By Daan de Wit
Translated by Ben Kearney

The current news coverage concerning Iran is depicting a series of incidents, but when placed in the context of the events of the past few years - as I have done in my book The Next War - The attack on Iran - A preview as well as in this DeepJournal series - it is clear that all the pieces are being put into place for a war against Iran. It is a long-term project demanding many years worth of preparation, and the ultimate goal is getting closer all the time. One component of this preparation is the covert arming of Syrian rebels.

A weakening of Syria is a weakening of Iran. 'President Barack Obama's National Security Advisor Tom Donilon, speaking a day after the United States announced new measures against Iran over its nuclear program, said that "end of the Assad regime would constitute Iran’s greatest setback in the region yet—a strategic blow that will further shift the balance of power in the region against Iran."' Speaking last November on the unstable situation in Syria, Obama’s Secretary of State said: 'I think there could be a civil war with a very determined and well-armed and eventually well-financed opposition [...] something that we hate to see because we are in favor of a peaceful protest and a nonviolent opposition'. The first part of Hillary Clinton’s remark seemed more an expression of hope than the warning it tried to be, as made clear by the fact that NATO and the U.S. are currently supplying the Syrian rebels with Libyan weapons.

Covert Western weapons shipments to Syrian rebels
Opponents of the regime of Syrian President Assad are being secretly armed by the West. Unmarked airplanes belonging to NATO countries are landing at Turkish military bases close to the Syrian border. These flights deliver weapons originating from the arsenals of the late Muammar Gaddafi. The airplanes also contain volunteer fighters from the Libyan transitional council, 'experienced in pitting local volunteers against trained soldiers, a skill they acquired confronting Gaddafi’s army'. Also the next step has been taken. 'French and British special forces trainers are on the ground, assisting the Syrian rebels while the CIA and U.S. Spec Ops are providing communications equipment and intelligence to assist the rebel cause, enabling the fighters to avoid concentrations of Syrian soldiers', writes the well-informed former CIA officer Phil Giraldi.

The road to Tehran runs through Damascus
The strategy of reaching Tehran through Damascus also seems to have been embraced by Saudi Arabia: 'The King knows that other than the collapse of the Islamic Republic itself, nothing would weaken Iran more than losing Syria', said a Saudi source speaking to Foreign Policy magazine in August of last year. Since that time there has been no let-up in developments. The Syrian situation is being eyed with suspicion by the Russians, who don't see it quite as sentimentally as the Western public does: 'The West is putting pressure on Syria because the country refuses to break off its alliance with Iran and not for repressing the opposition, said [Nikolai] Patrushev, who served with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in the Soviet-era KGB. “This time, it won’t be France, the U.K.and Italy that will provide the main strike forces, but perhaps neighboring Turkey, which was until recently on good terms with Syria and is a rival of Iran with immense ambitions,” Patrushev said.'

Syrian power vacuum filled by Islamic interests
Russia is worried about the future: 'Russia, which has a naval base in Syria and sells weapons to the Middle Eastern country, is more concerned that Islamic radicals may come to power, said Irina Zvyagelskaya, a Middle East analyst at the Academy of Sciences in Moscow. “Our fear is that Syria could collapse and extremist Islamic forces will seize control that no one will be pleased about,” Zvyagelskaya said in a phone interview today. “This could destabilize the entire region.”' Phil Giraldi would agree with this analysis. He writes: 'In the United States, many friends of Israel are on the Assad regime-change bandwagon, believing that a weakened Syria, divided by civil war, will present no threat to Tel Aviv. But they should think again, as these developments have a way of turning on their head. The best organized and funded opposition political movement in Syria is the Muslim Brotherhood.' Hillary Clinton: 'Look, Assad's going to be gone; it's just a question of time.'

Intelligence professionals warn Obama
Phil Giraldi has been warning of the coming war against Iran for years now, which in his opinion could lead to WWIII. 'As professionals with collectively hundreds of years of experience in intelligence, foreign policy, and counterterrorism, we are concerned about the gross misrepresentation of facts being bruited about to persuade you to start another war.' This is the first sentence from a letter sent to President Obama from Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, signers of which include Giraldi. The group of intelligence specialists warns him not to launch a war against Iran. 'We are seeing a replay of the “Iraq WMD threat.”' It’s a sound argument, and one that I expand on in my book The Next War. This group of experts concludes the letter with this sentence: 'We are currently winding down what you labeled a “dumb war;” we should not undertake another dumb war against a country almost three times larger than Iraq, that would set off a major regional war and create generations of jihadis. Such a war, contrary to what some argue, would not make Israel or the U.S. safer.'