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Iran has launched hypersonic missiles into the center of Tel Aviv.
This is shocking to me - I knew things were heating up in the Middle East, but now Iran is officially firing back at Israel. To be frank I was kind of not paying attention to the situation much until this happened, but seems like a major inflection point.
What are the implications of this for further war? For nuclear action in the area? Other countries getting invovled?
What are the implications for the U.S. election, and what do you think the U.S. will do in response?
How do we find a way towards peace now that Israel has been bombed in a civilian area?
EDIT: Almost goes without saying, but Iran has officially declared war on Israel.Tehran does not have the capabilities to launch a serious war against Israel. They wouldn't get an army to Baghdad, and their airforce would be lucky to get 50% of any attempted strike further than that as well.
Like their proxies Hamas and Hezbollah, their entire goal is to lose spectacularly and hope American and European leftists get extra mad at Israel for being competent at warfare.
Their strategy is simple. Israel has the non ultra orthodox population of Wisconsin and the area of El Salvador. It is a tiny country with abysmal natural resources that is deeply fractured. Israel needs to be kept in a permanent state of crisis as this will effectively make the country infeasible. Israel is going to be in a permanent state of chaos.
Europe has nothing to gain by Israel creating another refugee crisis. The support for Israel is low in Europe.
Isreal is a country of neurotic people with abysmal school results. They aren't competent at war, they are just exceptionally brutal while fighting people who barely have weapons.
I have no idea how you can analyze this conflict and not see immense Israeli competence. The pager attack, the elimination of all Hezbollah's top leaders, the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, these are all impressive results.
IMO, Israel has by far the most competent military and secret service of any country. The United States? We can't even successfully fight the Houthis in the Red Sea. China? They haven't fought a war in decades and were last seen brawling against India with melee weapons. Russia? Don't make me laugh. Europe? Competent fighters but hamstrung by effete leadership.
This is just... bizarre. This isn't a math test, this is war.
I mean just yesterday former Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad claimed that the head of Iranian counterintelligence was found in 2021 to be a Mossad double agent (alongside about 20 others in the unit). The head of counterintelligence! Pardon my swearing, but the one guy whose job it was to find spies was a fucking spy himself! Assuming it's true, and I don't see why it wouldn't be as it's massively shameful for Iranians to admit it, it's an absurd level of superiority and dominance Israel is showing. Israeli intelligence is so ahead of them that Iranians were unable to meaningfully vet that ONE guy at the top of the pyramid.
US had something similar happen two decades ago: Ana Montes, the senior analyst at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) responsible for Cuba (nicknamed "Queen of Cuba") turned out to spy for Cuba throughout her entire career at the DIA.
This situation isn't as ironic as it sounds. Cuba recruited Montes back when she was a college student, and persuaded her to go into the career that would be of most benefit. I am sure there were others, but this one happened to be the one that succeeded.
I'd bet the success rate is higher than you think, because the Cubans can feed her accurate or seemingly accurate Scoops about Cuba.
An intelligence analyst isn't that different from a beat reporter. They're examining a pile of information from different sources and trying to write a report guessing at the truth.
So much like a Yankees blogger secretly handpicked by Brian Cashman could quickly rise to the top by "correctly" predicting roster moves, a Cuban intelligence analyst working for Cuba can repeatedly guess meaningless facts correctly, showing brilliance in intuitions from limited data because she already knows the answers.
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