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The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

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Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#41

Post by fifilura »

spwa4 wrote: post #33
fifilura wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To think anyone ever mentioned defending Taiwan from China lol There are still countries willing to defend democracy out there - Ukraine/Europe/Canada/Japan/S-Korea/Australia. Just not USA.

Let me check if I get this right: you're making the argument that if USA won't defend Taiwan, Ukraine/Europe/Canada/Japan/S-Korea/Australia will? I mean, obviously Ukraine won't. Does that need saying? It's insane to think about. Look at the history of WW1 and WW2: Russia will fight until the Russian state collapses and we're, at minimum, years away from that happening. And Ukraine, if they have any sense whatsoever,…

Support for Ukraine from USA is almost zero now and they still hold up and event advance with help from Europe.

And obviously knowledge from Ukraine would be of huge help for Taiwan.

Your USAID example is depressing though. You'd wish the cutbacks had been done in a more controlled manner. They seemed a bit rushed, to noones benefit.

Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#42

Post by krapp »

We have the best quagmires. No one does quagmires like we do. You've never seen a quagmire like an American quagmire. Putin tells me he wishes Russia could do a quagmire as good as this, but they can't. Europe hasn't had a good quagmire in years, they don't even know how to make them anymore. Quagmires like this are only made in America.

Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#43

Post by bell-cot »

ExoticPearTree wrote: post #37
bell-cot wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many hours do you think our current President could stick to that strategy, if it didn't instantly - Poof! Magic! - make everything better?

Its not a Trump issue. With the exception of Jimmy Carter, every US president since WW2 bombed something or someone.

Is your phrase "stops bombing countries just because it can" shorthand for something like "America is a too-often-immoral-or-incompetent global superpower"?

A quick peek at post-WWII military history - 150-ish countries that the US could bomb, multiply by 80 years, subtract actual bombings - suggests that "because it can" is a very weak description of Uncle Sam's bombing behavior.

And America was no saint during Carter's years - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_policy_of_the_Carter_a...

Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#44

Post by swed420 »

khriss wrote: post #17

Aaaaaand right on cue the flagging brigade promptly flagged this to get it off the front page. What's stunning is that there doesn't seem to be a single way in which the United States has come out ahead on this conflict. We have * Established that US zero ability or will to protect it's 'allies' in region beyond Israel. * Permanently ceded de facto control over the straits of Hormuz to Iran * Significantly strengthen…

> Aaaaaand right on cue the flagging brigade promptly flagged this to get it off the front page.

This is why I exclusively use https://hckrnews.com as the "front page"

Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#45

Post by cindyllm »

spwa4 wrote: post #33
fifilura wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To think anyone ever mentioned defending Taiwan from China lol There are still countries willing to defend democracy out there - Ukraine/Europe/Canada/Japan/S-Korea/Australia. Just not USA.

Let me check if I get this right: you're making the argument that if USA won't defend Taiwan, Ukraine/Europe/Canada/Japan/S-Korea/Australia will? I mean, obviously Ukraine won't. Does that need saying? It's insane to think about. Look at the history of WW1 and WW2: Russia will fight until the Russian state collapses and we're, at minimum, years away from that happening. And Ukraine, if they have any sense whatsoever,…

[dead]

Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#46

Post by somenameforme »

nx77 wrote: post #36
NhanH wrote: post #3

Professor Robert Pape (University of Chicago) has 2 substacks where he have been discussing the exactly topic heavily, as well as having webinar/ live discussions with some heavy hitters about the topic. Unfortunately both of the substacks are both subscription-only https://professorrobertpape.substack.com/ https://escalationtrap.substack.com I would rather not paraphrasing or rewrite in my interpretation too much, a…

Does China or India care if Iran gets nuke as much the US does?

Nukes are a pretext. The former Supreme Leader, who the US chose to assassinate, had put a religious fatwa against nuclear weapons. The nut and yahoo in Israel has been saying Iran is a few years away from nukes for 30 years, literally. [1] Clearly they kicked his dog or something, and he just finally found a big enough fool to make his invasion fantasies finally come true.

I think the reason we cling onto that is because it's one way to try to retreat while waving a victory flag. Now we can claim we think the nukes are 'really' destroyed or whatever, and claim mission accomplished.

[1] - https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Vc_NanZ-Jos

Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#47

Post by username135 »

spwa4 wrote: post #33
fifilura wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To think anyone ever mentioned defending Taiwan from China lol There are still countries willing to defend democracy out there - Ukraine/Europe/Canada/Japan/S-Korea/Australia. Just not USA.

Let me check if I get this right: you're making the argument that if USA won't defend Taiwan, Ukraine/Europe/Canada/Japan/S-Korea/Australia will? I mean, obviously Ukraine won't. Does that need saying? It's insane to think about. Look at the history of WW1 and WW2: Russia will fight until the Russian state collapses and we're, at minimum, years away from that happening. And Ukraine, if they have any sense whatsoever,…

The litmus test for where a country stands on international issues boils down to a conversation you had with some lads over pints?

Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#48

Post by bell-cot »

krapp wrote: post #42

We have the best quagmires. No one does quagmires like we do. You've never seen a quagmire like an American quagmire. Putin tells me he wishes Russia could do a quagmire as good as this, but they can't. Europe hasn't had a good quagmire in years, they don't even know how to make them anymore. Quagmires like this are only made in America.

From the PoV of our enemies and rivals, perhaps.

But in the bigger picture? We're still futzing around at amateur hours. The quagmire of the Roman-Persian Wars lasted almost seven hundred years - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman%E2%80%93Persian_wars

Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#49

Post by xtracto »

swed420 wrote: post #44
khriss wrote: post #17

Aaaaaand right on cue the flagging brigade promptly flagged this to get it off the front page. What's stunning is that there doesn't seem to be a single way in which the United States has come out ahead on this conflict. We have * Established that US zero ability or will to protect it's 'allies' in region beyond Israel. * Permanently ceded de facto control over the straits of Hormuz to Iran * Significantly strengthen…

> Aaaaaand right on cue the flagging brigade promptly flagged this to get it off the front page. This is why I exclusively use https://hckrnews.com as the "front page"

After many years of using that, the few times when I manually get to news.ycombinator.com I find it unreadable haha. Crazy how ones brain adapts.

Re: The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US

#50

Post by swed420 »

xtracto wrote: post #49
swed420 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Aaaaaand right on cue the flagging brigade promptly flagged this to get it off the front page. This is why I exclusively use https://hckrnews.com as the "front page"

After many years of using that, the few times when I manually get to news.ycombinator.com I find it unreadable haha. Crazy how ones brain adapts.

Agreed.

Aside from it being uncensored, its default chronological sort makes it much easier to follow and see where I left off.

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