By General Monzer El Ayoubi
Translation: Dr Pierre A. Sarkis
In an overall view of what is happening on the planet’s surface, whether it is about thought, data and information, or against the background of historical readings of the course of wars and events, and also a voluntary or involuntary vision with its source being inevitably reason, there is in its content a mixture of religions and ideologies, and perhaps the creation of dreams and nightmares. There is also a pipe dream and nightmare, but in its entirety, it leads with logic and induction to possible expectations far from impossible, as long as the conflict between good and evil is raging and has not stopped since the beginning of time.
Assembling the puzzle pieces leads to more than one possibility, which requires not to have blurred vision, flipping it to several facets to give different images, but in its totality and sequence is a three-dimensional mechanism leading to an outcome, such as, Rubik Cube’s, or the magic cube.
From the foregoing, much can be read for facts on the planet are accumulating and becoming crowded, and in its recent heated and detailed development is the Russian military operation in Ukraine, in its deep background a decision not to lure, greater than an invasion but less than a third world war. It is a confrontation between the US on one side and the Russian Federation on the other, with NATO being the military arm of the former, with its common theater until now, the former Soviet Eastern Europe.
Next, a series of questions are raised of the kind of concerns, not anticipation, of the possibilities of geographical expansion with the subsequent need to use tactical nuclear weapons, with a limited dose of destruction aimed at enhancing the characteristics of the battlefield, some of which are:
1- Will US-European or NATO support for the Ukrainian Army remain within the defense framework? Such weapons are anti-aircraft missiles Stinger FIM-92 “the biting” and the anti-armor FGM-148 Javelin or “spear” which are packages unable to overturn the scales of the battle.
2- Will the attention shift and the conflict moves from the Middle-East to Europe? This would point to a long war of attrition which later develops into organized chaos in which religious, economic and geopolitical factors overlap and fall into the category of a simple division in strategic terms between Russia, the US and China and those falling into their orbits, including countries, blocs and alliances.
3- Over the horizon appear signs of Russian-American quid pro quo of influence in some Latin American countries “while retaining the investment factor”, Venezuela for example, in exchange for Russian influence in Eastern Europe, and Chinese influence in Taiwan, the South China Sea in Eastern Asia, which means a US retreat from the vital triangle of Turkey, Iraq and Syria as part of the equation of dividing economic yields, pending the “cheese mold” the reconstruction of Syria.
4- Will the renewal of the nuclear deal with Iran be a gateway to regional stability? This will be amid the recognition and agreement between the two world powers, the US and Russia, to share influence in the volatile region between Iran, Turkey and Israel. Will the deal include tiny Lebanon? This would implicate a freeze on the regional role of Hizbollah’s weapons within a kind of equation of similar, to a long-term truce of the balance of terror or power.
In the same context, a set of expectations can be approached in the next phase:
1- The extraction of gas from the Eastern Mediterranean will be carried out by consensus, not clash: the Israeli gas fields within US guarantee; the Lebanese fields within the lines of French and Syrian containment under the Russian umbrella.
2- The gathering of volunteers to form the so-called international corps of foreigners to fight with the Ukrainian Army, as well as, the summoning of Russian Wagner groups, Chechen mercenaries and Arabs who participated in the Syrian war and are experienced in combat in support of the Russian army, reflects the intentions and should these groups slip from Russian grip, it could turn the conflict into organized sabotage, becoming a religious one between groups of Orthodox Christians and Jihadist Muslims who have easily set foot on European soil.
3- The Washington-London Axis is politically and economically far to a certain extent from the Paris-Berlin Axis, even if it borrowed its European mantle. Thus, the frost of Europe can only be warmed up by Russian gas and the wheels of its economy will not move except with Siberian energy sources.
4- Arab normalization with the Israeli enemy is on its way, and the time factor will push for its consolidation, directly or indirectly.
5- Opening Israel’s doors to Jewish refugees fleeing the Ukraine’s inferno will be a boost to the demographic reality of the occupied entity.
6- The Lebanese Federation may be one of the hastily drawn images of stability, while keeping Palestinian refugees and displaced Syrians as a guillotine to be used when necessary.
On the other hand, it is not easy to dismantle the contract, as there is no utopia in the geopolitical interests of states, and the implementation of strategies may sometimes require cutting them… The conviction of the Russian leadership is that it will not face a strategic failure, even if losses become expensive and sanctions are increased, for Western and NATO focus is to prevent an easy victory for President Putin where he reaps its benefits. If the invasion produces enormous geopolitical changes, it will weigh or consider the moral concepts and human consequences. The fear is that President Putin will assimilate himself with Alexander the Great when the latter did not find both ends of the rope to solve the “Gordian Knot”, and ended up cutting it with his sword, and the missile “Devil 2” SARMAT RS28, the blade of the Russian sword.
Beirut, 09/03/2022
Scholar in Security and Strategic Affairs
Note: legend has it that the people of “Phrygia” were without a legitimate king and the oracle predicted that a man will enter the city on a cart pulled by a bull and would be declared king by the priests, and this is what happened. Then the cart was presented to the God of the city “Zeus”, who then tied it to the door of the palace of Gordium, with a knot from which neither end of the rope stood out. When Alexander the Great entered Gordium, he tried to solve the knot called “ The Gordian Knot” and when he could not find both sides of the rope, he cut it with his sword. Later, the oracle predicted that whoever solves the knot would be the conqueror of Asia, and Alexander the Great conquered Asia reaching the Indus River.
