“Look at the map very well. U.S. troops will complete their withdrawal from Iraq. There will be no American bases and American influence has declined even before they withdrew. This is a major event in the region with major implications for the future of the balance of power there. The decision to thwart the U.S. invasion of Iraq was taken weeks before it took place at a Syrian-Iranian summit in Tehran. The rest falls under details, including the role and passageways of the Jihadists. Look at the map very well. Take Iran and Iraq and put them in an alliance and integration. You would be looking at a large population mass, large oil reserves and military capabilities to be reckoned with. The mere alliance between Tehran and Baghdad sends an important message to the two countries' neighbors. Add to the two countries Syria's weight thanks to its position. And if you add Syria, you can also add Lebanon, whose position in this alliance was firmly established by the 2006 war, despite some Lebanese peculiarities. Faced with this alliance, Jordan will discover that it cannot be antagonistic to it. Jordan is well aware of the ability of both Iran and Syria to influence its stability, specifically through the Palestinian gateway. This is not to do with the Shiite Crescent, as much as it has to do with a big coup against old balances of power in the region. The ouster of Saddam Hussein's regime paved the way for such a coup that practically leads to marginalizing key Arab roles that thrived in the past decades. The success of the coup also requires marginalizing both the Israeli and the U.S. roles in the region. For this axis is practically capable of influencing the security of oil and Israel, or the two most important issues for the West in the region. Many diplomats and analysts misunderstood the objective of improving Syrian-Turkish ties to a strategic level. They thought that Assad was attempting to reposition himself halfway between Tehran and Ankara. But the truth is that the same grand scheme considers that attracting Turkey to strategic relations with the new axis would draw it away from NATO. And in the event Ankara joined this bloc, it would gain a vital area that contains a large population mass, oil wealth, water resources and military capability. This bloc overlooks many seas, and is able to influence beyond its borders. Then Russia would find such a bloc an opportunity to establish some kind of balance with U.S. presence in the region. I said that diplomats have misunderstood, because Syria's bonds with Iran are strong, deep and unbreakable. What intrigues me is that major countries in the region refuse to pay attention to and deal with the changes that have taken place. I fear we may be on course for a Sunni-Shiite conflict in the region as an alternative to the failure of the attempts to take Syria out of this axis through the so-called international rehabilitation of Syria”. I remembered these words which I heard two years ago. The reason is that the person in question who told me this is involved and engaged in this axis. Another reason is that reanalyzing some of the stances seen in past years show indeed that there has been an attempted coup, especially against the Saudi and Egyptian roles. Moreover, the Syrian-Turkish relations collapsed when the uprisings began in Syria, while Syrian-Iranian ties have proven to be solid, as though they involve shared paths and fates. The fourth reason is that the uprisings, upon calling for the downfall of the Syrian regime, have met with a grand plan in which decades-long efforts and funds have been invested, as well as military and intelligence spending, and painful and resounding blows were dealt. I remembered the words of my converser, as I was following the terrible scenes coming from Syria. What is happening is the most serious episode of the Arab Spring. At the same time, it is a civil and regional war. Furthermore, any success in taking Syria out of the Resistance Axis would signify a major coup, or at least a major chapter in the coup against the coup.
