When I mentioned in an earlier comment section, that I had been privy to intel on the development of an Iranian IRBM threat to Europe over 2 decades ago, I got a response that basically blew it off comparing that earlier assessment to the Iraq WMD reports.
The fecklessness (I probably use this term too often but it fits) of the Europeans, who had this intel as well and were recommended at the time to plan a ballistic defense, is jaw dropping. Of course, we encouraged that failure to act when, as you point out, the US elected to cover their collective asses once again.
The blockade of the strait and the shakedown of merchant ships demonstrate that the Islamic Republic is a criminal entity in addition to being a sponsor of terrorism by HAMAS, Hezbollah and the Houthis.
The missiles being launched at Israel, the Gulf Nations and Diego Garcia demonstrate that Iran was an immediate and serious threat to its neighbors and the world. Imagine if it had atomic bombs to place on those missiles.
I sincerely hope there is no treaty because any treaty with a bunch of religious fanatics who welcome the apocalypse would be worthless.
This war has been going on for 47 years and the only way to put it an end to it is by removing the Islamic Republic once and for all whatever the short-term costs.
Trump must not kick the can down the road like his predecessors did because there is no guarantee that his successors will be Vance or Rubio.
Imagine what might happen under a President Newscum or a President Kamala (who only lost by about 2%).
Your European allies have no desire to get involved into war, which your POTUS started without discussing with them or even warning them in advance. Alliances aren't friendship societies; Iran lay outside NATO jurisdiction, so your allies are not oblidged to help you. If you want help from them, you should negotiate and persuade them that it is in their own interests.
NATO area of responsibility is described as "territories of its members in Europe and North America, as well as ships and forces of those members in Mediterranean and North Atlantic". Those boundaries were specifically agreed during NATO formation, because USA didn't want to get involved into European colonial wars, and Europeans have no desire to get involved into US wars outside Europe.
Good thing there's a big dome over NATO territory so nothing bad can get through huh? It's all gonna be okay, little buddy (pats on head). Here's a kleenex for the drool on your chin. Go sit in the corner where you can't hurt yourself, sweetie.
The relations between the US, France, and the UK were only ever partially dictated by NATO, and indeed NATO was a Johnny come lately agreement compared to the bilateral alliance treaties we signed with them that covers much wider scopes.
And both sides have had desire to get involved in each others conflicts when it suited them.
Putting too much emphasis on NATO to explain how the alliances work is a mistake.
All the more jarring because it was on behalf of a bunch of terrorist murders of poor Klinghoffer, who were then generally given sweetheart soft deals. And that's before talking about that fuckhead Craxi dropping a dime about Operation El Dorado Canyon to Gaddafi while the blood in Berlin was still fresh.
I am generally an Atlanticist who is in favor of NATO and even with reservations the EU and an anti-Kremlin hawk, but there's a lot wrong with our relationship in Europe and idiots trying to blame it all on the US are either dumb, ignorant, or both.
"Your European allies have no desire to get involved into war,"
And I imagine neither did the Mullah's favorite intermediary and general scumbag Qatar. But sometimes you get involved anyway, especially when dealing with a fundamentally perfidious terrorist regime that does not accept nor respect neutral status when it comes to the Jihad.
And which you for some reason insist on carrying water for and regurgitating propaganda slogans for.
(PS: I have plenty bad to say about the Pahlavi dynasty, but it takes a special kind of retardation to claim the dynasty that was founded by the commander of the Iranian Cossack Brigade staging a coup and who went on to issue Firmans banning forced conversion and the ritual impurity of non-Muslims and whose son, successor, and last Shah pushed for secular education and armed the Kurds persecuted "religious and national minorities."
And to claim that they "neglected religion" in spite of the last Shah having been the person to found universal education in Iran, NOT the "Islamic Republic" like you previously claimed, because apparently you wouldn't understand what happened in the White Revolution if it bit you in the rear.)
"which your POTUS started without discussing with them or even warning them in advance."
Absolute bullshit.
Trump did indeed discuss and warn the relevant European Allies, as we now know from such habitually pro-Trump sources as the Starmer Cabinet. Which is also why the operations could not be launched from places like Diego Garcia, the British Cypriot Bases, or the French Indian Ocean territories.
And we now know how little good that did any of us, precisely because even with prior warning none of them were willing to help at the time and the British Labour government was so wretched it would *not even defend itself or its own bases and nationals from the expected blowback* because of what can only be called Trump Derangement Syndrome, with Ed Miliband arguing and ultimately prevailing that it would be against international law to station SAMs to defend the bases that are sovereign US soil and that the UK is obliged to by treaty.
The problem here was not that Trump did not consult or discuss with the European allies, because he did to the extent was wise and arguably well beyond that. We're very lucky none of the TDS afflicted governments pulled a Craxi in El Dorado Canyon and tipped the Mullahcracy off, saving Gaddafi's life after the Berlin Nightclub Bombing while endangering US Servicepeople.
And if you don't understand that reference maybe you need to shut the fuck up and sit the fuck down to let those of us with a historical awareness that extends beyond 1980 to talk.
But in any case the main problem here was never Trump.
"Alliances aren't friendship societies;"
Correct. They also aren't to be taken lightly or squandered like what Miliband and Starmer did over domestic political preferences, which is one reason they and some of the other Euros have attracted universal condemnation not just from us and Israel but also from the Gulf Sunnis.
Perhaps you may wish to peruse Machiavelli and what he had to say on neutrality.
"Iran lay outside NATO jurisdiction,"
And so does Diego Garcia and the French Indian Ocean territory. This was never a proper NATO matter, this was always a matter of bilateral consultation between allies, which Trump attempted only to have them blown off because various European Allies opted to keep feeding the crocodile in the face of its proven track of terrorism and perfidy as confirmed by not only their own history (see for instance in Germany: https://icct.nl/publication/iranian-external-operations-europe-criminal-connection ) and the IAEA.
"so your allies are not oblidged to help you."
You DO realize that the bonds between the UK and US on one hand and France and US predate and are not reliant upon NATO, and which go WELL BEYOND NATO's jurisdiction? Apparently not. Big oof on your part, but I suppose that's keeping with your proven track record of ignorance.
In any case, the NATO Allies are not obliged to help us, but they have to be judged accordingly from that failure. As it stands many of them failed even to help themselves in this case and are getting slagged by people beyond just us>
"If you want help from them, you should negotiate and persuade them that it is in their own interests."
We tried. We failed, not because of the evil Cheeto but because of truly staggering idiocy that's come to light now about how they reacted to Trump's warnings. It's now that they have largely switched tack and are helping us more.
Not compared to the Islamic Republic of Iran. Compare/contrast the number of neutral ships attacked by Iran versus those by Israel.
And then compare that to apologies given and reparations paid.
I’ll wait.
We know the USS Liberty was unintentional. We also know that Iranian attacks on neutral shipping and the USN in the strait were intentional. This is not hard.
Whataboutism will not change this. It will not even address it.
No, Milosevic was not charged for doing the same thing Israel is doing. Israel went out of its way to minimize casualties, to help people evacuate in peace, and to avoid casualties. Contrast that to Srebrenica or Sarajevo.
But thanks for owning that you are a Jew hating asswipe willing to carry water for Hamas and the PFLB.
Geo. Washington would beg to differ. “Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people under an efficient government. the period is not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel.
Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor or caprice?”
I would also think so. London should understand in a few years it could become a target from Missiles that could range their nation much as Iran has done for Israel.
Our NATO allies delusionally pretend that this 'isn't their war', when the outfit in question has clearly wanted to give them some loving attention for decades. Alliances face threats that are often not in the original charter, but they are still threats.
And if you think POTUS didn't 'discuss' this with them, you're buying into the same lies the mainstream media always tells. The threat was 'discussed', which is where we get the whole 'I disagreed before I agreed' backflip from most of them.
There is more to history than Hitler and indeed that only reinforces his point. Try studying Hudnas and Taqiyya. And how Khomenei lied to the US, France, and the Iranian public.
We will see about that. In any case a treaty with current Iranian management is worthless given their documented violations of prior treaties and ideological and religious justification for lying to infidels.
“We don't get to decide how Iranians rule themselves, so make the best of it.”
At present Iranians do not get to decide how they rule themselves and they have not since Khamenei rigged elections on behalf of Ahmadinijad. But we might be able to change that.
I'm sure he would. And in the meantime he can talk to Nasser and Sadat in hell on the subject of perfidy, which Gaddafi knew full well.
But while we're on the subject, kindly cite the treaty either we or the Israelis violated with Gaddafi.
And how said treaty granted immunity up to and including Gaddafi going on to commit slavery and mass murder of his own people. Somehow I doubt you're going to have much luck there.
You could almost make the case that elements in the unelected EU bureaucracy are quite pleased with this coming to light. They can now make the case for further deal making with Islamist forces as "the cost of peace" is becoming too high...missile defense is too expensive to do it on our own. Having the U.S. do it for us is no longer acceptable because...we're still working on why that is, but we'll let you know shortly. I said "almost make the case"...almost.
They are also seeding their own soil with those laying in wait to become actors for Islam in their midst. They let the enemy within their gates so why should we be defending them?
No. This is a very dangerous development for them. The right wing of Europe doesn't really care about foreign entanglements. They want no part of Ukraine. At the same time, there are a LOT of right wing people who want the foreigners gone as they could be sleeper agents and want as high a wall (military) as they can afford to keep the strangers out/at-bay.
This works at cross purposes to the Brussels Brahmins because it reveals that the fears of sleepers is not unfounded and that their countries are pathetically weak to invasion or attack from outside.
The Brahmins want a peaceful society that believes their glorious European Diplomacy will keep all threats at bay, so it's ok to spend money on the bottomless welfare state. Having somebody try to bomb your country for a war that you claimed not to be involved in sort of upsets that apple cart.
That is very kind. I have been approached a few times over the years, but to be frank, there’s only 24 hours a day and I actually have a real job. There’s just no time, or more likely, I’m just bad at time management
Be lazy, and ask a good AI tool to draft a few volumes on various subjects by using the OG Blog and Substack for all content. Might be a good way to make some progress on it (you'd still have to proof and edit of course, or get competent help to do so, but limiting input might make it a plausible path.
One could opine that the day that America ought to leave a lot of places to their own devices and defenses is drawing nigh. We are patsies in the eyes of the world we are the Lennie to their George in “Of Mice and Men.” We are slow and dimmed witted, not cultured and erudite enough for our European “friends” who have shrugged off their responsibilities for their own defenses and now realize the people who lie for a living and welcome their own demonic demise have something that can kill them and they can’t currently do a damn thing about it. Worse we have listened to the Obama’s and Kerry’s of our nation tell us we can do a deal with the IRI, well now we know what we have known for a 47 years. You can not trust the leadership of Iran.
So now what. News flash, global oil prices in many ways are the artifice of commodity brokers and banks, it’s an arbitrary price booked mark to market every day. If we bailed out of Europe and the Middle East and simply used the resources of the western hemisphere fully harnessed we could survive quite nicely. Two big moats the size of oceans make a good start at defense.
So now the question? Do we stick around and craft a coalition that works to contain Iran to include Turkey, the Russian Federation, India, Pakistan, Gulf States or come up with a different plan. No hitting below the belt and a standing 10 count rule and gentlemen protect yoursleves at all times. Now before we start this fight I need to grab a handful of sand and we start fighting at the count of 3…1…2…BAMMM WHOOPS! I cheated, threw sand in your eyes and landed a blow before we got to 3….l
I think some far-seeing people are doing that, which accounts for the hullaballoo earlier this year when the pearl clutchers all got the vapors when Pres. Trump spoke of "buying Greenland."
"Two big moats the size of oceans make a good start at defense".
They didn't even stop the World Wars from directly affecting us, and the Cuban Missile Crisis showed that hostile foreign powers are more than capable of deploying weapons near our territory unless we're aggressive about stopping them.
Not to be disagreeable, but the moats worked pretty well until the nation's leadership pushed past the boundaries. WWI, did not need our involvement, it was a war of choice. The second world war has been thoroughly documented, but one could argue that Japan's imperialism was placed in the position of oil or no oil. Germany, who knows; but early on Hitler and The German General Staff had no interest in having to engage the USA in their efforts to conquer Western Europe and the Soviet Union; post WWI colonial spheres of influence collapsed and the Nazi's filled the void. The Cuban Missile Crisis was in part a retaliation to our missiles in Turkey. Recall that through back channel diplomacy, we (the USA) agreed to remove our missiles if the Soviet Union removed theirs from Cuba.
We get back to the notion of the GWOT "strategy" which as it turns was no strategy at all, rather an amorphous "well better to fight them "over there" than here at home. We learn that Senator Lindsey Graham believes that since the Marines took Iwo Jima, that they can certainly take Kharge Island. As a US Marine Corps Infantry Officer, there is one thing the Senator leaves out of that statement. We will need a big supply of body bags. When American's wake up to see an ARG/MEU Ready Group sunk and or burning to the water line and or destroyed in detail on Kharge Island due to mad men destroying their own economy rather than submit, they will be right to ask how the Hell did this happen? Lastly who is going to fill the empty personnel slots? We are nation in which less than 1% of the population see's it in THEIR own personal interests to sign up and serve. Of that only 25% of military aged men and women are fit enough to serve. So as Toto said to the Lone Ranger "who's "WE" Kemosabe?"
"Not to be disagreeable, but the moats worked pretty well until the nation's leadership pushed past the boundaries."
Not really. The Moats were useful but never uncrossable, which is why you see things like French Revolutionary "Privateers" outright kidnapping American Sailors from New England ports as early as the 1790s in the Quasi-War, and Spain and Britain hiring Amerindians and various mercenaries to conduct what amounted to protracted terrorism on the American Frontier. These were not insurmountable problems (as shown by how we surmounted them) but they speak to the fact that a dedicated enemy with enough resources could cross them. Indeed from the 1860s to 1898 the US was dominated by the threat of the Spanish Navy in Cuba, reaching a nadir in 1873 when the US Navy's response to the Virginius Affair was held hostage by the crippled Spanish Ironclad Arapiles in 1873, which in spite of being repaired in New York City Harbor was concluded to be able to outmatch any USN ship, resulting in the major overhauls that helped us win the War of 1898.
But the lingering threat came to the fore when what started as an imperial proxy conflict between ourselves and the British on one hand and the Germans on the other over Samoa in the 1880s and German support for Spain in the 1880 and 1890s spiraled well further and led to the German leadership essentially going on a secret jihad against the US that I still struggle to explain in spite of knowing more about it than most, with Kaiser Wilhelm II and the Imperial Cabinet and OHL (their General Staff) planning to essentially Pearl Harbor the US, which then expanded into some kind of amphibious planned invasion of the US.
And while you can argue the first sparks of this occurred as a result of US imperial expansion in the Pacific and there's some merit to that, it continued on well after the US began a restoration of relative isolation and disengagement under the likes of Taft, and it began existential.
"WWI, did not need our involvement, it was a war of choice."
If you're prepared to accept the German Embassy conducting the single largest campaign of terrorist bombings in American history up to that point (and which would remain unmatched until the 1970s) with things like Black Tom, the Kaiserliche Marine fundamentally repudiating and violating American neutral rights at sea, and planning to get the Mexican Government to invade us.
But personally I don't see why we should accept such things. And if anything we're probability somewhat lucky because had WWI not sparked in Europe and drawn German attention away the Reich would probably have accelerated their plans to try and attack us and destroy the Monroe Doctrine as part of Kaiser Wilhelm II's monomania against us because of capitalism, democracy, allowing Gypsies to be emancipated (yes really), and so on.
What I find a lot of people ignore is that Wilson was by far the most pro-German and specifically pro-Prussian President in American History. He spent DECADES Glazing up the supposedly "rational" government of the German Empire (in large part because it was an unresponsive, authoritarian technocracy) and implementing various policy and reform ideas based on it. So he was baffled why Potsdam did not give him or the US the respect he thought was due and they treated him like just another Yankee Capitalist with not just snubs but also attacks. And eventually the German Government's revocation of the Sussex Pledge returning to Unrestricted U-Boat Warfare and the revelations of Germany trying to get Mexico to invade us and then lying about it pushed even him too far.
"The second world war has been thoroughly documented, but one could argue that Japan's imperialism was placed in the position of oil or no oil."
.That's only really something one can argue if they have literally no idea of the actual history of Japan's imperialism or why the oil embargo was put in place.
For reference, Japan invaded Korea with the express purpose of conquering China in the 1500s, only being beaten back by Korean and Ming Chinese resistance as well as internal Japanese chaos leading to isolation. But after the end of isolation and well before oil became much of a factor you had returns to discussing the annexation of Korea, with Saigo Takamori advocating for an embassy to Korea for the purpose of starting a war to invade them in 1873, citing its strategic importance and resources such as coal, only to be turned down due to the belief they could not win at the time. After 20 years of development they did, and so they began an influence war in the 1890s that ultimately led to an actual war with the Qing that led to dominance over Korea in 1895. Then Russia stepped in seeking its own ambitions and did a dummy by trying to prepare for war without actually being prepared, resulting in the 1904-1905 Russo-Japanese War and ensuing beatdown, leading within years to Korea first becoming a protectorate and then annexed colony of Japan.
Then the Japanese took advantage of WWI and the world's distraction to try and force China to yield several sovereign rights to Japanese interests in 1916, only to walk back after outcry by its allies.
All of this happened when Japan was still an allied country of the West and oil was not a significant priority for it due to limited demand compared to coal and the ability to import its demands from the West.
Then 1931 happened and the invasion of China started, with it taking about 5 seconds for people to recognize it was a false flag started by Japanese war hawks in their military's middle management that the Japanese government refused to reject. Resulting in Japan leaving the League of Nations, trying to construct an artificial puppet state, and invading more of China leading to sanctions. Which were then lifted a bunch of times due to diplomacy only to be reimposed after Japan's leaders would do something stupid or evil like invading more of China or eventually French Indochina in 1940 and then in 1941 in pursuit of an East Asian Empire.
The final straw came when the Japanese violated the previous agreement we made with them and invaded Southern French Indochina and began large scale airfield construction there and in occupied Taiwan, leading to the US, British, and Dutch imposing oil and metal sanctions that finally stuck and were not removed, since we figured that they were one of the few things limiting Japan's ability to do illegal imperial BS and that eventually they'd use whatever resources they had to come after us like they had the French.
'Germany, who knows; but early on Hitler and The German General Staff had no interest in having to engage the USA in their efforts to conquer Western Europe and the Soviet Union; post WWI colonial spheres of influence collapsed and the Nazi's filled the void. "
No, no they absolutely did. Study Hitler's Unpublished Second Book (so "named" Because it never had a formal title), in which he plans to create a pan-Eurasian empire to fight and ultimately destroy the "American Union" as he called the US. This is something he wrote in the 1920s, building off of his own biases and the kind of anti-American fever dreams in wider German military and political culture like I touched on with the Second Reich period that led to stuff like Black Tom.
"The Cuban Missile Crisis was in part a retaliation to our missiles in Turkey."
Not really, our missiles had been in Turkey for years by this point, it's more accurate to say it was retaliation for Bay of Pigs. But even then Khruschev was blindsided by the Castros trying to scam him to launch the nukes at the US and ultimately reports that it looked like Cuban military units might be getting into position to forcibly seize the missiles and launch them,.
"Recall that through back channel diplomacy, we (the USA) agreed to remove our missiles if the Soviet Union removed theirs from Cuba."
That's true, though there's a lot more to the story than that that might be worth covering later, but I've ranted enough.
"We get back to the notion of the GWOT "strategy" which as it turns was no strategy at all, rather an amorphous "well better to fight them "over there" than here at home."
I mean I have a lot bad to say about GWOT "Strategy" but i9/11 was proof positive that trying to resolve things by airstrikes and distant diplomacy did not seem to work, since it had led to the Taliban sponsoring Al Qaeda to kill us. So we had to at a minimum go over there to disrupt and destroy the terrorist networks so they could not strike us. And this worked in large part because we disrupted Osama's planned post-9/11 operations and destroyed the core of Daesh.
"We learn that Senator Lindsey Graham believes that since the Marines took Iwo Jima, that they can certainly take Kharge Island. As a US Marine Corps Infantry Officer, there is one thing the Senator leaves out of that statement. We will need a big supply of body bags."
Agreed, or at least some supply.
"When American's wake up to see an ARG/MEU Ready Group sunk and or burning to the water line and or destroyed in detail on Kharge Island due to mad men destroying their own economy rather than submit, they will be right to ask how the Hell did this happen?"
They will, especially if it happens. But they'll also need to confront the nature of the Iranian regime and its war with us.
"Lastly who is going to fill the empty personnel slots? We are nation in which less than 1% of the population see's it in THEIR own personal interests to sign up and serve. Of that only 25% of military aged men and women are fit enough to serve. So as Toto said to the Lone Ranger "who's "WE" Kemosabe?""
Agreed, and that's a very good point. My understanding is enlistments are improving, but my no means enough, and the US populace (including myself) are hugely unfit and inadequate. That's going to take a lot of time to change, and time is running out.
Turtler, some extremely good historical points, but in each of them there was a key point on which the efforts turned. Isn’t it interesting that Vietnam and China has several hundred years of “war” and during the Vietnam conflict were loosely aligned, only to hook and jab each other later after we had departed the area. The point is that we have been a Pax Americana and been a quiet or sometimes not so quiet empire. Our reach is by far, the greatest in human history to date, but then we have the internet and communications are so dazzlingly fast that the logistics of empire seem or perhaps feel more manageable. The Special Forces units that defeated the Taliban in months advised all of Washington, DC that was ill advised to make Afghanistan a large enterprise. They felt; and it would have likely proved out, that with counter insurgent efforts and air power that about 200 SF operators could keep things pretty quiet. It was someone(s) desire to turn a land of hostile terrain and limited resources into the experiment of nation building that went badly. What people forget is that even if it is “some body bags” “someone” is dead. We don’t get dead Marines back. (Or any other service members for that matter.)
No one was happier to see Khomeini and a lot of his band of thugs killed. I knew Marines that were killed in the Beirut barracks bombing. It was and is still personal. But, once the decapitation strikes failed to remove the regime it appears that we didn’t or don’t have a plan. That said, if the Gulf States are serious and they ought to be at this point, about getting rid of the kleptocracy in IRI, that form a coalition and start figuring out how “we” are going to handle these thugs. The region feels like we are watching the Godfather I or the Soprano’s. Everyone pays tributes, no one likes it. “It was Barzini all along.” Enlistments are stable and sadly it is the same cohort of lower middle and middle Americans who are signing up. The playing field is not level. Thus it is easy to engage in adventurism. If we want to protect our shores, then indeed, we need a very robust navy, far bigger and better prepared for the future than it is currently configured. But as long as Rich men north of Richmond are running things, not much looks likely to change. Taking yet another movie scene to your point about readiness, the movie “Unforgiven” William Munny aka Clint Eastwood sums it up when Little Bill accuses him of shooting an unarmed man. “Well he shoulda armed himself.” Perhaps we should arm ourselves and let others arm themselves.
Thank you kindly. I have never served as you have, and must yield to that, but I am a history nerd.
" but in each of them there was a key point on which the efforts turned."
Agreed, if anything I'd argue several key points.
"Isn’t it interesting that Vietnam and China has several hundred years of “war”"
Sure, but they have at least as many hundred years of co-existence with either direct Chinese colonization or Chinese overlordship of a Viet vassal with varying degrees of directness. This tends to get downplayed now as Hanoi has liked to paint itself as a stalwart opponent of the PRC at least when in non-Chinese diplomatic circles and not without reason given their territorial disputes, but it's worth remembering that Viet culture as we know it formed from a fusion of Han colonization with that of the locals in the Red River Valley, that most of the major anti-French Vietnamese underground movements emerged as ancillaries to Chinese Parties (both the Communists and Nationalists), that Vietnam has generally avoided direct conflict with the PRC even diplomatically since 1979 (which while a bloody debacle on both sides showed the Vietnamese could not hope to withstand protracted PLA pressure on their Northern Frontier indefinitely), and the fall of the Soviets as well as Russian withdrawal from much of the South China Sea pushed them further there.
And that the most dedicated effort by any Vietnamese government to break with a fundamentally China-centric identity and policy - under the very end f the Ho Dynasty- lasted about 1400-1407 before the Ming crushed them. And while Vietnam eventually fought its way out from under Chinese occupation again after decades, they still did so after a mixture of military victory and reaffirming Chinese vassalage.
"and during the Vietnam conflict were loosely aligned, only to hook and jab each other later after we had departed the area."
Indeed, and agreed. In a lot of ways the Vietnamese were fortunate the Khmer Rouge were so cruel and incompetent and caved so quickly it became impossible for the PRC to publicly justify there.
" The point is that we have been a Pax Americana and been a quiet or sometimes not so quiet empire. Our reach is by far, the greatest in human history to date, but then we have the internet and communications are so dazzlingly fast that the logistics of empire seem or perhaps feel more manageable."
Agreed, and to a limited extent they do make them more manageable, but that also leads to overreach. And God knows we've been prone to it before.
"The Special Forces units that defeated the Taliban in months advised all of Washington, DC that was ill advised to make Afghanistan a large enterprise. They felt; and it would have likely proved out, that with counter insurgent efforts and air power that about 200 SF operators could keep things pretty quiet. It was someone(s) desire to turn a land of hostile terrain and limited resources into the experiment of nation building that went badly."
Agreed, but I'd argue that as well as the failure to decapitate the enemy's leadership fast. Over-lawyering about whether it was appropriate to drone strike the Taliban's leadership was jaw droppingly stupid and a fine indicator of how badly managed things were. Nation Building I fear is a dirty enterprise with some to recommend it and that we'll need to get back into at some point in order to obtain permanent peace, but it is not a catch all or one we can get into easily. But above all whatever we decide -whether nation building or more surgical expeditions - we need to be a lot more competent and measured at that, including being willing to break things without needing to fix them.
"What people forget is that even if it is “some body bags” “someone” is dead. We don’t get dead Marines back. (Or any other service members for that matter.)"
Indeed. And they are by far the most valuable of us. Which is something to factor in considering how the enemy and civilians also don't get the dead back. I imagine a lot of people would still be alive today if Mullah Omar got droned in 2001, and if we made examples of pedophiles engaging with Bacha Bazi.
"No one was happier to see Khomeini and a lot of his band of thugs killed. I knew Marines that were killed in the Beirut barracks bombing. It was and is still personal."
To be fair unfortunately we didn't kill Khomeini. Khomeini was the first "Supreme Leader" and unfortunately went to hell of "natural causes" Khameini the Elder was his second in command and the second "Supreme Leader" and he's the one we drone strked.
But that aside, my sympathies. I was not born there at the time and know of nobody directly, but it still sears.
"But, once the decapitation strikes failed to remove the regime it appears that we didn’t or don’t have a plan."
I'm not sure what the plan is, or if there is one, and I am concerned with policies there. But it does seem like we are planning to continue hammering their leadership and military/coercive capacities while trying to gin up domestic revolution. That could fail or backfire, but it's certainly a better approach htan most.
"That said, if the Gulf States are serious and they ought to be at this point, about getting rid of the kleptocracy in IRI, that form a coalition and start figuring out how “we” are going to handle these thugs. "
I'm not sure how serious the Gulf States are. A Non-Insane Iran would be a logical ally of the US not unlike the Pahlavi Dynasty was, and that might cause a reorientation towards the hated Shiite Persians by us and against them. The Gulfers will fight violently and unethically to preserve their own regime against Iranian Revolutionary nonsense and not appear weak, but beyond that I am not sure.
"The region feels like we are watching the Godfather I or the Soprano’s. Everyone pays tributes, no one likes it. “It was Barzini all along.”"
Agreed, and I do think that is one reason why there's been so much support against it.
" Enlistments are stable and sadly it is the same cohort of lower middle and middle Americans who are signing up. The playing field is not level."
Agreed, and that's a problem. That as well as brain drain, population drain, and information drain. As horrifying as it is to say, you can at least try to fix up manpower shortages by the draft and if the cause is serious enough get a fair amount of buy in, but you can't just magically spam out the gear needed to equip the larger force.
It's also why I am not sure how much wider.
"Thus it is easy to engage in adventurism. If we want to protect our shores, then indeed, we need a very robust navy, far bigger and better prepared for the future than it is currently configured. But as long as Rich men north of Richmond are running things, not much looks likely to change. "
Indeed, and particularly the flavor of morons that consist many of the rich men of Richmond. I don't have a huge amount positive to say about Woodrow Wilson (by far one of our worst Presidents) or JFK but they could at least recognize mortal threats.
"Taking yet another movie scene to your point about readiness, the movie “Unforgiven” William Munny aka Clint Eastwood sums it up when Little Bill accuses him of shooting an unarmed man. “Well he shoulda armed himself.”
Agreed indeed.
" Perhaps we should arm ourselves and let others arm themselves."
Depends on who the them are. Our allies and friendly neutrals certainly, and we've been trying to do that for decades. In a lot of ways i do think we made a great mistake working so hard to de-nad our major European Imperial allies after WWII, like the British, French, and Dutch.
Our enemies though? Not so much. Especially since a lot of them have shown themselves unable or unwilling to play by "the rules" or act civilly. The irony is I'd be cautiously willing to accept a nuclear armed Iran under basically any leadership EXCEPT the current system that is actually there. I hate to say it but I do think we are sliding towards a world war due to the pressures involved, especially in the PRC and Russia. And that's not going to be pretty by any stretch of the imagination.
What Lindsey Graham never did was lump an Alice Pack (LBE) around with 70 pounds of “stuff” in and another 10 pounds or more hung on it, with a rifle that weighs 8-10 bounds 6-8 30 round magines with 28 rounds because 30 rounds can cause a jam with the Arlington follower…then there’s the new Kevlar several pounds and that before you’re an 0331 machine gunner and or 0341 mortarman. Then hump long hot, wet, cold etc patrols with crap chow when ever you can figure out how to eat it. The elites are quick to kill us, but they are running out of runway, no one will serve if the self indulgence of the boomers and and next generations believe there is nothing to fight for, because the system is rigged. At that point the moats of the Atlantic and Pacific become moot. The revolution will be internal and the great experiment will end. They never see it coming.
The elites have their place. There are the tragedies of folks who should be far away from combat getting murdered. Joseph Warren had no business being at Bunker Hill. If José Martí hadn't thought he was an infantryman Cuba would be prosperous and free.
While I seen nothing wrong about being a JAG Corps lawyer; it does piss me off to see these folks who spent their service time sitting in a Naval Station office reviewing repair contracts acting like they were in hand-to-hand combat.
I'm more optimistic than you. I have been spending time with high schoolers. The kids are alright.
So much truth here. The Iranians claimed to have nothing more than 2000km capability. Whoops! Math error. I have some doubt as to the type of warhead loaded into those weapons.
Iran has lied since the beginning. I see no option but capitulation as a solution for them.
A basic question is whether the Western Europeans want to be defended from the missile threat, "want" as in "willing to make a sacrifice for". If the governments of Western Europe announced that they could build or buy a solid missile defense, but only if the average work week were increased from 36 hours to 40 hours, how many takers would there be?
Where I think I should be seeing a YouTube video, at the end of this missive, I see a message that says, "Our systems have detected unusual traffic from your computer network. Please try your request again later. Why did this happen?
IP address: 2a09:bac3:3257:1c82::2d7:7c ≠ 2a02:26f7:c9d0:4000:5800::32
Now mine doesn't work, on this stack and numerous other ones. Something wonky with YouTube, it appears. Perhaps they don't like VPNs. Been too lazy to try disabling since I don't like video much.
People really should pay closer attention to your warnings these last 20 years. Those TDS pearl clutching fools out there angry at what Pres. Trump has been doing this year ignore that we also just cut off any possibility that Venezuela could be used as a launching pad for missiles as the Trump DOW removed Venezuela as Iran's longtime buddy in the region. I believe that place is well within the 2,500 mile radius. Also.... every TDS fool's favorite little tin god on wheels, Bathhouse Barry.... remember him? His $1.7 billion pallets of cash from OUR treasury, not HIS, financed the ICBM refinements and arming of Iran that we are dealing with now. Treason.
"Bathouse Barry"-scurrilous and unsubstantiated (Hitchens's razor). Like suggesting a nasty liberal slam, "I used to worry about my 14 year old daughter being alone in a room with Trump but now that she is 15 I don't have to worry, she is too old." Same level of nonsense.
The one item, however, is the notion that the U.S. paid $1.7 billion from OUR (emphasis supplied) Treasury. The funds returned to Iran under the the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action by the Obama administration were Iranian assets, which had been frozen by international sanctions. The $1.7 billion was comprised of $400 million that the Shah had placed as a deposit in a U.S. Foreign Military Sales trust fund. The 1979 MoU with the Shah stipulated that the unexpended funds would be placed in an interest-bearing account. (The original Trust Fund amounted to $600 million until the George H. W. Bush administration returned $200 million to Iran in a partial settlement in 1990-hence the $400 million.) The remaining $1.3 billion represented 35 years of accumulated interest earned on the withheld Iranian amount pursuant to the original Iranian contract put in place by the Shah.
Even if the settlement with Iran was determined to be bad policy, the correct terms of the deal and settlement should be used -even by TDS fools.
May be technically correct but it's still wrong and stupid to have given them any cash subsequently turned into Ballistic missiles, bombs for Hezbollah, Houthis and Hamas. That wasn't rocket science. It was an attempted bribe.
It is always better to be technically correct even in describing failure.
Comments are full of anti-Islamic responses based on the actions of Political Islam represented by Hezbollah, Houthis, Hamas and Iran. Usually not mentioned is the UAE as a post-ideological Islamic state that promotes a state-sanctioned "moderate" Islam, prioritizing national security from extremist ideology and economic development over religious activism.
Don't really know if this is viable or UAE spoofing, but it suggests a place in the capitalist economic system for a post-Islamist approach that rejects the Political Islam of Iran, etc.
See, "The First Post-Ideological Bedouin State" in Quillette 3/25/26.
You are naive to think there is a hair's breadth of difference between Political Islam and the ideology of Islam. Go read the five pillars and what they really mean as applied in the world.
It's hard to substantiate rumors when some of the people involve end up suddenly dead. I get it. Let me guess, you'd be all for the US never returning the $100 billion we hold in Russian assets. And using the windfall profits taxes too instead of returning the money with interest? And Russia didn't kill or maim nearly as many American citizens as Iran has over those years.
Doesn't matter whose funds they were. They were withheld for irresponsible behavior and the behavior had not changed. Obama and Biden funded our enemy.
The previous White House occupant and his handler made sure that unfrozen Iranian assets in the billions were only used for humanitarian purposes. We see how that turned out.
Not to be outdone, yesterday London mayor Sadiq Khan stated that only Europe can protect Great Britain from the Trump administration, economically and militarily.
Air Strip One is EXTREMELY dependant on Americans believing that it's still powerful; that the City of London is important for actual finance and not money laundering. One day the scales will fall from our fellow citizens eyes. And Great Britain won't like what happens next.
I saw a report that VW was going to start manufacturing Arrow missiles (if I recall correctly). It has been known that Iran wanted to do this and was working towards his. It was also known that Iran and China work together. None of this should surprise anybody. Somehow, Europe is surprised. Then again, they are surprised that unwashed Muslim masses from third world countries do not do positive things in their countries.
It is also notoriously American for us to have zero understanding of our own national interests and see everything in the world solely through our own still-isolationist (narcissist?) lens. Who better then to lead us than a president with an even dimmer view of such things than many Americans? And let us not forget there were significant forces in American politics and industry who didn't just like this setup--they endeavored strongly to keep it. The reckoning is ongoing, on both sides of the pond.
When I mentioned in an earlier comment section, that I had been privy to intel on the development of an Iranian IRBM threat to Europe over 2 decades ago, I got a response that basically blew it off comparing that earlier assessment to the Iraq WMD reports.
The fecklessness (I probably use this term too often but it fits) of the Europeans, who had this intel as well and were recommended at the time to plan a ballistic defense, is jaw dropping. Of course, we encouraged that failure to act when, as you point out, the US elected to cover their collective asses once again.
Our European allies are worthless if not harmful.
The blockade of the strait and the shakedown of merchant ships demonstrate that the Islamic Republic is a criminal entity in addition to being a sponsor of terrorism by HAMAS, Hezbollah and the Houthis.
The missiles being launched at Israel, the Gulf Nations and Diego Garcia demonstrate that Iran was an immediate and serious threat to its neighbors and the world. Imagine if it had atomic bombs to place on those missiles.
I sincerely hope there is no treaty because any treaty with a bunch of religious fanatics who welcome the apocalypse would be worthless.
This war has been going on for 47 years and the only way to put it an end to it is by removing the Islamic Republic once and for all whatever the short-term costs.
Trump must not kick the can down the road like his predecessors did because there is no guarantee that his successors will be Vance or Rubio.
Imagine what might happen under a President Newscum or a President Kamala (who only lost by about 2%).
Your European allies have no desire to get involved into war, which your POTUS started without discussing with them or even warning them in advance. Alliances aren't friendship societies; Iran lay outside NATO jurisdiction, so your allies are not oblidged to help you. If you want help from them, you should negotiate and persuade them that it is in their own interests.
They had 47 years of warning in advance.
There are reasons why NATO stands for "not at the office" or "not after two o'clock" or "needs America to operate."
It's time for the US to dump NATO and make bilateral treaties with reliable allies.
BTW, Libya and Ukraine are outside NATO jurisdiction, too.
NATO area of responsibility is described as "territories of its members in Europe and North America, as well as ships and forces of those members in Mediterranean and North Atlantic". Those boundaries were specifically agreed during NATO formation, because USA didn't want to get involved into European colonial wars, and Europeans have no desire to get involved into US wars outside Europe.
Good riddance to you and NATO.
Good thing there's a big dome over NATO territory so nothing bad can get through huh? It's all gonna be okay, little buddy (pats on head). Here's a kleenex for the drool on your chin. Go sit in the corner where you can't hurt yourself, sweetie.
I'm Russian, so I kinda indifferent to the matter of Europe having USA protection or not, you know)
Ah that makes things much clearer, you support Iran. You want Iran to hold Western Europe hostage.
Noted.
The relations between the US, France, and the UK were only ever partially dictated by NATO, and indeed NATO was a Johnny come lately agreement compared to the bilateral alliance treaties we signed with them that covers much wider scopes.
And both sides have had desire to get involved in each others conflicts when it suited them.
Putting too much emphasis on NATO to explain how the alliances work is a mistake.
"And both sides have had desire to get involved in each others conflicts when it suited them."
There it is.
Libya 2011. An inconvenient truth.
Not to worry Pete, NATO is reconstituting itself without the US as we speak.
Do you know how many time I heard that while I was in Germany and Italy?
BTW, I haven’t forgotten how fighting almost broke out between US SOF and the carabinieri in Sigonella.
Not suggesting that there is no culpability with NATO. But, I believe, this time may be different. Look at the NSS.
All the more jarring because it was on behalf of a bunch of terrorist murders of poor Klinghoffer, who were then generally given sweetheart soft deals. And that's before talking about that fuckhead Craxi dropping a dime about Operation El Dorado Canyon to Gaddafi while the blood in Berlin was still fresh.
I am generally an Atlanticist who is in favor of NATO and even with reservations the EU and an anti-Kremlin hawk, but there's a lot wrong with our relationship in Europe and idiots trying to blame it all on the US are either dumb, ignorant, or both.
Then it was the leftist PM of Italy. Today it is the leftist PM of Spain. That’s why NATO is worthless. All it takes is one idiot.
Oh shut up.
This is the most intellectual response you could come up with?
"Your European allies have no desire to get involved into war,"
And I imagine neither did the Mullah's favorite intermediary and general scumbag Qatar. But sometimes you get involved anyway, especially when dealing with a fundamentally perfidious terrorist regime that does not accept nor respect neutral status when it comes to the Jihad.
And which you for some reason insist on carrying water for and regurgitating propaganda slogans for.
(PS: I have plenty bad to say about the Pahlavi dynasty, but it takes a special kind of retardation to claim the dynasty that was founded by the commander of the Iranian Cossack Brigade staging a coup and who went on to issue Firmans banning forced conversion and the ritual impurity of non-Muslims and whose son, successor, and last Shah pushed for secular education and armed the Kurds persecuted "religious and national minorities."
And to claim that they "neglected religion" in spite of the last Shah having been the person to found universal education in Iran, NOT the "Islamic Republic" like you previously claimed, because apparently you wouldn't understand what happened in the White Revolution if it bit you in the rear.)
"which your POTUS started without discussing with them or even warning them in advance."
Absolute bullshit.
Trump did indeed discuss and warn the relevant European Allies, as we now know from such habitually pro-Trump sources as the Starmer Cabinet. Which is also why the operations could not be launched from places like Diego Garcia, the British Cypriot Bases, or the French Indian Ocean territories.
And we now know how little good that did any of us, precisely because even with prior warning none of them were willing to help at the time and the British Labour government was so wretched it would *not even defend itself or its own bases and nationals from the expected blowback* because of what can only be called Trump Derangement Syndrome, with Ed Miliband arguing and ultimately prevailing that it would be against international law to station SAMs to defend the bases that are sovereign US soil and that the UK is obliged to by treaty.
The problem here was not that Trump did not consult or discuss with the European allies, because he did to the extent was wise and arguably well beyond that. We're very lucky none of the TDS afflicted governments pulled a Craxi in El Dorado Canyon and tipped the Mullahcracy off, saving Gaddafi's life after the Berlin Nightclub Bombing while endangering US Servicepeople.
And if you don't understand that reference maybe you need to shut the fuck up and sit the fuck down to let those of us with a historical awareness that extends beyond 1980 to talk.
But in any case the main problem here was never Trump.
"Alliances aren't friendship societies;"
Correct. They also aren't to be taken lightly or squandered like what Miliband and Starmer did over domestic political preferences, which is one reason they and some of the other Euros have attracted universal condemnation not just from us and Israel but also from the Gulf Sunnis.
Perhaps you may wish to peruse Machiavelli and what he had to say on neutrality.
"Iran lay outside NATO jurisdiction,"
And so does Diego Garcia and the French Indian Ocean territory. This was never a proper NATO matter, this was always a matter of bilateral consultation between allies, which Trump attempted only to have them blown off because various European Allies opted to keep feeding the crocodile in the face of its proven track of terrorism and perfidy as confirmed by not only their own history (see for instance in Germany: https://icct.nl/publication/iranian-external-operations-europe-criminal-connection ) and the IAEA.
"so your allies are not oblidged to help you."
You DO realize that the bonds between the UK and US on one hand and France and US predate and are not reliant upon NATO, and which go WELL BEYOND NATO's jurisdiction? Apparently not. Big oof on your part, but I suppose that's keeping with your proven track record of ignorance.
In any case, the NATO Allies are not obliged to help us, but they have to be judged accordingly from that failure. As it stands many of them failed even to help themselves in this case and are getting slagged by people beyond just us>
"If you want help from them, you should negotiate and persuade them that it is in their own interests."
We tried. We failed, not because of the evil Cheeto but because of truly staggering idiocy that's come to light now about how they reacted to Trump's warnings. It's now that they have largely switched tack and are helping us more.
In so far as they are capable, which is not very much.
"perfidious terrorist regime that does not accept nor respect neutral status "
sounds like Israel.
Not compared to the Islamic Republic of Iran. Compare/contrast the number of neutral ships attacked by Iran versus those by Israel.
And then compare that to apologies given and reparations paid.
I’ll wait.
We know the USS Liberty was unintentional. We also know that Iranian attacks on neutral shipping and the USN in the strait were intentional. This is not hard.
Whataboutism will not change this. It will not even address it.
Not that I mind, but Milošević was charged for doing the same thing Israel is doing in the Gaza Strip. I doubt Israel will be held accountable.
No, Milosevic was not charged for doing the same thing Israel is doing. Israel went out of its way to minimize casualties, to help people evacuate in peace, and to avoid casualties. Contrast that to Srebrenica or Sarajevo.
But thanks for owning that you are a Jew hating asswipe willing to carry water for Hamas and the PFLB.
The USA did not want to become involved in WW 2 until The US got slapped upside the head at Pearl Harbor.
Was that the fault of FDR?
Sometimes it takes a declaration of war to start one, but the USA didn't wait 47 years after Germany did so to act.
All of our Presidents since Jimmy Carter 1979 have been kicking this bloody bucket down the road too long.
It is time to act or submit to allah.
Geo. Washington would beg to differ. “Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people under an efficient government. the period is not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel.
Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor or caprice?”
It seems to me that the missiles fired at Diego Garcia should be sufficient persuasion in themselves at this point.
I would also think so. London should understand in a few years it could become a target from Missiles that could range their nation much as Iran has done for Israel.
Only if the “migrants” that have invaded the UK are Sunni.
Yes, There is that.
Our NATO allies delusionally pretend that this 'isn't their war', when the outfit in question has clearly wanted to give them some loving attention for decades. Alliances face threats that are often not in the original charter, but they are still threats.
And if you think POTUS didn't 'discuss' this with them, you're buying into the same lies the mainstream media always tells. The threat was 'discussed', which is where we get the whole 'I disagreed before I agreed' backflip from most of them.
You cannot discuss an operation with co-belligerent allies of Iran.
Which is about what Europe has become.
Where was this hesitation when it came to wanting to go to war with Russia over Ukraine?
Our European allies wanted us to go Die there?
A treaty is the best you're going to get. We don't get to decide how Iranians rule themselves, so make the best of it.
Neville Chamberlain came home with a treaty.
There's more to history than Hitler, you should read more.
If you knew who I was you would know how stupid that comment is.
Unfortunately (?) we don't, so we can only go on what you write here:
Dull and uninteresting.
You are an idiot. Maybe you can find an ANTIFA chat room where you will feel more at home.
There is more to history than Hitler and indeed that only reinforces his point. Try studying Hudnas and Taqiyya. And how Khomenei lied to the US, France, and the Iranian public.
“ A treaty is the best you're going to get.”
We will see about that. In any case a treaty with current Iranian management is worthless given their documented violations of prior treaties and ideological and religious justification for lying to infidels.
“We don't get to decide how Iranians rule themselves, so make the best of it.”
At present Iranians do not get to decide how they rule themselves and they have not since Khamenei rigged elections on behalf of Ahmadinijad. But we might be able to change that.
Their prior violations of previous treaties? Gaddafi would like a word.
I'm sure he would. And in the meantime he can talk to Nasser and Sadat in hell on the subject of perfidy, which Gaddafi knew full well.
But while we're on the subject, kindly cite the treaty either we or the Israelis violated with Gaddafi.
And how said treaty granted immunity up to and including Gaddafi going on to commit slavery and mass murder of his own people. Somehow I doubt you're going to have much luck there.
One election away. We really aren’t that dependable as an ally. But like they say, when the going gets tough, call the Americans. They’ll fix it.
You could almost make the case that elements in the unelected EU bureaucracy are quite pleased with this coming to light. They can now make the case for further deal making with Islamist forces as "the cost of peace" is becoming too high...missile defense is too expensive to do it on our own. Having the U.S. do it for us is no longer acceptable because...we're still working on why that is, but we'll let you know shortly. I said "almost make the case"...almost.
They are also seeding their own soil with those laying in wait to become actors for Islam in their midst. They let the enemy within their gates so why should we be defending them?
No. This is a very dangerous development for them. The right wing of Europe doesn't really care about foreign entanglements. They want no part of Ukraine. At the same time, there are a LOT of right wing people who want the foreigners gone as they could be sleeper agents and want as high a wall (military) as they can afford to keep the strangers out/at-bay.
This works at cross purposes to the Brussels Brahmins because it reveals that the fears of sleepers is not unfounded and that their countries are pathetically weak to invasion or attack from outside.
The Brahmins want a peaceful society that believes their glorious European Diplomacy will keep all threats at bay, so it's ok to spend money on the bottomless welfare state. Having somebody try to bomb your country for a war that you claimed not to be involved in sort of upsets that apple cart.
General comment - have you ever thought about publishing a book or two? My $$ would be waiting, just sayin' . . .
That is very kind. I have been approached a few times over the years, but to be frank, there’s only 24 hours a day and I actually have a real job. There’s just no time, or more likely, I’m just bad at time management
That seems strangely familiar....
Be lazy, and ask a good AI tool to draft a few volumes on various subjects by using the OG Blog and Substack for all content. Might be a good way to make some progress on it (you'd still have to proof and edit of course, or get competent help to do so, but limiting input might make it a plausible path.
One could opine that the day that America ought to leave a lot of places to their own devices and defenses is drawing nigh. We are patsies in the eyes of the world we are the Lennie to their George in “Of Mice and Men.” We are slow and dimmed witted, not cultured and erudite enough for our European “friends” who have shrugged off their responsibilities for their own defenses and now realize the people who lie for a living and welcome their own demonic demise have something that can kill them and they can’t currently do a damn thing about it. Worse we have listened to the Obama’s and Kerry’s of our nation tell us we can do a deal with the IRI, well now we know what we have known for a 47 years. You can not trust the leadership of Iran.
So now what. News flash, global oil prices in many ways are the artifice of commodity brokers and banks, it’s an arbitrary price booked mark to market every day. If we bailed out of Europe and the Middle East and simply used the resources of the western hemisphere fully harnessed we could survive quite nicely. Two big moats the size of oceans make a good start at defense.
So now the question? Do we stick around and craft a coalition that works to contain Iran to include Turkey, the Russian Federation, India, Pakistan, Gulf States or come up with a different plan. No hitting below the belt and a standing 10 count rule and gentlemen protect yoursleves at all times. Now before we start this fight I need to grab a handful of sand and we start fighting at the count of 3…1…2…BAMMM WHOOPS! I cheated, threw sand in your eyes and landed a blow before we got to 3….l
I think some far-seeing people are doing that, which accounts for the hullaballoo earlier this year when the pearl clutchers all got the vapors when Pres. Trump spoke of "buying Greenland."
"Two big moats the size of oceans make a good start at defense".
They didn't even stop the World Wars from directly affecting us, and the Cuban Missile Crisis showed that hostile foreign powers are more than capable of deploying weapons near our territory unless we're aggressive about stopping them.
Not to be disagreeable, but the moats worked pretty well until the nation's leadership pushed past the boundaries. WWI, did not need our involvement, it was a war of choice. The second world war has been thoroughly documented, but one could argue that Japan's imperialism was placed in the position of oil or no oil. Germany, who knows; but early on Hitler and The German General Staff had no interest in having to engage the USA in their efforts to conquer Western Europe and the Soviet Union; post WWI colonial spheres of influence collapsed and the Nazi's filled the void. The Cuban Missile Crisis was in part a retaliation to our missiles in Turkey. Recall that through back channel diplomacy, we (the USA) agreed to remove our missiles if the Soviet Union removed theirs from Cuba.
We get back to the notion of the GWOT "strategy" which as it turns was no strategy at all, rather an amorphous "well better to fight them "over there" than here at home. We learn that Senator Lindsey Graham believes that since the Marines took Iwo Jima, that they can certainly take Kharge Island. As a US Marine Corps Infantry Officer, there is one thing the Senator leaves out of that statement. We will need a big supply of body bags. When American's wake up to see an ARG/MEU Ready Group sunk and or burning to the water line and or destroyed in detail on Kharge Island due to mad men destroying their own economy rather than submit, they will be right to ask how the Hell did this happen? Lastly who is going to fill the empty personnel slots? We are nation in which less than 1% of the population see's it in THEIR own personal interests to sign up and serve. Of that only 25% of military aged men and women are fit enough to serve. So as Toto said to the Lone Ranger "who's "WE" Kemosabe?"
"Not to be disagreeable, but the moats worked pretty well until the nation's leadership pushed past the boundaries."
Not really. The Moats were useful but never uncrossable, which is why you see things like French Revolutionary "Privateers" outright kidnapping American Sailors from New England ports as early as the 1790s in the Quasi-War, and Spain and Britain hiring Amerindians and various mercenaries to conduct what amounted to protracted terrorism on the American Frontier. These were not insurmountable problems (as shown by how we surmounted them) but they speak to the fact that a dedicated enemy with enough resources could cross them. Indeed from the 1860s to 1898 the US was dominated by the threat of the Spanish Navy in Cuba, reaching a nadir in 1873 when the US Navy's response to the Virginius Affair was held hostage by the crippled Spanish Ironclad Arapiles in 1873, which in spite of being repaired in New York City Harbor was concluded to be able to outmatch any USN ship, resulting in the major overhauls that helped us win the War of 1898.
But the lingering threat came to the fore when what started as an imperial proxy conflict between ourselves and the British on one hand and the Germans on the other over Samoa in the 1880s and German support for Spain in the 1880 and 1890s spiraled well further and led to the German leadership essentially going on a secret jihad against the US that I still struggle to explain in spite of knowing more about it than most, with Kaiser Wilhelm II and the Imperial Cabinet and OHL (their General Staff) planning to essentially Pearl Harbor the US, which then expanded into some kind of amphibious planned invasion of the US.
And while you can argue the first sparks of this occurred as a result of US imperial expansion in the Pacific and there's some merit to that, it continued on well after the US began a restoration of relative isolation and disengagement under the likes of Taft, and it began existential.
"WWI, did not need our involvement, it was a war of choice."
If you're prepared to accept the German Embassy conducting the single largest campaign of terrorist bombings in American history up to that point (and which would remain unmatched until the 1970s) with things like Black Tom, the Kaiserliche Marine fundamentally repudiating and violating American neutral rights at sea, and planning to get the Mexican Government to invade us.
But personally I don't see why we should accept such things. And if anything we're probability somewhat lucky because had WWI not sparked in Europe and drawn German attention away the Reich would probably have accelerated their plans to try and attack us and destroy the Monroe Doctrine as part of Kaiser Wilhelm II's monomania against us because of capitalism, democracy, allowing Gypsies to be emancipated (yes really), and so on.
What I find a lot of people ignore is that Wilson was by far the most pro-German and specifically pro-Prussian President in American History. He spent DECADES Glazing up the supposedly "rational" government of the German Empire (in large part because it was an unresponsive, authoritarian technocracy) and implementing various policy and reform ideas based on it. So he was baffled why Potsdam did not give him or the US the respect he thought was due and they treated him like just another Yankee Capitalist with not just snubs but also attacks. And eventually the German Government's revocation of the Sussex Pledge returning to Unrestricted U-Boat Warfare and the revelations of Germany trying to get Mexico to invade us and then lying about it pushed even him too far.
"The second world war has been thoroughly documented, but one could argue that Japan's imperialism was placed in the position of oil or no oil."
.That's only really something one can argue if they have literally no idea of the actual history of Japan's imperialism or why the oil embargo was put in place.
For reference, Japan invaded Korea with the express purpose of conquering China in the 1500s, only being beaten back by Korean and Ming Chinese resistance as well as internal Japanese chaos leading to isolation. But after the end of isolation and well before oil became much of a factor you had returns to discussing the annexation of Korea, with Saigo Takamori advocating for an embassy to Korea for the purpose of starting a war to invade them in 1873, citing its strategic importance and resources such as coal, only to be turned down due to the belief they could not win at the time. After 20 years of development they did, and so they began an influence war in the 1890s that ultimately led to an actual war with the Qing that led to dominance over Korea in 1895. Then Russia stepped in seeking its own ambitions and did a dummy by trying to prepare for war without actually being prepared, resulting in the 1904-1905 Russo-Japanese War and ensuing beatdown, leading within years to Korea first becoming a protectorate and then annexed colony of Japan.
Then the Japanese took advantage of WWI and the world's distraction to try and force China to yield several sovereign rights to Japanese interests in 1916, only to walk back after outcry by its allies.
All of this happened when Japan was still an allied country of the West and oil was not a significant priority for it due to limited demand compared to coal and the ability to import its demands from the West.
Then 1931 happened and the invasion of China started, with it taking about 5 seconds for people to recognize it was a false flag started by Japanese war hawks in their military's middle management that the Japanese government refused to reject. Resulting in Japan leaving the League of Nations, trying to construct an artificial puppet state, and invading more of China leading to sanctions. Which were then lifted a bunch of times due to diplomacy only to be reimposed after Japan's leaders would do something stupid or evil like invading more of China or eventually French Indochina in 1940 and then in 1941 in pursuit of an East Asian Empire.
The final straw came when the Japanese violated the previous agreement we made with them and invaded Southern French Indochina and began large scale airfield construction there and in occupied Taiwan, leading to the US, British, and Dutch imposing oil and metal sanctions that finally stuck and were not removed, since we figured that they were one of the few things limiting Japan's ability to do illegal imperial BS and that eventually they'd use whatever resources they had to come after us like they had the French.
'Germany, who knows; but early on Hitler and The German General Staff had no interest in having to engage the USA in their efforts to conquer Western Europe and the Soviet Union; post WWI colonial spheres of influence collapsed and the Nazi's filled the void. "
No, no they absolutely did. Study Hitler's Unpublished Second Book (so "named" Because it never had a formal title), in which he plans to create a pan-Eurasian empire to fight and ultimately destroy the "American Union" as he called the US. This is something he wrote in the 1920s, building off of his own biases and the kind of anti-American fever dreams in wider German military and political culture like I touched on with the Second Reich period that led to stuff like Black Tom.
"The Cuban Missile Crisis was in part a retaliation to our missiles in Turkey."
Not really, our missiles had been in Turkey for years by this point, it's more accurate to say it was retaliation for Bay of Pigs. But even then Khruschev was blindsided by the Castros trying to scam him to launch the nukes at the US and ultimately reports that it looked like Cuban military units might be getting into position to forcibly seize the missiles and launch them,.
"Recall that through back channel diplomacy, we (the USA) agreed to remove our missiles if the Soviet Union removed theirs from Cuba."
That's true, though there's a lot more to the story than that that might be worth covering later, but I've ranted enough.
"We get back to the notion of the GWOT "strategy" which as it turns was no strategy at all, rather an amorphous "well better to fight them "over there" than here at home."
I mean I have a lot bad to say about GWOT "Strategy" but i9/11 was proof positive that trying to resolve things by airstrikes and distant diplomacy did not seem to work, since it had led to the Taliban sponsoring Al Qaeda to kill us. So we had to at a minimum go over there to disrupt and destroy the terrorist networks so they could not strike us. And this worked in large part because we disrupted Osama's planned post-9/11 operations and destroyed the core of Daesh.
"We learn that Senator Lindsey Graham believes that since the Marines took Iwo Jima, that they can certainly take Kharge Island. As a US Marine Corps Infantry Officer, there is one thing the Senator leaves out of that statement. We will need a big supply of body bags."
Agreed, or at least some supply.
"When American's wake up to see an ARG/MEU Ready Group sunk and or burning to the water line and or destroyed in detail on Kharge Island due to mad men destroying their own economy rather than submit, they will be right to ask how the Hell did this happen?"
They will, especially if it happens. But they'll also need to confront the nature of the Iranian regime and its war with us.
"Lastly who is going to fill the empty personnel slots? We are nation in which less than 1% of the population see's it in THEIR own personal interests to sign up and serve. Of that only 25% of military aged men and women are fit enough to serve. So as Toto said to the Lone Ranger "who's "WE" Kemosabe?""
Agreed, and that's a very good point. My understanding is enlistments are improving, but my no means enough, and the US populace (including myself) are hugely unfit and inadequate. That's going to take a lot of time to change, and time is running out.
Turtler, some extremely good historical points, but in each of them there was a key point on which the efforts turned. Isn’t it interesting that Vietnam and China has several hundred years of “war” and during the Vietnam conflict were loosely aligned, only to hook and jab each other later after we had departed the area. The point is that we have been a Pax Americana and been a quiet or sometimes not so quiet empire. Our reach is by far, the greatest in human history to date, but then we have the internet and communications are so dazzlingly fast that the logistics of empire seem or perhaps feel more manageable. The Special Forces units that defeated the Taliban in months advised all of Washington, DC that was ill advised to make Afghanistan a large enterprise. They felt; and it would have likely proved out, that with counter insurgent efforts and air power that about 200 SF operators could keep things pretty quiet. It was someone(s) desire to turn a land of hostile terrain and limited resources into the experiment of nation building that went badly. What people forget is that even if it is “some body bags” “someone” is dead. We don’t get dead Marines back. (Or any other service members for that matter.)
No one was happier to see Khomeini and a lot of his band of thugs killed. I knew Marines that were killed in the Beirut barracks bombing. It was and is still personal. But, once the decapitation strikes failed to remove the regime it appears that we didn’t or don’t have a plan. That said, if the Gulf States are serious and they ought to be at this point, about getting rid of the kleptocracy in IRI, that form a coalition and start figuring out how “we” are going to handle these thugs. The region feels like we are watching the Godfather I or the Soprano’s. Everyone pays tributes, no one likes it. “It was Barzini all along.” Enlistments are stable and sadly it is the same cohort of lower middle and middle Americans who are signing up. The playing field is not level. Thus it is easy to engage in adventurism. If we want to protect our shores, then indeed, we need a very robust navy, far bigger and better prepared for the future than it is currently configured. But as long as Rich men north of Richmond are running things, not much looks likely to change. Taking yet another movie scene to your point about readiness, the movie “Unforgiven” William Munny aka Clint Eastwood sums it up when Little Bill accuses him of shooting an unarmed man. “Well he shoulda armed himself.” Perhaps we should arm ourselves and let others arm themselves.
"Turtler, some extremely good historical points,"
Thank you kindly. I have never served as you have, and must yield to that, but I am a history nerd.
" but in each of them there was a key point on which the efforts turned."
Agreed, if anything I'd argue several key points.
"Isn’t it interesting that Vietnam and China has several hundred years of “war”"
Sure, but they have at least as many hundred years of co-existence with either direct Chinese colonization or Chinese overlordship of a Viet vassal with varying degrees of directness. This tends to get downplayed now as Hanoi has liked to paint itself as a stalwart opponent of the PRC at least when in non-Chinese diplomatic circles and not without reason given their territorial disputes, but it's worth remembering that Viet culture as we know it formed from a fusion of Han colonization with that of the locals in the Red River Valley, that most of the major anti-French Vietnamese underground movements emerged as ancillaries to Chinese Parties (both the Communists and Nationalists), that Vietnam has generally avoided direct conflict with the PRC even diplomatically since 1979 (which while a bloody debacle on both sides showed the Vietnamese could not hope to withstand protracted PLA pressure on their Northern Frontier indefinitely), and the fall of the Soviets as well as Russian withdrawal from much of the South China Sea pushed them further there.
And that the most dedicated effort by any Vietnamese government to break with a fundamentally China-centric identity and policy - under the very end f the Ho Dynasty- lasted about 1400-1407 before the Ming crushed them. And while Vietnam eventually fought its way out from under Chinese occupation again after decades, they still did so after a mixture of military victory and reaffirming Chinese vassalage.
"and during the Vietnam conflict were loosely aligned, only to hook and jab each other later after we had departed the area."
Indeed, and agreed. In a lot of ways the Vietnamese were fortunate the Khmer Rouge were so cruel and incompetent and caved so quickly it became impossible for the PRC to publicly justify there.
" The point is that we have been a Pax Americana and been a quiet or sometimes not so quiet empire. Our reach is by far, the greatest in human history to date, but then we have the internet and communications are so dazzlingly fast that the logistics of empire seem or perhaps feel more manageable."
Agreed, and to a limited extent they do make them more manageable, but that also leads to overreach. And God knows we've been prone to it before.
"The Special Forces units that defeated the Taliban in months advised all of Washington, DC that was ill advised to make Afghanistan a large enterprise. They felt; and it would have likely proved out, that with counter insurgent efforts and air power that about 200 SF operators could keep things pretty quiet. It was someone(s) desire to turn a land of hostile terrain and limited resources into the experiment of nation building that went badly."
Agreed, but I'd argue that as well as the failure to decapitate the enemy's leadership fast. Over-lawyering about whether it was appropriate to drone strike the Taliban's leadership was jaw droppingly stupid and a fine indicator of how badly managed things were. Nation Building I fear is a dirty enterprise with some to recommend it and that we'll need to get back into at some point in order to obtain permanent peace, but it is not a catch all or one we can get into easily. But above all whatever we decide -whether nation building or more surgical expeditions - we need to be a lot more competent and measured at that, including being willing to break things without needing to fix them.
"What people forget is that even if it is “some body bags” “someone” is dead. We don’t get dead Marines back. (Or any other service members for that matter.)"
Indeed. And they are by far the most valuable of us. Which is something to factor in considering how the enemy and civilians also don't get the dead back. I imagine a lot of people would still be alive today if Mullah Omar got droned in 2001, and if we made examples of pedophiles engaging with Bacha Bazi.
"No one was happier to see Khomeini and a lot of his band of thugs killed. I knew Marines that were killed in the Beirut barracks bombing. It was and is still personal."
To be fair unfortunately we didn't kill Khomeini. Khomeini was the first "Supreme Leader" and unfortunately went to hell of "natural causes" Khameini the Elder was his second in command and the second "Supreme Leader" and he's the one we drone strked.
But that aside, my sympathies. I was not born there at the time and know of nobody directly, but it still sears.
"But, once the decapitation strikes failed to remove the regime it appears that we didn’t or don’t have a plan."
I'm not sure what the plan is, or if there is one, and I am concerned with policies there. But it does seem like we are planning to continue hammering their leadership and military/coercive capacities while trying to gin up domestic revolution. That could fail or backfire, but it's certainly a better approach htan most.
"That said, if the Gulf States are serious and they ought to be at this point, about getting rid of the kleptocracy in IRI, that form a coalition and start figuring out how “we” are going to handle these thugs. "
I'm not sure how serious the Gulf States are. A Non-Insane Iran would be a logical ally of the US not unlike the Pahlavi Dynasty was, and that might cause a reorientation towards the hated Shiite Persians by us and against them. The Gulfers will fight violently and unethically to preserve their own regime against Iranian Revolutionary nonsense and not appear weak, but beyond that I am not sure.
"The region feels like we are watching the Godfather I or the Soprano’s. Everyone pays tributes, no one likes it. “It was Barzini all along.”"
Agreed, and I do think that is one reason why there's been so much support against it.
" Enlistments are stable and sadly it is the same cohort of lower middle and middle Americans who are signing up. The playing field is not level."
Agreed, and that's a problem. That as well as brain drain, population drain, and information drain. As horrifying as it is to say, you can at least try to fix up manpower shortages by the draft and if the cause is serious enough get a fair amount of buy in, but you can't just magically spam out the gear needed to equip the larger force.
It's also why I am not sure how much wider.
"Thus it is easy to engage in adventurism. If we want to protect our shores, then indeed, we need a very robust navy, far bigger and better prepared for the future than it is currently configured. But as long as Rich men north of Richmond are running things, not much looks likely to change. "
Indeed, and particularly the flavor of morons that consist many of the rich men of Richmond. I don't have a huge amount positive to say about Woodrow Wilson (by far one of our worst Presidents) or JFK but they could at least recognize mortal threats.
"Taking yet another movie scene to your point about readiness, the movie “Unforgiven” William Munny aka Clint Eastwood sums it up when Little Bill accuses him of shooting an unarmed man. “Well he shoulda armed himself.”
Agreed indeed.
" Perhaps we should arm ourselves and let others arm themselves."
Depends on who the them are. Our allies and friendly neutrals certainly, and we've been trying to do that for decades. In a lot of ways i do think we made a great mistake working so hard to de-nad our major European Imperial allies after WWII, like the British, French, and Dutch.
Our enemies though? Not so much. Especially since a lot of them have shown themselves unable or unwilling to play by "the rules" or act civilly. The irony is I'd be cautiously willing to accept a nuclear armed Iran under basically any leadership EXCEPT the current system that is actually there. I hate to say it but I do think we are sliding towards a world war due to the pressures involved, especially in the PRC and Russia. And that's not going to be pretty by any stretch of the imagination.
Agree. WWI didn't need us. The cousins war would have been over and things patched up had US not gotten involved.
I have a real issue with lawyers pretending they are warriors. Lindsey Graham was a REMF, let’s not pretend pencil pushers are fighters.
What Lindsey Graham never did was lump an Alice Pack (LBE) around with 70 pounds of “stuff” in and another 10 pounds or more hung on it, with a rifle that weighs 8-10 bounds 6-8 30 round magines with 28 rounds because 30 rounds can cause a jam with the Arlington follower…then there’s the new Kevlar several pounds and that before you’re an 0331 machine gunner and or 0341 mortarman. Then hump long hot, wet, cold etc patrols with crap chow when ever you can figure out how to eat it. The elites are quick to kill us, but they are running out of runway, no one will serve if the self indulgence of the boomers and and next generations believe there is nothing to fight for, because the system is rigged. At that point the moats of the Atlantic and Pacific become moot. The revolution will be internal and the great experiment will end. They never see it coming.
The elites have their place. There are the tragedies of folks who should be far away from combat getting murdered. Joseph Warren had no business being at Bunker Hill. If José Martí hadn't thought he was an infantryman Cuba would be prosperous and free.
While I seen nothing wrong about being a JAG Corps lawyer; it does piss me off to see these folks who spent their service time sitting in a Naval Station office reviewing repair contracts acting like they were in hand-to-hand combat.
I'm more optimistic than you. I have been spending time with high schoolers. The kids are alright.
Am with you on the zoomers! I am around them as well as a sort of coach emeritus and they are with it and indeed gonna be alright!
Our pleasure, not our obligation....
And yet as Lady Thatcher said, "We have harboured those who hated us, tolerated those who threatened us and indulged those who weakened us."
and that was just the ex wife!
So much truth here. The Iranians claimed to have nothing more than 2000km capability. Whoops! Math error. I have some doubt as to the type of warhead loaded into those weapons.
Iran has lied since the beginning. I see no option but capitulation as a solution for them.
Gerat article Sal on the problems of missile defense for Europe!!!
A basic question is whether the Western Europeans want to be defended from the missile threat, "want" as in "willing to make a sacrifice for". If the governments of Western Europe announced that they could build or buy a solid missile defense, but only if the average work week were increased from 36 hours to 40 hours, how many takers would there be?
Don't start none, won't be none. How many missiles do you think Iran has pointed at Kazakhstan? Or Tajikistan?
Where I think I should be seeing a YouTube video, at the end of this missive, I see a message that says, "Our systems have detected unusual traffic from your computer network. Please try your request again later. Why did this happen?
IP address: 2a09:bac3:3257:1c82::2d7:7c ≠ 2a02:26f7:c9d0:4000:5800::32
Time: 2026-03-25T14:20:51Z
URL: https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/P2g9H8vz3QM?start=174&rel=0&autoplay=0&showinfo=0&enablejsapi=0?" Is the YouTube video failing to load only for me, or for everyone?"
Mine worked.
I’ll send you a DM.
Now mine doesn't work, on this stack and numerous other ones. Something wonky with YouTube, it appears. Perhaps they don't like VPNs. Been too lazy to try disabling since I don't like video much.
Disabling my VPN didn’t work, but the problem seems limited to iOS, my macOS devices are fine.
People really should pay closer attention to your warnings these last 20 years. Those TDS pearl clutching fools out there angry at what Pres. Trump has been doing this year ignore that we also just cut off any possibility that Venezuela could be used as a launching pad for missiles as the Trump DOW removed Venezuela as Iran's longtime buddy in the region. I believe that place is well within the 2,500 mile radius. Also.... every TDS fool's favorite little tin god on wheels, Bathhouse Barry.... remember him? His $1.7 billion pallets of cash from OUR treasury, not HIS, financed the ICBM refinements and arming of Iran that we are dealing with now. Treason.
"Bathouse Barry"-scurrilous and unsubstantiated (Hitchens's razor). Like suggesting a nasty liberal slam, "I used to worry about my 14 year old daughter being alone in a room with Trump but now that she is 15 I don't have to worry, she is too old." Same level of nonsense.
The one item, however, is the notion that the U.S. paid $1.7 billion from OUR (emphasis supplied) Treasury. The funds returned to Iran under the the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action by the Obama administration were Iranian assets, which had been frozen by international sanctions. The $1.7 billion was comprised of $400 million that the Shah had placed as a deposit in a U.S. Foreign Military Sales trust fund. The 1979 MoU with the Shah stipulated that the unexpended funds would be placed in an interest-bearing account. (The original Trust Fund amounted to $600 million until the George H. W. Bush administration returned $200 million to Iran in a partial settlement in 1990-hence the $400 million.) The remaining $1.3 billion represented 35 years of accumulated interest earned on the withheld Iranian amount pursuant to the original Iranian contract put in place by the Shah.
Even if the settlement with Iran was determined to be bad policy, the correct terms of the deal and settlement should be used -even by TDS fools.
May be technically correct but it's still wrong and stupid to have given them any cash subsequently turned into Ballistic missiles, bombs for Hezbollah, Houthis and Hamas. That wasn't rocket science. It was an attempted bribe.
It is always better to be technically correct even in describing failure.
Comments are full of anti-Islamic responses based on the actions of Political Islam represented by Hezbollah, Houthis, Hamas and Iran. Usually not mentioned is the UAE as a post-ideological Islamic state that promotes a state-sanctioned "moderate" Islam, prioritizing national security from extremist ideology and economic development over religious activism.
Don't really know if this is viable or UAE spoofing, but it suggests a place in the capitalist economic system for a post-Islamist approach that rejects the Political Islam of Iran, etc.
See, "The First Post-Ideological Bedouin State" in Quillette 3/25/26.
https://quillette.com/2026/03/25/the-post-ideological-bedouin-state-uae-middle-east/
You are naive to think there is a hair's breadth of difference between Political Islam and the ideology of Islam. Go read the five pillars and what they really mean as applied in the world.
Well , I guess the UAE model is a lie and there can be no such thing. Good to know.
It's hard to substantiate rumors when some of the people involve end up suddenly dead. I get it. Let me guess, you'd be all for the US never returning the $100 billion we hold in Russian assets. And using the windfall profits taxes too instead of returning the money with interest? And Russia didn't kill or maim nearly as many American citizens as Iran has over those years.
I would be for something a touch more data driven.
Doesn't matter whose funds they were. They were withheld for irresponsible behavior and the behavior had not changed. Obama and Biden funded our enemy.
You gentlemen do go on.
The previous White House occupant and his handler made sure that unfrozen Iranian assets in the billions were only used for humanitarian purposes. We see how that turned out.
Not to be outdone, yesterday London mayor Sadiq Khan stated that only Europe can protect Great Britain from the Trump administration, economically and militarily.
I guess ignorance truly is bliss.
Air Strip One is EXTREMELY dependant on Americans believing that it's still powerful; that the City of London is important for actual finance and not money laundering. One day the scales will fall from our fellow citizens eyes. And Great Britain won't like what happens next.
Yeah, I heard the British navy is on the way to the Gulf; all 2 ships.
I saw a report that VW was going to start manufacturing Arrow missiles (if I recall correctly). It has been known that Iran wanted to do this and was working towards his. It was also known that Iran and China work together. None of this should surprise anybody. Somehow, Europe is surprised. Then again, they are surprised that unwashed Muslim masses from third world countries do not do positive things in their countries.
It is also notoriously American for us to have zero understanding of our own national interests and see everything in the world solely through our own still-isolationist (narcissist?) lens. Who better then to lead us than a president with an even dimmer view of such things than many Americans? And let us not forget there were significant forces in American politics and industry who didn't just like this setup--they endeavored strongly to keep it. The reckoning is ongoing, on both sides of the pond.
Cut a deal with the Portuguese for ABM bases in the Azores, too?