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I'm always perturbed to see people talk of mass killings so casually
I'm almost perturbed to not see it discussed at all. What are the casualty estimates of blasting open the Strait?
I'm always perturbed to see people talk of mass killings so casually
Looney Tunes language like this projects an aura of un-reality further in the article, which I like even less.
I'm always perturbed to see people talk of mass killings so casually
Even when discussing a war that's obviously gone out of hand with no easy resolution in right, there's still this air, this attitude from American commenters that somehow the might and brilliance of the US military will prevail in the end and they can restore their position as leaders of the free world. Meanwhile the rest of the world has waited 50 years for this day.
Let me have a little schadenfreude with my €2.20+ litre of petrol.
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There is no party even capable of doing it. The Gulf coastline is almost 1000 miles long, there would have to be a gigantic occupation of an area the size of a small country, at the same time as there would be 'all out war' with Iran, which would be backed by China and to a lesser extent Russia, and whereupon an invasion would provide them with millions of determined fighters. We're talking 'Gulf War' scale of operat…
> The Gulf coastline is almost 1000 miles long, there would have to be a gigantic occupation of an area the size of a small country If you want to secure even 5 miles inland over 1000 miles, that's 50,000 square miles, or an area bigger than more than half the countries on earth, including North and South Korea, Iran is the 18th largest country in the world
If you want to secure the entire Strait, sure. My understanding is you'd only seek to hold the area around the Musandam Peninsula, along with a couple of the islands near it.
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The pay levels seem more of an inherent problem than the political winds.
The people I know leaving that sector have been steadily leaving for years due to the day to day bullshit/internal politics and poor leadership that they have to put up with, not the pay nor current administration.
The first thing they are going to see is the salary and run a mile. That's partly why Palantir 'works'; they pay tech salaries and have a tech culture, but do gov work. Booz Allen et al were less advanced prototypes of that as well.
Brightest minds of US were too focused on displaying ads and making teenagers addicted to tik tokies-like stuff instead of working security, defense, etc You couldve seen anti militsry industry sentiment on HN for years, which apparently worked for US adversaries, who knows who was behind that propaganda :) Inb4: im from eu
I prefer having those minds focused on optimizing ad serving than on optimizing school bombings.
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> America has lost the capability to manufacture anything at scale We make plenty of stuff at scale. We just haven’t designed any of military around it since WWII. > unclear if we can do much other than threaten sanctions and nukes We could learn from our allies in Ukraine. Give them capital and manufacturing bases in America.
>We could learn from our allies in Ukraine. Give them capital and manufacturing bases in America. The soviet union collapsed as a result of military overspending and massive supply chain corruption in an attempt to keep up with an opponent with lower levels of corruption and a far more powerful industrial base. Which is to say, inviting the gold toilet brigade from Ukraine to come and build our weapons while showerin…
The US survived spending a trillion dollars to achieve very little in Iraq and Afghanistan. I'm sure they'll survive spending another trillion over a decade to achieve nothing in Iran other than hundreds of thousands dead.
Brightest minds of US were too focused on displaying ads and making teenagers addicted to tik tokies-like stuff instead of working security, defense, etc You couldve seen anti militsry industry sentiment on HN for years, which apparently worked for US adversaries, who knows who was behind that propaganda :) Inb4: im from eu
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_projection
The leader image is ... a US aircraft carrier (the USS Nimitz). That's what the US uses its military power for, to influence events in lands far, far away from its territory.
But, now, tell me which one of the many wars that the US has fought in after WWII did not end in disaster. Afghanistan? Iraq? Korea?
There was a meme doing the rounds the other day: "Name a character who can defeat Captain America". The answer being "Captain Vietnam". The US has faced humiliating defeat after humiliating defeat while bringing death and destruction and immeasurable misery to millions around the world.
That is what HN users seem to have an "anti" sentiment for. If you watch the news you'll be able to tell that this goes far beyond HN. The whole of US society seems to be extremely tired with those "forever wars", those senseless excursions to faraway lands, that not only do not secure US interests but turn world opinion more and more against the US. Even the US' closest allies now fear the US: vide Greenland. Anyone with more than a video game or comic book understanding of how the real world works would do well to be concerned.
Edit: also from EU, btw. Greek but living in the UK.
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Sorry, at the heart of this is that the Commander in Chief and Secretary of War are idiots. It's not clear how any of this situation would be any different if America had a dramatically higher production capacity.
These are orthogonal problems. Getting into this war was stupid. Being unable to win it is also pretty bad.
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> The Gulf coastline is almost 1000 miles long, there would have to be a gigantic occupation of an area the size of a small country If you want to secure even 5 miles inland over 1000 miles, that's 50,000 square miles, or an area bigger than more than half the countries on earth, including North and South Korea, Iran is the 18th largest country in the world
> If you want to secure even 5 miles inland over 1000 miles, that's 50,000 square miles If you want to secure the entire Strait, sure. My understanding is you'd only seek to hold the area around the Musandam Peninsula, along with a couple of the islands near it.
Granted it may not have to be 'the whole thing' but something like it.