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Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

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Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#131

Post by bigyabai »

_DeadFred_ wrote: post #98
wolvoleo wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The pretense that has already been debunked you mean. Iran was nowhere near having nuclear weapons. The purpose of the war was keeping Netanyahu in power by having a constant war going on. And Trump went along because he was promised a quick win which he could have used to turn his midterms around.

Why does HN flag valid replies like this dead? tristanj 3 hours ago [dead] | root | parent | next [–] > Iran was nowhere near having nuclear weapons. No, that's outdated. Iran had ~440kg of uranium enriched to 60%, enough for 9-10 nuclear weapons enriched to weapons grade. Given Iran's enormous centrifuge fleet, enrichment to enough material for a single weapons grade nuke would take 2-3 days. To enrich the entire am…

Iran has had a stockpile of >100kg medium-enriched uranium for decades. The "enough for 9-10 nuclear weapons" scare line has been repeated since the 1990s, and it's not really any better of an argument today.

Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#132

Post by inglor_cz »

tristanj wrote: post #125
inglor_cz wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is nothing straightforward about the option you describe. The necessary buildup would take several months and would happen within range of Iranian drones. Neither Iraq nor Pakistan seem to be particularly likely to grant a permission to the US to stage a large-scale land operation against Iran from their own territory. Both have large populations partly sympathetic to the mullahs, the political destabilization…

You misunderstand. You underestimate the depth of the campaign. The strategy calls for a total dismantling of Iran's infrastructure, including oil generation, fuel processing, electrical generation, and industrial capacity. Similar how the allies won WWII against Germany and Japan by destroying their industrial capacity. Iran would be paralyzed without fuel and electricity, GDP would collapse by 90%, and within days,…

"You underestimate the depth of the campaign. The strategy calls for a total dismantling of Iran's infrastructure, including oil generation, fuel processing, electrical generation, and industrial capacity. Similar how the allies won WWII against Germany and Japan by destroying their industrial capacity."

Nope, I understand quite well. I also understand that your picture of current US capabilities is too rosy.

The current US military simply does not have enough assets to do that without dangerously overstretching its commitments elsewhere. They already had to withdraw some missiles from the Far East to compensate for what was used during March.

The US armaments industry is nowhere near where it was during WWII in terms of current capacity, and its future capacity ramp-up is slooooow. Not enough qualified people, for starters. Many necessary components are produced overseas. Too much red tape and not enough willingness from the government to commit to large orders in the future.

In order to build a new factory, you need to be sure that the government will be buying the products for ~15-20 years, but the voters don't support this sort of military expenditure. They want more Medicare and Social Security, not unlike Europeans, and less military spending.

Even if the US decided to supercharge spending on its military, the lead-in time to build those factories is at least two years.

BTW your assertion that the Allies destroyed German industrial capacity is flat wrong. This is exactly the shallow understanding of history I was talking about. Dive into some actual historical sources on strategic bombing.

The Allies mostly destroyed living quarters of German workers, but Germany actually reached peak armaments production in 1944 and the occupying forces were surprised by finding the factories in good order and full of new machines.

What really broke Germany's back was physical loss of territory, severe lack of important resources like oil (caused by physical loss of control of Romania), molybden (which made their first jet engines unreliable) and a significant loss of people. But its industry was working quite reliably until Stunde Null. They moved the most critical factories underground and that was it.

One of the reasons why West Germany was so swiftly reintegrated into Europe was that their industrial capacity was necessary for post-war buildup. During the Marshall Plan years, Germany was the only European nation where the average age of industrial equipment was under 5 years.

Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#133

Post by zzrrt »

tristanj wrote: post #127
zzrrt wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weird response that does some dodging of its own. Anyone defending JCPOA is obviously in favor of controlling nukes, so why don't you explain more than restating what we already agree with? You're going to have to specifically address why ending the program with no replacement was better than letting it continue. Your other comments about cost, lack of conventional weapon limits, and perverse incentives for other cou…

Rubio's response to JCPOA in 2015 is prescient https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5dQIVh_QT4 . Everything foretold in his speech has happened. Continued sanctions were a viable answer, the reason they failed is because Biden relaxed them at the beginning of his term, allowing Iran to resume oil sales and he also paid Iran $5B in exchange for hostages.

Everything foretold? Iran is the most dominant in the region, they kicked US out, they possess nukes (or conventional) that can reach the US, and the cost of US stopping them is prohibitive? Wow, Trump had better surrender today then.

I don't think it's fair to say he predicted all of its consequences when he also hoped the next president/congress would cancel it, and they did. Did he foresee that it would only last 3 out of the 10-15 years it was supposed to run, but that would be enough to doom us? Or would it have worked out better if it lasted?

Maybe you are right that the sanctions lift built them into a threat, but it still feels stupid there was an agreement in effect, Trump destroyed it, and 10 years later the best we can hope for is they agree again to give up their biggest lever and with sanctions this time. I don't think that will go well.

Arguably it's a weakness of the US system, or the particular laws in this case, that, whichever of JCPOA or sanctions was best, either can be undone at the next election. Rubio implied that's a strength though.

It is prescient that he predicted a lunatic would possess nuclear weapons and act according to apocalyptic religious beliefs, he just didn't say he would be working for the lunatic.

Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#134

Post by spwa4 »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #112
spwa4 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No of course not. The problem is that the point of morality is to achieve a just world. Therefore using morality to allow one side to commit more crimes must be immoral, even if the actions taken to prevent are pretty bad ones. Any moral system must allow for this if it is to exist. In other words: shooting someone to prevent a murder is not immoral. Despite the fact that shooting someone is obviously immoral under a…

The problem is that you believe that everybody being affected is on a particular side. Collective punishment is a Geneva Convention war crime, and it is immoral because it causes more harm than good.

Does it really need to be said that the Geneva convention rule about collective punishment does not apply to your gas bill? Yes, what happens in the world affects you. How unfair!

Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#135

Post by tristanj »

bigyabai wrote: post #130
tristanj wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You misunderstand. You underestimate the depth of the campaign. The strategy calls for a total dismantling of Iran's infrastructure, including oil generation, fuel processing, electrical generation, and industrial capacity. Similar how the allies won WWII against Germany and Japan by destroying their industrial capacity. Iran would be paralyzed without fuel and electricity, GDP would collapse by 90%, and within days,…

If that strategy was the only strategy, then it would have already been done, there would be no desire for diplomatic resolution here. Optics-wise, banking on social unrest has failed, and if the US escalates it to a Dresden situation then the Gulf States will have their own critical services attacked in reprisal. Part of the reason why we're even seeing negotiations is because the US has no free win button. The esca…

Lots of issues

> If that strategy was the only strategy, then it would have already been done

No, it's not done because the US is averse to combat losses. The US will win a ground war against Iran, there's no question here. But it will do so at significant loss, in the thousands of lives.

Trump is politically savvy enough to not desire this option.

> banking on social unrest has failed

The social unrest strategy was never implemented. It was hinted at happening, Iranians were told to wait until told to resume protesting, but the green light was never given.

> By the time Marines land in Bandar Abbas

The marines can't land at Bandar Abbas, a cursory look at the geography shows it makes no sense to land here; a ground invasion would start from Pakistan or Iraq.

> the HEU is halfway to an underground vault in Magnitogorsk.

Why would Iran voluntarily give up its Uranium stockpiles to Russia? There is no strategic benefit.

> The remaining job of securing UF6 rubble, locating spare centrifuges and dismantling their enrichment loop is pointless.

False, it is not possible to build a nuclear weapon without a significant amount of accompanying infrastructure; there is enormous strategic value to destroying Iran's nuclear infrastructure.

> There is no option to "remove the nuclear material" that reasonably deters Iran from attaining nuclear weapons.

False, doing so would set back the Iranian nuclear program by ten to twenty years; which is long enough for another president to revisit the issue.

While in the country, the US would also dismantle the Iranian missile stockpile, destroying thousands of missiles that could target neighboring countries.

And JCPOA has its own issues, JCPOA was fundamentally flawed, it never addressed the Iranian missile problem, which is equally as large an issue as the Iranian nuclear problem.

Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#136

Post by tristanj »

inglor_cz wrote: post #132
tristanj wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You misunderstand. You underestimate the depth of the campaign. The strategy calls for a total dismantling of Iran's infrastructure, including oil generation, fuel processing, electrical generation, and industrial capacity. Similar how the allies won WWII against Germany and Japan by destroying their industrial capacity. Iran would be paralyzed without fuel and electricity, GDP would collapse by 90%, and within days,…

"You underestimate the depth of the campaign. The strategy calls for a total dismantling of Iran's infrastructure, including oil generation, fuel processing, electrical generation, and industrial capacity. Similar how the allies won WWII against Germany and Japan by destroying their industrial capacity." Nope, I understand quite well. I also understand that your picture of current US capabilities is too rosy. The cur…

Nope, you do not comprehend the strategy at all. I don't understand how you could write all that, without comprehending the situation.

The strategy, which Trump chose not to pursue, is the total destruction of Iran's energy and fuel infrastructure.

This strategy was used against Germany and Japan by destroying their industrial capacity; though to a lesser extent.

The allies did not target German electrical production, which was a massive strategic oversight. Post war analysis concluded that if the allies targeted This strategy calls for precision targeting of Iran's electrical and fuel infrastructure.

Iran would be paralyzed without fuel and electricity. GDP would collapse by 90%.

It is not possible to run a modern economy without fuel or electricity. Communications are largely cut. Fuel will quickly run out. Shortages would rapidly ensue.

Protests would begin immediately, and the IRGC would be forced to divert resources to manage the chaos. During this period, the US would launch a ground invasion, and retrieve the buried nuclear material.

Iran would not be able to mount a coordinated response, and combat losses would be far lower than if the US mounted a traditional invasion.

Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#137

Post by zzrrt »

tristanj wrote: post #129
zzrrt wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's that simple. If it was, why hasn't the administration managed to focus on that? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rationale_for_the_2026_Iran_wa... And your own comments say they also have a large arsenal of conventional weapons, so presumably they would be a threat without nukes. And the US already claimed to have fixed the nuclear problem last year. And they torched JCPOA – even with your arguments i…

The nuclear problem was never fixed; the nuclear material is still in Iran, and during the months since June 2025 Iran has had adequate time to dig out the buried fuel and move it to a more secure location. The reason JCPOA got torched was because documents stolen by Mossad revealed Iran was caught systematically lying to the IAEA about the depth of its nuclear weapons program for decades. Iran operated multiple site…

> The nuclear problem was never fixed

https://www.whitehouse.gov/releases/2025/06/irans-nuclear-fa... It's kind of a cheap shot at this point, but my point is why should we trust them today if 1 year ago they said the program was set back by years?

> Wikipedia: The majority of the documents were created between 1999 and 2003, after which the AMAD Project was halted and Iran's nuclear weapons research program was cancelled

> the documents contained no revelations about recent nuclear activity

Granted, additional background on the past affects trust levels in the present, but to be clear, AFAICT it was not showing violations of JCPOA. Maybe there is something worse that's classified.

Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#138

Post by tristanj »

zzrrt wrote: post #133
tristanj wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rubio's response to JCPOA in 2015 is prescient https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5dQIVh_QT4 . Everything foretold in his speech has happened. Continued sanctions were a viable answer, the reason they failed is because Biden relaxed them at the beginning of his term, allowing Iran to resume oil sales and he also paid Iran $5B in exchange for hostages.

Everything foretold? Iran is the most dominant in the region, they kicked US out, they possess nukes (or conventional) that can reach the US, and the cost of US stopping them is prohibitive? Wow, Trump had better surrender today then. I don't think it's fair to say he predicted all of its consequences when he also hoped the next president/congress would cancel it, and they did. Did he foresee that it would only last…

[dead]

Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#139

Post by Hikikomori »

tristanj wrote: post #107
Hikikomori wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "reason" for this war was created by Trump in 2017 when the US left the agreement with Iran, while US intelligence agencies all testified to congress Iran was following the agreement and was not working towards a bomb. Then US imposed sanctions and Iran eventually started enrichment again. Such a dumb lie.

JCPOA was a terribly designed deal, it never addressed the Iranian missile issue, which is arguably just as bad the Iranian nuclear issue. While following JCPOA, Iran decided to build tens of thousands of conventional missiles and drones instead. Enough to swarm and overwhelm air defense systems. 1000 conventional missiles cause as much infrastructure damage as a single nuclear warhead. Iran basically bypassed JCPOA,…

>And if you think paying a country tens of billions of dollars not to develop a nuke is a great deal, that incentives every other country to develop their own nuclear weapons.

Iran was never paid any money, sanctions were lifted. Are you able to state a truthful point at all?

Re: Cheap Iranian drone downed $25M US Army helicopter–maybe by chance

#140

Post by tristanj »

Hikikomori wrote: post #139
tristanj wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

JCPOA was a terribly designed deal, it never addressed the Iranian missile issue, which is arguably just as bad the Iranian nuclear issue. While following JCPOA, Iran decided to build tens of thousands of conventional missiles and drones instead. Enough to swarm and overwhelm air defense systems. 1000 conventional missiles cause as much infrastructure damage as a single nuclear warhead. Iran basically bypassed JCPOA,…

>And if you think paying a country tens of billions of dollars not to develop a nuke is a great deal, that incentives every other country to develop their own nuclear weapons. Iran was never paid any money, sanctions were lifted. Are you able to state a truthful point at all?

Did you conveniently forget what happened? To get Iran to agree to JCOPA, Obama gave Iran tens of billions to not develop nukes for 15 years.

In 2016, Iran was paid $1.7 billion in cash as a result of the nuclear deal, and regained control of $100-$150 billion in assets.

CNN: "US sent plane with $400 million in cash to Iran" Aug 4, 2016 https://www.cnn.com/2016/08/03/politics/us-sends-plane-iran-...

President Barack Obama approved the $400 million transfer, which he had announced in January as part of the Iran nuclear deal. The money was flown into Iran on wooden pallets stacked with Swiss francs, euros and other currencies as the first installment of a $1.7 billion settlement.

US officials said cash had to be flown in because existing US sanctions ban American dollars from being used in a transaction with Iran and because Iran could not access the global financial system due to international sanctions it was under at the time.

The money was procured from central banks in Switzerland and the Netherlands, official said, and an unmarked cargo plane loaded with Swiss francs, euros and other currencies were flown to Iran.

At the same time [as the January cash delivery], the White House unfroze a larger pool of Iranian assets, estimated at $100 to $150 billion, as part of the nuclear deal, though administration officials cautioned that Iran would only pocket about $50 billion after legal claims.

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