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Miscellanea: The War in Iran

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Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#101

Post by D_Alex »

lmm wrote: post #69
D_Alex wrote: post #60

>Iran would have to respond and thus would have to try to find a way to inflict ‘pain’ on the United States to force the United States to back off. But whereas Israel is in reach of some Iranian weapons, the United States is not. This is too complacent for my liking. Every rusty trawler is a viable launch platform for Shahed type drones (operational range ~2500 km per Wikipedia). Nearly every US oil refinery and LNG…

> Every rusty trawler is a viable launch platform for Shahed type drones And where exactly are you planning to operate that trawler out of? Or are you going to send it across the Atlantic on its own (well, with a couple of tankers accompanying it, but never mind that) and hope no-one pays attention? > operational range ~2500 km per Wikipedia I think you either added an extra zero or were looking at the hyped prototyp…

>I think you either added an extra zero or were looking at the hyped prototypes

I thought I was clear where I was looking - here, you may check for yourself: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HESA_Shahed_136.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#102

Post by Arnt »

lmm wrote: post #69
D_Alex wrote: post #60

>Iran would have to respond and thus would have to try to find a way to inflict ‘pain’ on the United States to force the United States to back off. But whereas Israel is in reach of some Iranian weapons, the United States is not. This is too complacent for my liking. Every rusty trawler is a viable launch platform for Shahed type drones (operational range ~2500 km per Wikipedia). Nearly every US oil refinery and LNG…

> Every rusty trawler is a viable launch platform for Shahed type drones And where exactly are you planning to operate that trawler out of? Or are you going to send it across the Atlantic on its own (well, with a couple of tankers accompanying it, but never mind that) and hope no-one pays attention? > operational range ~2500 km per Wikipedia I think you either added an extra zero or were looking at the hyped prototyp…

I assume that smuggling drones into the US is easier than it was for Ukraine to smuggle them into Russia.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#103

Post by Gibbon1 »

beloch wrote: post #71

A few thoughts. 1. The straight of Hormuz is crazy because of the sheer amount of options Iran has to threaten shipping. It's so narrow that they can even hit ships with artillery fire . No need for missiles or drones at all! Lobbing kinetic shells may sound primitive, but anti-missile defences are designed to deal with large projectiles with minutes or hours of warning, not shell-sized projectiles that hit within se…

Counter point to 4. The Israeli's wouldn't be trying to kill the Iranian leaders if they hadn't spent the last 40 years waging a proxy war against Israel.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#104

Post by pas »

beloch wrote: post #71

A few thoughts. 1. The straight of Hormuz is crazy because of the sheer amount of options Iran has to threaten shipping. It's so narrow that they can even hit ships with artillery fire . No need for missiles or drones at all! Lobbing kinetic shells may sound primitive, but anti-missile defences are designed to deal with large projectiles with minutes or hours of warning, not shell-sized projectiles that hit within se…

Tehran "spent" 2T USD on the nuclear weapons program, which they could have spent on water desalination for example.

Yes having the deterrent is strategically beneficial, but working toward it paints a huge target on your back, while you need to pay for development, endure sanctions, etc.

Any state considering such weapons development already knows this. So this war is not new information.

And it's far from over yet.

Iran could very well end up cut off from the strait as rival gulf states build pipelines, rail, and drone defenses. (Sure this kind of long term thinking is not characteristic of the actors involved, but politics change easier around Iran than inside it.)

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#105

Post by roenxi »

geraneum wrote: post #66
Synaesthesia wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The purpose of the war is to destroy the Axis of Resistance, Iran, Hezbollah and its allies, the only force standing in the way of US/Israeli hegemony in the region.

That’s a purely ideological way of looking at the situation which IMO is not sufficient. As the article states, this war was not unprovoked either, regardless of whether the provocations warrant such a response. Iran is seeking its own hegemony. Now, this does not negate your point on the hegemonic approach of US in the region. I think this war can be viewed as a power struggle between a regional and global power tha…

Is anyone going to mention what these provocations are? I've yet to figure it out after 6-12 months. Pretty much everything going on seems to involve the Israelis aggressively expanding their borders or viciously attacking anyone who might oppose their expansion. I've lost count of the number of negotiators they've killed.

Trump has averaged something like 1 bombing run on Iranian leadership ever 2 years. Iranian provocations must be quite effective at making him see red.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#106

Post by citrin_ru »

lmm wrote: post #83
citrin_ru wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2500 km is a realistic range of you follow the war in Ukraine. Kyiv is frequently attacked with Shahed drones and it is far from frontlines.

> Kyiv is frequently attacked with Shahed drones and it is far from frontlines. reply It's a couple of hundred miles from the frontlines in Kharkiv, and the Russian border to the North is even closer.

Shaheds are launched not from the frontline (to avoid a launch site being attacked) but I would agree that a typical attack distance is around 500 km (which is much less than the range stated in wikipedia). Still this unlikely the max range of this drone and there is a tradeoff - one can increase range by reducing the war head mass.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#107

Post by pas »

ardit33 wrote: post #81
beloch wrote: post #71

A few thoughts. 1. The straight of Hormuz is crazy because of the sheer amount of options Iran has to threaten shipping. It's so narrow that they can even hit ships with artillery fire . No need for missiles or drones at all! Lobbing kinetic shells may sound primitive, but anti-missile defences are designed to deal with large projectiles with minutes or hours of warning, not shell-sized projectiles that hit within se…

Agreed on your points. This conflict, just validated the North Korea style of strategy to all regimes out there. It does the opposite of what it is intended. I hope things do get de-escalated soon, as this is not good for any party (apart Israel and Russia, which are the main gainers of all this mess).

But it didn't really. Iran is poorer than it was before, even more of a problem than it was before. NK has two very special advantages (Seoul is within artillery range, and it is literally in the backyard of one or two relevant superpowers over the decades) whereas Tehran's "force projection" is mostly through proxies and affecting global commodity trade.

Without NK's hard deterrence (and without being next door to its allies) Tehran is an easy target up until the last second. And even then what's going to happen if they detonate a nuclear bomb? Everyone will sit back and let them build as many more as they feel?

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#108

Post by GJim »

pm90 wrote: post #33
khhu2bnn wrote: post #26

The amazing part to me is just the perceived invincibility this small circle within the US administration has. You can find dozens of articles with a search limited to Feb 1~Feb 27, plenty of analysis warning of the risks that have now become reality, everything - the strait, no revolution, further radicalization, critically low US stockpiles, abandoning other US partners, gulf destabilization, etc. In the fantasy im…

Its what happens when you surround yourself with incompetent yes men.

I don't think that is the whole picture.

I suggest a significant cause is Trump's arrogance and only listening to the advice he wants to hear.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#109

Post by locopati »

csomar wrote: post #85
khhu2bnn wrote: post #26

The amazing part to me is just the perceived invincibility this small circle within the US administration has. You can find dozens of articles with a search limited to Feb 1~Feb 27, plenty of analysis warning of the risks that have now become reality, everything - the strait, no revolution, further radicalization, critically low US stockpiles, abandoning other US partners, gulf destabilization, etc. In the fantasy im…

Read on the martingale strategy. This is Donald Trump signature strategy. Basically, when something doesn't work, you double down; and it pays off. This strategy keeps working until it doesn't and completely bankrupt the player. Because the strategy has been always paying off for the them (djt & co), they thought they have some kind of a special skill/power that others don't; not realizing that they are just bad at m…

Trump doesn't care about the results in Iran. He's getting richer through graft while making himself look big. He's pathetic and we're all paying the price in one way or another.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#110

Post by pas »

underdeserver wrote: post #96
bigyabai wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't understand what this article has to do with Hacker News. Judging by your comment history it seems to be the majority of what you discuss. Maybe you're not the best judge of what HN finds interesting or salient.

I'm basing that opinion on the FAQ that states that most politics stories are irrelevant. But sure, I'm one vote among tens of thousands, and it's up to the mods to decide. It's most of my comment history recently because I have family and friends in the region and I'm admittedly triggered by the callousness, heartlessness and sanctimony I see in these comments. It's not healthy, I know. People are trying to preach g…

The HN protocol to deal with this is downvote silently. Complaining about why and what is on HN is also in the FAQ as a no no.

If there was any serious preparation for a many months long campaign then why Kharg island is not occupied already?

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