WarSclerotic

In face of rising tensions with Iran, Israel will participate – for the first time – in the biennial Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) multinational naval exercise led by the US 3rd fleet off of the coast of Hawaii and Southern California later this month.

RIMPAC, the world’s largest international maritime exercise, will be be held from June 27 to August 2nd and will see the participation of 26 nations, 47 surface ships, five submarines, 18 national land forces, and more than 200 aircraft and 25,000 personnel.

With the theme of RIMPAC 2018 being “Capable Adaptive Partners,” the drill will work to increase multi-national cooperation and trust as well as enhance interoperability of troops.

Israel will be joining other first-time participants Brazil, Sri Lanka and Vietnam.

Other countries participating in RIMPAC 2018 are Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Colombia, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Peru, South Korea, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Tonga and the United Kingdom.

China was uninvited from participating due to its ongoing militarization of the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea.

According to the US Navy RIMPAC will focus on a wide range of capabilities “critical to ensuring the safety of sea lanes and security on the world’s oceans” with drills ranging from disaster relief to counter-piracy, mine clearance operations, air defense exercises to complex maritime warfare.

“Participating nations and forces will exercise a wide range of capabilities and demonstrate the inherent flexibility of maritime forces,” read a statement released by the US 3rd fleet.

“These capabilities range from disaster relief and maritime security operations to sea control and complex warfighting. The relevant, realistic training program includes amphibious operations, gunnery, missile, anti-submarine and air defense exercises, as well as counter-piracy operations, mine clearance operations, explosive ordnance disposal, and diving and salvage operations.”

The combined live field training exercise will included tactical level and limited operational level training and will feature live firing of a Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) from a US Air Force aircraft, surface to ship missiles by the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force, and a Naval Strike Missile (NSM) from a launcher on the back of a Palletized Load System (PLS) by the US Army.

While Israel’s Navy is relatively small compared to other IDF corps it has a significant amount of territory to protect since the expansion of the country’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) from 40 miles to 150 miles four years ago.

Israel regularly participates in naval exercises with the United States such as the trilateral Noble Dina exercise between the US, Israeli and Greek navies as well as a joint IDF Special Forces and US Marines military exercise in the Negev Desert dubbed ‘Noble Shirley,’ which involved special units from the Israeli Air Force, Navy and ground forces.

Israeli Navy’s Salvage and Underwater Missions Unit also held a wide-ranging two-week drill in Haifa dubbed “Noble Melinda” with its counterparts from the US and France where the three navies drilled on scenarios involving naval mines, underwater demolitions and sea-based terror attacks.

“Israel denies reports that an understanding has been reached,” a diplomatic source said on Saturday.

The source added that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had spoken last week with both Russian President Vladimir Putin and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo about Syria and Iran.

Netanyahu “emphasized that Iran must withdraw from all of Syria and that Israel would continue to maintain its freedom to act against Iranian military entrenchment anywhere in Syria,” the source said.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moualem said that an agreement on southern Syria must include a US withdrawal of its forces from the Tanf base in the south.

He added that Damascus had not engaged in talks over the country’s southern region.

“Do not believe any statements that talk about agreements in the south unless you see the United States withdraw its forces from Tanf base.

It must withdraw its forces from Tanf base. This is Syrian land and there is no doubt of Syria’s sovereignty over it,” Moualem said.

Russia has already called for all foreign forces to leave Syria.

On Friday, the London-based Arabic newspaper Asharq al-Awasat reported that Israel and Russia had agreed to keep Iran out of southern Syria.

Just one day earlier, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it had seen a Russia-backed plan to return government forces to the country’s border areas with Israel and Jordan. It further reported that Iran and its proxy forces, such as Hezbollah, were preparing to withdraw from southern Syria.

Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman, who visited Moscow briefly on Thursday to meet with his Russian counterpart Sergei Shoigu, said that he felt that Israel’s security concerns were understood.

At the UN on Friday, Russian Ambassador Vasily Nebenzya indicated that an agreement had been reached with regard to southern Syria.

“I heard news that were in the press and elsewhere about an agreement reached on certain disengagement in the southwest of Syria and I think my understanding is that the agreement was reached. Whether it has been implemented as of now I cannot answer, but I understand that the parties that were involved in reaching the agreement are satisfied with what they reached,” he said, according to the Russian media site TASS.

“If it has not been done by now, it will be done in the near future,” he added.

The Syrian government wants to recapture insurgent territory in the southwest through a settlement in which fighters accept state rule or leave.

Southwest Syria, near the borders with Jordan and Israel, remains one of the big chunks of Syria still outside the control of the state, which has recovered swathes of the country with the help of Russian jets and Iran-backed militias.

Rebel factions hold stretches of Quneitra and Deraa provinces in the southwest, bordering the Golan Heights, while Syrian army troops and allied forces control nearby territory.

Moualem said Damascus had communicated with the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) but no negotiation process had started over the fate of their territory in the north and east.

He added that Raqqa city, which the Kurdish-led SDF militias seized from Islamic State with US support, “must be rebuilt and liberated” from any foreign presence.

Syrian government forces, in their strongest position since the early months of the seven-year conflict, have driven rebels out of all territory near Damascus this year.

For weeks there have been reports that the government’s next target would be the zone in the south, one of only two large areas left in the hands of fighters seeking to topple President Bashar Assad.

Washington says any offensive in the area would violate a cease-fire it has jointly sponsored with Moscow for that part of Syria, and has warned it would take “firm measures” in response.

The secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Ali Shamkhani, told the Shargh daily that his country had no military advisers in southern Syria.

“We have said before that Iranian military advisers are not present in southern Syria and have not participated in recent operations,” Shamkhani said.

“We strongly support Russian efforts to drive terrorists out of the Syria-Jordan border and to bring the area under Syrian army control,” he added

Jens Stoltenberg, the head of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), told a German media outlet on Saturday
that NATO would not side with Israel in the event that the Islamic Republic of Iran attacks the Jewish state..

The NATO chief told Der Spiegel magazine that “the security guarantee [of NATO] does not apply to Israel” because the Jewish state
is not a member of the 29 country alliance.

In response to the Stoltenberg’s announcement, the German Green Party politician and former head of the German-Israel parliamentary group in the Bundestag, Volker Beck, asked on Twitter: “That raises the question. What does this clarification mean for the security dialogue between NATO, EU, Germany and Israel? It points to at least very different starting points and positions of interest.”

Tensions between Israel and Iran have escalated in recent months, with Israel striking Iranian military bases in Syria, including in a May 8 attack that reportedly left 9 Iranian military personnel dead.

Stoltenberg’s statement comes despite growing cooperation between Israeli and the NATO alliance, including Israel’s participation in a joint naval exercise in late May. Earlier Israel-NATO joint naval and air force exercises took place in December.

Israel’s relationship with NATO is defined as a “partnership,” and the country has been a member of NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue since it was initiated in 1994, along with six other non-NATO Mediterranean countries: Jordan, Algeria, Egypt, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia. The goal of the group is to enable dialogue and cooperation on security and counterterrorism issues.

However, Turkey, a member of NATO since 1952, objected to Israel’s cooperation as part of the Mediterranean Dialogue since Israeli-Turkish ties soured six years ago.

Following a Turkish-Israeli reconciliation in 2016, Ankara withdrew its longstanding veto against Israel being accepted as a partner nation to the organization, and Jerusalem opened its first ever diplomatic mission to NATO headquarters in Brussels.

In the face of Russia’s growing military presence in the eastern Mediterranean, especially in Syria, NATO’s strategic interest in the region is increasing — as is Israel’s importance to the alliance.

BERLIN – The US military has held preliminary discussions about moving a powerful missile defense system to Germany to boost European defenses, according to two sources familiar with the issue, a move that experts said could trigger fresh tensions with Moscow.

The tentative proposal to send the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system to Europe predates US President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the 2015 Iran nuclear accord, and comes amid a broader push to strengthen Europe’s air and missile defenses.

While Europe and the United States are at odds over the fate of the nuclear agreement, they share concerns about Iran’s continued development of ballistic missiles.

Iran’s Shahab 3 missiles can already travel 2,000 km, enough to reach southern Europe, and its Revolutionary Guards have said they will increase the range if threatened since the range is capped by strategic doctrine, not technology constraints.

US European Command has been pushing for a THAAD system in Europe for years, but the US withdrawal from the Iran nuclear accord has added urgency to the issue, said Riki Ellison, head of the non-profit Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance.

A senior German military official cited the need to add more radars across Europe to better track and monitor potential threats, and cue interceptors if needed.

The US Defense Dept said no such action had been decided.

“There are currently no plans to station THAAD systems in Germany. We do not discuss potential future military planning, as we would not want to signal our intent to potential adversaries. Germany remains among our closest partners and strongest allies,” said Pentagon spokesman Eric Pahon.

Deploying another US defensive system to Europe could reassure NATO allies in southern Europe already within striking range of Iran’s missiles, said one military official from that region.

Talk of deploying a THAAD system in Europe also comes against the backdrop of rising tensions between the West and Russia.

NATO has long insisted that its missile defense program is not directed at Russia, but the alliance has adopted a tougher tone toward Moscow in the wake of the poisoning of a Russian former spy in England.

Moscow denies any involvement in the poisoning, and blames the tensions on NATO’s military expansion eastward, and its assembly of a ballistic missile shield with a key site in Romania that was declared combat-ready in 2016.

Moving THAAD to Germany could plug a radar gap caused by a two-year delay in completion of a second Aegis Ashore missile defense site in Poland that was initially due to open this year.

The issue may be raised in a new Pentagon missile defense review expected in early June.

The review may draw a closer connection between missile defense and a need to deter Russia that was highlighted in the new US national defense strategy, said Tom Karako, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

MESSAGE TO EUROPEAN ALLIES

One US military official said there had been preliminary talks with German military officials on moving a THAAD system to Ramstein Air Base in Germany, headquarters for the US Air Force in Europe and NATO Allied Air Command.

“It would be a further political message to the Europeans that we’re serious about protecting our allies,” said the official. “The initial assessment is that Germany would very likely not have a problem with a THAAD deployment,”

US General Curtis Scaparrotti, head of US European Command, last week said he was seeking more troops and equipment to deter Russia, but declined further comment.

A second source said German officials were open to the move as a way to better protect civilian populations.

The German defense ministry is working to rebuild its own short- and medium-range missile defenses after years of cuts.

Starting later this year, it also plans to review territorial missile defense needs in a conceptual study that will also look at THAAD and the Arrow 3 anti-missile system built by Israel and the United States, a spokesman said.

The German foreign ministry, which oversees foreign troops stationed in Germany, said it could not confirm sending any signals about a possible THAAD deployment to the United States.

Washington does not need Germany’s permission to move such equipment under existing basing contracts, but the sources said a formal notification would be sent before any move to proceed.

The THAAD system is built by Lockheed Martin Corp with a powerful Raytheon Co AN/TPY-2 radar, to shoot down short-, medium-, and intermediate-range ballistic missiles.

WASHINGTON — When the Trump administration demanded a UN Security Council vote on Friday meant to counteract a Kuwaiti resolution condemning Israel, the Israelis saw the birth of a new diplomatic strategy that it hopes becomes the norm.

Under the plan, Israel would no longer face hostile votes at the council without the US counter-punching, demanding a vote on language that calls out “the hypocrisy of the council,” Danny Danon, Israel’s ambassador to the UN, told The Jerusalem Post on Friday.

“This is changing the rules of the game — we are now on the offense,” Danon said. “Its the beginning of a new strategy and of new rules.”

The US vetoed Kuwait’s resolution, in the works for weeks, in a Friday afternoon vote, alongside abstentions from the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Poland and Ethiopia. Israel was pleased with the extent of opposition to the measure, and considers the tally a mark of progress, although Israeli officials expressed concern with France’s vote in favor.

“The final text is certainly not perfect– we would have liked it to establish clearly Hamas’ responsibility, and condemn the rocket launches against Israel,” said France’s envoy, Francois Delattre. “But the deep consultations in recent weeks led to significant improvements.”

The Kuwaiti proposal called for “international protection” for Palestinians in Gaza, and declined to mention the role of Hamas in governing the coastal strip. The US measure would have condemned Hamas as a terrorist organization and for its recent firing of over 70 rockets onto Israeli territory, but it too failed, only receiving one vote – from the US itself – in its favor.

“When the United Nations sides with terrorists over Israel, as the Kuwait resolution does, it only makes a peaceful resolution to this conflict harder to reach,” Haley said, explaining the US veto. “It is resolutions like this one that undermine the UN’s credibility in dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”

Haley said she was offering members an alternative in the form of a resolution that explicitly condemns Hamas for its “grip” on Gaza. “There is an alternative,” she said. “This resolution rightly brings responsibility where it belongs.”

It is that alternative that has sparked hope in the Israeli team that a new strategy has taken shape.

“From now on, whenever there’s going to be a resolution like this condemning Israel, it won’t be just a US veto that follows,” Danon said. “There will be a proactive effort to expose the hypocrisy of the council.”