At the minute, the US and the Russian governments are debating about the future of Syria and how to proceed. One of the main points of discussion is regarding the withdrawal of Hezbollah and other militias. The US has made it clear that all armed forces from abroad that are supporting the Syrian regime need to leave. First and foremost, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), as well as the Lebanese Hezbollah and Afghan, Iraqi and Pakistani militias.

The United States had as good as agreed that the Russian project aiming to end the conflict politically in Syria regardless of the survival of Bashar al-Assad was the way to move forward. But then the chemical weapons attack on Khan Shaykhun happened.

The war in Syria can no longer be described as a civil war. A more accurate description would be a clash of coalitions and opposing blocs. Iran’s presence in Syria is by far the most dangerous. In fact, in Iran’s involvement in propping the Syrian dictator up, Assad ironically seems to play a very small role. The Iranian regime is commanding Assad’s troops and has a much higher ratio of forces. 

Iran, with its huge financial wealth and the copious number of weapons that goes with it, has deployed jihadist agents all over the region to help in its domination of the Middle East.

President Donald Trump makes it very clear that he does not adhere to the policy of his predecessor for Iran or many other issues. 

On February 2, 2017 Michael Flynn, former National Security Advisor, put Iran “on notice” over missile tests. The next day Trump tweeted, “Iran is playing with fire — they don’t appreciate how ‘kind’ President Obama was to them. Not me!”

During his campaign, Trump described the Nuclear Deal with Iran by saying, “It’s one of the worst deals ever made.”

Iran, one of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad’s key backers, has been hit with extensions on existing sanctions, by The European Council, in response to serious human rights violations. 

On the same day that EU member states helped block a fast US/UK drive for new sanctions on the Assad regime and Russia, these sanctions that hit exports and target key leaders were signed off on, as well.

Relations between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran have been tense since President Donald Trump took office at the beginning of the year. The Iranian regime had become somewhat accustomed to President Obama’s rapprochement and appeasement policies. It spent years carrying out numerous terrorist and nuclear activities, not to mention the ongoing human right abuses, confident in the knowledge that the Obama administration would do nothing for fear of rocking the boat.

However unstable the relations between the two countries have been, it seems like the situation has become even more rocky following the missiles launched by the United States following the Syria chemical attacks that left dozens of civilians dead.

The international community was informed last week about the increasingly large and powerful commercial empire that is being controlled by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). At a press conference, the main opposition to the Iranian regime, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), also pointed out that the IRGC’s wealth is making a huge contribution to the ongoing terrorist activities by various groups throughout the Middle East. 

Thanks to information obtained by the network of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) network, (which has contacts in the country and even in the Iranian regime and the IRGC itself) we now know that there are around at least 90 docks around the coast of Iran that are controlled solely by the IRGC.