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Iran War Cost Tracker

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381–390 of 486 posts

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#381
post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about tens of thousands of peaceful civilians who have been killed by the Iranian regime during past decades? The alternative to this war is allowing the Iranian government to keep doing that, business as usual. In my opinion bombing people responsible for these atrocities increases the well-being of the world. Most Iranians seem to agree.

I don't see how this is going to work without troops on the ground? The US had air supremacy, troops on the ground and a friendly regime in Afghanistan and Vietnam, and it did not work. (I am not sure if Iraq was a success, but I am sure that people were super tired of it, and did not want something like that again) What is just bombing going to do? They just rebuilt their weapons and you have to bomb them again in 1…

You’re right that airpower alone will not change anything. But as you pointed out, putting troops on the ground does not automatically change the outcome either. If there is a lesson from the last few decades it is that the military is good at two things. Killing people and breaking their equipment. What it can do is create opportunities that political or covert efforts have to capitalize on.

Any military campaign needs a clear objective and an achievable end state with contingencies planned. Even then something unexpected will still happen. Afghanistan, Vietnam, and Iraq were all very different conflicts and the current situation is different again.

As for rebuilding their capabilities, that is not trivial. Iran is still operating aircraft that we retired decades ago, which says something about their supply constraints.

The outcome also does not have to be installing a perfect government of our choosing. A more realistic result would be a government the United States can work with and one that the Iranian people actually support. That could still include parts of the current system if major and unpopular things changed.

I am sure someone in the current leadership would like to be the person who reduced the influence of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, loosened the grip of the religious leadership, and ended the country’s pariah status while getting sanctions lifted and money flowing back into the economy.

That would probably be a better outcome than trying to export our model of government to yet another Middle Eastern country.

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#382
post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're talking about the Qataris, Kuwaitis and Bahrainis, they generally don't consider themselves[1] repressed, even though it looks that way from say an American perspective. (Women's rights are definitely a huge issue still) Those countries are very quickly becoming enormously Westernized, though. Just don't ask how many women politicians there are. [1] only speaking of the natives, immigrants of all flavors ha…

If you ask iranians, it also strongly depends who you ask, whether they confirm or debate the claim that they are repressed.

I remember watching a TikTok Live from someone walking the streets of Tehran a couple of weeks before the big protests started and it reminded me of those photos [1] of the Middle East from the 1970s. Most women were without any hair coverings, and it looked like the much more Westernized Arab areas. It was clear that the authorities had started to lose religious control of the major cities or had simply let it lapse at that point. You'd be hard pressed to see anyone who looked repressed on the surface at least.

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-47032829

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#383
post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main source in that Wikipedia article is "According to the IRGC." Trusting any belligerent in a war is silly, but given its history, trusting the IRGC during wartime is even sillier. No independent body like the Red Crescent (which is counting casualties in Iran) verified this. It's all "trust me, bro." USCENTCOM and the IAF both rejected these assertions. You should demand some evidence for the IRGC's claim. If…

This "debunks" nothing, it's merely a demand for more evidence.

Step 1. OP makes a positive claim, repeating an IRGC narrative.

Step 2. I point out there’s no good evidence supporting it.

Step 3. You reframe that as "you’re just demanding more evidence."

That’s backwards. If someone claims something extraordinary happened, the burden is on them to provide evidence. Showing that the current evidence doesn’t support the claim is a perfectly valid rebuttal.

Otherwise we could do this with anything:

kid: "There’s a ghost in my room." dad: "I don't hear a ghost. I don't see one. There’s no heat, sound, footprints..." kid: "That doesn’t mean there's no ghost. You’re just demanding more evidence.”

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first gulf war was 1990. The US has been at war with various factions of the Middle East more or less continuously for thirty five years. The current president specifically campaigned on no new foreign wars and repeatedly tried to bully the Nobel committee into awarding him a peace prize before accepting a second hand one from another world leader and a sham one from FIFA of all things. What makes anyone think th…

The only end game here is distraction from the Epstein files and a potential coup to prevent midterm elections. The whole war is just plain stupid.

Me-of-2000 would be utterly incredulous at just one auto-coup [0] in the US, let alone the potential for two in 6 years.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-coup

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This justification for bombing Iran is dumb as fuck. In a few days the number of civilians killed by US-Israeli bombings will surpass the number of civilians killed by the regime in decades.

Possibly. What is that threshold? I've heard anywhere from 3k to 300k. You can definitively answer this question?

300k? You mean 30k right?

Iranian official numbers are 3.5k. the OSINT community say at least 15k in the 3 biggest cities (including peo-regime guardias of the revolution), and 'local' journalists (a lot with CIA ties though), not friend of the system say 30k.

I wouldn't trust Iran with a butter knife, so I imagine between 15 and 30k, including 1 to 2k 'guardians'

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#386
post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counterargument: squabbling about "blue team vs red team" is legitimate domestic politics about issues important to voters. You're just upset because what you think the "the whole game" is about is a rare area of general agreement[1] and you happen to be on the "other side". To wit: when you disagree with everyone, it looks like they're conspiring against you to control the masses, yada yada yada. They're not, you're…

red team was against endless wars in Middle East, red team specifically elected Trump to be America first and to stop all wars. if it was indeed about domestic policies, why promises were not held given to the "team"?

Even back in 2016 when Trump criticized prior wars he always said he would have done it better and without warning. Not exactly a pacifist position.

> Trump was not a conventional anti-war candidate. His message was a variation of the “peace through strength” ideology of the right, plus Richard Nixon’s “madman theory”: a belief that the more other countries fear the retribution of the United States, the less likely war would be. - The Nation

If anything he's anti-invasion because he doesn't actually care about the countries, he only cares about American interests which is projecting power, scaring off adversaries, and isolationism.

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#387

This seems really low considering one of the early warning radars taken out cost around $1bil on its own.... and it's possible a second one was at least damaged. (one in Qatar the other in Bahrain)

NSA (Naval support) Bahrain lost a ground station (maybe two), not a radar.

I believe Qatar(?) lost part of a THAAD system which is expensive. But that money has already been spent.

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#388
post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What part is debunked? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Minab_school_airstrike

The main source in that Wikipedia article is "According to the IRGC." Trusting any belligerent in a war is silly, but given its history, trusting the IRGC during wartime is even sillier. No independent body like the Red Crescent (which is counting casualties in Iran) verified this. It's all "trust me, bro." USCENTCOM and the IAF both rejected these assertions. You should demand some evidence for the IRGC's claim. If…

>> what's the claim, really? That western powers intentionally struck a school and killed these kids

Israel or US or both struck a school and killed these kids. Nobody knows whether it was intentional or not. And this is not the first time Israel bombed schools or hospitals.

Mental gymnastics done to skew facts is amazing.

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main source in that Wikipedia article is "According to the IRGC." Trusting any belligerent in a war is silly, but given its history, trusting the IRGC during wartime is even sillier. No independent body like the Red Crescent (which is counting casualties in Iran) verified this. It's all "trust me, bro." USCENTCOM and the IAF both rejected these assertions. You should demand some evidence for the IRGC's claim. If…

>> what's the claim, really? That western powers intentionally struck a school and killed these kids Israel or US or both struck a school and killed these kids. Nobody knows whether it was intentional or not. And this is not the first time Israel bombed schools or hospitals. Mental gymnastics done to skew facts is amazing.

[deleted]

Re: Iran War Cost Tracker

#390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main source in that Wikipedia article is "According to the IRGC." Trusting any belligerent in a war is silly, but given its history, trusting the IRGC during wartime is even sillier. No independent body like the Red Crescent (which is counting casualties in Iran) verified this. It's all "trust me, bro." USCENTCOM and the IAF both rejected these assertions. You should demand some evidence for the IRGC's claim. If…

>> what's the claim, really? That western powers intentionally struck a school and killed these kids Israel or US or both struck a school and killed these kids. Nobody knows whether it was intentional or not. And this is not the first time Israel bombed schools or hospitals. Mental gymnastics done to skew facts is amazing.

nzrf wrote: "Do you really believe killing 175 children[0] will bring peace and prosperity to the Iranian people?"

The implication is that someone thought that it would. I am saying nobody in the US or Israel thought bombing a children's school would bring peace to the iranian people. In fact, both the USAF and IAF deny they hit a school. There is no evidence the IRGC has put forward to support its claim. Without such evidence, it doesn't make sense to believe it.

Also, you talk about mental gymnastics while defending IRGC propaganda and spewing nonsense like "Israel bombed hospitals." If you're so confident that Israel has bombed hospital buildings, can you tell me which they bombed, when they did this, and any OSINT details like the munition used?

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