Iran Begins War Games in Persian Gulf

Yesterday the Revolutionary Guard, the elite sector of the Iranian military, held war games in the Hormuz Strait, a strategic part of the Persian Gulf oil route, in a move clearly designed to provoke the United States and demonstrate Iran’s fighting capabilities. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei accused the Obama administration of attempting to annihilate Iran with “implicit atomic threats”, revisions of its nuclear policy in the past couple of weeks, and American efforts to push for stronger UN sanctions against Iran to persuade Iran to end its nuclear program. Iran is looking for ways to weaken the US’s new nuclear policy by sending Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchechr Mottaki to Austria in the next few days to negotiate with the UN Security Council about the possibility of reaching a compromise on nuclear fuel that could allow Iran to continue nuclear research for the sole purpose of energy sources.

Since 2006, Iran has been holding military maneuvers, dubbed The Great Prophet, in the Persian Gulf, and Iranian TV news reports depicted Iranian air, naval and ground units in action recently at the war exercises. Iran’s leaders have said in the past that if attacked, the country would respond by shutting off the Strait of Hormuz, the mouth of the Gulf through which around 40 percent of the world’s oil and gas supplies pass, as well as by attacking American bases in the Gulf. Iranian military officials also announced new developments in their technology, but US authorities have responded with statements saying that the current war games “don’t seem out of the ordinary” and that Iran’s military capacities are being exaggerated by its leaders. The US Navy announced that there will be “no significant impacts” on the American fleets near the Persian Gulf.