US President Trump said that three Iranian nuclear facilities had been “completely cleared”. The world is paying attention to whether the situation between Iran and Israel will ease or become more serious after the US intervention. Chinese scholars said that Iran’s retaliation will depend on the assessment of the losses.
According to the First Financial Daily, Sun Degang, director of the Middle East Research Center of Fudan University, said that the protagonists of the previous conflict were Israel and Iran. After the US exits, the protagonists of the conflict will largely shift to the US and Iran. As the game between the two sides intensifies, the conflict may spill over and spread to a certain extent.
Sun Degang pointed out that the content of Trump’s speech shows that the goal of the US military action this time is to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities through limited strikes, rather than to overthrow Iran’s current regime. He said that as a populous country in the Middle East, if Iran falls into chaos and forces the United States to send ground troops, this does not meet Trump’s expectations. Trump made tough remarks after the airstrike, in essence, hoping to prevent Iran from taking further retaliatory actions through deterrence.
As for the follow-up of the situation in the Middle East, Sun Degang believes that it will depend on Iran’s assessment of the losses. If the nuclear facilities do not suffer too much damage, Iran may not escalate the conflict. After all, Iran has received advance warnings from the United States and can transfer relevant personnel and data.
He further analyzed that if Iran suffers heavy losses, Iran also has many “retaliation” options, including attacking US military bases in the Gulf region and even blocking the Strait of Hormuz. “Given the US military strength, Iran’s retaliation against the United States may be more cautious,” he said.
After Trump’s speech, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) wrote on social media: “Now, for us, the war has begun.” Iranian hard-line lawmaker Hamid Rasaei believes that Iran must respond strongly to the US bombing of Iran.
Trump said on the 21st that the US military has bombed three Iranian nuclear facilities, including Fordow, Natanz and Esfahan. This is the first time that the US has sent air forces to bomb major facilities in the country since the Iranian Revolution in 1979.
