U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war • Hacker News Board

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#611

Post by SR2Z » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:40 PM UTC

swat535 wrote: post #575

SR2Z wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the US got into a war that anyone actually cared about, it would almost certainly snap into action at incredible speed. I'm gonna push back on "nobody cares." The United States is somewhat unique in that our doctrine calls for wars to be fought on distant shores, and that the main role of our military is to ensure that our ideology (liberal democracy) is protected across the world. That's why we entered WWII, it…

> the main role of our military is to ensure that our ideology (liberal democracy) is protected across the world. How is US defending liberal democracy? So far they've killed 3,000+ Iranians. 110k+ causalities in IRAQ and Afghanistan.. don't even get me started on Vietnam.

A generation of Afghan women got to learn to read because of the US intervention. I don't think you'd find very many Afghans who prefer life pre- or post-US occupation to even the very shitty, corrupt government the US set up.

Iran was funding terror attacks on Israel (and has been for decades) which for all its many faults is a liberal democracy which grants citizenship to millions of Palestinians who get to vote. Trump is a moron who picked a fight he could not possibly win, but fundamentally this was not a war that got declared out of the blue.

Iraq II was an unjustifiable experiment in nation-building, but Iraq I was a military intervention to protect Kuwait (a constitutional monarchy) from an invading dictatorship.

The US also intervened in Kosovo, Grenada, Panama, and Korea. You look those up and tell me how they went.

It is very, very trendy to pretend like the US is an evil empire. It is not. I'm not in the mood to have lots of people reply to me going "but what about!" because it's not productive and I don't feel like it's constructive conversation.

Believe whatever you want. If you care about actually being right, please go and at least read the Wikipedia pages about these conflicts. In war, armies go to KILL people. There are rarely good or bad guys, just evils of greater or lesser degree.

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#612

Post by SR2Z » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:41 PM UTC

estearum wrote: post #373

SR2Z wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the US got into a war that anyone actually cared about, it would almost certainly snap into action at incredible speed. I'm gonna push back on "nobody cares." The United States is somewhat unique in that our doctrine calls for wars to be fought on distant shores, and that the main role of our military is to ensure that our ideology (liberal democracy) is protected across the world. That's why we entered WWII, it…

Nobody cares about the war in Iran.

They sure care about rising gas prices, though.

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#613

Post by inigyou » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:43 PM UTC

werdnapk wrote: post #509

bitmasher9 wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s simple. Oil is traded in USD. A large share of the oil is produced in the Middle East. If oil stopped trading in USD the value of our currency would plummet. So we have a strong interest in all oil exporters.

There's also the petroyuan [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroyuan

Yes, which the USA is strengthening with all these blockades, presumably because the current guy in charge doesn't understand this.

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#614

Post by inigyou » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:44 PM UTC

etiennebausson wrote: post #466

bettercallsalad wrote: post #434

Not an American but live here. But I don’t understand the fixation of US in middle east theatre. With the abundance of onshore oil through fracking revolution, presumably US doesn’t need to police the Middle East. The president himself said US doesn’t need their oil. So what is this conflict all about? Is there bigger geopolitical price tag attached to victory in Iran? Or US is just besieged by corruption to the exte…

My understanding is that the point is not to hit iran, but the oil market. The US has stocks and production, but EU and china, trumps favorite economical targets, do not. No proof to offer, but it fits with his other move when it come to economy.

China has Russia as a captive supplier.

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#615

Post by SR2Z » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:53 PM UTC

pibaker wrote: post #590

SR2Z wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the US got into a war that anyone actually cared about, it would almost certainly snap into action at incredible speed. I'm gonna push back on "nobody cares." The United States is somewhat unique in that our doctrine calls for wars to be fought on distant shores, and that the main role of our military is to ensure that our ideology (liberal democracy) is protected across the world. That's why we entered WWII, it…

> and that the main role of our military is to ensure that our ideology (liberal democracy) is protected across the world. This is why the US military is partnered with all the Middle East democracies, like the one in Bahrain, or the one in UAE, or the one in Qatar…

There are not that many democracies in the Middle East. The US is allied with almost all of them.

Would you prefer democracy be delivered to those countries by force? If not, then accept the lesser evil.

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#616

Post by estearum » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:55 PM UTC

ericmay wrote: post #451

estearum wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uhh yes. I am sure. A smash and grab in Venezuela is not Iran and Iran is not China. The closest analog we have to war with China is Ukraine/Russia. All evidence from NATO exercises and investigations is that Ukr/Rus conflict has virtually no relevance to OEF, OIF, or The Caracas Kidnapping. Iran is a little taste of what's going in Ukr/Rus, but obviously China would be able to wield the same type of war at orders of…

Ok so let me explain something to you as I think you might be a little new to the military or military theory, combat, &c. Militaries need to train in order to test systems, test weapons, gain experience, and be able to generally perform better and accomplish any given objective. In the modern era, militaries need to engage in what is called Combined Arms exercises. These exercises, as the name alludes to, coordinate…

Your ego and confidence would do wonders in the Russian military! After all, they had tons and tons of combined arms, counterinsurgency, and standoff experience. Way more combat experience than Ukraine did.

Unfortunately it turns out different wars are very different.

You’re acting like I’ve argued that I would prefer China over the US. That’s absolutely not true, and partially for the reasons you mention. However, we should absolutely not rest on our more expansive direct experience in very different combat to presume anything.

We especially shouldn’t presume that when Iran, as a China-lite adversary, is teaching us lessons that we apparently have been unwilling to learn indirectly in Ukraine.

By the way, Mr Military Strategy Buff, “combined arms” is not (necessarily) multiple branches working together. It’s multiple functions working together. Aviation, armor, artillery, infantry, etc. Nothing to do with different branches.

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#617

Post by _heimdall » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:55 PM UTC

nemothekid wrote: post #281

WarmWash wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China, in it's modern incarnation, and every living member of it's military, has never seen a single real battle. Nothing. No one has any rank that has bearing on any kind of combat. Just decades of self-congratulatory war games. China has tons of weapons and resources. But it would remain to be seen if they can actually fight when every single person along the entire chain is a total day one rookie.

I'm not sure that any of that actually matters. Wars are not Call of Duty. It's politically difficult to invest actual manpower in Iran and Unless China were to nuke Hawaii, an all out war with China would also immediately be politically unpopular. China, like Iran, wouldn't doesn't need to defeat the US, they just need to hold out long enough for the US economy to collapse, which would happen way faster if China is…

I'm curious what the financial engineering you're referring to was.

I've been trying to understand why gas is still comparatively cheap given the war and the best I've landed on so far is that the spread between feedstock (crude oil) and output (diesel, gas, jet fuel, etc) widened in large part die to flooding the market with strategic oil reserves.

We keep crude prices low, which is what many indicators track, while we couldn't keep final product prices low as easily because we can't quickly increase refinery capacity.

How did they financially suppress fuel prices?

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#618

Post by SR2Z » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:56 PM UTC

mrguyorama wrote: post #424

nanliu wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looking back at COVID crisis, the rate China vs US snapped to action when it come to PPE production is probably good glimpse into the disparity. I'm not sure we have done anything to improve this situation.

That is, again, a great example of the same administration being utterly incompetent at directing production. Every single manufacturer in the US stated plainly that they did not feel safe scaling up production, because the demand was always going to be temporary, and they didn't want to be left with unusable factories. A competent admin could have worked with them to arrange for financial help to temporarily expand…

Yeah, this is a great addition. US production suffered a lot under Mr. "if you don't measure them, the cases stop going up!"

But one incredible bright spot was production for the mRNA vaccines, which was technical enough that Trump couldn't get his tiny little paws on it, and the US then produced enough to vaccinate large chunks of the world.

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#619

Post by goatlover » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:56 PM UTC

rhelz wrote: post #528

bryan0 wrote: post #476

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s even more puzzling is that line of reasoning was one reason why trump was elected in the first place: increase domestic oil supply and get out of foreign wars

It stops being puzzling when you recall that Trump is a con man. This whole thing was never about making America great again, it was about lining Trump and his family's pockets. By every metric which matters to Trump, things are going exactly according to plan.

And when will Trump supporters realize this?

Re: U.S. used 'virtually all' of its long-range precision missiles during Iran war

#620

Post by estearum » Tue, Aug 04, 2026, 10:56 PM UTC

ericmay wrote: post #452

estearum wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The claim above is that neither side has experience that's all that relevant to the type of conflict we'd expect in a China/US conflict. Nothing to do with "validity." Your lived experience (or whoever's you're defending) is valid.

That is factually incorrect then if that's the claim. The US has that experience.

No active American servicemember has fought a near-peer adversary lmao

You should do some reading from the people who fought in GWOT and are now volunteering in Ukraine. Obviously combat experience is better than no combat experience, but we absolutely should not assume much beyond that.