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There are clear signs that a significant American military
build-up is under way, not only on Diego Garcia—which now hosts perhaps a
third of all American B-2s as well as six refuelling tankers—but also
in the Middle East itself. The Pentagon has ordered one aircraft-carrier
strike group to stay in the region and has dispatched another to join
it. It has also sent Patriot and THAAD missile-defence batteries from
Asia. Avi Scharf, the national-security editor at Haaretz, an Israeli newspaper, who regularly reports on aircraft movements using open sources,
writes
that flights by American military transport planes were 50% higher in March than the previous monthly peak.
On April 2nd General Michael Erik Kurilla, the commander of
America’s Central Command (CENTCOM), which has responsibility for the
Middle East, visited Israel for talks, which presumably covered how all
these forces might be used. As we explained in
a recent briefing,
Israel’s foreign and security policy is going through a period
of extraordinary ambition. Israel has reinvaded Gaza, threatening to
permanently annex territory there, has broken a ceasefire in Lebanon and
has attacked targets in Syria, in part to deter Turkey from
establishing a presence in that country. Last week Israeli ground forces
moved deeper into Syria, beyond a previously defined buffer zone.
My colleagues describe all this as “an unbridled assertion of
power”, one aimed at “regional hegemony”. They report that Israel’s
government is lobbying Mr Trump to support air strikes against Iran’s
nuclear programme, which has
expanded dramatically
over the past year—though, as America’s director of national
intelligence confirmed on March 25th, the regime has not yet decided to
build a nuclear bomb.
There is still room for diplomacy. Last month Mr Trump sent a
letter to Iran’s leaders, who are thought to have responded indirectly.
“Our signal to Iran is ‘let’s sit down and see if we can, through
dialogue, through diplomacy, get to the right place,’” said Steve
Witkoff, Mr Trump’s envoy to the Middle East (and to Russia). The
problem is the chasm between American and Iranian expectations.
American officials want Iran not only to roll back its nuclear
programme, but also to make big concessions on its development of
ballistic missiles and its aid to armed groups in the region, such as
Hizbullah. Iran’s leaders, though bruised by the experience of the past
18 months, are in no mood for capitulation. European officials are
privately sceptical that any deal can be done on these terms. They say
the risk of a strike is growing.
They also say that Israel would probably need American help to
do lasting damage. One reason is that only American heavy
bombers—specifically, the B-2—can carry the GBU-57, known as the Massive
Ordnance Penetrator, necessary to penetrate sufficiently deeply to
threaten Iran’s buried nuclear sites. In theory Israel could drop these
from cargo planes; in practice it would be risky to take such aircraft
near even Iran’s air defences, depleted as they are.
On March 30th Mr Trump openly threatened to attack: “If they
don’t make a deal, there will be bombing. It will be bombing the likes
of which they have never seen before.” Mr Trump has good reason to hold
back. Many in his administration, including J.D. Vance, the
vice-president, want America to extricate itself from the Middle East,
rather than start a war which could engulf the region and destabilise a
global economy, which is already teetering from Mr Trump’s tariffs. The
clock is now ticking. And Israel could yet move ahead itself. American
intelligence agencies believe that Israel is likely to act within six
months.
Speaking of spies, America’s intelligence community is going
through yet another shock. On April 3rd Laura Loomer, a far-right
conspiracy theorist who has said that 9/11 was an inside job, persuaded
Mr Trump to fire not only several officials in the national security
council, but also General Tim Haugh, the director of the National
Security Agency, the country’s signals-intelligence service and by far
America’s largest and most important spy agency. This will add to the
concerns that I outlined a couple of weeks ago: that American
intelligence agencies might be politicised, their intelligence distorted
and their workforce demoralised, with
serious implications
for America’s allies in the Five Eyes pact. |