implicit threat. Asked if the United States opposes Israel attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities, the US president’s national security adviser contented himself with saying “Israel is a sovereign state.”
The implication of this statement, in the international diplomatic language, is that at least for now, the leadership in Jerusalem and the security forces in the Kirya have a bright yellow light from the United States to do what they think is necessary, and when they think it will be necessary.
No need to get carried away. Sullivan did not imply that the US supports or participates in an Israeli attack. It should be remembered that his message was aimed at Iranian ears and not at Israeli ears and therefore should have sounded threatening and intimidating. Destroy Iran’s military nuclear program.
Offensive, intelligence and kinetic military cooperation (bombs and missiles) already exists between the Pentagon and the Kirya in Tel Aviv in everything related to ISIS and the establishment of the Iranians and their envoys in Syria and Iraq. There is Israeli-American operational cooperation in the Red Sea arena as well. But when it comes to a direct confrontation with Iran, the United States is ready, for the time being, solely for defensive cooperation with us (warnings against missile attacks, reinforcing missile interception systems in Israel and dealing with cruise missiles and UAVs that will attack Israel).
The US is also cooperating with us in gathering intelligence in Iran and in cyber operations that have disrupted, and are supposed to disrupt, Iran’s military nuclear project in the future.
There are now clear signs that Iran’s arrogant conduct – one might say rude – not only brought the US closer to its partners in negotiations in Vienna, including China and Russia, but also prompted the Biden administration to seriously consider Bennett’s recommendations in negotiating with bazaar traders. The Shrews from Tehran.
This is exactly what Sullivan wanted to illustrate to the Iranians during his visit here last week. He also signals that cooperation with Israel may intensify. One sign of this is that Washington has not yet definitively informed Israel that it refuses to advance the supply of at least two modern refueling aircraft, as Defense Minister Gantz requested.
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Arrogant conduct. Iranian President Ibrahim Raisi
(Photo: AP)
In light of recent contacts with American security forces, it is likely that if the negotiations in Vienna finally explode, a way will be found to bring the KC-46 to Israel ahead of time, which will greatly improve Israel’s ability to conduct a campaign in the IDF.
From what Sullivan said in conversations with Israeli figures in private, one can also learn that the United States is already in the midst of advanced Plan B planning, that is, an American-European action plan to put pressure on Iran in the event that negotiations in Vienna explode.
According to US media reports, the plan includes additional sanctions, tightening enforcement of the old “biting” sanctions that prevent Iran from exporting oil and access to the international financial market, and various measures to strengthen US deterrence such as selling state-of-the-art combat equipment to Israel and Arab Gulf states. To the Middle East, joint exercises and possibly even limited military action against Iran’s ’emissaries’ if they threaten American forces in the region.
However, it is clear that the Biden administration still wants to reach a renewed, or new, agreement with Iran through diplomacy. The novelty is that the Americans now already understand that diplomacy alone will not achieve anything from the Iranians.
Sullivan believes, and has even said so openly, that in order to strengthen American diplomacy vis-à-vis the Iranians and make it more effective, two additional levers need to be activated: “pressure” and “deterrence.” This is so that the Iranians will stop dragging their feet in Vienna in order to gain time in which they will continue with an accelerated enrichment of pines and accumulate a large amount of fissile material from which several explosive cores of atomic warheads can be produced.
In addition. As long as the negotiations in Vienna continue, there is not enough UN oversight of nuclear facilities to know exactly what they are doing in producing new and fast centrifuges, how much uranium they have enriched and to what extent, and whether they have renewed the development of the explosive device.
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The Iranian centrifuges
(Photo: Reuters)
The US “pressure” is expressed in the mobilization of support in the international arena that will increase Iran’s political and economic isolation in the international arena, the mobilization of the EU and even Russia and China to present tough and uniform positions in negotiations, and economic measures to prevent Iran until an agreement is reached. Oil and gas prices in the global energy market. Much of the severe economic hardship in Iran stems from the empty state coffers that are begging for dollars.
The “deterrence” of the Americans’ method was intended to add to the “pressure” a dimension of physical threat. It is meant to make the Iranians fearful. This is exactly where Israel comes into the picture. Washington knows what Iran denies – that the threat of a direct military attack by Israel if the Iranians reach the nuclear threshold or, God forbid, the nuclear weapons themselves – creates deterrence in Tehran. Sullivan came to us to strengthen the deterrent box in the American pressure matrix in the context of the Vienna talks.
It is not pleasant to say this so blatantly, but the US uses us as an attack dog whose sharp teeth and aggressive record are supposed to illustrate to the rulers of Tehran what the alternative might be if the diplomatic olive leaf that the US extends to them fails.
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The United States uses Israel as an assault dog
(Photo: IDF Spokesman)
The leak yesterday from American intelligence sources to CNN, which Saudi Arabia produces long-range ballistic missiles with Chinese aid, was also intended for the same deterrent purpose. These missiles threaten Iran first and foremost.
Bennett happily cooperates with the American deterrence venture that Sullivan is leading, because it fits perfectly with the mood of his electoral base and Netanyahu’s legacy that he and his supporters are afraid to deviate from. The motives of Ganz, Lapid and Herzog are more complex. They, too, want to help the Americans, but mostly in the hope of reinforcing and tightening the cooperation and assistance that Israel will receive from the United States in the future.
Most political captains in Israel understand that they have no chance of convincing Biden and his men to abandon the negotiations in Vienna. They know that it is only in the power of the Iranians to do so, if they continue to insist on their maximalist demands. Therefore, it is better to help Sullivan make a deterrent lemon from the Israeli lemon. For the time being, to refrain from actions in Iran and abroad that could harm American diplomatic efforts, and to arrive at the day after the negotiations when the Americans see us as a reliable and indebted partner.
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