Shakes
4d ago
I think the US took more than it gave before Trump but I think you're also basically right.
This is one of those things where, I think, a lot of the emotion and anger is really just for the cameras. That is to say, I know that a lot of Canadians are angry, and I know that a lot of Canadian politicians also claim to be angry, and I know that Trump certainly sounds angry, but I suspect that behind closed doors Trump and the Canadians probably are just doing business.
Shakes
4d ago
The Israelis provide bad intelligence, it was the Israelis producing imaginary armies of Kurds for this most recent Iran shambles.
The idea that America went to war with Iran because of Israeli intelligence about the Kurds strikes me as very bizarre.
They've been demanding Iran be bombed for 20-30 years now because of nukes that nobody's ever seen.
Why does Iran keep building secret nuclear sites under mountains where inspectors aren't allowed to go?
how much harm does it do to the US non-proliferation agenda for Israel to be sitting there while America warns Iran must never be allowed to have nuclear weapons?
How much harm does it do?
What has Canada ever done to America that would motivate harsh rhetoric and trade wars? Canada might be incompetent and weak but is that such a great crime?
Canada imposes tariffs and other barriers on American goods, often in violation of our agreements. Trump retaliated. I really don't think it's deeper than that.
Shakes
4d ago
I also ultimately have a lot of apathy and also sympathy for both sides. I've known some Israeli Jews, I think it's good for them to build a first-world state, although their friendship has never filled my heart to the brim. I've known some Palestinian Muslims, I've always found them warm people, I feel bad to see them pushed out and squeezed, but I also don't see any real compatibility between our nation and theirs. I've even known some Palestinian Christians, I've seen how they've been abused by the Israelis and abused by the Palestinians, although they're too small and impractical for me to try to have some contrarian third way take.
My sneaking suspicion is that a big part of the problem is the idea of the two-state solution. At this point, Israel is at least three states: Israel, The Gaza Strip, and the West Bank. The West Bank and Gaza are not meaningfully the same entity at all, even if they share the same struggle. It seems like every prospective peace is thwarted by the disunity of the Palestinian two sides, even if it's not always the determining factor. I suspect it would be a lot easier to actually work out a peace deal if Gaza was treated as a separate state, or worse, actually wiped off the map. That's another thing, this whole thing would have wrapped up by now if either Israel or Palestine were allowed to wipe each other off the map. But both sides are backed by larger powers plus "The International Community" trying specifically to avoid a final solution. So there aren't any. I wonder if we've saved suffering this way or if after 80 years of intractable conflict the interest was greater than the principle.
Also, a large part of the conflict is exacerbated by the emotions of people who aren't actually involved but identify strongly with one side or the other, like spectators at a particularly grisly sports game. There is a lot of proxy struggle from people who use Israel-Palestine to subsume their more complicated feelings about Western Civilization as such.
Shakes
5d ago
I agree with your optimism and I think people are taking this a little too critically. I know that AOC is saying this cynically, that there is a lot of work to do, that "Woke 1.0" is dormant but not dead, etc. But this is also what winning looks like. And I don't think the fact that we have to keep fighting is evidence that we aren't winning.
Shakes
5d ago
Of all the criticism directed at Trump from anywhere, I was sure that this has the strongest legs to stand on and will also have severe consequences down the line.
I always thought this argument deserved a longer take-down because it was so common and so-often taken for granted. (I remember having this argument on The Motte, in fact.)
I think though, after ten years of Trump, we've seen how the fight goes and time makes more converts than reason. Personally I think we gained a lot more than we lost by fighting even if this radicalized many in opposition.
Shakes
6d ago
I'm kinda with the feminists on this one: why don't they deserve a turn at being catered to for a while?
Feminists don't want to be "catered to", they want to be the only segment whose preferences are considered. That's what the logic of "catering to" entails: book publishing is a zero-sum game so anything that isn't for me is against me.
We used to have quite a robust literature that both men and women enjoyed reading before this logic about representation took hold. The feminist-SJW logic that women were oppressed by the lack of feminist-SJW literature was always ahistorical and self-interested. It was ridiculous logic in its own time. So now we've created a scarce resource out of what used to be a free market. Fair play if the boys see "GIRLS RULE BOYS DROOL" lit and want their turn.
Shakes
6d ago
Chinese-language bookshop opened up near me right next to the regular bookstore. I thought the comparison was very interesting. The normal bookstore, which I generally like, is full of new modern semi-woke histories, romance novels, pop-sci, ghostwritten memoirs, etc. The Chinese bookstore was full of translated classics, Monte Cristo, Shakespeare, histories like Robert Caro and William Cronon, Samuel Huntington, Dostoevsky, etc. etc. I would say that the Chinese bookstore was much more "serious" and contained more books I feel like I'm "supposed" to read, more books that are going to sit on my shelf. The liberal bookstore is full of books that are going to go in the little free library up the street when I'm done with them.
Also, I confess, I have a sloppy love for trashy lowbrow Romance novels, I've been reading them for years, and there was a big turnover a few years ago in what's getting printed. There's a lot more gay stuff now. It got to the point where browsing the "Young Adult" section reliably turned up facially-normal books that were really about or contained gay romances. That seems to be all liberal women go for now, they only have a taste for stories about outcasts coming-to-terms with their true selves. This stuff used to be contained in its own ghetto but is now a major feeder pipeline for more serious stories. The pipeline took a few years to fully develop, but I think we're starting to see much more of this stuff in mainstream TV shows and movies now.
Shakes
7d ago
Normally Iranian media wouldn't be particularly trustworthy but in this case Occam's Razor suggests that the Emiratis wouldn't just fly a cargo plane to Tehran in the middle of a war for sport.
Occam's Razor suggests that a random picture of a plane flying over Tehran is not evidence of anything because it could be anything.
If the question is "what are the Iranians demanding?" then the actual absurdity is trusting serial liar Trump over the Iranians themselves.
Iran is a third-world country bloviating about how they demand to be taken seriously. You are taking their ridiculous demands to toll the strait as proof that they can toll the strait.
Six months ago, war critics said that Iran was going to toll the straits. This has not happened. This has not happened so thoroughly that we are reduced to debating third-world Iranian newspapers posting pictures of planes in the sky as proof that the world respects them and takes them seriously.
Shakes
7d ago
Why is anyone talking about Iran getting 7% tolls, or splitting profits with Oman, or charging 1-2 million per ship?
Because Iran is a third-world country blustering and bloviating as they are being defeated, and a lot of panicans and Europeans are choosing to take that seriously. Really: You are asserting that Iran's ludicrous claims to toll the strait are evidence that Iran can toll the strait, and that I have to explain this somehow. I don't pay it any attention at all. I take it as seriously as the Navy Seal with 300 confirmed kills threatening to wipe me out.
They know that if they tried to secure the straits in actual fact,
This is what the American military is currently doing. American ships and personnel are under constant threat. You have invented some new requirement that American ships have to go where you, an amateur, with no skin in the game, with no military intelligence -- that American ships have to go where you believe they should go, or else they're chicken. In point of fact you have no idea where American ships are actually stationed at any particular moment.
But we do know for a fact that American ships have physically escorted merchant ships through the straits, so we can at least conclude with certainty that you are wrong.
Shakes
7d ago
The entire global supply chain is held up by the implicit promise that America will escort merchant vessels. Iran is now threatening neutral vessels, so America is escorting them.
Shakes
7d ago
They take hostages only to return them.
Yeah that's how taking hostages works
Bomb army bases during wartime
Correct
attack neutral shipping as a last ditch defense deterrent
(!)
fund militia groups region wide as a response to decades of proxy wars and terror campaigns being waged against them
You're not arguing that Iran is not America's enemy. You're arguing that Iran is correct to be America's enemy.
It simply sounds like you hate America and want it to fail, but you don't want to come out in favor of bombing and kidnapping Americans.
Shakes
8d ago
-
America has been escorting ships through the strait.
-
America is constantly operating within range of Iranian missiles
You seem to be advancing a weird sadomasochistic view of war where America not going out of its way to increase risk means it must be running scared.
The fact that Iran can’t kill American soldiers and can only hit empty bases is a good sign that they lost.
Shakes
8d ago
I don't think the Civil War or WWII required any explaining.
The Election of 1864 was about whether it was impossible to defeat the South and the Union had to negotiate peace. The party that believed this won 45% of the vote. The war did not even last another six months!
Shakes
8d ago
No, the original source is Reuters. This is just weakmanning.
You claimed that UAE “literally flew a cargo plane loaded with billions of dollars in cold hard cash to Tehran”. None of that comes from Reuters (your Tabnak link doesn’t even link back to Reuters). The only Reuters reporting I have found (discussed on a different thread here) does not allege this either. They allege that the UAE had released to Iran $3 Billion of its own funds, I.e. toggling permission.
“Weakmanning”? You claim that UAE is so desperate that they sent a plane loaded with cash. Gulf states are loading planes with pallets of cash to pay Iran off. This is central to how you phrased your own argument. This comes entirely from Tabnak. It is not credible at all.
You are regurgitating Iranian propaganda. Absurd
Iran is demanding a toll on the Strait, literally the one thing you said Trump would never allow
See what I mean?
Shakes
8d ago
If America is winning a war that is of no benefit to anyone but zionists then I don't fully subscribe to the notion that 'America' is winning given the nature of the conflict.
Yeah if you make up novel definitions no one else shares you can try to claim to win the argument a priori.
Iran is one of America’s greatest geopolitical enemies and has been for decades. They take Americans hostage, bomb American bases, attack neutral ships and fund terrorist networks throughout the Middle East.
Shakes
8d ago
There is no trade in the Gulf! Nothing is crossing Hormuz. You even admit this with 'announcing another deal to reopen the strait' but ignore the fact that reopening the strait is only happening on Iran's terms since they control it
US was escorting oil tankers through the straits even before the MOU and its subsequent collapse. Iran is not capable of exercising control over the Strait. All they can do is threaten to bomb and drone neutral merchant ships (and despite all their rhetoric they have done precious little of this).
Meanwhile, the US has Iran under blockade. It’s Iranian ports that are empty. America has the mouth of the Gulf bottled up — so what does it mean when ships are still transiting the gulf? It means that America is allowing traffic through.
Iran will never control the Strait and will certainly never be allowed to toll the Strait. Declarations of the opposite should be viewed with the same credulity we give Baghdad Bob announcing that Saddam will push the Americans back any day now.
At the small cost of the bulk of remaining US missile interceptors that'll take years to replace?
I’ve been over this before in this thread but this is fake news. The two missile types running low are stockpiles of an old interceptor from the 90s, and test units of a new prototype being used on the battlefield.
I guarantee that America will continue to deploy interceptors as needed in Iran and across the world. As this happens you should consider how it is you came to believe fake news.
But America can't do this. They haven't done it! Why is that? Because American soldiers are whimpering sissy girlymen too afraid to get into a fight with this almost totally defeated enemy? Because Trump's a massive cowardly loser desperately afraid? Or because a sober assessment of risks and gains says 'they'd try, die and fail' so Trump and the military don't try that? I personally believe the latter.
I’m afraid this reads more like cuck porn than an argument.
Your belief is that the American military can win any time it wants to, but simply chooses not to? Or that America knows deep down it would lose so that’s why it doesn’t even try? That’s not even remotely close to anything happening in the real world, that is an emotional reaction being projected onto world events.
In reality, Iran is weaker than ever, facing economic crisis, cannot control traffic through the Straits, cannot stop trade from rerouting around the Straits, cannot meaningfully damage the American military, cannot break the American blockade. Oil is barely more expensive than when the conflict started, contrary to all predictions that Iran would have the global economy by the throat and would bring oil to $200 a barrel. America, meanwhile, is totally unphazed.
Shakes
9d ago
We can bomb things, we can't bomb everything.
Why not? We can bomb whatever we want.
Shakes
9d ago
Wars where the losing party refused to surrender long past the point of inevitable defeat:
- Paraguay in the War of the Triple Alliance
- Nazi Germany 1944-1945
- Jewish resistance after the fall of the Second Temple
- Siege of Nanking 1864 Taiping Rebellion
Wars where the winning party (or parts thereof) thought they were losing, or going to face much greater resistance than they in fact did:
- Israel before the Six Days War
- Gulf War 1991
- US after Gettysburg
- Battle of Jutland
It is really not that hard for the losing party to be delusional or the winning party to be dismayed.
Here, the US has total air naval and space superiority, Iranian strength is diminishing, Iran’s economy is collapsing, America’s is almost unaffected, Iran suffers catastrophic military losses, America suffers almost none at all, trade through the Straits is picking up and Iran is becoming weaker and weaker at stopping it. And yet a large part of the commentariat is not just skeptical but actively reversing cause and effect or reading unvarnished Iranian propaganda. Not to put too fine a point on this but: it’s really not hard to imagine a lot of people believing something that is demonstrably false.
Shakes
9d ago
>America lost
>America’s leverage is growing
>This is bad news for everyone but America
What are we doing here what is the argument.
But since they were not a threat to anyone before the war outside of zionist expansion plans
You can just say America is winning and you wish they lost because you’re on Iran’s side. That’s more respectable than whatever this is.
Shakes
9d ago
Yes, the fact that the MOU was adapted on the 14th means that this was happening in the period of negotiations leading up to the MOU.
Furthermore, Iranian drones targeting UAE ships is evidence against UAE paying a massive bribe.
“Four sources familiar with the matter” is like a bad parody of a source, because it could mean anything. But if we want to take it seriously: the story still doesn’t prove anything close to what you are suggesting.
Shakes
9d ago
How are you going to rely on Reuters to prove your argument if they themselves don’t have the proof? You said UAE paid a $10 Billion dollar bribe and now have to admit even Reuters doesn’t know that for sure.
The likeliest explanation is the one I supplied: this two-month-old story was part of the negotiations over the MOU, which means Iran never got that money back because the deal fell through. That would also explain why there’s no follow-up reporting anything close to what you alleged: it never happened.
I’m not the expert on their missile cities so I’m deferring to the Intel guys on this. How would we know? It would require a pretty serious understanding of how their tunnels work.
Please look into “Deep Sensing” technology, also called “Ground Penetrating Radar”. For example:
I think one difference that surfaces in these discussions over and over again is our different priors about military technology. My sense is that the public thinks of satellites like giant cameras in space, and so they ascribe to satellites all the limitations that cameras have. I believe this understanding is 30-50 years out of date.
I think a lot of people are interpreting the American military’s posture as empty bluster because they don’t realize how good the tech is. Thousands of satellites in space, a few dozen sites that need monitoring. Iran is not invisible to us.
Shakes
9d ago
This is an unfalsifiable position. “If your argument was right, it would convince me. But I won’t allow it to convince me, therefore it can’t be right.” It could simply be the case that a large number of people refuse to admit that Iran has lost, which is actually very common in the history of war.
I wouldn’t trust Israel uncritically and I think they understand well when their interests differ from ours. But I saw the same story and I don’t see why I should trust that either. It’s much more likely that someone at CIA has an axe to grind with Israel, or that someone in the media wants to boost something anti-Israel, or someone is exaggerating something because it sounds like a good story. I think it’s extremely implausible we know what he actual story is.
More options
Context Copy link