211–220 of 586 posts
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If we assume everything you say here is true, why is the US in such a bind with reopening the straits? The risk of Iran behaving exactly like this has been understood for decades. The attack was not a a wise, measured move.
This was (I thought) very obvious sarcasm, the man is an easily manipulated buffoon.
I'll go recalibrate my detector!
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It would be a massive scandal if any of our other allies were conducting this level of spying on our country's senior leadership, for the sole purpose of manipulating their decision processes to the foreign ally's benefit. Israel needs to learn to play by the rules.
From its start Israel's existence has been about not playing by the rules. The days are numbered for Israel because it's not and never has been a sustainable enterprise and its exploitation of the American people and US taxpayer money is catching-up to it faster than it can damage control it away or come-up with more and more creative ways to pay people to call label criticism of Israel a hate crime.
Like geez, we can't even get rid of North Korea, how are people expecting to successfully destroy a nuclear armed power without getting everyone else in that area killed? Its delusional.
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How can a vassal state with 1/60th your GDP 'influence' your nation into a war ? It's a rhetorical question. It can't. Makes the MAGA military look incompetent. The US has a history of botched wars around the globe, most of which have little to do with Israel. If I'm drawing from data, then the Iran conflict is consistent with the post-war military movements of the US. Now that the communists are no more, Israel is t…
> How can a vassal state with 1/60th your GDP 'influence' your nation into a war ? It's a rhetorical question. It can't. You don’t need to influence a nation, you only need to get one guy on board. When you have ready access to the ego-driven and cognitively limited man in charge, either directly or through his sycophants, and that man has enormous executive authority to do mostly whatever he wants, this becomes very…
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Both Netanyahu and Trump have a vested interest in promoting the idea of how much influence Israel has over US foreign policy. For Netanyahu, the propaganda that he manipulated Trump into waging a war against Iran boosts his political image with some Israelis. (And it is near election season in Israel).
I don't see how that's a win for him since the outcome was a stronger Iran.
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> between 2009 and 2018, it said." -> this is smack in the middle of the JCPOA period. The US withdrew in the 2018, so it is actually not "smack in the middle". > And yes, this is from 2025, but it's about non-compliance during the period where the JCPOA was active. It is actually not. You are not reading the material you are providing. > The findings in the "comprehensive" ... pave the way for a push by the United S…
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"The finale of the PMD controversy has been a long time coming. In November 2011, IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano issued a detailed report — based on “overall credible” information from a “wide variety of independent sources” and the Agency’s own investigations — which concluded that, at least until 2003 and possibly beyond, “Iran has carried out activities relevant to the development of a nuclear explosive device.”
In the years following the report, the IAEA actively sought to gain a better understanding of those activities, but its efforts were stymied by Iranian stonewalling and obfuscation. Tehran repeatedly claimed that the evidence on which the IAEA was relying was fabricated and based on forgeries. It denied that Iran was ever interested in nuclear weapons or that it had engaged in nuclear weapons-related research and experimentation."
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"This may come as an unpleasant surprise to American observers, many of whom probably assumed that sanctions relief would depend on Iran credibly disclosing its past activities, not simply fulfilling the undemanding, largely procedural requirements of the “roadmap.” Critics can be expected to attack the JCPOA anew for permitting sanctions to be relieved despite the December IAEA report having concluded that Iran has not made a full accounting of its past nuclear work"
So terrible agreement and Iran not acting in good faith. And we can debate technicalities and I'll even acknowledge that "technically" you're right but it's irrelevant.
"Government suddenly and confusingly starts acting accordingly to what everyone's already know for a long time." This is really quite scary when you think about it. Why now all of a sudden?
Elections. The Trump administration joined the war hoping that any positive outcome in the Iran war would boost its mid-term prospects. Netanyahu attacked Iran and Lebanon because he faces elections in a few months and he wants to prolong all his wars till the election is over - apparently Israeli electorate don't tend to vote out a PM during a war. Trump has now realised the Iran war has been a political disaster and is looking to extricate out of it, through temporary ceasefires (which means he can resume the war later - which is standard US policy with a weaker foe). That doesn't work for Netanyahu because if he loses this election, he could also find himself behind bars due to some corruption conviction. Thus, he is working to sabotage Trump's ceasefire deals as he needs the wars to go on till October, when the elections will presumably be held ...
I really dislike when a tiny fraction of the conspiracy theories become true since it validates people who believe in them. But I have to admit I do have one of my own, pegasus and related spyware can gain a lot of power over politicians i.e. blackmail which makes me think about how much of our politics are based solely on the fact that politicians often find themselves exploiting their powers and then possibly getti…
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Also, please don't use quotes to make it look like you're quoting someone when you aren't. That's an internet snark trope, and thus breaks the "Don't be snarky" guideline too.
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Along these lines, but with a bit more: Israel definitely wanted us to do this, but they've been trying to sell US presidents on this for decades without success. MBS and the Saudis also want this, but you rarely read about that in the news; likewise with the UAE and quite a few others who have even been running their own direct strikes on Iran. The thing is, and I realize this is a rough climate to say this into: Je…
Forcing the existence of a new jewish state has created, as expected, a permanent political fissure in the area. This is just dumb ideas piling up upon one another.
No, forcing the existence of a new aggressively expansionist jewish state did that.
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It was not and never was a good idea. The US and Europe need to stay out of the Middle East, including Israel and Palestine, and let the Jews, Christians, Muslims, and all other indigenous peoples of the area live there peacefully like that had for over a thousand years until each and every single time Europeans and Americans entered militarily causing chaos and havoc. Was it 100% peaceful prior to the Crusades? Of c…
You must be joking re: peaceful before US and Europe. The first crusade was in 1099 for those who don't know the details. We had the Byzantine-Arab wars, Fatimid civil wars, Turkish invasions... Ofcourse we had the whole spread of Islam "by sword". Don't forget it was the Roman invasion of the region in 63 BCE that resulted in the mass murder and expulsion of Jewish people from Israel after the Bar Kokhba Revolt... A…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Europe
in particular state formation in late medieval and early modern europe saw immense bloodshed and turmoil.
middle east was comparatively peaceful in contrast, especially post mongol conquest.
e.g. compare 1700s and 1800s europe to middle east