Iran’s air defense chief Gen. Farzad Esmaili boasted Tuesday, Nov. 12, that the ongoing military exercise was “a strong slap to those countries that threaten [us].” debkafile: Tehran's six-day air defense drill is its answer to the joint US-Israeli maneuver for practicing defenses against an Iranian or Syrian ballistic missile attack on Israel. Patriot anti-missile launches from Palmachim Monday tested US-Israel ability to lock onto Iranian cruise missiles coming from the Mediterranean aboard Iranian military or civilian vessels or Hizballah speedboats.

Special operations units of the Iranian army and Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) Tuesday, May 14, began a two-day practice of offensive tactics, for the first time dropping large-scale forces from the air deep behind enemy lines. The many war games Iran has conducted until now focused on defenses of strategic and nuclear locations and repelling invaders. It began on the same day as the US-led multination nation special forces exercise in Jordan and was staged deliberately near the Afghan border.

The US, Israel and Iran embarked on significant military steps Tuesday, May 1, refuting certain US media reports of a lessening in war tensions over Iran: Shortly after Israel launched a big war exercise on its northern borders with Syria and Lebanon, Iran’s border guards initiated naval drills along its southern coast where nuclear facilities, Revolutionary Guards bases and oilfields are situated.  The United States disclosed that the first phase of its anti-Iran missile defense network for protecting Europe was complete.

Some 20,000 marines, seamen and air crews from six countries, a US nuclear aircraft carrier strike group and three US Marine gunship carriers are practicing an attack on a fictitious mechanized enemy division which has invaded its neighbor in the largest amphibian exercise seen in the West for a decade. "Bold Alligator 2012" simulates an Iranian invasion and a marine landing on the Iranian coast. debkafile: It is the prelude to the stationing of this aircraft carrier and marine force opposite Iran.

US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has been outspoken about a possible Israeli offensive being launched against Iran from April, but has not leveled about massive US war preparations. The question is no longer if armed hostilities are afoot, but when. Tehran too is gearing up with a new three-week "exercise" and calling allies to the flag, including Syria. There, the appalling bloodbath has reached a scale – 350 Saturday, Feb. 4 alone – which potentially rivals nuclear Iran as the trigger for a Middle East confrontation.

Iran's big war game was launched Monday, June 27 ahead of a Turkish operation against Syria's Assad regime anticipated by its military and Revolutionary Guards chiefs, with the unveiling of its first underground missile silo. debkafile reports Tehran expects the Turkish army to have US air and naval support in case of Iranian reprisals against them both. Israel moves an Iron Dome rocket interceptor battery to Haifa.

Despite Iranian claims in October that their nuclear systems were cleansed of the Stuxnet virus, debkafile's intelligence and Iranian sources confirm that the invasive malworm is still making trouble. It shut down uranium enrichment at Natanz for a week from Nov. 16 to 22 over breakdowns caused by mysterious power fluctuations in the operation of the centrifuge machines.  Stuxnet is also on the march inside Iran's military systems, sowing damage and disorder in its wake.

The first of 9,000 incoming US troops have arrived in Israel – not just for the joint Austere Challenge 12 exercise but for a longer stay. They are part of the joint US-Israel deployment ready for a military engagement with Iran and its possible escalation into a regional conflict.  A US aircraft carrier will soon dock in Israel for joint missions with the Israeli Air Force. Most of the US arrivals are airmen, missile interceptor teams, marines, seamen, technicians and intelligence officers.