Poverty is ravaging through the country. Many Iranians can’t afford to have three full meals in a day. Islamic Republic and its propaganda machine have been blaming US “maximum pressure” policy for all regime’s shortcomings in many years. Coronavirus hit the nation, many have died and many families have suffered through this ordeal on top of their other problems in the past 162 days! Regime launched a campaign trying to pressure US into lifting the crippling sanctions, but they didn’t because they saw through regime’s ruse.
That didn’t stop the regime from blaming everything on US, at least keeping some people who don’t have access to the truth on its side. In the meantime, however, Islamic Republic continued to launch a military satellite to orbit, sent weapons to Syria, Lebanon, Yemen and Iraq, continued to attack US bases in the region and made a replica of US Navy Nimitz-class aircraft carrier. These are just some examples of regime’s splurging Iranians’ money, worth billions of dollars!
Today, July 28, 2020, IRGC performed a military exercise in Strait of Hormuz, called Great Prophet 14, spending millions of dollars in weaponry, including cruise and ballistic missiles. It was broadcasting it live on national TV for propaganda purposes, of course, all to show “Islamic Republic will respond to any malign activity by the enemy”. There couldn’t have possibly been any military advantage or show of force in this war game because they even failed at sinking the mock-up US Navy warship which they had spent millions of dollars to build! The state-owned media announced IRGC receiving its data for this game from the Nour satellite!
However, this “exercise” which supposedly was to “deter enemies”, was strongly condemned by US military in the region. Central Command, CENTCOM, says IRGC launched “several ballistic missiles” at 5:30 AM local. “The United States condemns these irresponsible missile launches in the vicinity of a congested maritime shipping lane.” Three of those missiles landed near US bases in Qatar and UAE, causing them to be put on high alert.
Whatever the purpose of this war game was, it only showed the international community that Islamic Republic and IRGC could not be trusted with any more advanced weapons. US is doing its best to have the backing of other UNSC members to extend Islamic Republic’s arms embargo set to expire in October 2020.
On the other hand, people have to go to work, risk contracting the novel coronavirus and die of COVID-19 because according to Rouhani, Namaki and many other officials, quarantining or locking down epicenters is impossible “due to our economic situation and brutal sanctions by US.”
