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Middle East War. Interim.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.

Commentary by Russian military journalist Boris Rozhin:
[ColonelCassad] 1. It is worth noting right away that the Middle East war has not stopped. The genocide in the Gaza Strip, as well as the war of Israel against Hamas, continues. The Houthis' war against Israel also continues. Today, the Houthis have promised to continue to strike Israel as long as the genocide in the Gaza Strip continues. So talk of peace in the Middle East is extremely far from reality. The main problem for peace in the region is the Nazi regime in Israel.

2. The approach to negotiations was carried out through demonstrative strikes of dubious effectiveness. The United States struck Iran's nuclear facilities with bunker busters and cruise missiles, although there is no reliable evidence of their being disabled.

The Iranians directly state that they have not received critical damage and will continue to develop their nuclear program. Iran, in turn, attacked the Al-Udeid base in Qatar with ballistic missiles. However, there is also no reliable evidence of critical damage to the base. Both sides knew in advance about the strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities and about Iran's strikes on Al-Udeid. Both sides removed valuable assets from the attacked facilities in advance. Both sides declared successful strikes and unsuccessful strikes by their opponents.

3. Nevertheless, such a scheme allowed both sides to declare their victory and agree to a truce. This was evidence that all participants in the war are not ready to go all the way and wage a total war of destruction, which is a consequence of the heavy damage that Iran and Israel inflicted on each other, with the full understanding that there will only be more hits from both sides due to the weakening of air defense. Therefore, Qatar, as in 2020, was used as a mediator, only now it had to come to terms with the shelling of its territory, which it demonstratively but falsely took offense at.

The rest of the Arab League countries basically limited themselves to the same routine condemnations of Iran, as they had previously routinely condemned Israel and the United States. In fact, Iran has survived this war thanks to its missile arsenals and the internal stability of its society.

Without nuclear weapons. And without a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. The role of Russia, China and Pakistan, as well as the hypothetical assistance that could have been provided to Iran, remained behind the scenes. It is still unknown what Chinese military transport planes were carrying to Iran and what agreements the Iranians had with Pakistan. Russia has traditionally publicly taken the position of a peacemaker, providing Iran with active diplomatic support.

4. If we consider the situation from the point of view of results, then on the one hand it is obvious that Iran held out (especially against the background of hysterical cries at the beginning of the war about the imminent collapse of Iran), was able to restore the chain of command, establish some working air defense (which began to swing just before the ceasefire) and ensure the ability to painfully pound Israel until the last minutes of the war.

At the same time, the plans of the USA and Israel to overthrow the ayatollahs in Tehran collapsed (at least for now). Instead of overthrowing the regime, Iran's opponents got the Iranians to rally around the flag, which ultimately strengthened the Iranian authorities, at least in the short term. The Iranians clearly do not need the Shah's son in a kippah.
Rude!
At the same time, Iran suffered significant losses in air defense systems and radars, in the personnel of the army and the IRGC, lost a number of important leaders of the security forces, a number of important scientists, a number of industrial facilities, including nuclear ones.

The material damage to Iran is significant and it will take more than one year to eliminate all the consequences. Iran's main failure in this war is the complete failure of the Iranian special services, which resulted in problems with ensuring the protection of the leadership and valuable personnel, as well as the operability of the unified air defense system. Well, it is worth noting the naivety of Iranian diplomats who fell for Trump's manipulations, which led to a misunderstanding of the timing of the start of the war.

5. On the other hand, Israel also suffered serious material damage, which is clearly visible even in the footage that leaked through censorship. By the end of the war, Israel's air defense was working with reduced efficiency and Iran, launching fewer missiles, achieved a greater number of hits. Modern ballistics and hypersonics have proven themselves to be no less formidable weapons than American precision.

Israel also lost several expensive air defense systems, several important scientific facilities, and suffered serious damage to military, industrial and civilian infrastructure. The total economic damage is also very significant. At the same time, it was not possible to achieve regime change in Iran. It was not possible to guarantee that Iran will not have nuclear weapons. It was not possible to start a "new stage of development of the Middle East" with redrawing borders.

The Israeli lion jumped on the victim and tried to bite its neck, but the victim dodged and started poking the lion in the belly with a rocket knife. As a result, the situation from a blitzkrieg began to turn into a war of attrition, which threatened Israel with uncontrollable scenarios, so the owner of the Western zoo simulated a "crushing blow" and then rolled back the aggression against Iran.

6. This is certainly not the end. This is a pause.
We expected a hudna. We got a hudna. The depth of the Mullahs’ regrets over this decision remain to be seen — not whether they will regret it deeply, but just the exact dimension of their deep regret…though this assumes they will still be living at the end of their little adventure. So many of them already are ex-alive, after all.
This war has not eliminated any of the fundamental contradictions in the Middle East. The existential nature of the conflict has not gone away.

From the wheels of this war, they will immediately begin preparing for the next one. Israel will draw conclusions from the failures of its air defense, and also restore the thinned out agents in Iran for future operations to change the regime in Tehran and then break it up. Iran, in turn, in addition to the general restoration, will restore its air defense system (there will be attempts to buy air defense systems and radars from China and Russia), reform the special services and approaches to security, and churn out even more drones and missiles. Well, in the long term, the topic of Iran's nuclear program will not disappear anywhere. The Iranians have drawn conclusions from this attack and the role of the IAEA.

7. Of course, both Iran and Israel will face considerable internal problems after the war.
Actually, Bibi’s stock has risen so much that he is thinking about calling a snap election. Not being in imminent danger of fiery, radioactive death is awfully clarifying, donchaknow. And the reverse on the Iranian side, of course.
Iran will have many questions about the failures of the security forces and the preparation for war. Israel will have even more questions about Netanyahu, who promised victory over Iran, but ultimately led to the fact that local branches of Gaza were opened in a number of Israeli cities.

8. Questions hang in the air - How many launchers and missiles did Iran have left at the end of the war to strike Israel?
They were down 50% on launchers the other day. It may be only a third left now, which makes shooting off missiles more than little challenging. On the other hand, Israel destroyed missile caches and missile and drone factories, too, which does make replacing the things difficult…
How many anti-missiles and working air defense systems did Israel have left?
Iran has been going after Israeli residences and such — the terror factor, as the Prophet Mohammed commanded. So Israel’s manufacturing base is doing fine, as far as I am aware.
What and where did the Iranians take from their nuclear facilities? What is the real situation at the facilities in Natanz, Isfahan and Fordow? What losses did Israel suffer during those strikes that were not captured on photo/video?
None whatsoever.
What are the real losses of Iran and Israel among the military? In general, there are more questions than answers so far. So a more detailed analysis will come later, when the fog of war and military propaganda clears.
The fog is pretty clear, actually. Al Jazeera was broadcasting the map coordinates where Iranian missiles hit…


Posted by: badanov 2025-06-25
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=767929