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Sinteres posted:Most of those countries would be vehemently opposed to the US staging anything offensive from their territory, particularly those sharing land borders with Iran. Turkey didn't even let us invade Iraq from their territory back when Erdogan was friendlier, so they sure as poo poo wouldn't now. Iraq is majority Shia, so good loving luck, and Afghanistan is enough of a mess as it is without getting involved in this poo poo. Invasion isn't plausible. Literally every one of those nations excepting possibly a resurgently nationalist Iraq would accede to it, plus however many carrier groups we could pack into the Gulf of Oman would suffice. "Afghanistan is a mess so it wouldn't happen there" is barely even a complete thought. Power projection and logistics is the one thing the US Military genuinely does really really well. It would be a brutal catastrophe, the IRI would raise hell going down, the occupation would be the stuff of nightmares, but in such an event the conventional war would go only one way sure as water flows downhill and Volkerball is completely correct in stating that.
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Jan 15, 2019 01:35
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Herstory Begins Now posted:Name a war in the last 50 years where most of the fighting was conventional. well for starters the iran-iraq war lmao
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Jan 15, 2019 01:36
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Willie Tomg posted:Literally every one of those nations excepting possibly a resurgently nationalist Iraq would accede to it, plus however many carrier groups we could pack into the Gulf of Oman would suffice. "Afghanistan is a mess so it wouldn't happen there" is barely even a complete thought. Afghanistan has a Shia minority in the west, so they'd be causing themselves even more problems, plus stationing a shitload of new troops in a country we're withdrawing from would be awkward (and would provide lots of opportunities for mischief from the Taliban and other resentful locals). Conceding that Iraq "possibly" wouldn't accede is funny given that there's absolutely no chance in hell they'd consider it at all. As mentioned, Turkey didn't even let us invade Iraq from their territory in 2003, so why would they help us invade Iran now when they're one of the biggest sanctions busters and involved in trilateral negotiations with Iran and Russia? Pakistan sure as gently caress doesn't want a massive US military presence in their country either, and Russia would likely have something to say about us trying to stage anything from Turkmenistan (whose main economic partners are Russia and Iran). Basically the whole world except some GCC countries and Israel oppose any kind of US attack on Iran, so the idea that these countries would throw open their territory to an invasion force just because we asked is hilarious. Dr Kool-AIDS fucked around with this message at 01:50 on Jan 15, 2019 |
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Jan 15, 2019 01:45
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Willie Tomg posted:An invasion of Iran would be hellaciously costly and messy, and the occupation would be a disaster for the ages, but you're high as gently caress if you think the conventional fighting would last more than a couple weeks. I'll give you a hint as to why: I think this map is quite out of date. I don't believe there are any US bases in Uzbekistan anymore. It also doesn't list anything in Syria. Speaking of which, it seems like non-conventional warfare is now the norm, or the new conventional. Iran wouldn't form up a huge line of battle tanks opposite a line of US tanks. Their fight would be non-conventional from the start, maybe like Hezbollah's defense of southern Lebanon against Israel in '06. Similar rough, hilly terrain that already has bunkers. Some of these will be very well hidden and equipped, with long tunnels and multiple exit points. Teams of men with ATGMs will ambush US forces and not melt away into the hills. They'll instead move around before reloading and firing again. They'll use extensive camo to avoid drones and other aircraft. They will use some of the same tactics as insurgents that the US has been fighting for 20 years, but they'll be a lot more capable and disciplined about it. I think the US would find it very difficult to move ground forces around. The US would rule the skies almost by default-- but what goals would they be able to achieve with air power alone?
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Jan 15, 2019 01:46
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Sinteres posted:Afghanistan has a Shia minority in the west, so they'd be causing themselves even more problems, plus stationing a shitload of new troops in a country we're withdrawing from would be awkward (and would provide lots of opportunities for mischief from the Taliban and other resentful locals). Conceding that Iraq "possibly" wouldn't accede is funny given that there's absolutely no chance in hell they'd consider it at all. As mentioned, Turkey didn't even let us invade Iraq from their territory in 2003, so why would they help us invade Iran now when they're one of the biggest sanctions busters and involved in trilateral negotiations with Iran and Russia? Pakistan sure as gently caress doesn't want a massive US military presence in their country either, and Russia would likely have something to say about us trying to stage anything from Turkmenistan (whose main economic partners are Russia and Iran). Basically the whole world except some GCC countries and Israel oppose any kind of US attack on Iran, so the idea that these countries would throw open their territory to an invasion force just because we asked is hilarious. I think you're drawing an admirable but ultimately fallacious line between popular opinion and what would actually happen, most specifically in the cases of Pakistan and Afghanistan, but this entire tangent is so outlandish that we may as well bicker over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. I *do* think there's a lot of daylight between sentiment, and US relationships with autocrats/deep states, however. Even subtracting everything but the Gulf and sea--and you're not fuckin' telling me for a second the gulf states minus Qatar wouldn't be cool with being a staging ground--would mean the entire southern border, which is how you'd want to invade anyway to get around the mountain ranges, would immediately become a pyroscape from which to push further into the country proper. Again: absolutely hellish but it would go one way. Count Roland posted:I think this map is quite out of date. I don't believe there are any US bases in Uzbekistan anymore. It also doesn't list anything in Syria. 1) While I think you're closer to the actual case of this hypothetical, I'd point out this entire tangent was started because Iran ostensibly has greater conventional capability than any US invasion target since WW2. I think we're in agreement that the merit of that conventional force when set against the full weight of the US MIC, but that gets far away from "Iran will rebuff invasion entirely because of its manufacturing and standing armies" 2) There is a MASSIVE difference between the 2006-era IDF and the US military. This is the best summary of the failures of the IDF in the 2006 war I've read. A lot of it dovetails with what you're saying--the Iranians would be similarly prepared and dug-in, motivated, be prepared to be flexible in their command structures, and the attackers losing sight of the distinction between "controlling" territory and "capturing" territory--yet there are several factors that would not be present in an American context: --Logistics were long since reoriented toward essentially domestic application of firepower toward Palestinians, and not a maneuvering war in another country, which left many units out of supply. --Most of the troops in the invasion were raw reservists. --A very hazy objective--"regime change" was never on the table in 2006, and would explicitly be such in this instance. --An almost immaculately stupid doctrine, which aped American doctrine just enough to invite trouble (such as a massive reliance on air power where traditionally the IDF's wheelhouse been commandos and intelligence units, treating "effects" as an end instead of a means to such) without being based on any organic Israeli strength, while also incorporating a really really catastrophic reading of Deleuze and Guattari quote:The IDF’s Operational Doctrine Research Institute, which was very influential in the training of the officer corps before the war, believed that delving into non-military post-modern theories would equip senior officers with the tools necessary for dealing with the complex and changing realities of war. According to the Institute’s director Brigadier General (res.) Shimon Naveh, ‘[. . .] We read Christopher Alexander, [. . .] John Forester, and other architects. We are reading Gregory Bateson; we are reading Clifford Geertz. Not myself, but our soldiers, our generals are reflecting on these kinds of materials. We have established a school and developed a curriculum that trains ‘‘operational architects’’.’ In his lectures Naveh was using a diagram resembling a ‘square of opposition’ that plotted a set of logical relationships between certain propositions referring to military and guerrilla operations. Labeled with phrases such as ‘Difference and Repetition – The Dialectics of Here is an actual, genuine, honest-to-god attempt to illustrate D&G's semiotic model of the rhizome:  ^^^ this poo poo isn't helpful when the lead and tail elements of your convoy get blown up by two ATGMs coming from different directions and the radio lights up into a dozen panicked reservists' voices shouting thirty different compass bearings all at once I again would never claim the result would be anything other than a meatgrinder, but the US military is immune to that at least. Willie Tomg fucked around with this message at 02:50 on Jan 15, 2019 |
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Jan 15, 2019 02:45
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Count Roland posted:I think the US would find it very difficult to move ground forces around. The US would rule the skies almost by default-- but what goals would they be able to achieve with air power alone? Blow stuff up. Within a month, there wouldn't be any single wedding left standing in the country.
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Jan 15, 2019 02:51
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Willie Tomg posted:I again would never claim the result would be anything other than a meatgrinder, but the US military is immune to that at least. What you quoted is  worthy, but are you absolutely sure, absolutely sure, US PME for senior field grade officers and general/flag officers is immune?
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Jan 15, 2019 02:54
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Willie Tomg posted:An invasion of Iran would be hellaciously costly and messy, and the occupation would be a disaster for the ages, but you're high as gently caress if you think the conventional fighting would last more than a couple weeks. I'll give you a hint as to why: Most if not almost all of those bases, are either closed or not designed to host an invasion force especially in Iraq, Pakistan and Central Asia. The bases in Afganistan are currently being reduced to garrison forces. The US does not have forces in the region or the accessibility for an invasion.
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Jan 15, 2019 03:08
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Willie Tomg posted:2) There is a MASSIVE difference between the 2006-era IDF and the US military. This is the best summary of the failures of the IDF in the 2006 war I've read. A lot of it dovetails with what you're saying--the Iranians would be similarly prepared and dug-in, motivated, be prepared to be flexible in their command structures, and the attackers losing sight of the distinction between "controlling" territory and "capturing" territory--yet there are several factors that would not be present in an American context: Do you have an alternate source for that analysis PDF? The link doesn't appear to be working.
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Jan 15, 2019 03:08
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Spacewolf posted:What you quoted is 20 years of deployment has been fairly effective at weeding out the worst of the bullshit artists among the ground troops, yes. I think the Air Force and Navy would respond very interestingly to actually getting shot back at for the first time in the 21st century, however, yet I doubt they'll be existentially threatened by Iran's conventional capability. PoontifexMacksimus posted:Do you have an alternate source for that analysis PDF? The link doesn't appear to be working. Try this link instead? That might work better. If that doesn't work, it's titled The Israel defense forces in the Second Lebanon War: Why the poor performance? by Avi Kober, published June 5th 2008 in the Journal of Strategic Studies Willie Tomg fucked around with this message at 03:18 on Jan 15, 2019 |
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Jan 15, 2019 03:15
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Willie Tomg posted:20 years of deployment has been fairly effective at weeding out the worst of the bullshit artists among the ground troops, yes. Are you talking about the same ground troops who were still using dowsing rods over a decade into the Iraq war?
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Jan 15, 2019 03:29
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So the contention is that the US would crush the Iranian military in a conventional war but then get bogged down in far worse insurgent activity than Iraq?
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Jan 15, 2019 03:30
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Lightning Knight posted:So the contention is that the US would crush the Iranian military in a conventional war but then get bogged down in far worse insurgent activity than Iraq? crush is a bit of a strong term. they'd win, but it would involve the first time the US had seen meaningful casualties in a combat operation in decades, and that is very Here There Be Monsters territory for the American armed forces as they currently exist. our advantages are sufficient that we'd get to the Mission Accomplished banner eventually, but the road there's a lot slower and more body-strewn than you'd expect. not least because defending our supply lines would be an almost inconceivably bloody nightmare
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Jan 15, 2019 03:42
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Speaking of Iran, can anyone give some recommendations for good books on the Iran Iraq War? And not Persepolis, please.
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Jan 15, 2019 04:01
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Volkerball posted:If you're going to oppose the remnants of the neocon ideology, you have to do it with facts and logic. You can't leave gaping holes in your argument for them to drive tanks through. And the facts are that Iran has lost thousands of men, including high ranking officers while holding defensive positions in Syria, defending against ragtag militias that rely on shoving square pegs into round holes militarily due to their lack of proper equipment. In the face of a US bombing campaign in which it has total air superiority and the technology to utilize it, they'd be shattered except for in pockets outside of the major population centers, which isn't going to stop US soldiers from taking selfies inside Khomeini's mausoleum. Their airpower is a joke. Their backbone militarily is their ballistic capabilities, but that would be a priority target, and without it, Iran's military would be dead in the water. Also facts though, are that hundreds of thousands, if not millions of Iranians, many of whom are opposed to the regime, would die, and whatever benefits there are to the US would be offset by orders of magnitude by the tremendous cost to the US's standing in the middle east and in the world. Trump and his buddies don't have an actual rebuttal for that, because it's the truth. It doesn't require faith and wishful thinking to oppose a war with Iran. The Iranian airforce is decent enough. It’s actually a legacy left over from the Shah’s era - he spent a shitload on the airforce. They obviously would be soundly beaten by the US, by calling it a joke is idiotic. They have some top line craft (The F-14 and some Dassault types) and have the capability to service their own planes. This isn’t like the Iraqi and SyAAF airforces flying garbage bin spec Mig-23s that fall apart in mid-air or the Serbian Mig-29s with malfunctioning radars.
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Jan 15, 2019 04:06
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420 Gank Mid posted:Are you talking about the same ground troops who were still using dowsing rods over a decade into the Iraq war? Procurement during the Iraq War was an absolute unregulated clown fiesta that is nontheless distinct from doctrine but yes I'm talking about those ground troops and how they ultimately identified the issue while simultaneously developing IED countermeasures that actually worked. A lot of poo poo has changed in 20 years. Lightning Knight posted:So the contention is that the US would crush the Iranian military in a conventional war but then get bogged down in far worse insurgent activity than Iraq? There's also some reasonable ambiguity about what "conventional" would even look like, and my contention is that the IRGC would not be turning the Zagros into The Maginot Line, But This Time It Actually Works merely because Hezbollah effectively resisted the IDF in 2006 because to my view those situations are far more different than they are alike in their details. Ultimately the entire thing is essentially Clancychat though, because the reasons why the US hasn't invaded yet have everything to do with politics and nothing to do with my tank's dad beating up your tank's dad.
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Jan 15, 2019 04:10
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Herstory Begins Now posted:Name a war in the last 50 years where most of the fighting was conventional. I guess maybe the Falklands if you count that as a war. It counts as a war. So does Gulf 1. Lightning Knight posted:So the contention is that the US would crush the Iranian military in a conventional war but then get bogged down in far worse insurgent activity than Iraq? Yes.
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Jan 15, 2019 04:24
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Lightning Knight posted:So the contention is that the US would crush the Iranian military in a conventional war but then get bogged down in far worse insurgent activity than Iraq? Pretty much dude 30 million people is a lot to handle. And we hosed it up. Imagine 71 milllion
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Jan 15, 2019 04:59
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Iraq was also weak from a decade of ridiculously harsh sanctions (which themselves killed half a million iraqi children) and had either been at war with, invaded, or pissed off all of their neighbors. Iran is in an entirely different position and while not exactly beloved by all of their neighbors, Iranian diplomacy really expressly avoids trying to make enemies and they have a lot of favors they are owed. Ironically, now that the Syrian conflict is winding down and the Iraqi situation is finally cooling, Iran has a ton of pmu types with little to do and a lot of experience. There was a window where Lebanese, Syrian, and Russian forces were tied down and not free to come help Iran, but that is in the past now. Anyways, my main point is that the American tendency to equate Iran and Iraq because they seem similar and are neighbors could not be more inaccurate and is dangerous af as they're more different than they are similar.
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Jan 15, 2019 05:18
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The US would likely win an air-war assuming that neither the Russians/Chinese send them more advanced SAMs (which is not necessarily a given both Chinese/Russian relations with the US are terrible atm). I don't think the US military would have the capacity to actually occupy Iran like it did Iraq, at least any more. Iran is a heavily mountainous country of 81 million people, almost all of which would rally to a single cause (unlike Iraq). Maybe the US could occupy a few choice locations on coast and hold out for a while, but that is largely it unless a draft happens. The US army especially isn't in the shape it was in 2003 and they are fighting a combatant in far more worse conditions with a reason to fight. I just don't see it happening unless the US starts mobilizing its economy in a serious way towards war. Also, according to Wikipedia, Iran lost about 561 soldiers in Syria not "thousands." (Also, in all honesty, Russia and China would probably at least send some weaponry which would likely make it a quagmire.) Also, I think Bolton was hoping of provoking a conflict where the US could bomb some choice strategic points and Iran and its close allies a few notches, but yeah I don't think even Bolton is dreaming of a land invasion.
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Jan 15, 2019 05:34
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If the American public can't handle 4000 combat deaths over 10 years in Iraq they'll never support an invasion of Iran. America would be forced to conduct a naval invasion across the Persian Gulf - and with the number of cruise missiles that Iran has at their disposal that would be disastrous. 4000 deaths over a 10 year period would look like nothing in that scenario
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Jan 15, 2019 07:04
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A Typical Goon posted:If the American public can't handle 4000 combat deaths over 10 years in Iraq they'll never support an invasion of Iran. America would be forced to conduct a naval invasion across the Persian Gulf - and with the number of cruise missiles that Iran has at their disposal that would be disastrous. 4000 deaths over a 10 year period would look like nothing in that scenario If there was a naval invasion across the gulf there could be over 4000 combat deaths before the fall of Bandar Abbas, getting to Tehran from there is a pipe dream.
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Jan 15, 2019 07:17
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Volkerball posted:It's not going to happen, nor should it, but US forces would be in Tehran in a month. Ardennes posted:The US would likely win an air-war assuming that neither the Russians/Chinese send them more advanced SAMs 
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Jan 15, 2019 10:00
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You honestly can't figure out the difference between the two statements?
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Jan 15, 2019 10:25
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Herstory Begins Now posted:Name a war in the last 50 years where most of the fighting was conventional. I guess maybe the Falklands if you count that as a war. Well, the Iraq-Iran War, the Falklands, the Gulf War, the Yom Kippur War, the Sino-Vietnamese War . . . among others. Even in the current war in Ukraine and Syrian Civil War, the fighting is essentially all conventional: i.e. well-defined forces fighting along a front-line, as opposed to irregular warfare like the the insurgencies we faced in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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Jan 15, 2019 10:39
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Ardennes posted:You honestly can't figure out the difference between the two statements? Well I for one could tell you which one is stupid. Unfortunately between you, the dude taking notes of all the sage wisdom ze pollack has to offer instead of banning him for being the biggest shitposter on the forums, and the one off in cspam arguing that allegations of human rights abuses in North Korea are western propaganda or some other dumb poo poo, there just aren't enough brain cells to rub together to sort it out. It's crazy to think that it used to be that journalists, activists, and researchers would sign up for accounts here because this thread had a reputation for hosting some of the most sane discussion around the hyper politicized issues in the middle east on the internet. Now basically all of them are gone, and all we're left with is yet another echo chamber for hot takes from CSPAM crossposters. 
Volkerball fucked around with this message at 11:13 on Jan 15, 2019 |
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Jan 15, 2019 11:11
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Good old Volkerball still wanting to wage war in the middle east. By the way, didn't we bet on Assad a few years ago? I think I won that bet.
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Jan 15, 2019 11:14
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Cippalippus posted:Good old Volkerball still wanting to wage war in the middle east. Where do you want your oceans of blood?
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Jan 15, 2019 11:17
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Even if ousting Assad worked, and it's debatable (see Lybia), the USA just sent weapons and contributed to escalate the Civil War without contributing enough effort to end it. Like it or not, Russia and Iran won this round, and the USA compromised and worsened their situation, especially regarding key allies in the area, such as Turkey.
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Jan 15, 2019 11:20
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Volkerball posted:Well I for one could tell you which one is stupid. Unfortunately between you, the dude taking notes of all the sage wisdom ze pollack has to offer instead of banning him for being the biggest shitposter on the forums, and the one off in cspam arguing that allegations of human rights abuses in North Korea are western propaganda or some other dumb poo poo, there just aren't enough brain cells to rub together to sort it out. It's crazy to think that it used to be that journalists, activists, and researchers would sign up for accounts here because this thread had a reputation for hosting some of the most sane discussion around the hyper politicized issues in the middle east on the internet. Now basically all of them are gone, and all we're left with is yet another echo chamber for hot takes from CSPAM crossposters. Btw, this thread really hasn't changed for years. Ardennes fucked around with this message at 11:33 on Jan 15, 2019 |
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Jan 15, 2019 11:26
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I think It'd be cool if we could spend more time talking about the middle east than talking about other posters in this thread, because the latter never adds anything worthwhile, interesting or probably even accurate
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Jan 15, 2019 11:45
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This period in time feels very much like a prelude to war in the middle east, unclear whether it's 1897 or 1914 though. It's going to be the Saudis causing it of course.
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Jan 15, 2019 12:10
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Frond posted:The Iranian airforce is decent enough. It’s actually a legacy left over from the Shah’s era - he spent a shitload on the airforce. They obviously would be soundly beaten by the US, by calling it a joke is idiotic. They have some top line craft (The F-14 and some Dassault types) and have the capability to service their own planes. This isn’t like the Iraqi and SyAAF airforces flying garbage bin spec Mig-23s that fall apart in mid-air or the Serbian Mig-29s with malfunctioning radars. The Shah's era was long ago; the F-14 are quite obsolete nowadays. The most modern fighter aircraft type they bought was the MiG-29. A large part of their inventory, including the Mirage F1, came from Iraq to Iran to avoid destruction during the 1991 Gulf War; these aircraft would have even less of a chance now than they did back then. It's still a potent air force, but only against another country that is similarly outdated. If they can't drag a powerful ally (Russia) to their defense, the IRIAF is toast. And when I say "to their defense", I mean "to deter attacks in the first place", not "to dogfight with the Americans". But winning the air war isn't the same thing as occupying the country. Honestly I don't believe the USA would be interested at all in an invasion-&-occupation operation. Far more likely, they'd just try to destroy and disorganize the Iranian state enough that roving bands of jihadist warlords can come pouring in from outside and start genociding the perfidious safavids; helped along by Saudi money. This is the only strategic goal that the USA, Israel, and KSA have in Iran.
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Jan 15, 2019 15:16
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I don't buy that they don't have actual ground-based interests in iran because the Iranian nuclear program is essentially a count down clock that has to be shut down in order to actually grind Iran back into the geopolitical stoneage and after the previous attempts to shut down their nuclear program (and capacity thereof), they hardened tf out of it and put a ton of it so far under ground that it can't be conventionally touched. Besides, the anti-Iran hawks are historically some of the most wildly ignorant people in the entire country wrt anything between Greece and India. Assuming that they understand any of the pertinent nuances or difficulties of an Iran invasion is giving them entirely too much credit. They're literally the same people who thought that a reconstruction plan for Iraq of 'let the stock market sort it out' was a great idea. E: one of the peculiar oddities of USFP in the middle east is the absolute lack of knowledge on almost any scale of anything regionally relevant by the actual decision-makers. There are low level people with intimate local knowledge and language skills, but they're basically institutionally irrelevant if even still working for the us govt. Like they were leaving in protest 5 years ago, I'd be surprised if even a fraction of the people who actually learned from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are still employed by the govt. Herstory Begins Now fucked around with this message at 15:41 on Jan 15, 2019 |
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Jan 15, 2019 15:35
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Like i mention this periodically, but it bears restating: you can find the original reconstruction plan on wikipedia and it is soberingly stupid and 100% worth a read
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Jan 15, 2019 15:38
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Without going full armchair general, some basic stuff freely available from a US DOD perspective: 1. The running assumption is that Iran does not want to provoke (or be on the receiving end of) a conventional war. 2. The DOD would not like to get into a war with Iran in general, much less a land war. US DOD is using this mild breather to push for a lot of force modernization and force management stuff, and hopping into a shooting war tends to put a big ole damper on that. Plus, it's no secret that there's a general shift to focusing on the Indo-Pacific and Europe right now. 3. Such a land war would suck, and it would require massive buildup of forces first if it ever came to that. 4. Iran knows that its SAMs and air force aren't good enough to stop US/coalition air power. Why do you think they've invested so much time and money into a potent ballistic missile force that can exact pain, cost, damage, etc? (I'm talking conventional warheads, not nuclear, biological, chemical, etc) 5. Meanwhile, you'll get a lot of "gently caress Iran" talk out of the admin and parts of the DOD based on their support for shia militias, Houthi rebels, ties to Syria, ties to Russia, general anti-US rhetoric, continued ballistic missile capability testing, etc. 6. Miscalculation leading to unnecessary and possibly irreversible escalation on either the Iranian or US / US-aligned countries remains scary to all involved. Regarding point 5, I'm not saying that warrants a war; it's just part of why you'll hear a lot of people continue to bitch and grumble about Iran even among those who definitely do not want a conventional war. Proxy wars and competing supported groups suck, but they're often less painful for the major backing interests than a proper war.
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Jan 15, 2019 15:38
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Agreed on all of those, but wrt 5, the anti Iran sentiment predates basically all of those factors aside from anti-us rhetoric. It's a significantly popular idea, albeit one largely connected with a handful of individuals who somehow happen to be political liches that keep popping up in positions of power. I'm curious sometimes where that sentiment even originated from and afaict it's partly a side effect of Israeli lobbying, some institutional inertia from the hostage crisis, and a hearty helping of American contempt for brown people. As an aside, I would love to know how many Farsi speakers the US even has working for them right now
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Jan 15, 2019 15:51
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Herstory Begins Now posted:Agreed on all of those, but wrt 5, the anti Iran sentiment predates basically all of those factors aside from anti-us rhetoric. Yes, accurate.
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Jan 15, 2019 15:54
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LeoMarr posted:We dont need ME oil anymore dude. Any iran conflivt would be a hawk strike or a re election jump point The bullying of Iran has had nothing at all to do with "rational" economic interests for decades.
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Jan 15, 2019 19:24
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Herstory Begins Now posted:I'm curious sometimes where that sentiment even originated from As far as I can tell, the revolution was really the start of it. The hostage crisis was a serious wound to US pride, and the whole thing pissed off the entire western national security clique. Gulf and Israeli influence on our foreign policy apparatus just added fuel to the fire.
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Jan 15, 2019 20:24
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