The Iran thread

[bennynova]

On 6/22/2019 at 5:14 PM, 17D_guy said:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/with-trumps-approval-pentagon-launched-cyber-strikes-against-iran/2019/06/22/250d3740-950d-11e9-b570-6416efdc0803_story.html?utm_term=.a1069838cb86

I’m not sure why we’d mitigate their ability to launch missiles right now.  Save that action for a war/real operation that could save US lives....

 

wasted tech, if you ask me

[Slick]

2 hours ago, bennynova said:

I’m not sure why we’d mitigate their ability to launch missiles right now.  Save that action for a war/real operation that could save US lives....

 

wasted tech, if you ask me

https://www.rt.com/news/462533-iran-cyber-attack-unsuccessful/

Iran says they foiled it.  If true, then better to find out now that it wouldn't have worked when it really counted.

Edited June 24, 2019 by Slick

[nunya]

Maybe they worked, maybe they didn't, but I wouldn't expect anything else from RT.

[McJay Pilot]

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/iranian-commander-kept-secret-israeli-f-35-stealth-fighters-had-violated-iran-airspace

Well, that’s interesting. Who knew all we needed was Russian radar codes?

[matmacwc]

3 hours ago, McJay Pilot said:

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/iranian-commander-kept-secret-israeli-f-35-stealth-fighters-had-violated-iran-airspace

Well, that’s interesting. Who knew all we needed was Russian radar codes?

So they were undetected but they know they took pics of an underground facility, uh, how?

[SurelySerious]

4 hours ago, McJay Pilot said:

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/iranian-commander-kept-secret-israeli-f-35-stealth-fighters-had-violated-iran-airspace

Well, that’s interesting. Who knew all we needed was Russian radar codes?

When you load up the tapes, you just have to plug this in first. 

[RegularJoe]

[bfargin]

Escalating quickly with the UK now. I still can't get inside the heads of foreign leaders who want to piss of the big guys like this. They're like chihuahuas around Labs and any other larger breed.

[jazzdude]

Escalating quickly with the UK now. I still can't get inside the heads of foreign leaders who want to piss of the big guys like this. They're like chihuahuas around Labs and any other larger breed.

Because they think they can win in the long term. Sure, we can cause them a lot of pain in the near term, but short of conquering and occupying Iran, they probably feel they can retain power over whatever is left after we're too tired to keep fighting. Basically like the Taliban in Afghanistan-we can't stay forever, and they know that.

Plus it gives them negotiating capital for easing sanctions.

[waveshaper]

 

[uhhello]

6 hours ago, waveshaper said:

 

Good thing they sent the A-team.  Nothing like a go around to keep up the element of "surprise".  Hover about 20 feet too high.  Team roping onto each other.  

Can't believe they keep poking the bears. 

[M2]

So the Iranians are now Somali pirates with helos?

[GrndPndr]

Well, if it has to start, might as well get started by the Brits.

[McJay Pilot]

Welp... shit.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1054561

This is kinda how Red Storm Rising kicked off. Maybe we’ll get that movie after all!

[DirkDiggler]

1 hour ago, McJay Pilot said:

Welp... shit.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1054561

This is kinda how Red Storm Rising kicked off. Maybe we’ll get that movie after all!

Except the Saudi’s have consistently shown themselves to be one of the most incompetent fighting forces in the history of warfare (billions of dollars in some of the best US military hardware hasn’t doesn’t mean anything when you’re unwilling to maintain it or learn how to employ it effectively).  They’re not gonna go after Iran on their own, they’re barely holding their own against the Houthis.

  I’d highly encourage anyone interested in what’s unfolding in the Gulf right now to read Andrew Bacevich’s America’s War for the Greater Middle East.  It’s a fairly depressing read; there’s a lot of historical parallels going on right now (understanding that it’s not direct ie history doesn’t repeat itself but it does rhyme).

[Orbit]

8 hours ago, DirkDiggler said:

Except the Saudi’s have consistently shown themselves to be one of the most incompetent fighting forces in the history of warfare (billions of dollars in some of the best US military hardware hasn’t doesn’t mean anything when you’re unwilling to maintain it or learn how to employ it effectively).  They’re not gonna go after Iran on their own, they’re barely holding their own against the Houthis.

  I’d highly encourage anyone interested in what’s unfolding in the Gulf right now to read Andrew Bacevich’s America’s War for the Greater Middle East.  It’s a fairly depressing read; there’s a lot of historical parallels going on right now (understanding that it’s not direct ie history doesn’t repeat itself but it does rhyme).

Mind pointing out a few of the parallels to some of us who find this interesting but are too lazy to get to deep into it?

[LJDRVR]

9 hours ago, DirkDiggler said:

  I’d highly encourage anyone interested in what’s unfolding in the Gulf right now to read Andrew Bacevich’s America’s War for the Greater Middle East.  It’s a fairly depressing read; there’s a lot of historical parallels going on right now (understanding that it’s not direct ie history doesn’t repeat itself but it does rhyme).

Everything Bacevich has written should be required reading.

[pilot]

4 hours ago, LJDRVR said:

Everything Bacevich has written should be required reading.

Maybe for all you anti-Trumpers. TL;DR version of Bacevich's views: Obama's approach to Iran was great. Trump is a disaster. 

Edited September 16, 2019 by pilot

[WheelsOff]

5 hours ago, pilot said:

Maybe for all you anti-Trumpers. TL;DR version of Bacevich's views: Obama's approach to Iran was great. Trump is a disaster. 

That’s too bad. I hate it when people take the time to write about an otherwise interesting subject and completely politicize it. Everyone is pushing an agenda these days and it’s exhausting. Guess it belongs in the pile of “good kindling” as a fire starter for my fire pit...

[gearhog]

Another tanker seized. We're clearly being provoked. My guess is they're hoping to trigger a political/economic crisis in the West and are willing to risk conflict to achieve it.

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1178571/iran-news-iran-oil-tanker-Strait-of-Hormuz-gulf-saudi-arabia-uk-us

 

[nsplayr]

8 hours ago, WheelsOff said:

That’s too bad. I hate it when people take the time to write about an otherwise interesting subject and completely politicize it. Everyone is pushing an agenda these days and it’s exhausting. Guess it belongs in the pile of “good kindling” as a fire starter for my fire pit...

FWIW Andrew Bacevich is a self-described conservative with a view of US foreign policy that is deeply skeptical that military power is an all-purpose salve that it's often used as. This has put him at odds at times with the current President as well as both of his predecessors. He's also a retired Army Colonel who served in Vietnam who earned a PhD from Princeton and lost a son to combat in Iraq.

All this to say: read him for yourself and figure out if you agree or disagree with his thoughts. I don't count myself in the camp that agrees with him reflexively, but I respect his thinking enough to at least read his writing on occasion. My recommendation is to start here, published in 2008.

[brickhistory]

Say, Europe, Japan, et al, we, the US are net exporters of oil/energy now.  Other than the principal of freedom of navigation, the Straits are not nearly as important to us now as they are to you.

We'll put a few Patriot batteries in Saudi Arabia, y'all got the rest.  If it's important to you, you'll step up.  We can be fine "leading from behind" on this one.

The economic squeeze we are applying to the Mullahs and all the apparatus that relies on them for their cheap gas, pensions, etc, is working just fine.

Sure beats us sending gazillions of dollars to Tehran via clandestine cargo planes any day.

Edited September 16, 2019 by brickhistory
spelling

[LJDRVR]

15 hours ago, pilot said:

Maybe for all you anti-Trumpers. TL;DR version of Bacevich's views: Obama's approach to Iran was great. Trump is a disaster. 

Bacevich fought in combat in Vietnam. He retired as an infantry Colonel. His son was killed in Afghanistan. Colonel Bacevich teaches history at Boston College, is devoutly Catholic and a conservative.

He's wrote several well-reasoned books that do a pretty good job explaining the dangers of continued American misconduct abroad.

You're the only one I see bringing up politics and Trump here.

 

Edited September 16, 2019 by LJDRVR

[pawnman]

6 hours ago, brickhistory said:

Say, Europe, Japan, et al, we, the US are net exporters of oil/energy now.  Other than the principal of freedom of navigation, the Straits are not nearly as important to us now as they are to you.

We'll put a few Patriot batteries in Saudi Arabia, y'all got the rest.  If it's important to you, you'll step up.  We can be fine "leading from behind" on this one.

The economic squeeze we are applying to the Mullahs and all the apparatus that relies on them for their cheap gas, pensions, etc, is working just fine.

Sure beats us sending gazillions of dollars to Tehran via clandestine cargo planes any day.

Sounds good in theory, but oil is a global market.  Supply goes down, price goes up... Regardless of where in the world the oil is extracted.

[pilot]

5 hours ago, LJDRVR said:

Bacevich fought in combat in Vietnam. He retired as an infantry Colonel. His son was killed in Afghanistan. Colonel Bacevich teaches history at Boston College, is devoutly Catholic and a conservative.

He's wrote several well-reasoned books that do a pretty good job explaining the dangers of continued American misconduct abroad.

You're the only one I see bringing up politics and Trump here.

 

Fighting in combat in vietnam, or any war for that matter, does not make one a foreign policy expert, nor does it make his opinions right. Neither does retiring as an infantry colonel. Neither does being Catholic. Neither does being conservative. Neither does losing a kid in combat. I’d venture to say 99.999% of gold star families are not foreign policy experts. Teaching history at BC also does not make one’s opinion on Iran more correct than others. If being in academia is the litmus test for having all the right answers, more people from academia should be running the country. Trying to support your argument by throwing these facts out takes away from argument  

Reread what I wrote. Maybe more slowly this time. 

Did he or did he not support Obama’s Iran deal? Has he, or has he not, blasted Trumps undoing the deal and calling it a disaster?  These questions are rhetorical. His exact words are towards the bottom of the following link “I supported the Iran deal...Trump’s policies with regard to Iran are disastrous” https://progressive.org/dispatches/bacevich-stockwell-190629/

He can be a Colonel, conservative, catholic, a gold star father, college professor, author of 69 books, and still be wrong or still not necessarily have all the right answers. Lots of really smart people who have gone to Ivy League schools and who have held a lot of high government positions with vast experience still don’t necessarily have all the right answers.  I personally disagree with his stance on the Iran deal. I don’t think Obama's deal was going to be very effective in preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear power. And it’s too early to call Trump’s Iran policy disastrous.