One the thing to note about these dueling 15-point and 10-point plans, is that the precise details of both remain unreleased. A lot of fake or reconstructed versions are circulating on social media but we don't really know precisely what the US is offering or Iran is counter-offering here.
Problem is anytime the US starts talking to some Iranian, Israel kills that person. Just like what happened to JD last week. They want total dominion over the middle east and this chaos is all part of the plan. And i'd say it's working. Problem is for the rest of us there will be massive inflation and worldwide food shortages.
Do people realize the amount of fertilizer currently taken offline? Just you wait for the refugee deluge.
The US has not spoken with any Iranians so your swipe at Israel is misplaced. Perhaps if you lived in Israel you would feel differently about your friends and family getting murdered by the mullah thugs in Iran or would you remain relaxed about that? And your Calamity Jane comment is economically illiterate.
I read the article you referenced but it contains no evidence that Kharazi or any other Iranian has spoken with any US official. So my reply to you remains accurate. There is no evidence that any meeting with Vance ever occurred. And any communication between the US and Pakistan is just so much telephone tag.
Oh goodness, Trump is not going to use a nuclear bomb. This is so obviously "The Art of the Deal" it's not worth explaining.
IMO, here is what's really going on behind the scenes with Trump's declarations about destroying Iran.
He is going to attack critical infrastructure that creates the most pressure on the IRGC's command and control capabilities...he'll probably also attack the leadership's financial interests
The objective is to divide and conquer their "mosaic strategy" via uprisings and/or targeted military operations. The IRGC spread their forces out in Iran's 31 military provinces so the point is to cut off communication and transportation between them
This creates the pressure necessary to force IRGC leadership to make a deal or eventually collapse
All of this is legal and not a war crime even if civilians are indirectly affected
The CIA and Mossad have not been sitting idle for the last month...
This may work, or it may not...but you'd have to be stupid to think that Trump is going to spell this out for everybody. Also, regardless of what he does it's going to be reported as horrific and a genocide so he's just embracing the madman strategy at this point
Also possible he extends the deadline or does limited strikes to continue applying pressure and sowing chaos within the IRGC ranks
Where the hell did that come from...TRUMP uses 'harsh words' and boasts to conquer; he doesn't need nuclear weapons. He is a pompous, posturing braggart...TRUMP himself is the prototypical empty suit! It is sad that America cannot produce better.
Oh jeez, the mean tweets complaint again, you sound just like my Aunt Irene. Remember the kind-hearted, soft spoken Pres Truman dropped nuclear bombs on Hiroshima & Nagasaki
I am a well-seasoned tougher than leather FREE AMERICAN who sees that this BLUSTERING BRAGGART is going to put MY NATION into the hands of the LEFTIST LOONIES for the next 30 years! I voted for your HERO all three times...this 3rd vote has proven to to be for a TURNCOAT!
I would guess: some combination of trying to avoid squeezing the global oil supply more than necessary, and also I think the Americans want to keep Iran motivated not to mine the Strait of Hormuz.
I would also point out that most people seem to think that these tweets (or whatever they're called on TruthSocial) are meant for an American or European audience. Like his speech the other night, which said NOTHING NEW, I think this is a negotiating tactic with someone he's not naming yet to avoid derailing. "Take the deal, or when I get to the microphone tonight, it's all over..." In all of this, just remember that he sees information that we don't. It's easy for us to critique, but at the end of the day, I'm trusting that our chief executive has the best interests of this country in mind until it's definitively proven otherwise.
Yes, and I think he's got everyone's best interests at heart, long term, including even Iran's. I don't think he ever gives up hope on anyone. I see this time and again. He's also super tough, but that's to push for a deal.
Nuclear is probably on the table but that option last resort. Probably not tactical nukes but several selective airbursts (with burst altitudes low enough to have the most minimal effects on Iran's neighbors )to fry their grid with the EMP energy.
Iranian 'nukes' inbound toward Tel Aviv, or Berlin and Paris...not our American problem. I voted for this posturing buffoon 3 times...he told me that he wouldn't have us in incessant wars. TRUMP LIED...he bragged and blustered his way into yet another 'War without End'. The Obama Gang...wasn't fit to lead...but either is the spoiled child Trump. Maybe these...from the Bushes on...are the brightest and best the USA can put forward, if so, the lights have been turned off in Reagan's 'Shining City on the Hill'.
"Iranian 'nukes' inbound toward Tel Aviv, or Berlin and Paris...not our American problem."
Not likely either. Tel Aviv has nukes. The French have nukes. The UK has nukes. The Germans don't, but they're NATO members, so the French and the UK (if not the USA themselves) would retaliate - in kind - immediately. That's what NATO's for.
Actually, my comment here is more a criticism of the comment _above_ yours. Sure, Kamala was dreadful; but "Iranian nukes inbound" anywhere is hyperbole.
The utterly tragic part is that the US is no more immune to batshit crazy leaders than are the rest of the west. Trump (Feb-April25) is what everyone cheered (and many voted for).
Trump 2026 is either being threatened or has lost it. I mean hanging out with Graham and retweeting Mark Levin?????????????????? Graham, Levin, and Murdoch are all never Trumpers and must be delighted to see him immolate the GOP. This time around the deep state is sitting back and watching it all unfold.
I wonder what your opinion of the leadership in Canada is. You go from the boy king to the communist banker. Did Canada learn nothing from when the US let China into the WTO?
Our leaders are just like the european ones. Total marxists who hate their own populations. Carney is just getting rich through his hedge fund (brookfield)
We just have a more Chinese flair as the CCP has every intention of using us to weaken the USA. Their might even be a Ukraine type scenario in the future. I mean nothing is off the table anymore.
No, we want a Donald who is credible enough, effective enough, and sufficiently less retarded for the dems to not have a run on the white house for the next 25 years. Instead what he is doing is ensuring a dem triple lock on the US legislature for 25 years.
Apparent, perhaps, to those who double down on non-sequiturs. Or are just tiresome, time-sucking trolls. This community is more interested in substance and insight. At any rate, I am. Now you can double down on your faux insouciance and repeat "to each their own."
First of all, who appointed you the Arbiter of "This Community", Doug?
Secondly, I practice my First Amendment rights on my terms alone, so if any or all of my posts fail to meet your lofty standards, I suggest that you just keep on scrolling....
Trump posted "a whole civilization will die tonight" and the internet decided he was threatening genocide. The same post ends with "God Bless the Great People of Iran" and "47 years of extortion, corruption, and death will finally end."
He's talking about the regime. It's RIGHT THERE.
In the same post.
You just have to keep reading past the first sentence, which apparently is too much to ask from people who do political commentary for a living.
What nobody seems to be talking about is Iran's response to this post. Asking civilians to form human chains around power plants. To put children in front of bridges. To announce that fourteen million people have "volunteered to sacrifice their lives."
So you're OK with that, I guess?
The regime that screams "Death to America" every Friday just asked its own population to stand in front of the bombs. And somehow Trump is the monster in this scenario.
The number of cognitively impaired people screaming at the top of their lungs made the White House deny they were using nukes.
That's where we are. A man posts on social media and the entire national security establishment has to issue a statement clarifying that, no, they are not deploying nuclear weapons based on a Truth Social post.
Meanwhile, American intelligence is watching Iran scramble in real time.
Every bridge they surround with human shields is a bridge they just told the Pentagon matters. Every facility they panic-protect is a facility they just flagged on the map. The hysteria IS the strategy. It always has been.
Ten years in and people still fall for it like it's brand new every single time
I was a huge Trump fan. Loved that man. But he's lost the plot. I was never for any of these foreign adventures and now we and the rest of the world are much worse off than before. He needs to stop the psycho posts, get our troops out of the middle east, and sstop the chaos. I do not support any of this and it gets worse by the day.
I'm sure none of this will happen. We are going to waste more lives in the middle east. I did lose the plot- I genuinely thought he wouldn't go into forever wars. Turns out, DC is DC and it doesn't matter who you elect.
The very best comment in this thread! DC will always be DC...and there is absolutely ZERO CHANCE of a regular citizen having impact...either through voting, or penny ante contributions. THANK YOU for exhibiting that some can still THINK!
Trump is nothing if not rational. So dismiss any ideas about madness. But he is also a "riverboat gambler." Meaning he bluffs---not all the time. In fact probably relatively little of the time. But he famously covers his bets enough to make his bluffs effective...most of the time.
Sun Tzu said that the best general of all is the one who can win without fighting. Of course, the credibility of that naturally depends on a prior record of successful, impressive "kinetic performance." Trump has that, in the destruction of the drug-running boats in the Caribbean and Pacific, the lightning overthrow of Maduro in Venezuela, the attack on the Fordow nuclear facility last June, the most recent regime removal in Iran (Urgent Fury), and the massive strikes against Iranian assets in and around the Persian Gulf. These are the reasons why the world is scared shitless about what he might do in re: the power plants.
Is he bluffing or not? Everything has been leading up to this moment (which was bound to come). He's trying to pull this off like a gambler bluffing on a pair of 8's, to avoid the quagmire that will likely result if the IRGC calls his bluff. Unfortunately, I think he's got the stones to make good on his threat if the Iranians call his bluff.
As the old Chinese curse goes, "May you live in interesting times."
Trump isn’t a politician. It’s why they have tried their damndest to cheat to get him out and attempt to lock him up and bankrupt him before 2024. He’s been through more than any single person should endure to try and get this country back on track. The problem is everything he has done to this point has been by Executive Order and many of those have been challenged in court in front of left wing activist judges. Congress has been useless as well and what we have witnessed is how the Uni-party comes together to keep the U.S. on the same track it’s been on before Trump 1. He could cure cancer and the libtards would refuse it to save their own lives that’s how deep TDS lives in the left. No politician would ever endure what he’s been through and still be standing. I’m aware it’s off topic but a politician he surely isn’t just because he’s In politics now as President. I’d argue he has never risen to the mantle of the Presidency because of his social media use but I understand why he uses it as anything he says gets overanalyzed and twisted to create a narrative that fits a certain story. I don’t think anyone loves a war but if regime change can happen in Iran and they are brought into the 21st century it will have been worth it.
We all knew Trump is a blowhard who hates showing weakness, but thankfully he seemed smart about which fights to pick. Until he went and picked the dumbest effing fight possible. He's incapable of de-escalating if he can't make himself look good, and people around the world are learning to use that to play him.
Excuse me.....Trump fans or not, he sounds completely deranged and he is also threatening with war crimes. Should someone think that morals and laws of war do not matter, that only might matters, then why (which is usual for Western countries) all this moralizing language regarding various Khameneis, Ghaddafis, Assads....Then just speak language of 18th century, we want this and that (oh wait, Trump sometimes does that).
it struck me here this morning...that we are about to witness HISTORY in reverse...about 2500 years ago. XERXES I, the PERSIAN KING, threatened and postured, and burned and killed, right up to gates of Athens...then the WORLD'S FOREMOST FREE city-state. He managed to set the city aflame, but then had to sit and watch as his fabulously large, and powerful NAVY was destroyed at Salamis. NOW...we have the American BRAGGART OF BRAGGARTS before the gates of NEW PERSIA...strutting and posturing, puffing out his EMPTY CHEST...and he will LOSE. He will declare an historic unprecedented victory...but WE WILL HAVE LOST! and the world will have lost
eugyppius, I'm sorry that your last piece was so attacked that you felt the need to defend it today. It was so good that I forwarded it to my family with the comment "This is about as clear-eyed an assessment of the Iran war as you'll find anywhere." And I almost never forward stuff.
I have no idea what's about to happen, but it's unsettling, to say the least.
It is Israel who controls the escalation ladder. Last night ahead of Trump’s (5 times-moved) deadline they attacked South Pars again. They are already attacking bridges and rail. Iran in retaliation attacked energy facilities in Israel, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Israel has kinetically destroyed every de-escalation off ramp. Any time Trump hesitates to escalate, they pre-empt him.
I don't know who's more unpredictable Trump or who/what ever is running Iran.
I was only 10 in 1962 during the Cuban missile crisis, but I could tell that my mother and father and the teachers at school couldn't predict what was going to happen. This reminds of that period.
I was in college during the Cuban missile crisis. I remember watching it on the news, but the seriousness of it didn't really register. Of course I was a dumb college boy full of piss and vinegar and not the news junkie I am now. I do remember later when I found out how serious it really was, it became clear to me how much had been concealed from me by the government. We didn't have a clue.
Leaving Iran's power generation intact allows them to launch missiles, although they are now seen in smaller numbers. It will be very difficult for them continue supplying, fueling, and launching without power, and it is not clear they can otherwise provide it through generators, which themselves are vulnerable to air attack. Removal of bridges impedes response to distributed attacks from those who would overturn the regime. So it is not gratuitous destruction, as the pro-Iran Leftists such as the NY Times would have it.
I'm an American who has been more right than wrong about Trump--it usually seems very obvious to me when he's joking, when he's bluffing, and what he thinks is essential vs. what he thinks is up for debate. I have no idea how to interpret this move and won't pretend that I do.
I hope it's a bluff/"madman strategy" type thing, but I don't know. The problem with that strategy when dealing with Iran is that they don't care. They don't care about their people, they don't care about keeping their word, they don't care about anything about their plan to eventually conquer the world even if that means there are two people left in it--one of them and one other person subject to him (and to the god they profess). I'm old enough that I've seen Iran break treaties, promises, and agreements; I've seen Iran attack and kill over and over; I've seen Iran fund terrorism and terrorists and entire terror regimes; I've seen Iran kill thousands of its own citizens. So I have no patience for anyone calling for dialogue and agreements, as if we haven't BEEN DOING JUST THAT for fifty years. That said, I don't know whether what we're doing now is a good idea or not. There are a lot of bad options, including making more treaties that no one expects to be followed and waiting for Iran to attack again. It also means Iran doing nothing and Trump doing exactly what he said.
My best guess is that Iran won't do what Trump says, and that if so, Trump won't bomb the country into the stone age but WILL bomb it a lot and say that's enough. But that's a guess.
One the thing to note about these dueling 15-point and 10-point plans, is that the precise details of both remain unreleased. A lot of fake or reconstructed versions are circulating on social media but we don't really know precisely what the US is offering or Iran is counter-offering here.
Problem is anytime the US starts talking to some Iranian, Israel kills that person. Just like what happened to JD last week. They want total dominion over the middle east and this chaos is all part of the plan. And i'd say it's working. Problem is for the rest of us there will be massive inflation and worldwide food shortages.
Do people realize the amount of fertilizer currently taken offline? Just you wait for the refugee deluge.
The US has not spoken with any Iranians so your swipe at Israel is misplaced. Perhaps if you lived in Israel you would feel differently about your friends and family getting murdered by the mullah thugs in Iran or would you remain relaxed about that? And your Calamity Jane comment is economically illiterate.
https://www.irishtimes.com/world/middle-east/2026/04/02/former-iranian-foreign-minister-seriously-injured-and-wife-killed-in-us-israel-strike/
"Kharazi was recently involved in Pakistani efforts to arrange a meeting between senior Iranian officials and US vice-president JD Vance."
Please. It's not like I'm making stuff up here.
I read the article you referenced but it contains no evidence that Kharazi or any other Iranian has spoken with any US official. So my reply to you remains accurate. There is no evidence that any meeting with Vance ever occurred. And any communication between the US and Pakistan is just so much telephone tag.
Oh goodness, Trump is not going to use a nuclear bomb. This is so obviously "The Art of the Deal" it's not worth explaining.
IMO, here is what's really going on behind the scenes with Trump's declarations about destroying Iran.
He is going to attack critical infrastructure that creates the most pressure on the IRGC's command and control capabilities...he'll probably also attack the leadership's financial interests
The objective is to divide and conquer their "mosaic strategy" via uprisings and/or targeted military operations. The IRGC spread their forces out in Iran's 31 military provinces so the point is to cut off communication and transportation between them
This creates the pressure necessary to force IRGC leadership to make a deal or eventually collapse
All of this is legal and not a war crime even if civilians are indirectly affected
The CIA and Mossad have not been sitting idle for the last month...
This may work, or it may not...but you'd have to be stupid to think that Trump is going to spell this out for everybody. Also, regardless of what he does it's going to be reported as horrific and a genocide so he's just embracing the madman strategy at this point
Also possible he extends the deadline or does limited strikes to continue applying pressure and sowing chaos within the IRGC ranks
To be clear, I don't think a nuclear attack is likely at all.
Oh i know. That's not directed towards you in the slightest.
I think you have a thoughtful analysis, per usual.
Where the hell did that come from...TRUMP uses 'harsh words' and boasts to conquer; he doesn't need nuclear weapons. He is a pompous, posturing braggart...TRUMP himself is the prototypical empty suit! It is sad that America cannot produce better.
Oh jeez, the mean tweets complaint again, you sound just like my Aunt Irene. Remember the kind-hearted, soft spoken Pres Truman dropped nuclear bombs on Hiroshima & Nagasaki
TRUMPIE, TRUMPIE, THAT'S OUR MAN...IF HE CAN'T DO IT, NOBODY CAN! An insipid 13 year old junior high school has spoken! I am chastised! FO
Take your medicine. You sound like a petulant child
that's all you got?
Look me up...I've got a whole lot more twit!
And you are who?
I am a well-seasoned tougher than leather FREE AMERICAN who sees that this BLUSTERING BRAGGART is going to put MY NATION into the hands of the LEFTIST LOONIES for the next 30 years! I voted for your HERO all three times...this 3rd vote has proven to to be for a TURNCOAT!
I wonder if Trump goes after the pistachio plantations. I still don't completely understand why we are allowing Kharg Island to operate.
I would guess: some combination of trying to avoid squeezing the global oil supply more than necessary, and also I think the Americans want to keep Iran motivated not to mine the Strait of Hormuz.
I would also point out that most people seem to think that these tweets (or whatever they're called on TruthSocial) are meant for an American or European audience. Like his speech the other night, which said NOTHING NEW, I think this is a negotiating tactic with someone he's not naming yet to avoid derailing. "Take the deal, or when I get to the microphone tonight, it's all over..." In all of this, just remember that he sees information that we don't. It's easy for us to critique, but at the end of the day, I'm trusting that our chief executive has the best interests of this country in mind until it's definitively proven otherwise.
Yes, and I think he's got everyone's best interests at heart, long term, including even Iran's. I don't think he ever gives up hope on anyone. I see this time and again. He's also super tough, but that's to push for a deal.
It's obviously not meant for Americans or Europeans
As reasonable an explanation as any. The Red Chinese may be talking to him, too.
Bingo
His international bosses have said NO!
Nuclear is probably on the table but that option last resort. Probably not tactical nukes but several selective airbursts (with burst altitudes low enough to have the most minimal effects on Iran's neighbors )to fry their grid with the EMP energy.
C;mon man...he is already destined to be portrayed as a blustering clown...
Worse than the madness of King George. The insanity of Orange Retard
Not exactly an insightful or intelligent response.
So, you would prefer a cackling Kamala Harris and Iranian nukes inbound by 2028?
Iranian 'nukes' inbound toward Tel Aviv, or Berlin and Paris...not our American problem. I voted for this posturing buffoon 3 times...he told me that he wouldn't have us in incessant wars. TRUMP LIED...he bragged and blustered his way into yet another 'War without End'. The Obama Gang...wasn't fit to lead...but either is the spoiled child Trump. Maybe these...from the Bushes on...are the brightest and best the USA can put forward, if so, the lights have been turned off in Reagan's 'Shining City on the Hill'.
"Iranian 'nukes' inbound toward Tel Aviv, or Berlin and Paris...not our American problem."
Not likely either. Tel Aviv has nukes. The French have nukes. The UK has nukes. The Germans don't, but they're NATO members, so the French and the UK (if not the USA themselves) would retaliate - in kind - immediately. That's what NATO's for.
Actually, my comment here is more a criticism of the comment _above_ yours. Sure, Kamala was dreadful; but "Iranian nukes inbound" anywhere is hyperbole.
The utterly tragic part is that the US is no more immune to batshit crazy leaders than are the rest of the west. Trump (Feb-April25) is what everyone cheered (and many voted for).
Trump 2026 is either being threatened or has lost it. I mean hanging out with Graham and retweeting Mark Levin?????????????????? Graham, Levin, and Murdoch are all never Trumpers and must be delighted to see him immolate the GOP. This time around the deep state is sitting back and watching it all unfold.
I wonder what your opinion of the leadership in Canada is. You go from the boy king to the communist banker. Did Canada learn nothing from when the US let China into the WTO?
Our leaders are just like the european ones. Total marxists who hate their own populations. Carney is just getting rich through his hedge fund (brookfield)
We just have a more Chinese flair as the CCP has every intention of using us to weaken the USA. Their might even be a Ukraine type scenario in the future. I mean nothing is off the table anymore.
No, we want a Donald who is credible enough, effective enough, and sufficiently less retarded for the dems to not have a run on the white house for the next 25 years. Instead what he is doing is ensuring a dem triple lock on the US legislature for 25 years.
vagent743736, Please stop with this idiotic form of rhetorical challenge. It's a complete non-sequitur.
Apparently you would prefer a cackling Kamala Harris and Iranian nukes inbound by 2028.
To each their own, I suppose.....
Apparent, perhaps, to those who double down on non-sequiturs. Or are just tiresome, time-sucking trolls. This community is more interested in substance and insight. At any rate, I am. Now you can double down on your faux insouciance and repeat "to each their own."
First of all, who appointed you the Arbiter of "This Community", Doug?
Secondly, I practice my First Amendment rights on my terms alone, so if any or all of my posts fail to meet your lofty standards, I suggest that you just keep on scrolling....
Trump posted "a whole civilization will die tonight" and the internet decided he was threatening genocide. The same post ends with "God Bless the Great People of Iran" and "47 years of extortion, corruption, and death will finally end."
He's talking about the regime. It's RIGHT THERE.
In the same post.
You just have to keep reading past the first sentence, which apparently is too much to ask from people who do political commentary for a living.
What nobody seems to be talking about is Iran's response to this post. Asking civilians to form human chains around power plants. To put children in front of bridges. To announce that fourteen million people have "volunteered to sacrifice their lives."
So you're OK with that, I guess?
The regime that screams "Death to America" every Friday just asked its own population to stand in front of the bombs. And somehow Trump is the monster in this scenario.
The number of cognitively impaired people screaming at the top of their lungs made the White House deny they were using nukes.
That's where we are. A man posts on social media and the entire national security establishment has to issue a statement clarifying that, no, they are not deploying nuclear weapons based on a Truth Social post.
Meanwhile, American intelligence is watching Iran scramble in real time.
Every bridge they surround with human shields is a bridge they just told the Pentagon matters. Every facility they panic-protect is a facility they just flagged on the map. The hysteria IS the strategy. It always has been.
Ten years in and people still fall for it like it's brand new every single time
"Ten years in and people still fall for it like it's brand new every single time" kind of amazing.
I was a huge Trump fan. Loved that man. But he's lost the plot. I was never for any of these foreign adventures and now we and the rest of the world are much worse off than before. He needs to stop the psycho posts, get our troops out of the middle east, and sstop the chaos. I do not support any of this and it gets worse by the day.
None of that will happen, sorry you lost the plot
I'm sure none of this will happen. We are going to waste more lives in the middle east. I did lose the plot- I genuinely thought he wouldn't go into forever wars. Turns out, DC is DC and it doesn't matter who you elect.
The very best comment in this thread! DC will always be DC...and there is absolutely ZERO CHANCE of a regular citizen having impact...either through voting, or penny ante contributions. THANK YOU for exhibiting that some can still THINK!
Trump is nothing if not rational. So dismiss any ideas about madness. But he is also a "riverboat gambler." Meaning he bluffs---not all the time. In fact probably relatively little of the time. But he famously covers his bets enough to make his bluffs effective...most of the time.
Sun Tzu said that the best general of all is the one who can win without fighting. Of course, the credibility of that naturally depends on a prior record of successful, impressive "kinetic performance." Trump has that, in the destruction of the drug-running boats in the Caribbean and Pacific, the lightning overthrow of Maduro in Venezuela, the attack on the Fordow nuclear facility last June, the most recent regime removal in Iran (Urgent Fury), and the massive strikes against Iranian assets in and around the Persian Gulf. These are the reasons why the world is scared shitless about what he might do in re: the power plants.
Is he bluffing or not? Everything has been leading up to this moment (which was bound to come). He's trying to pull this off like a gambler bluffing on a pair of 8's, to avoid the quagmire that will likely result if the IRGC calls his bluff. Unfortunately, I think he's got the stones to make good on his threat if the Iranians call his bluff.
As the old Chinese curse goes, "May you live in interesting times."
Trump isn’t a politician. It’s why they have tried their damndest to cheat to get him out and attempt to lock him up and bankrupt him before 2024. He’s been through more than any single person should endure to try and get this country back on track. The problem is everything he has done to this point has been by Executive Order and many of those have been challenged in court in front of left wing activist judges. Congress has been useless as well and what we have witnessed is how the Uni-party comes together to keep the U.S. on the same track it’s been on before Trump 1. He could cure cancer and the libtards would refuse it to save their own lives that’s how deep TDS lives in the left. No politician would ever endure what he’s been through and still be standing. I’m aware it’s off topic but a politician he surely isn’t just because he’s In politics now as President. I’d argue he has never risen to the mantle of the Presidency because of his social media use but I understand why he uses it as anything he says gets overanalyzed and twisted to create a narrative that fits a certain story. I don’t think anyone loves a war but if regime change can happen in Iran and they are brought into the 21st century it will have been worth it.
We all knew Trump is a blowhard who hates showing weakness, but thankfully he seemed smart about which fights to pick. Until he went and picked the dumbest effing fight possible. He's incapable of de-escalating if he can't make himself look good, and people around the world are learning to use that to play him.
Excuse me.....Trump fans or not, he sounds completely deranged and he is also threatening with war crimes. Should someone think that morals and laws of war do not matter, that only might matters, then why (which is usual for Western countries) all this moralizing language regarding various Khameneis, Ghaddafis, Assads....Then just speak language of 18th century, we want this and that (oh wait, Trump sometimes does that).
Blowing up bridges and power plants is not a war crime. We did the same thing in the Baltic and Iraq.
Errrm, "we did it, therefore it's not a war crime" is not a very solid argument.
Isn't war itself a war crime then?
it struck me here this morning...that we are about to witness HISTORY in reverse...about 2500 years ago. XERXES I, the PERSIAN KING, threatened and postured, and burned and killed, right up to gates of Athens...then the WORLD'S FOREMOST FREE city-state. He managed to set the city aflame, but then had to sit and watch as his fabulously large, and powerful NAVY was destroyed at Salamis. NOW...we have the American BRAGGART OF BRAGGARTS before the gates of NEW PERSIA...strutting and posturing, puffing out his EMPTY CHEST...and he will LOSE. He will declare an historic unprecedented victory...but WE WILL HAVE LOST! and the world will have lost
eugyppius, I'm sorry that your last piece was so attacked that you felt the need to defend it today. It was so good that I forwarded it to my family with the comment "This is about as clear-eyed an assessment of the Iran war as you'll find anywhere." And I almost never forward stuff.
I have no idea what's about to happen, but it's unsettling, to say the least.
It is Israel who controls the escalation ladder. Last night ahead of Trump’s (5 times-moved) deadline they attacked South Pars again. They are already attacking bridges and rail. Iran in retaliation attacked energy facilities in Israel, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Israel has kinetically destroyed every de-escalation off ramp. Any time Trump hesitates to escalate, they pre-empt him.
Regarding your first points. I am not here to agree or disagree with you. I enjoy reading your pieces no matter if I agree with all of them or not.
It’s Tuesday. Let’s hope it’s another TACO Tuesday.
I don't know who's more unpredictable Trump or who/what ever is running Iran.
I was only 10 in 1962 during the Cuban missile crisis, but I could tell that my mother and father and the teachers at school couldn't predict what was going to happen. This reminds of that period.
I was in college during the Cuban missile crisis. I remember watching it on the news, but the seriousness of it didn't really register. Of course I was a dumb college boy full of piss and vinegar and not the news junkie I am now. I do remember later when I found out how serious it really was, it became clear to me how much had been concealed from me by the government. We didn't have a clue.
My father was career Air Force. He went on alert during it.
All the kids in school and the neighborhood figured the base would be a target and we’d be obliterated.
Leaving Iran's power generation intact allows them to launch missiles, although they are now seen in smaller numbers. It will be very difficult for them continue supplying, fueling, and launching without power, and it is not clear they can otherwise provide it through generators, which themselves are vulnerable to air attack. Removal of bridges impedes response to distributed attacks from those who would overturn the regime. So it is not gratuitous destruction, as the pro-Iran Leftists such as the NY Times would have it.
I'm an American who has been more right than wrong about Trump--it usually seems very obvious to me when he's joking, when he's bluffing, and what he thinks is essential vs. what he thinks is up for debate. I have no idea how to interpret this move and won't pretend that I do.
I hope it's a bluff/"madman strategy" type thing, but I don't know. The problem with that strategy when dealing with Iran is that they don't care. They don't care about their people, they don't care about keeping their word, they don't care about anything about their plan to eventually conquer the world even if that means there are two people left in it--one of them and one other person subject to him (and to the god they profess). I'm old enough that I've seen Iran break treaties, promises, and agreements; I've seen Iran attack and kill over and over; I've seen Iran fund terrorism and terrorists and entire terror regimes; I've seen Iran kill thousands of its own citizens. So I have no patience for anyone calling for dialogue and agreements, as if we haven't BEEN DOING JUST THAT for fifty years. That said, I don't know whether what we're doing now is a good idea or not. There are a lot of bad options, including making more treaties that no one expects to be followed and waiting for Iran to attack again. It also means Iran doing nothing and Trump doing exactly what he said.
My best guess is that Iran won't do what Trump says, and that if so, Trump won't bomb the country into the stone age but WILL bomb it a lot and say that's enough. But that's a guess.
It's always dangerous when dealing with religious zealots.They don't care too much about what happens on this planet. Only their pie in the sky.
A) They're not "religious zealots," they are pretty much a living example of how Islam has always been, and
B) People have slaughtered just as ruthlessly for the cause of communism and socialism -- in vastly larger numbers