Rising tensions in the Middle East

Speaker 1: Welcome to The World of Intelligence, a podcast for you to discover the latest analysis of global military and security trends within the open source defense intelligence community. Now, onto the episode with your host, Harry Kemsley.

Harry Kemsley: Hello and welcome to this edition of World of Intelligence by Janes with me, Harry Kemsley, as your host and my co- host, Sean Corbett. Hello, Sean.

Sean Corbett: inaudible.

Harry Kemsley: Sean, we've spoken about situations, various, actually in and around the Middle East. We've talked about how open source can be sometimes the only source of an understanding what might be happening in that part of the world as well as elsewhere. But, of course, recent events in the Middle East have brought that area very much back into focus, sharply into focus. And I know that you've wanted to have this conversation since events started to emerge over the last week or so. So what's been on your mind, Sean? What do we need to discuss this morning?

Sean Corbett: Yeah. Thanks, Harry. I thought it was important that we revisit the events following the events recently in the Middle East and Levant. We've been, as you say, watching them for some time now, and previous episodes have covered, I guess, you call it tactical events with strategic consequences, but actually it's all getting pretty strategic now. We've been trying to focus on predictive intelligence, which we're going to do again, but we've had that continuity, so I thought it'd be really good time to revisit it, particularly as the time of going to print. We're expecting some imminent reactions to the actions that occurred over the last few days.

Harry Kemsley: Yeah, indeed.

Sean Corbett: Are we going to see serious escalations? We've seen events unfold of huge potential for belligerence, I'll use that term advisedly, to step into open warfare on several fronts. Now, there's a lot of rhetoric out there and you will get as many views as there are people. So I think we need to just have a look at it from a very objective ocean perspective, which is exactly what we're here to do. So before we go into that, it might be worth just recapping with one of our many experts actually-

Harry Kemsley: Yeah, let me do that.

Sean Corbett: ...to see what's happening.

Harry Kemsley: Let me first of all introduce the subject matter experts, a couple of which have been on podcast before. A couple of new colleagues here from Janes. So first of all, Elliot Chapman. Hello, Elliot.

Elliot Chapman: Hi, Harry. Hi, Sean. Thanks very much for having me. Yeah, as you said, my name is Elliot Chapman. I'm a senior analyst on the Middle East Desk in the Janes Country Intelligence Department, so it's a pleasure to be back. Thanks.

Harry Kemsley: Yeah, thanks for coming back and joining us again, Elliot. Anant, good morning to you.

Anant Venkatesh: Hi. Good morning, Harry and Sean. Pleasure to be here. My name is Anant Venkatesh. I am a senior research analyst for the Janes Country Intelligence team, and I look after Iran, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia.

Harry Kemsley: Perfect. Thank you, Anant. Siraj, good day to you.

Suraj: Hi, Harry and Sean. Pleasure to be here. I'm a research analyst for the Middle East and North Africa desk for the Country Intelligence team looking at Syria and Lebanon.

Harry Kemsley: Very good and very pertinent for both of you. And then last, but not the least, James, good day to you again.

James Trigg: Good morning, Harry. Good morning, Sean. Thank you for having me back. Yes, my name is James Trigg. I'm a senior research analyst with the Janes Country Intelligence Team. For the purpose of this conversation, my main focus is Yemen and the Red Sea.

Harry Kemsley: Perfect. All right, James, then let's capture quickly what's different this time. We've had this kind of conversations before. What's different? Let me come to you first, Elliot, in terms of what is going on and what makes it different. As Sean said in his introduction, tactical events that become strategic, but perhaps now things are becoming increasingly strategic. So what's going on?

Elliot Chapman: Yeah. I think on potentially the eve of these huge explosion of events, it's also important. Actually, flip it on its head and say that in many respects things are still the same as they have been for several months now. If we start in Gaza, that conflict is looking like there's very little opportunity for any kind of short to immediate term off ramp. The type of conflict that's going on there looks like it's going to be dragging on, if not at the current intensity, but at least in terms of similar types of operations that we're seeing for the foreseeable future. And Israel's indicated its willingness to stay in Gaza for a long, long time. So that's got the potential to carry on for the long term. And then at the same time, we look to sort of Israel's north with its conflicts with Hezbollah, and Siraj will go into greater detail on this later on in the conversation. But we've seen that the dynamics there, although they've expanded, they remain the same. There is essentially an attritional war that's been going on for almost 10 months now between the two sides. But gradually, things have become increasingly more severe. And this has culminated in events the last couple of weeks with an attack in Majdal Shams in Northern Israel in the Golan that led to death of 12 civilians including lots of kids. And then that brings us through to the highest level of tensions now in the conflict, which really is a multinational regional conflict to this stage, I'd say in my opinion, rather than just these bilateral disagreements that are going on. So I'd say that all is happening within this context that actually the various actors are also limited by their willingness to engage in a full scale of war, but also sometimes with their capabilities of actually conducting potentially what they would like to achieve. So there's limits to ambition in technical and also along the lines of willingness to go into a large war as well. So there's this ratcheting up, I guess, in summary ratcheting up, but ultimately within constraints of a conflict as well.

Harry Kemsley: Would it be fair to say before I come to you in just a second, Anant, in terms of the Tehran perspective on this? Would it be fair, Elliot, to say that what we're seeing here is that as the tension is rising, as the temperature is rising, the potential for a mistake, a miscalculation to have exactly the wrong outcome is increasing? Is that really what we're seeing is that we're adding fuel to an existing very combustible environment?

Elliot Chapman: Yeah. I think to go back to that event again in Majdal Shams recently, that appears to have been a mistake. No side taking responsibility for no actor taking responsibility for that. And this has caused this enormous explosion. And among these opportunities for miscalculation. There's huge internal pressures, for example, inside Israel from various elements of the government to go to war with Hezbollah conduct an intervention in southern Lebanon. And I think the general consensus seems to be among the security and defense establishment is that that is a miscalculation, but there's also that there is more fuel, as you put it for the fire coming from black political elements now as well as miscalculations in terms of operational tactical mistakes. There's also just temperatures rising on many fronts as well.

Harry Kemsley: Let me come to you then Anant, in terms of the perspective from an Iranian perspective. What's likely to be going through the minds of the Iranian government and forces at this stage? And as you go through your thinking on that regard, what do you think they're seeing as potential for miscalculations in terms of their appetite to do anything?

Anant Venkatesh: So from the Iranian point of view, it would be prudent again to highlight some differences. If we go back to the situation we were in early April of this year, where once again the region was bracing for an Iranian retaliation against Israel. Now, back then, that was for an Israeli strike against an Iranian consulate in Damascus, which Iran considered as an affront to its own sovereignty. Now, what's different here, in addition to the fact that Israel very lightly assassinated Ismail Haniyeh, the chief political leader of Hamas in Tehran on 31st July, is that Iran perceives this attack to have been in simultaneity or in near simultaneity with two other attacks in the region, which was Israel's assassination of Fuad Shukr, which Siraj can elaborate on, as well as US airstrikes in Iraq on 30th of July. So the way Iran looks at it is that it's preparing for retaliation not only against itself and its territory, but also against the axis of resistance, which is a coalition of Iran backed militias and groups across the region that's evident in the words and the phrasing used by IRGC generals where they've explicitly mentioned that the axis as a whole and not just Iran is weighing its next steps. In terms of miscalculations, there remains a realistic possibility. Again, we assess this with a low to moderate degree of confidence that Iran is not looking to trigger a broader escalation. This is evidenced by remarks where certain political officials in Iran have emphasized the importance of not falling into what they've called Netanyahu's trap of triggering a broader escalation by then luring the US into confronting Iran with an armed response. But that being said, the situation's dynamic, the exact nature, the timing of the response remains unclear given the limitations of open source intelligence, but yup, there definitely remains a huge potential for miscalculations that could raise tensions significantly.

Harry Kemsley: Perfect. Thank you, Anant. Sean, in a moment we've listened to the views from Siraj and James from their particular aspects of this. I'd be really interested, Sean, to come back to you with, given your background, what will be happening right now inside the headquarters that you know so well around the NATO environment, the UK environment, the US environment. What are the calculations they're looking at? What's the algorithm going through their minds? So let me come back to you in just a second. But Siraj, before I go back to Sean through Janes, what are you seeing in the areas of your particular focus?

Suraj: Yeah. Like my colleagues Elliot and Anant elaborated, the attack on Majdal Shams on 27th July was seen as an escalation by Israel, but Hezbollah has so far denied that it has conducted any attack, including in Nasrallah's speech where he suggested that Hezbollah was not behind the attack. And he also said that he reached out to Nabih Berri, the speaker of Lebanon's parliament and the US envoy to suggest that Hezbollah was not behind it. So Hezbollah and Nasrallah basically consider Israel's targeting of Fuad Shukr in Beirut as an escalation. And in his speech, Nasrallah said, usually when Israel has targeted Hezbollah commanders since October, Nasrallah says that these Israeli operations are part of the ongoing war against Hamas and Hezbollah's confrontation against Israel. But this time, he put it as an escalation by Israel. He didn't call it as a part of the larger, broader war that's going on. So what we are assessing at Janes is that we expect Hezbollah to retaliate, but Hezbollah only has so much space to maneuver because if they do, Israel is at a position right now to see it as a furthermore escalation and that's just going to create an escalatory cycle or increase the risk for escalatory cycle between Israel and Hezbollah.

Harry Kemsley: Yeah. Thank you, Siraj. And then finally, just before I go to Sean, James, your perspective then looking at it from adjacent countries in that territory?

James Trigg: Right. So with regards to Yemen, we have Ansar Allah more commonly known as the Houthis, who since November, 2023 have launched a campaign of attacks on shipping in the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden as well as missile and UAV attacks towards Israel. Now, Ansar Allah scored their first operational success as it were on the 19th of July when a drone launched from Yemen successfully struck a building in Tel Aviv causing the death of one civilian. And that led to an immediate Israeli response operation outstretched arm on the 20th of July when the Israeli Air Force struck targets in the Yemeni port of Hudaydah. So there was in that moment a real sense that this conflict could escalate into an open confrontation between Israel and the Ansar Allah regime in Yemen more directly. However, there has also been attempts by certainly the Israeli side to mitigate and to damp down those kind of suspicions. For example, the Israeli defense minister reported that that attack in Hudaydah only occurred because a civilian was killed. Ansar Allah has launched numerous unsuccessful attacks against Israel since November'23 without an immediate Israeli response. So again, we're in that situation where there are certainly more fuel and there's certainly more kind of antagonism in the situation. However, there are efforts being made to mitigate those risks at the same time.

Harry Kemsley: Right. Right. So when I come back to this point in just a moment, one of the things that I think I've heard, and Sean, I'm going to come to you in just a second in terms of what's happening in the" Western government areas," but just before we do that, I just want to make the point that what I think I've heard is that whilst there appears to be an escalatory environment, there is an equal and opposite attempt going on. It would appear from what you've said to try and de- escalate and to try mitigate the situation as much as possible so that we don't end up with an incendiary situation, which really could blow out of control. But let's come back to that point later, because one of the things I want to look at in that regard is how do we know that? What are the things we're looking for that will tell us how incendiary things are, how much fuel is being added to the fire in terms of open sources that we can reach into? But let's not come to that straightaway. Sean, what's happening in the past of the world that you know so well in the organizations you've been a part of in your past?

Sean Corbett: Yeah. So right now, there will be an increase in activity, although I must stress that people will have been looking at this from a continuity perspective for some time now because it's going to ebb and flow as we've already mentioned. But the activity is going to be up to basic levels. One is going to be in the diplomatic side, and that will really... And I mentioned that because it's as important for the intelligence analysts to hear what's being said by whom and what their audience is. So in Iran, for example, what's happened is an extreme front to their domestic political situation that somebody's been attacked who is a guest in their country from one of their alleged safe houses. So that requires quite a deliberate response to it and probably somewhat more than the, in my view, very carefully calibrated response that happened last time where the union not much we go through. So what happens next is quite interesting from that perspective. But from intelligence perspective, seeing who's saying what to whom on all perspectives is really, really important. And that includes the domestic politics side as well. And we're seeing it very much in the UK, US, the polarization of politics right now, which is pretty, from my view, destructive, but it's going to suit whichever site to get that popular vote. So that's a really important thing and the intelligence community will try as much as they can to help with that. And that requires the continuity of who normally says things about what and what the rhetoric means. On the purest, if you like the military to quote another famous dead strategist warfare is a continuity of diplomacy by other means to misparagraph that. But we will be looking as we are, I know at the indicators and warnings about what's going to happen next. So are we seeing the IDF starting to recalibrate themselves for a potential push into Lebanon? Don't know, I've not even looked at that yet. The ELINT side of things will be really interesting right now because if we start seeing increases in their defenc= ses coming up, radars, early warning, long range, et cetera. And again, that's not just by the Israelis, that's also by the Iranians. And that would be a really good indicator warning they're about to do something if indeed they do. And then as I said, the redistribution of forces. I think there's a more strategic intelligence piece here as well is that a lot of these nations are using up a lot of their arms right now. I'm thinking specifically really about Iran, Iraq, and Israel is, do either of them have enough capacity to start mounting anything that is on a more sustainable basis or sustained basis? And again, that's something that will be exercising the minds of intelligence analysts both in the open source world and the secret intelligence world. Now, bringing that diplomatic military side together is quite complex sometimes, because Diplomats want answers, and of course by the nature of intelligence there's not necessarily going to be answers. So it's going to be pretty busy and pretty tense time, certainly mild headquarters right now.

Harry Kemsley: I'm sure. All right. Let me pick up on this point then about how do we judge what we think is going on using open sources. And at the end of the day, the World of Intelligence podcast series has been largely about the potential and the utility of open source as a place to derive intelligence value. So gents, in your different specialist areas or specialist perspectives, you will be looking at certain indicate to certain types of information that give you the ability to make a judgment, to make assertions about what you think is happening and indeed what might be happening. So let me start with you and Anant, if I may, from a Iranian perspective, given that that's relatively closed to us, how do you begin to understand from open sources what might be going on in the Iranian mind so that we can begin to judge what might be happening? And then I'll come across to you Siraj from your perspective, and then finish off with Elliot and James. Anant?

Anant Venkatesh: In the case of Iran, it becomes very important to pay close attention to what media affiliated with the government are reporting or what official statements convey. This is obviously as previously mentioned, given the fact that Iran wants in our assessment as of now to avoid a miscalculation. So that being said, Iran will engage in clear setting of red lines and signaling through its rhetoric either by official statements or by media. The fact that Iran has so many English language outlets that are affiliated with the state also goes to show that it wants its messaging to be clear, it wants the red lines set to be clear, especially to the west. What we've seen over the past couple of days is Iran's terming the anticipated retaliation as operation honest promises two. To put that into perspective, honest promise one was what Iran was the attack Iran conducted against Israel on the 13th and 14th of April. That again was what we assess to be a quite calculated move on their part that stopped short of triggering a broader escalation, but at the end of the day, something that both sides could claim victories with and gloss over their shortcomings. But that being said, the signaling on Iran's behalf has also indicated that this retaliation will be more severe. There's been reports by state- linked media that have tacitly acknowledged the shortcomings and failures of operation. Honest promise one thereby indicating a resolve to inflict more damage and try and lead a more concerted and coordinated response to Israel. Now, whether this manifests in the form of simultaneous attacks by Iran and its proxies or a most staggered attack campaign, we have to wait and watch. But these are the indications from within Iran. Another development I'd like to highlight is that the Jordanian FM, the Foreign Minister, visited Tehran yesterday. This we assess to be as part of a de- escalatory move as we alluded to previously, considering the fact that on April 13th and 14th, several projectiles launched from Iran or by its proxies in Iraq had to cross Jordanian airspace to reach Israel. And Jordan's very concerned of the security threats that might emerge in case of the anticipated retaliation. So those are the indicators from Iran.

Harry Kemsley: Very, very clear. Thank you. And, Siraj, what about yourself from the indicators that you can see from open sources?

Suraj: Yeah. Well, Harry, when it comes to Hezbollah, I think all roads lead to Nasrallah. His posturing and his statements on how the organization is going to react is a great indicator for us to understand what's about to take place. So since the assassination of Fuad Shukr, Nasrallah, like I stated, has blamed Israel for escalating and also the airstrike that killed Fuad Shukr in Beirut also killed five civilians. So now, Nasrallah states that Israel has killed civilians in Lebanon and Hezbollah will retaliate accordingly. And that's notable because since October 2023, Hezbollah has been very categorical in claiming attacks against civilians in Israel. When Hezbollah has attacked civilians in Israel, they have always claimed it in retaliation to Israel operations against civilians in Lebanon. So they've been very careful to do that because they want to avoid collateral damage and civilian deaths which could lead to uncalculated escalation. So this time around, Nasrallah has stated that Israel has allegedly purposely killed civilians, but right now, we assess that it is unlikely in its retaliation that Hezbollah would target civilians in Israel. We think that it's more likely that Israeli military targets our primary targets for Hezbollah in the coming retaliation because attacks against civilians, again, it's going to lead to an escalated cycle or it increases the likelihood of risks of an escalated recycle, which Nasrallah has been clear that he wants to avoid. Rather he said that Hezbollah still does not seek an all- out war with Israel. We want to retaliate to the assassination of Fuad Shukr, but we still do not want an all- out war, even though if a war breaks out, Hezbollah is ready. And I think that statement from all actors about their readiness for a war does not necessarily indicate that they're going to escalate it to an all- out war. So in that regard, coming back to your question, Hezbollah's and speeches have been a useful indicator for how Hezbollah is going to go forward, but also looking at Hezbollah's affiliated media such as Al-Manar and Al- Mayadeen, both in English and Arabic is a useful indicator to see how many attacks they've claimed so far, what kind of weapons they've used, what are their targets principally, and things like that.

Harry Kemsley: Thank you. I'm curious to, before we go on to yourself, Elliot and James, in terms of anything you want to add, if anything in terms of other indicators that you've used because I know you've been looking at this for a long time. Do you have any standing indicators? But just before we do that, to give you some time to think about this question, do we have any indications at all about the sentiment of the populations that are watching the political and diplomatic efforts going on around them as well as the military? Because I know that very often, we focus on the military activity, the political drivers for it, the diplomatic efforts around it, but seldom do we focus on the impact of the civilian populations. Is there any sentiment that we can draw from any sources that might give us indications of how the people are feeling because they're the ones at the end of the day, you end up almost always suffering the most from that. So Siraj, I'll come back to you on that in just a moment if I may. But just before I do that, Elliot and James, what are your thoughts in terms of standing indicators, things that we use alongside these ideas of the political and leadership level that Anant and Siraj have mentioned?

Elliot Chapman: So I think I can speak to perhaps big things that we're looking at from Israel's perspective. Sean, you put really eloquently, there's this kind of diplomatic political echelon of stuff that we're looking at. And I think, and the other piece being that the military stuff, and so the political and diplomatic things inside Israel, I think it's often very helpful as almost ironically with Hezbollah to focus on the chief executive of Israel. There's the style of governance and structure of governance inside Israel means that executive power is really heavily concentrated around the prime minister. And Netanyahu has been fairly consistent in his stating what he would like to achieve in terms of this conflict and then the methodology around how that's going to be achieved. And so we've seen him say things like, " No, we're not going to leave Gaza before we've achieved various goals." And it's really important to take that on board and really build that into our indicators, really. The other excuse indicators piece that we're looking at on the military side is it's a little perhaps less relevant given the current context of events today, but one thing we've been looking at and modeling for a while is the potential for an invasion into Southern Lebanon by Israel. And so on that piece, we're looking at mobilization requirements which would be affected by the scale of conflict in Gaza and what Israel would actually need to achieve in terms of its stated goals that it would want to push Hezbollah back, create this buffer zone, what would be a minimum requirement for that. So we can build quite reasonably sophisticated models for what Israel would need to deploy and do in order to achieve its kind of minimum required security. And so then we can say things like, " Well, in order to do that, they would need to mobilize reserves." And we aren't seeing that, right? So we're not seeing the standing up of reserve divisions to be mobilized and we're not seeing other indicators on the military front that indicate imminent operation of that kind. So perhaps that adds some, yeah.

Harry Kemsley: Yeah, thank you. I think it does. And Sean, of course, I'll come back to you in a moment about how we could track military developments and deployments in preparation for, but we'll come back to that in a minute. Elliot, anything else from your side in terms of standing open sources that we could reliably or relatively reliably use to give us indicators of what might be about to happen?

Elliot Chapman: I think definitely something we've been tracking since the side of the conflict is also looking at movements of vehicles. Israel's a small country, however, it's not necessarily always obvious that things are being moved and prepositioned for a large operation. I think exception being, of course, the invasion is a Gaza, but there's been several moments where trucks and vehicles have been seen moving around the country, but it doesn't necessarily mean that there's any large prepositioning going forwards, so... Yeah. Sorry, Harry, I might not be able to elaborate on that. We have to-

Harry Kemsley: That's fine. We are seeking to get to the limits of our understanding of this and if that's the extent that which we can push to with open sources, that's a good thing to understand. James, anything at all from looking into Yemen, which again is a relatively closed environment to us, it's not anywhere near as pervasive in terms of sources we might get from open sources, I imagine. How do you look at that in terms of indicators for you, James?

James Trigg: So beyond looking at Ansar Allah's own propaganda and statements which have been relatively frequent and formulaic, they've created a nice standardized template that they now use for any kind of significant military activity they wish to report, whether that's attacks on shipping or launches towards Israel of missiles or drones. The other key indicator that I can often draw upon tends to be reporting by the other side in Yemen because it shouldn't be forgotten that while Ansar Allah is tormenting Mariners passing through the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, there is a war going on in Yemen, a threefold fourfold war between Ansar Allah, the internationally recognized government and southern successionist groups which also sit on the government, but conflict as well. It isn't always necessarily possible to determine what Ansar Allah is doing because they aren't reporting it. However, these reports can be taken from the other side of what are the opposition saying? As Elliott described, are they witnessing movement of troops and material which have been reported quite frequently since the outbreak of conflict between Israel and Hamas in October 2023? There have been numerous reports that Ansar Allah is perhaps using anti- Israeli sentiment, pro- Palestinian sentiment among Yemenis to mobilize, galvanize, and organize fighters and the civilian population, which goes to some extent to your question regarding sentiment analysis of Ansar Allah are very keen to publish imagery and footage of million man marches every Friday in support of Palestine and by extension in support of the actions of their regime. And this has some credence across Yemen where again, despite the country being divided by three or four competing authorities, pro- Palestinian protests have occurred in the territory of each and every faction since the October 2023. So sentiment analysis certainly seems to suggest that the Yemeni population as a whole is pro- Palestinian and wants to see the conflict in Gaza brought to an end. Now, of course, different factions are mobilizing that sentiment for their own purposes. Ansar Allah are using it as we've discussed previously, to justify military operations against their domestic rivals. Meanwhile, notably last week on the same day that Ansar Allah's leader Abdul- Malik al- Houthi released a statement condemning Haniyah's assassination. The Yemeni government also released a statement condemning the assassination. So sentiment analysis in Yemen would certainly suggest that there is a strong pro- Palestinian trend regardless of the regime under which the population are living. And for the purposes of the belligerence in Yemen that is enabling the conduct of military operations and the imposition of harsher living conditions. I expect particularly in the aftermath of Israel's strike on Hudaydah fuel shortages and power cuts that are expected after that attack, Ansar Allah will be able to rationalize and justify those difficulties by blaming Israel.

Harry Kemsley: So you had a point on the wider population's view of what's going on around them. What was your point?

Suraj: Yeah. I think similar to what James highlighted, in Lebanon, you can see that a majority of the population in general are pro- Palestinian, but because of Hezbollah's involvement such close involvement in the ongoing conflict, you tend to see some reactions that question the rhetoric of a war between Israel and Hezbollah and how Lebanon in general would suffer from that considering that of all the difficulties that Lebanon has gone through in the past few years. So with their economy and infrastructure, if Israel were to conduct an incursion into Southern Lebanon, you can see a lot of civilians in Lebanon questioning how they would come back from such an incursion and rebuild infrastructure and things like that. But that being said, I think the sentiment is still pro- Palestinian and they would want an end to the war between Israel and Hamas. But yeah, they definitely want to avoid a larger escalation. But I do want to end off with saying that that does not mean they're not supporting Hezbollah, they're still supporting Hezbollah early. They hope that it does not escalate to an all- out war with Israel.

Harry Kemsley: Yeah, very good. Elliot?

Elliot Chapman: Yeah, Harry, just to go back on your point regarding sources and indicators and warnings, I think one thing that we haven't discussed yet is actually Janes reach directly to people in the region as well. So I think one of the great things that working with Janes has provided me is the ability to go and speak to lots of people in the region. Janes is a professional essentially nonpartisan organization and people respect us for that. I think there's the monitoring of regional media, the monitoring of signaling from senior officials and that kind of thing with regard to organizations and states. But also, we have I think good penetration into the sort of the organizations themselves. We don't have to be secondary downstream consumers. We can get quotation and speak with people that are able to be in meeting rooms themselves.

Harry Kemsley: We'll take our marketing hats off, but replace it with an open source intelligence analysts hat, which is that there is... I'm sure I'll come to you on this point in just a second. There is no substitute for first language, first culture, and the first hand insight to what's happening on the ground versus dare I say it myself as a white middle- aged western educated male, and the view that I see of the world put that perspective that I might have and the inevitable biases that I bring to it by virtue of my background culture, et cetera to the exact same situation from a different perspective who's looking at it from first language, first culture and first hand? And Sean, just to that point, in terms of tradecraft. We've often talked, haven't we in the past about the need for that local understanding of what's going on.

Sean Corbett: Yeah, 100% agree with the understanding as local as possible about what's going on. There is a gotcha with that one though to make sure that we are aware that people are there to influence as well as inform. So whoever is saying something will give it from their own perspective. But this is exactly, and it was going to be one of my key takeaways actually. In the responsible open source intelligence world, we have an absolute requirement to be objective. So report dispassionately and objectively from either side, because right now this is a diplomatic engagement up until it gets more than that. So what people are saying are been saying for a reason. So for example, the Iranians, I've got, as I said before, their own target audience internally to say, " Don't worry, we've got this and we won't let it happen again." At the same time, their perspective may be, and I've seen some reflections that it is that Israel are trying to drag them into something they don't want to get into. Now that might or might not be true, but Israel's perspective is that, and of course, putting it back up the agenda because it has got a little bit quiet in terms of Palestinian terms really. So it depends on whose saying what about the situation. So getting below that level and saying, " Okay, what exactly is happening? Why are people saying things and why are they doing things is really, really important?" And I think that's something that the open source intelligence community can do because it's not tied necessarily to a government. At the end of the day, I've been there where I've made an objective assessment and whoever my particular bosses at the time, whether a diplomat or a senior military person said, no, I don't agree with that because without saying it explicitly, because that doesn't serve my world view or that is not the government line. I have actually had that said to me before that you may think something, but that's not the government line, which doesn't help anybody in my view. But anyway, so that is a real requirement. You mentioned a little bit about what would we be looking at from no perspective in terms of a tactical event that's about to happen or not is going to be really hard. And Elliott's mentioned, and it depends on who again we're looking at. So we would expect to see indicators and warnings from the IDF about recalibrating their forces, different areas, staging posts, preparation. It would take a long time. And of course, you're going to see social media, you're going to see lots of chit- chat about, " Oh, this person's going off to war, et cetera, et cetera." So we'd see that. With Iran, with the quieter they go, the more worried I get. Because at the moment they calibrate any activity. We would see, of course as we did last time, if they're going to fire a whole load of drones, they take a long time to actually get to Israel. We were talking a couple of hours plus. So people are saying, " Oh, I can hear noises and see them all the rest of it. Obviously that's not true ballistic missiles as well." But so even things like that, no TAMs, all the flights stop in the area or they get diverted. That's always a reasonable indication that something's about to happen. So it's taking all that together. I mean, if we had a geostationary ELINT satellite over the area, that would be really good, but I don't think that that is practical from a commercial perspective yet, or the people are looking at it. So you are trying to pull all three together. And I go back to again, the experience of knowing when somebody's saying something, who's their audience, why are they saying it and what their efficacy is.

Harry Kemsley: Yeah. Sean, I'm going to let you have that one as your one takeaway. And gents, I'm conscious that time is now against us. So I'm going to ask you each for your takeaway for the audience, but in your takeaway, I'd ask you to do one of two things, both if you can. What is your one takeaway in terms of what you are learning from the power or utility of open source and/ or what's going to happen next? Give me your assessment of what you think the next few days, next few weeks are likely to hold. And by the way, remember this, this is my takeaway. Intelligence work is not about giving an answer, it's about giving the audience less uncertainty, more understanding. So your answer doesn't have to be in quotes, right? It has to be based on your understanding, give the audience a greater understanding to reduce the uncertainty of what might be happening. So I'm going to start with Elliot. I'll come down through James and Anant, Siraj in terms of what do you think about the power of open source and/ or what do you think is going to happen next, Elliot?

Elliot Chapman: Yeah. I think the power of open source, as Sean mentioned, I think that diplomatic following that indicates the warnings that are happening at a political level. You've got brilliant access to that. And as I mentioned, the ability to speak with people in rooms. Yes, they might be trying to influence us, but at least it enables us to ask the specific questions that we want an answer to, even if it's from their perspective. What's going to happen next, I think we've seen consistently that there is not a desire for a larger regional war, and we're going to see again, a pressing on the outsides of the limits to that. But ultimately a few weeks will show that no one's ultimately interested in a large conflict and the various actors will act accordingly.

Harry Kemsley: Okay, that's fair enough. So an expansion of pressure on the system, but not actually yet an explosion. Anant?

Anant Venkatesh: I think a main takeaway when we deal with OSINT, especially in a country like Iran where there's so much polarization. So the media outlets are either very pro- government or very anti- government is to take everything you see with a pinch of salt. And just to touch upon what Sean mentioned, which is its scary when Iran goes silent, is we can't predict the form and timing of Iran's response precisely because of its doctrine of strategic patience where it differs and immediate impulsive response in favor for what could be a most successful response in the medium to long term or a few days or weeks down the line in their worldview. So the bottom line up front for what I expect going ahead is there is a realistic possibility for Iran to retaliate, but as we've already touched upon the form and timing, we will have to wait and watch what happens.

Harry Kemsley: Very good. That was a very tactical way of maneuvering around giving a direct answer, Anant. So I'm going to come back to you in terms of what do you think that response will look like, but I'll come back to you in just a second to give you another chance to think about it. Siraj, what's your view in terms of OSINT, but also the likely next steps?

Suraj: Yeah. I think in terms of power of OSINT, I just want to echo what Elliot and Anant have said, there's a lot of charter online, especially since 31st July, I think every day, including the weekend, I kept seeing experts suggesting that an attack was going to happen within the next three years or five hours or 15 hours and just a lot of charter. I just want to circle back to what you mentioned when it comes to intelligence, it's about reducing the uncertainty. And I think with OSINT and online charter, we see more of that uncertainty. Uncertainty, not less. And I think that's where Janes distinguishes itself. And we are not exactly saying that it's going to happen in the next five hours or 10 hours, but we examine or assess what the pathways and indicators of a retaliation could be, rather than trying to figure out how sooner or later such a retaliation might occur, trying to get the exact figures.

Harry Kemsley: Well, that's a good point. That's a good point. That's maybe let you off the hook as well, Anant, because I think what we're really saying is if we can find the indicators that lead us to the conclusion something's about happen, what that's most likely to be, then that's actually the takeaway, which is a perfectly good way of answering the question. James, let me come to you. And I left you the most difficult job, of course, because your colleagues have already given properly all the answers you might have given. But what's your big takeaway from an OSINT perspective, but also what's your thoughts, your forecast for the next few days, weeks?

James Trigg: I think, as we've said on previous issues of this podcast, the key takeaway from OSINT is that it's about immersion and it's about providing a fuller understanding of the situation rather than reacting in a knee- jerk manner to all the various prompts and misinformation points that might be put out on, particularly on social media, on the internet, or in regular media. So with Yemen's involvement in this conflict so far there have been a lot of reports of ships that have been hit and sunk, which have been demonstrably false, but it's only by utilizing OSINT and reflecting on the value that OSINT provides by creating that longer term view that those reports can be dismissed more easily than when they get a run for 24, 36 hours in traditional media sources and are then refuted, but in a very small error was made section. In terms of what's going to happen next, certainly in terms of Yemen Ansar Allah remains an actor with their own agency and agenda. We saw after the UK- US airstrikes in January this year that Ansar Allah broadened its targeting to British and American owned and operated vessels. In response to Israel's attack on Hudaydah, Ansar Allah immediately launched missiles back in Israel's direction on the 21st of July. Those missiles or single missile, as Israel reported was intercepted. So Ansar Allah, as far as I'm concerned, is going to continue to pursue its own agenda, its own war aims. Sometimes, that will involve operating in conjunction with other groups and sometimes they'll continue to take unilateral action in order to achieve their own aims.

Harry Kemsley: Perfect. All right. Now, because time is about to evaporate on us, let me draw stumps, let me pause the conversation at this point, but anticipate Elliot, Siraj, Anant, and James, me asking you to come back with Sean for a follow- up on this because this is going to continue. And what I would like to see us do is report what we're seeing, what we're finding, what we think we're seeing to this audience so that we can continue this dialogue, particularly around the utility of open sources, particularly around this theme that I've introduced about reducing uncertainty. And I like the points that have been made about the context, the gap filling that can come on from open sources as well. So we'll come back to those. So for today, for now, thank you. It is quite likely in the last 45, 50 minutes events have taken place that we're now going to go and find out out about outside this podcast that might change what we've been talking about inside the podcast, but such as the dynamic nature of the world we live in. Thank you all four of you for joining me. Thank you, Sean, as ever for reducing the topic and getting us started. And thank you to the audience for taking the time to listen. Thank you for your time. Bye- bye.

Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us this week on The World of Intelligence. Make sure to visit our website, janes. com/ podcast, where you can subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Google Podcasts, so you'll never miss an episode.