The regime has, in fact, increased its efforts to turn Iraq and Syria into satellite states by attacking or threatening U.S. related targets in both countries, and reinforcing its proxy forces in the Middle East.

Leaders of Iran, Turkey, and Russia, attended a three-state summit in Tehran regarding the Syrian war, where Iranian president Hassan Rouhani openly stated that Iran was seeking the ouster of the US military from Syria.

Rouhani told reporters, “We have to force the United States to leave (Syria).” He also warned that the U.S. and Israel have realized “they will not reach their objectives,” He repeated his demand that the U.S. immediately withdraw its forces from Syria.

According to Rouhani, the “fires of war and bloodshed” in the country have reached their end, although in the meantime, a pro-Assad coalition appeared to be preparing an assault on the American garrison in the At Tanf area on the Syrian Iraqi border.

In an effort to prevent Iran from establishing a land bridge that reaches from the Iranian border in Nineveh Province in Iraq up to the Israeli border on the Golan Heights, the U.S. keeps a presence on the Iraqi Syrian border.

Last week, the Russian military warned the Trump Administration that it is ready to support an offensive by the Iranian-backed Syrian army against the US military at the At Tanf base east of Deir az-Zur in Syria. The Pentagon decided to reinforce the Special Forces in At-Tanf and send another 100 Marines to the base, to face the Iranian and Russian threats.

The Pentagon has also reinforced its forces in the Kurdish-controlled region in southeast Syria by sending a 150-vehicle convoy from Iraq to what is called Rojava by the Syrian Kurds.

Assailants targeted the US embassy in the Green Zone in Baghdad on Friday, firing three mortar shells which caused no casualties. On Saturday, a missile attack on the American consulate at the airport of Basra followed.

Basra is home to a large Shiite militia that is part of the Iranian backed Hashd al-Shaabi umbrella organization of predominantly Shiite militias in Iraq, who issued a statement warning foreign “invaders” that it would “expel” them from Iraqi soil, last Wednesday.

The statement said, “Our patience has run out with the unjustified presence of foreign troops still deployed in Iraq,” and added that Hashd al-Shaabi regards “these troops as occupying forces and will use all legitimate means at our disposal to expel them.”

In Iraq, Iran’s Shiite allies urged Haider al-Abadi, the US-backed Prime Minister of Iraq, to step down, as well as to apologize to the Iraqi people over his role in the devastating humanitarian crisis in southern Iraq.

They blame the crisis on al-Abadi, but the people of the Basra region hold Iran accountable, as the unrest in Basra was sparked by the Islamic Republic suddenly halting its electricity supply and by aggravating a severe water shortage in southern Iraq.

Iran attacked a Kurdish base belonging to the Democratic Party (DPKI) of Iranian Kurdistan in northern Iraq on Saturday, launching missiles from Urmia, an Iranian city 200 kilometers from the base in the Kurdish autonomous region in northern Iraq. A dozen DPKI fighters were killed in the assault.

Iran also attempted to supply weapons to its Yemenite proxy — the Houthis. The US central command in the Middle East, Centcom, later announced the USS Jason Dunham, a guided missile destroyer, had seized 2,521 AK-47 rifles on a stateless ship floating in the Gulf of Aden. Centcom issued a statement saying that the rifles “plausibly derive from Iranian stockpiles, according to Conflict Armament.”

What is evident, is that even with crippling sanctions looming, that Iranian Regime has not changed its nature. The Iranian people have been calling for regime change, and this seems possible at this time, as there is an Organized Resistance. Appeasement with Tehran means more disaster for the world. Support for the Iranian people in their quest for a democratic government will bring peace, instead.