Amphibious Ready Groups are already in the lead to rehearse major operations, apparently to implement naval blockade. Interestingly, Russia and Chinese Navy has not been noticed to help Iranian oil tankers to pass through, despite the fact that two weeks back Iran-Russia-China carried out trilateral joint Naval exercise (27 – 31 December 2019) to secure same communication routes. Chinese and Russian destroyer, frigate and submarine as well as rescue ships are all gone. It can be perceived that movement of US Navy in Pacific and Indian Ocean and stationing of Navy ships along the lanes are stretched to counter Iran.

Apparently, after the US drawdown from some strategic locations is indicating that US has no plans to oppose China. This can also be realized from the fact that a high-level Chinese delegation is all set to reach Washington in a week or so to ink US-China trade agreement, “Phase One”. White House will witness signing of “Phase Two” later this year. After the agreement, American companies would have free access to Chinese marks. Interestingly, there was a unilaterally announcement from President Trump that Chinese delegation would reach US on 15 January 2020. No one should be now surprised that Washington had been contributing huge funds in Africa to make Chinese a competitor and power everywhere.

If we re-examine President Trump’s tweet, “We took action last night to stop a war… America does not seek regime change in Iran,” is reflective that Washington is in the possession of good number of Iranian loyalties as a “Trump Card”. The Naval presence near the Arabian Gulf and around and movement of aircraft carriers in Indian Ocean is not for the Chinese or Russian but to create a security situation where any breach post provocation by Tehran would compel US difficult to honour the Tweet. In fact, when Major General Qassem Soleimani was being awarded Order of Zulfiqar, which was also awarded to Shah Mohamed Reza Pahlavi, things should have been visualized at that stage. March last year, Islamic scholars in were told that if Iranian military was unable to prevent the government from being overthrown then officials would bring in militia groups to protect the regime.