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Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

noahpinion.blog

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Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You wouldn't. That's not a meaningful claim about what other people would or wouldn't do. The juice looks entirely worth the squeeze from here. Iran now knows exactly the saturation point of your defenses with all allies engaged.

You're entitled to your opinion. I'm not making a claim on what people would do. That's just standard military practice when a missile is fired you fire back at the source to prevent additional firing. Iran has no clue about the saturation point and got nothing. First, this was 100% synthetic since Israel knew about the attack and was very prepared. It got help from Jordan, US, UK and even the Saudis. According to ar…

I believe the US is struggling to reach production of 650 Patriots a year. Given the shambolic state of our industrial base, I strongly doubt that any of the other platforms are in better logistical shape.

I am deeply concerned that the US armories will be empty in two years at this rate.

Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deep pockets in the sense of "can print indefinitely or until the inflation leaks into Bitcoin", and shallow pockets in the sense of actual artillery shells and interceptors.

Why would "inflation leaking into Bitcoin" stop governments from printing money?!? It's not as if the shady "crypto" tail wags the big dogs of the real economy, is it?

There's just never been anywhere for the coordinated inflation to leak into before. Novel territory, just keeping an eye on the future. A dollar continues to buy less of everything, be it equities or commodities.

Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#103

My gut is Iran wanted the missiles to be intercepted. They wanted to show they are not pushovers but don’t want to escalate too much. In some sense the whole thing was a fireworks display by the countries involved. Like a warning shot.

Every analyst I respect has the same take. This guy even glosses over that it wasn’t a general on a tarmac this time, but a general in a consulate that was extrajudicially murdered. Iran had to respond in a show of force to reestablish deterrence, without escalating the conflict, drawing the US in. Two kids are on the playground, one has a big brother. They’re both constantly bothering each other. The kid without the…

the current regime in Iran has not thought much of the "special" status of embassies historically.

I tend to agree the strikes on embassies/consulates is not a great precedent, but it's hard to think of a less sympathetic victim.

Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#104
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>But this was also a unique situation where Israel held back. In a typical case a firing would receive an immediate deadly response. E.g. planes and missiles from Israel returning the favor. Thus the cost for Iran would have been much higher. I feel like we are observing separate conflicts altogether. Israel whose conscript army is nearing its end in terms of endurance, who has been bogged down in urban guerilla warf…

> You think that Israel would even consider an immediate deadly response to open a fourth front in a war they can't afford, a war the public is getting sick of, and a war that the very disliked leader of the nation is cynically prolonging to maintain his waning grip on power? It's worth keeping in mind a few things. The world's public might be "getting sick of" the war, but most Israelis are united around wanting to…

Israel needs the support of the US to continue operating as it does. The US support of Israel was already on a demographic timer, the unwavering support of boomer evangelicals is dying out with them and even the new evangelicals have an net unfavorable view of Israel. The Gaza conflict has simply sped up this already seemingly inevitable decline. Losing popular support causes a cascade loss of other support; political, economic, and then military. There has already been unprecedented pushback against Israel from Joe Biden who is clearly worried about his own reelection chances. I.e. the loss of public support is already causing a loss of political support.

Acquiring nukes keeps getting easier, improvement in material science, electronics, etc. Even North Korea has them now, in my view the only thing keeping Iran from getting nukes is the ability to use them as a bargaining chip. Unless it's Israelis plan to completely destroy Iran then taking away that bargaining chip would just end up with Iran getting nukes.

To be honest I'm not sure how Israel survives this.

Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#105
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was far more than 50M. Heavy ballistic rockets aren’t cheap even in Iran. And Iran could have used them to cause several times the amount of damage just by hitting a couple of AD deployment points. I think Israel understands that too, hence the difficulty with deciding how or whether to respond

So am I off by one order of magnitude or three?

Definitely at least one order of magnitude off. For comparison, one Patriot battery can cost over a billion dollars, and they hit none. Not because they couldn’t (it doesn’t intercept hypersonics, which Iran has) but because they chose not to.

Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#106
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy. They’re losing the Gaza war. Yemen’s blockade and full militarization is crushing Israel’s economy. Bibi is out of a job and possibly his freedom if war stops. Time for a trump card: escalation of the conflict will keep the extremists happy and keep the hostilities going for possibly years. Bibi’s best choice.

They are losing the Gaza justification. Obviously they have obliterated Gaza and Gaza had no way to defend itself.

HAMAS has retaken Northern Gaza. The area is depopulated but not safe for IDF. Mission Failed (unless the mission was to ethnically cleanse in the first place).

Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#107
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You think that Israel would even consider an immediate deadly response to open a fourth front in a war they can't afford, a war the public is getting sick of, and a war that the very disliked leader of the nation is cynically prolonging to maintain his waning grip on power? It's worth keeping in mind a few things. The world's public might be "getting sick of" the war, but most Israelis are united around wanting to…

> The world's public might be "getting sick of" the war, but most Israelis are united around wanting to see the end of Hamas. They'd like things done faster, obviously, but aren't "sick of the war". The Israeli public is getting sick of the war, mass protests against Netanyahu and against prolonging the war and not bringing back hostages are growing from 0 right after the attack to quite populated right now in front…

> The Israeli public is getting sick of the war, mass protests against Netanyahu and against prolonging the war and not bringing back hostages are growing from 0 right after the attack to quite populated right now in front of our eyes.

Eh. There's definitely less "enthusiasm" than in the beginning, but for the most part, even those who want a hostage deal don't see it as instead of the war, or at least not instead of removing Hamas from power. They mostly prefer the hostages to come first, but then Hamas to be dealt with. (I'm speaking of my general impression in broad strokes, but polls I believe back me up.)

> As for Iran gaining nukes. They will likely gain them if they haven't already gained them.

I don't think it's necessarily unavoidable, and I think it's well worth avoiding. Iran has repeatedly says it wants to wipe Israel out completely. If they have nukes, it will be incredibly hard to oppose them in a war, and they can much more easily make good on their threat.

It really is something that is an existential risk for Israel.

> What [Israel] should avoid, instead of Iran getting nukes, is losing so many world allies that nuclear armed countries abandon them or begin to oppose them.

I don't think it's an either/or. Especially since most of Israel's allies are also enemies of Iran, it's in fact quite the opposite - many countries are happy that Israel is doing the dirty work of actually dealing with Iran.

And you can see that in the unprecedented level of cooperation between Israel and some of its Arab neighbors, who had once been enemies of Israel themselves!

> Lastly, Hamas will not be "eradicated" or "eliminated" the same way no amount of American might and force could "eradicate" or "eliminate" the Taliban.

Maybe. It's a military and political question. I don't think it's a given. I think given enough time, and given a political solution for governing, Israel can effectively eliminate Hamas. At the end of the day, they are made up of specific people, possess specific weapons, etc. Once those are gone, they are effectively eliminated.

> You can't eliminate people's desire to be free or to secure their homeland. Israelis understand this when it comes to their own land, but fail to comprehend it when it comes to other people's land.

Most Israelis understand this. Hamas's desire isn't to be free or secure in their own homeland - Israel disengaged from Gaza in 2005, and Hamas could've turned its thoughts inwards on security and on building up Gaza. They absolutely had that option. They choose to use it to fight Israel.

I think everyone would've been better off, especially the Gazans themselves, if Hamas had actually tried to improve Gaza and had just... not fought Israel and not spent vast resources on this war.

Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#108
post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It was definitely Israel who violated Iranian sovereignty first here, no? With the killing of IRGC commanders in a Syrian consulate. Neither country has attacked Israel recently. Iran funds Hamas, which attacked Israel on October 7th (and has attacked it many other times). It funds Hezbollah, which has been attacking Israel since October 7th, partially from Syria.

And the US funds Israel who has extrajudicially assassinated Iranian civilians in Iran in the past few years. So can Iran then blow up an American embassy with justification?

The US itself has assassinated Iranian generals.

> So can Iran then blow up an American embassy with justification?

Well, that's a tough question. If you're asking legally or something, idk, I have no real knowledge of this.

If you're asking practically, yes, the US is powerful and is able to do things that other countries can't.

If you're asking morally - there's no question in my mind that the US should do whatever is possible to weaken the Iranian regime. For all its faults, the US are the "good guys" on the world stage right now. The Iranian regime is a dictatorship that has taken a wonderful people hostage and is forcing them to live by religious laws that many (most?) would be happy to live without. It is evil, pure and simple.

It is also incredibly dangerous, has funded terrorism for years, has destabilized the entire Middle East for years, and is likely to wipe out Israel if given the chance.

I'm not shedding any tears over the US trying to stop the Iranian regime.

(And note - this only goes for the Iranian leadership, the Iranian people are wonderful and should be protected at all costs!)

Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#109
post #76

I've always seriously doubted Ukraine shooting down any "hypersonic" missiles. The problem is not solvable. Hypersonic missiles are really just manuevering ballistic missiles, and its impossible to plot an intercept path unless you have a really really big explosion. Missile defense is done, along with large military assets like surface ships.

It shot down what is claimed to be "hypersonic" missle by russians. I don't know about "kinzhal" speeds, but the rockets are indeed was shot down a bunch of times. Speaking about "cyrcon" missiles, they do travel at the hypersonic speed but slowing down at the last miles of trajectory and can (and was) shot down too.

Re: Why so many of us were wrong about missile defense

#110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The US and Israel have assassinated targets in the country of Iran recently, while the reverse has not been true. I presume you are referring to the US killing of Soleimani, and the embassy bombing, though neither of those were in Iran. But you're missing the point. Why did those killings happen? Iran keeps arming proxies (Hamas, Hezbollah, militias in Iraq, the Houthis, and maybe some others), and having those pro…

You presume wrong. I mean the killing of Iranian civilians such as Mohsen Fakhrizadeh. The US arms Israel who conducts such extrajudicial assassinations. By your logic, this makes all American military personnel and proxy civilians fair targets for Iran

So, you mean like the Iranian attempt to assassinate John Bolton? (I mean, they didn't succeed, but does that make a real moral difference?)
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