Hurst: The sun of America in the Middle East has begun to fade

Britain's Middle East Eye news site reported that Iran was not looking to kill American soldiers when it rained two US bases in Iraq with missiles last Wednesday. In an article by his editor-in-chief, David Hurst, he considered that Tehran wanted these attacks to send a message to its Arab Gulf neighbors.

The US Department of Defense (the Pentagon) announced that the missile strikes targeted the Ein al-Assad bases in western Iraq and the other in Arbil, in the north.

On the other hand, Iranian television reported that the attacks were in retaliation for the assassination of Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani in a US raid near Baghdad airport on January 3.

According to Hurst, it seemed clear that Iran had acted "with a high degree of restraint" in response to the killing of what it considered "its greatest war hero in the modern era."

Advance warning
Iran first alerted Iraq to its intention to launch these attacks, which means - according to the editor of the site - that the US Department of Defense received with certainty a warning in advance, and immediately proceeded to arrange the conditions in the two bases accordingly.

Iran did not “retract” from the confrontation with the American army, as President Donald Trump claimed last Wednesday, on the contrary, “Whoever retreated and kept his cool is the American army ... The United States did not attempt to shoot down Iranian missiles, even though five of them missed their target.”

There is no doubt - according to the author - that the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, if he wanted to inflict heavy human casualties on the American army, would have been able to do so.

But the missile attack - according to Hurst - had another goal, namely, to send a message to America's closest Gulf allies (Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Bahrain), the same countries that encouraged the idea of ​​an alliance against Iran, which Hurst called "Arab NATO".

Directed messages
If these Gulf countries do not understand the messages addressed to them from the bombing of the oil tankers off the Emirati Fujairah port, or the bombing of the Aramco oil facilities in Abqaiq and Khurais in eastern Saudi Arabia, they must have absorbed them this week, as the Middle East Eye article goes to.

The content of Iran's message is: "If the Pentagon cannot protect its bases and soldiers from our missiles, it will certainly not be able to protect your bases and your soldiers. All of your bases, ports, and pipelines are not safe, so beware."

The article points out that four decades of American policy, including three years of Trump's presidency, did not succeed in bringing Iran to a kneeling, adding that Tehran's missile force performed well at dawn last Wednesday, to demonstrate its ability to deter in a region it considers its backyard.

The editor of the British website believes that the threat of the Revolutionary Guards to all countries hosting American bases - that they would be targeted if attacks were launched from those bases against Iran - means an early abortion of the "Arab NATO" idea.

However, the attacks revived the idea of ​​establishing a new architecture for regional security, which would see the light of day if the US military ended its military presence in the Gulf.

Hurst concludes that a number of members of the US Congress are under pressure from pro-Israel groups and the Evangelical Christian Movement to complete the mission against Iran.

The author concludes by stressing that what these groups and even President Trump did not realize is that "the sun of the American empire in the Middle East has begun to fade."