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Miscellanea: The War in Iran

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Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#781

Post by aa-jv »

macintux wrote: post #297
MomsAVoxell wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From over a decade ago .. its still happening: https://gh.bmj.com/content/6/2/e004166 https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2009_2014/documents/... https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S277304922... But of course, it depends who you ask. American institutions cannot be trusted, obviously.

Your first link is the same as mine. Nothing in any of the links seems to support the assertion that “Even still today mothers in Baghdad lose half of their babies to deformities caused by the US' criminal use of depleted uranium” I have no doubt that what happened, and is still happening, is tragic. I do doubt that statement.

I agree with the OP, American sources are untrustworthy on this matter. Do you read Arabic?

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#782

Post by somenameforme »

ranger207 wrote: post #648
somenameforme wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just this administration. Everything with the US military has been going clearly downhill since the Millennium Challenge 2002. [1] It was, appropriately enough, a wargame simulating an invasion of Iran. It was a major event involving preparation in years and thousands of individual operators. When it was carried out the invading force was defeated by unexpected resources and resourcefulness from the Iranian…

MC2002 was not primarily a wargame to develop operational plans. You can do that much easier and cheaper with a bunch of generals around a map. MC2002 was a training exercise with an element of competitiveness to pressure people under unexpected situations. As a training exercise its prime goal was not to figure out what plans were best but to just exercise plans and get people to do the plan, period. Given that, eve…

Wargames have repeatedly been used to align strategic initiatives because they are designed to as closely replicate an adversary's actions and resources as closely as possible. So for instance in better times there was Proud Prophet [1], another wargame, played out in 1983. Its goal was to simulate outcomes of various scenarios involving hot conflict with the USSR. Up to the point of that wargame, the US position towards the USSR had been this sort of 'peace through strength', 'escalate to deescalate' nonsense.

The problem is that the wargame demonstrated that it ended up with the extinction of the Northern Hemisphere every single time. We didn't then change the rules of the game to make it so we could still play nuclear games and come out okay, but instead took this as a major wakeup call. It directly led to a shift in US policy towards the USSR of coexistence, de-escalation, and some degree of reconciliation. Within 7 years the first McDonalds would open in the USSR, and the entire Soviet system would collapse in under a decade after the shift of the strategy driven entirely by this wargame result.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proud_Prophet

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#783

Post by JumpCrisscross »

andrewflnr wrote: post #711
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #695

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Iran has made it quite clear that it is not up to the aggressors as to when this ends Israel and the U.S. can absolutely end the war and leave a turd in the Gulf states' mess kits. The former would focus on Hezbollah. The latter start laying into Cuba or whatever.

They can try. I don't think they'll like the consequences. Imagine if Saudi Arabia decides it's not friends with the US anymore and won't send any more oil here. That'll shake things up a bit, won't it? And Iran will be even more pissed off and determined to get a nuke than before, probably still choking the strait. You're talking about the US and Israel leaving the biggest, most obvious turd in history on the entire…

> don't think they'll like the consequences

Sure. The point is strategic depth absolutely gives America this choice. The way it could actually happen is with a regime change. Special election in Israel or midterm full switch of the Congress together with war-powers resolutions in America.

To be clear, I’m not advocating for this. But it’s a bit silly to say Iran gets a veto on this at a kinetic level. They don’t. They have a de facto veto on strategic and messaging levels. But so did Vietnam.

> Imagine if Saudi Arabia decides it's not friends with the US anymore and won't send any more oil here

This isn’t a realistic threat. America and Israel are not in positions to be lectured by Riyadh. Like, we started this mess without bothering to materially loop them in.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#784

Post by donkeybeer »

YZF wrote: post #673
pydry wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These days conflating criticism of israel with anti semitism is a very clear, very obvious and very reliable racist calling card. Mitch McConnell (adherent of the great replacement theory) accusing Joe Kent of anti semitism gave the accusation the same gravitas it would have if Strom Thurmond or the Grand wizard of the KKK did it. i.e. it only serves to underscore the accuser's racism.

Those days people that hate Jews claiming they're "only anti-Zionists" are being white washed while synagogues are shot at and people displaying anything Jewish are attacked on the streets in western countries. Antisemitism is at all times high. And not the "critical of Israel" type of antisemitism. The "jews control the weather", "space lasers from mars" and "let's kill all of them" type of antisemitism is rampant.…

Yes and why do you think that is. Constant crying wolf means moderate persons are slowly feeling the word antisemite lose all meaning and therefore the real antisemites are gaining room to legitimise themselves.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#786

Post by altacc »

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…

This is nothing new, history repeats. Prior to the invasions of Afghanistan & Iraq there were numerous regional experts warning that the result would be chaos, failed states, a rise in extremism and long term instability in the region and indirectly the rest of the world. Millions of us marched through the streets, asking our governments not to make what was obviously a massive mistake.

The US & UK governments were convinced that they would recreate the liberation of Europe, with cheering crowds, flowers in their hair, Mission Accomplished banners and then simply totally dismantle a government & civil service and recreate a new one to their favour. Groupthink is a powerful thing.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#787

Post by JumpCrisscross »

don_esteban wrote: post #780
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #527

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You should go take a look at what Lenin and many other communists was doing and where he was physically right before the October revolution To what effect? The only other successful Communist revolution prior to the conclusion of the October revolution was the one in Mongolia [1]. It built on decade-old revolutionary ground [2]. (Finland, meanwhile, was seceding from White Russia.) Trying to cause a revolution from…

Re: Trying to cause a revolution from abroad just doesn't work. Are you just blindly ignoring all 'regime changes' supported/caused by US (i.e. from abroad) since WW2? Some of them do not work (this one is especially botched). Many, many have succeeded (the initial change), with typically less successful outcomes over longer time frames. And you are totally missing the point of the remark about Lenin and Germany's pa…

> Are you just blindly ignoring all 'regime changes' supported/caused by US (i.e. from abroad) since WW2?

What fraction was popular revolt versus military coup? Engineered from afar?

> totally missing the point of the remark about Lenin and Germany's part (essentially sending him to destabilize Russia

Oh fair, I did miss this. I would argue this is leveling up an existing revolution. But sure, this is the closest N = 1 modern history offers.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#788

Post by don_esteban »

sysguest wrote: post #744
markdown wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup, Iran is threatening regime change by targeting the financial stability of American voters. It's their only play, really.

well... I actually think even when trump is impeached, the democrats will continue -- even more so, to call mr trump "a weak president" I mean, can US and its allies exactly stop at status quo? Iran just learnt it can missile nearby neighbors and demand $2M toll fee on the strait users... even if US just backs down from "epic wut", will iran become "the good guy" and never missile neighbors and stop demanding that $2…

Stop projecting on Iran what USA would do in their place (bullying everybody).

Iran was NOT bombing its neighbours and demanding Hormuz toll before the war. Not even after it was bombed last June.

If they had not responded strongly, USA/Israel would keep periodically 'mowing the lawn', not acceptable to any country, especially not for a big and proud nation like Iran.

Btw, the US military bases in Gulf countries are legitimate military targets, and have born the brunt of Iran's attacks. It is just that in our western media the focus is on any civilian damages, and almost all damages to military is hushed up.

Iran has no good way to prevent future attacks (nobody sane would believe any agreement signed by USA), their only way is to make sure beyond any doubt that attacking them again will hurt VERY, VERY much. As a side note, getting rid of USA military bases in the Gulf would be beneficial to them in making any future attacks on them more difficult. Hence the (very true!) messaging 'the USA military bases are not there to protect you, but to help them project power over us (and you!), and are only making you a target, reducing your security, not increasing it'.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#789

Post by JumpCrisscross »

amarant wrote: post #676
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #638

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> even if LNG becomes crazy cheap, a battery set up will still save you money in the long run just by allowing off-peak demand See Uruguay. Bet heavily on renewables [1]. Baked in a high cost [2]. If LNG becomes crazy cheap and you're stuck with expensive solar and battery, the countries with cheaper power will eat your industry. On a household level, you wasted money. The alternate you who didn't put money into the…

Per your sources it looks like they are subsidising industry use of electricity with household usage: Household electricity prices are 157% of average in SA, and 200% of industry prices. That's not a case of renewables backfiring, it's a case of strange policy resulting in weird pricing.

> they are subsidising industry use of electricity with household usage

Germany had to do the same thing when their power costs threatened de-industrialisation. The base cost of electricity in Uruguay is higher than its neighbors’ in an environmentally-wonderful but economically-problematic way.

Re: Miscellanea: The War in Iran

#790

Post by don_esteban »

Pay08 wrote: post #363
samus wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Gulf states are not any more willing than the USA at invading Iran with ground troops. The only thing that changes by making them angry is that slightly more missiles fly into Iran. Which is already accounted for and won't magically reopen the strait.

Actually, Saudi Arabia might get involved.

I doubt US wants them involved.

The coordination will be difficult (I doubt the Saudis are properly, NATO - style, trained for joint actions with USA).

Their involvement would also severely raise the risk of friendly fire (see the F15's over Kuwait).

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