I’m half expecting the families of our military to receive notification their loved ones passed away in tragic car accidents.
Quaro
1571
Ugh. We left 2016 with a multi-country Iran nuclear deal. We’ve now completely burned the moderate faction in Iran. This sucks.
And here is where it gets so tragically frustrating. On the one hand, this crisis, at least this particular scenario, is completely unnecessary and is the direct result of this administrations ill-considered, poorly informed, and generally just stupid decisions. Again, if the outcome we want is stability, security, and prosperity for the region, very few of our military actions in the region have moved us towards these things, and the recent assassination perhaps least of all.
But, at the same time, as an American I can’t endorse or sympathize with violent attacks on our service people, even if at the higher level I don’t think they should be there in Iraq necessarily. Hell, I even think, at one level, the Iranians are entirely justified in this sort of military response. That doesn’t change the fact that I can’t and won’t wish harm for our personnel, and thus have to endorse some sort of response, though I wish it would be focused on both protecting people in the short run and on moving us towards broader goals in the long term. Instead, the US currently doesn’t seem to have the leadership and confidence to do anything but escalate or do tit for tat. Still, we have to respond in some way, and knowing this administration, it will make matters worse.
People are in for a shock I think if they believe the Iranians will roll over like the Iraqis. Even without boots on the ground, we will likely face more casualties than we took with the Iraqis (speaking of the actual invasion phase, not necessarily the occupation) if we engage the Iranians in a serious way. If we actually try putting troops into Iran, God help everyone.
Where do you invade from? Iraq won’t go for it. And even if they did, the Iranians get all their Shiite allies to go all insurgency on us there. Look at the map. Azerbaijan? How do you get troops/supplies there? It’s landlocked; you gotta go through Georgia or Russia or Turkey. Ditto Armenia and Turkmenistan and Afghanistan. Pakistan won’t go along with it.
There’s no way we can invade Iran. Not to mention the fact that it’s 3 or 4 times larger than Iraq, and rugged as fuck.
The problem with that scenario:
- I can’t imagine any American NATO ally (excepting the UK, who will be forced to roll over, since their future post-Brexit trade deal will depend on it), is going to agree to commit any forces to this. So the US will be going it almost entirely alone. There is no longer even a coalition of the willing.
- Iraq will essentially be a hostile country at this point. They can’t countenance an invasion of Iraq from their lands, which complicates the logistics of any response even further. At this point, I suspect the best case for peace is that they throw the US out as fast as possible - anything else will get extremely messy, extremely fast.
- That leaves the US with a bombing campaign, etc. No way that Iran capitulates from that. Which means that the US will be committing to an extremely expensive and lengthy conflict, with no realistic hope or chance of resolution in the future. What is the win scenario here? Congress can not countenance a war under those circumstances - and that may be what Trump is counting on.
Timex
1577
Trump said he didn’t need an exit strategy.
I’m surprise and a little pleased that Iran’s elected to respond conventionally. You and I have both discussed the shadow war and I think Iran is probably every bit as good at running a shadow war as we are. Obviously having Trump as the president makes it really hard to run a shadow war, because he is incapable of keeping his fucking mouth shut. I’d expect to see a lot of attacks on soft targets, both abroad and at home. Right now my money is this is just a diversionary tactic.
Oh and to the alien race running this video game, you could you pretty plus lower the difficulty level.
I really don’t expect a land war either. But we could stage troops to Kuwait and then go through Al Basrah. Iraq won’t like it, but the cool thing about being super power is you can get away with a lot of shit that other countries can’t.
Once we seize Abadan, Iran we will have captured a major port to supply the troops. The city contains the largest refinery, so that will cripple the economy. According to HO IV The terrain there is mostly desert so not to a bad country to fight. Ishafan is located close by and with two million people the 3rd largest city in Iran.
Plus we have Donald Trump as commander-in-chief, that’s got to be worth something.
ShivaX
1580
The US out of Iraq and lots of sales/testing of air defense systems to Iran.
Oh wait, you meant for the United States, not Russia.
RichVR
1581
He’s not the one that needs an exit.
Quaro
1582
Imagine Iran starting the ‘Bedbug War’. They just have agents stay in Trump hotels, leave bedbugs behind, then play golf and wreck the golf greens. That’s it. All over the world. Constantly. I honestly believe this would bother Trump more than any kind of military attack.
Menzo
1584
You say that like there’s any chance that any of Trump’s properties would allow men of…that complexion let’s say…to use their front-of-house services.
Well the Saudis have spent millions at Trump’s property in DC As long as the money is green I think they’ll take it.
antlers
1586
But they never actually stayed in any of the rooms.
I’m not sure that’s true.
