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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   36623 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 9, 2025

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I recently got into an argument regarding Israel vs Iran with a staunch "America First Isolationism Now" type. It cemented my views on the issue, not from an "Israel is righteous and Iran is not" angle but a practical weighing of the facts. The other party's opinion was "I don't want another war, and that region is bloodthirsty anyway. Let them sort it out." My thesis is simply: I cannot understand anyone who has Western or even strictly American interests in mind could think that the strikes on Iran are none of our business.

Mind you, I don't mean "United States Government" interests. I mean the interests of every single living American.

To recap the history: The current Iranian regime rose from a revolution overthrowing a US-backed monarchy, which we had previously supported economically and supplied with military technology (The F-4 and F-14 being the big examples you can still see today). Said regime hates the US with a burning passion, both for backing the monarchy and for getting in the way of a regional Islamic revolution in the entire region. This is why they back the Houthis, Hezbollah, Hamas, and insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Hamas and Hezbollah are strictly against Israel, but the Houthis were explicitly anti-American and attempted to strike us, luckily with no loss of life (RIP drones). I can't say the same for the militias in Iraq, which successfully killed several US service members in 2023. Nowadays that's mostly directed at Israel, but I cannot imagine these groups and their funders suddenly had a change in heart towards Americans themselves.

Even putting that all aside, even when you think the whole region is a backwater shithole that can sort itself out, a hands-off position on Iran makes no sense when they're developing nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons are a complete game changer, making your nation functionally immune to any threat to its sovereignty. It was bad enough when North Korea developed them, but I can at least understand the hesitancy there due to its Chinese backing and already-existing existential threat to South Korea (thousands of artillery pieces would reduce Seoul to rubble regardless of NK's nuclear program). More than that, North Korea is an extremely poor country which has continuously struggled to develop a missile program. I don't think that it's outside the realm of possibility that they do, but again, at least there's some reason as to why we all sat around on it.

This is not true of Iran. Iran has ties with Russia and China, but they've never made so bold a defense pact as China did with North Korea. They are geographically separated from their backers as well. This makes them assailable. However, they are not geographically separated from the west. Iran already has MRBMs that could be converted to take a nuclear payload right now. Those threaten our bases and our allies. They have a functional space program, and if you have put a satellite in orbit you can build an ICBM. Those threaten the continental US. Iran has demonstrated that it has the intent to strike the west and US if it can. They are working on the capability, and once that's done, an active nuclear arsenal presents them the opportunity at any time. They will be incapable of being invaded lest you risk nuclear hellfire for the region, at absolute best. The only time you can strike them is now, before their nuclear program yields results.

I was genuinely shocked when I saw the posts from Rubio and the like denying our involvement in the Israeli strikes and implying that they were unwarranted aggression. Personally, it makes me understand why some people think Israel is simply America's attack dog, doing the dirty work we don't want to be involved in directly. Perhaps it is will be a fortuitous outcome for us simply because Israel would be in even more danger, and felt they had to attack no matter what. I wouldn't mind Iran buckling without a single American life lost.

I mentioned this in another post long ago, but it seems to me that echoes of the bygone neolib/neocon 90s and early 2000s world order have been crystallized in a really stupid way. An aversion to quagmires and wars of questionable outcome seems to make a lot of people (including Rubio - a bad indicator of the administration's position) think that any American intervention is some kind of ill fated, possibly bloodthirsty action. In the opinion of the person that spawned this post, it would be a war to continue some kind of dominion in the Middle East, which would hurt individual Americans to benefit the rich and powerful. While I don't think the US can magically fix countries in the area (see: Iraq), there is a middle zone between "Try to prop up an unwanted regime after removing the previous one" and "do nothing". Applying Iraq's sample size of one reeks of an embarrassing application of prior results to me.

At the end of the day, I can say that Israel's righteousness in this matter does not have a bit of sway as to whether or not I think these strikes are justified (or whether or not American involvement is a good thing). I do not want another nuclear power in the world, especially one so blatantly aggressive toward the West. I will admit that the odds of them cementing their own destruction via a nuclear strike against another nuclear power is low, but I worry about the insurgents they fund or political instability within leading to a device going "missing". That these are even possibilities makes my skin crawl. I find it ignorant and borderline cowardly that there are so many purportedly in favor of American interests who can plug their ears and say "let it sort itself out".

As an aside, to illustrate where I'm coming from: In political terms I am completely disinterested in the outcomes of the world apart from America. Not that I consider them lesser, or that any disasters anywhere else are unimportant; but I still must practically value my home, my life, and those of my loved ones first. As such, I strongly empathize with the "America First" sentiment. What I don't empathize with is the completely unrealistic expectation that we can simply close our borders, give people the middle finger, and not wake up to a vastly worse world for us in twenty years. The world is connected, and a collapse in one place will have follow on effects in others. See: Syria, Haiti, Somalia. You'd have to be crazy to think that every administration in every coming year would be able to or even want to hold the borders that tight and move all manufacturing to be domestic (the only way to be truly isolationist in my eyes). That's just a pipe dream. Thus America taking its hands of the reins would not be truly isolationist, and the soft power we'd be subjected to by countries filling in the void we leave would affect us at home. We already have adversaries fanning the flames of social unrest in the country (and useful idiots that play into their hands), and that's bad enough. A United States is impossible to invade. A broken one is anything but. So global affairs are our business, and if America can project its power to mitigate much worse threats downstream then I am on board with that.

This doesn't mean I blindly want a war, or to bomb every single potential threat all the time everywhere. But nuclear weapons make this entirely a different question.

Counterpoint: The US already has nuclear adversaries. If the threat of nuclear retaliation works to deter Putin (who owns the world's largest nuke stockpile), it should also suffice to deter Iran. They might be religious nutjobs, but not total religious nutjobs, like Hamas. They will not consider the glassing of all their population centers as a price worth paying to nuke New York.

Nukes work great to prevent you from being invaded or bombed, but they are not the win button for any conflict. Putin has a ton of nukes, and yet this only meant that NATO would not join the fight directly (which, to be sure, is a big deal). He did not try to nuke cities until Ukraine surrenders.

Iran has had a nuclear weapons program since 1989. In 2015, the JCPA was negotiated between Iran and the Obama administration as well as China, Russia and Europe. It limited to the amount of nuclear material Iran was allowed to produce in exchange for sanction relief. While Israel (itself a noted expert on nuclear proliferation, I might add) claimed non-compliance, the IAEA claimed compliance in 2018, when Trump decided to quit the JCPA (possibly because it was an Obama deal) and impose sanctions on Iran. Since then, the gas centrifuges have been running.

Bombing the facilities and murdering their scientists can slow their program, but is unlikely to stop it. Sure, you kick the can down the road for another year, but you also normalize bombing sovereign countries, which is likely not a good lesson to teach a soon to be nuclear power.

If you do not want Iran to have nukes, then you need an invasion and regime change. I would like to point out that about the only one to benefit from recent US-led invasions in the Muslim world was the military industrial complex. The conquest of the Taliban was undone in a heartbeat as soon as the US withdrew, and the US invasion of Iraq prepared the ground for daesh. I for one would prefer not to find out what kind of religious crazies a US-led nation building project in Iran would inevitably give rise to.

I do not contest that Iran is very anti-Israel. Basically any group which prides itself on murdering Jews is supported by them. As someone who thinks Israel has a right to exist (though no right to the West Banks), I do not like this one bit. But at the end of the day, this is Israel's problem, not the problem of the US. Israel certainly has the ability to nuke Tehran, which should hopefully stop Iran from nuking Tel Aviv.

I am also not a fan of the current Israeli government, which basically encourages illegal settlements in the West Bank because they do not feel any pressure not to maximally piss off the Arabs, as they can be sure that the US will have their back if any large backslash happens. Them getting into a cold war with Iran might not be the worst thing in the world, there.

For what it is worth, compared to Sunni countries, Iran has not shown a lot of inclination to commit terrorist acts outside the Middle East. Bin Laden was famously a Saudi national with Saudi funding. Al-Qaeda and Daesh were Sunni extremist projects. This would bode well for the larger world in face of a nuclear Iran.

Them getting into a cold war with Iran might not be the worst thing in the world, there.

I don't deny this, but it's nonetheless an insane risk that risks global consequences. If you presented me a button of "these countries may nuke each other but you can guarantee it will never affect the world outside the middle east", I'd probably press it. But such an eventuality is no more a guarantee than some zealot in Tehran sees the Israeli missiles on the way and goes "fuck it, I'll take Europe/America out with me".

The conquest of the Taliban was undone in a heartbeat as soon as the US withdrew, and the US invasion of Iraq prepared the ground for daesh.

I mention this in another post but I think the prolonged nation-building stuff doesn't work if you don't a. rout the actual supporters (which would include a lot of collateral damage and questionable arrests where Afghanistan was concerned) and b. Don't work with the surviving establishment to make something new. In Iraq, this would have meant letting at least some Ba'ath party members be involved in the reorganization of the party, rather than completely ousting them and making them and all their supporters de facto enemies (hence the insurgency) while propping up a bunch of previously uninvolved Sunnis (hence ISIS). In Afghanistan, this likely never would have worked, because the only existing mass establishment they had was the Taliban. There were no mid level bureaucrats who were going "I'm just in the Taliban to do city planning", the Taliban was it. You can't replace them with tribal, sometimes boy raping farmers, and declare victory.

Point being, as I said in another post, you can just gut a country's military and leave, a la Gulf War 1. There's a reason we had an even easier time rolling over their conventional army in Gulf War 2, which is that they were never able to recover to the level they were at pre-Gulf War 1. I would be fine with the same thing happening to Iran.

I mean, the reason that deterrence works on Putin is that he’s at least semi-rational. He doesn’t want to have millions of dead Russians as a result. The concepts of Jihad and martyrdom of killing and dying in the name of Islam giving you a ticket to paradise— these negate the deterrent effect of “don’t try it, you and 3/4ths of your people will die.” Add in that there are statements in the Hadith that claim the end of days is marked by a great slaughter of Jews, and it’s not hard to imagine that they’d be willing to use it.

I mean, the reason that deterrence works on Putin is that he’s at least semi-rational. He doesn’t want to have millions of dead Russians as a result. The concepts of Jihad and martyrdom of killing and dying in the name of Islam giving you a ticket to paradise— these negate the deterrent effect of “don’t try it, you and 3/4ths of your people will die.”

I question whether one can in fact rise to control of a nation-state without becoming sufficiently cynical/realist that "don't try it, you and 3/4ths of your people will die" still works. We had a whole lot of evidence that the Japanese were insanely fanatical, but in the end they were, in fact, actually sane humans. Jihadism has demonstrated that it is willing to eat notable costs, but they still have to recruit their suicide bombers very carefully from a quite-limited pool.

It is not clear to me that Jihadism is actually more insane than Communism, and MAD worked on Communism.

...

a revolution overthrowing a US-backed monarchy,

That is certainly one way to put it.

The gist of the matter is that in 1941, Iran was a constitutional monarchy with an elected parliament (not a very well working one, though). Then in 1951 their prime minister voted to nationalize British oil interests, so the US and the Brits backed a military coup in 1953, after which the shah regime became your typical tinpot dictatorship. Then in 1979, the ayatollah overthrew the shah with a lot of popular support, and Iran has been a theocracy ever since.

In other news, it is a complete mystery why Iran hates the US, when their goal is to bring democracy and economic freedom to the world.

ayatollah overthrew the shah

Though the Iranian regime (and neocons) prefer this narrative, communists (and fellow travelers) and friends overthrew the Shah, then islamists stabbed them in the back (cf. the Bolsheviks). The Shah had thousands of communists in his prisons, not islamists. Khomeini was only invited back to Iran, after the Shah lost power, by the new civilian-military government. It took them a few years (until 1982) to definitively wrestle control, executing most of the military leadership and various leftists. Worse yet, the US helped Khomeini enter. Two examples: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Mojahedin_Organization_of_Iran#1979_Iranian_Revolution_and_subsequent_power_struggles and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tudeh_Party_of_Iran#Islamic_Republic

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left-wing_guerrilla_groups_of_Iran

Tangentially, Mossadegh also backstabbed the communists:

Next the royalist officers moved to overthrow Mossadeq. On August 16, three days after the shah left for the Caspian to take a “rest cure,” Colonel Nasiri of the Imperial Guards arrived at the premier’s doorstep with a royal decree replacing Mossadeq with Zahedi as premier. The attempt, however, was a complete fiasco, for the pro-Mossadeq chief of the army, tipped off by the Tudeh military network, surrounded Nasiri and his Imperial Guards as they approached the premier’s residence. The following day the shah fled to Bagdad, the and the Tudeh crowds poured into the streets, destroying royalist statues. In some provincial towns, such as Rasht and Enzeli, the Tudeh took over the municipal buildings. The next morning, Mossadeq, after a fateful interview with the American ambassador, who promised aid if law and order was reestablished, instructed the army to clear the streets of all demonstrators. Ironically, Mossadeq was trying to use the military, his past enemy, to crush the crowd, his main bulwark. Not surprisingly, the military used this opportunity to strike against Mossadeq. On August 19, while the Tudeh was taken aback by Mossadeq’s blow against them, Zahedi, commanding thirty-five Sherman tanks, surrounded the premier’s residence, and after a nine-hour battle captured Mossadeq. Acoustical effects for the event were provided both by Sha'yban “the Brainless,” who led a noisy demonstration from the red-light district to the bazaar, and by the gendarmerie, who transported some eight hundred farm hands from the royal stables in Veramin to central Tehran. - Iran Between Two Revolutions - Ervand Abrahamian

We have a strong interest in Iran.

We don't want another regime change fiasco with another migrant crisis to Europe. The neocon wars have been a disaster for Europe, they have been a disaster for the christians in the middle east and they have destroyed the region. We have a stake in this war, Iran is defending Europe and we should be greatful for that.

The idea that we should keep bombing the middle east because they hate us because we bomb them is silly logic. The US has good relations with Vietnam because the US hasn't bombed them for decades. If the policy was to have an eternal conflict with Vietnam it wouldn't have benefited either party. Pull out of there and focus on trying to mend the relations after decades of horrific wars and crimes committed against the people there.

China is the biggest trading partner in the middle east. They have achieved a significant economic presence without wasting trillions bombing weddings, running torture camps and backing jihadists. If anything the US is doing an excellent job pushing countries toward China as they seek a patron that isn't bombing them.

The idea that we should keep bombing the middle east because they hate us because we bomb them is silly logic.

I would agree. Who besides you is using this logic?

Mass third world immigration. When the US invaded Iraq and opened the flood gates to Europe with migrants Iran helped the Iraqis defend themselves. Iran played a key roll in defeating ISIS. These two wars have been immensely helpful for Europe.

A guess: Sunnism?

Iran has demonstrated that it has the intent to strike the west and US if it can. They are working on the capability, and once that's done, an active nuclear arsenal presents them the opportunity at any time.

The West? What Western country has Iran struck? France? Germany? Japan? Canada? They could bring out a bunch of drones from a shipping container and cause mayhem in any major city if they wanted.

Iran only strikes Israel and US bases right on its borders, with the US launching strikes on Iran and generally acting in a hostile fashion (sanctions, cyberattacks, proxy wars, assassinations, open threats to invade). The Houthis attacked a bunch of shipping as part of a campaign against Israel.

Iran is an American foe. But it doesn't necessarily have to be this way. It could be less of a US foe, like Venezuela for instance. Or it could be a friend. The US's biggest victory in the Cold War was swaying Maoist China away from the Soviet Union. Maoist China had actively fought and killed thousands, maybe tens of thousands of US troops in a major war. Total ideological incompatibility. They hated America and were super, duper crazy. Iran is much less of a foe than China was in the 1960s. Yet the US was able to work constructively with China and shift 1/3 or so of the Red Army into the far east, facing their former ally. Suddenly the US stopped needing to fight wars in East Asia! Diplomacy is really powerful!

There were opportunities to reopen relations with Iran during the 1990s but the US pursued an unhelpful strategy of 'dual containment' of both Iran and Iraq since neither were friendly towards Israel. Obama tried to improve relations with Iran but Trump then nixed this initiative.

Now the US is involved in yet another Middle East conflict. This is strategically foolish - China and Iran were the biggest winner of the Iraq War. China got much of the liberated oilfields and the US navy defending their shipping lanes for free! Iran got most of the country of Iraq. Terraforming the Middle East to be friendly towards Israel is extremely costly and dangerous and doesn't work. It should be much less of a priority than the primary theatre of conflict, with the great powers.

Iranian militias in Iraq wouldn't exist if the Iraqi government hadn't been demolished by America. No US troops would die if they weren't there. There's no need for them to be present, the damage is already done. Iraq has been pushed into Iran's sphere of influence (about 40% of the way to puppet state), at US/Coalition expense. It's time to take the L and depart.

China will be a winner of this war too. There is little they want to see more than US air defence stockpiles depleted by Iranian missiles, carrier groups redeployed from the Pacific to the Middle East. Russia is another winner if oil prices rise, though it's bad for China, probably evens out. There is no reason to face Russia, China and Iran at the same time when Iran could've been turned. Too late now but don't double down further on an error!

A better strategy would be to tell Israel to shut up about Iran and move on. Iran hasn't nuclearized in the last 30 years when the Israelis continuously shrieked it was going to happen in a few months or so. Barring a major shock like this attempted disarming strike, they're unlikely to nuclearize, there's a fatwa against it. Iran didn't retaliate with chemical weapons after Iraq gassed 20,000 of them to death, a more than reasonable provocation! Putting more pressure on Iran is the exact way to get them to undo the fatwa and nuclearize.

More than that, North Korea is an extremely poor country which has continuously struggled to develop a missile program. I don't think that it's outside the realm of possibility that they do, but again, at least there's some reason as to why we all sat around on it.

They already have ICBMs that can hit the US. North Korea is another example of the danger of the 'I can't even spell diplomacy' trend in DC. Sanctions and threats don't result in compliant denuclearization (certainly not after going in on Iraq and Libya when they'd complied), they end up with tens of thousands of North Korean troops fighting on Russia's side in Ukraine.

Not an argument, but I have a hard time accepting that the "bomb iran" people are working in good faith from solid natsec principles-- because the majority of rabidly pro-israel partisans I've met are republican and therefore at least defacto ukraine-skeptic. Like, I can intellectually understand that there are honest to god neocons out there voting for Holden Bloodfeast whenever possible, and in principle I sympathize quite a lot with them. But they seem to occupy very, very little of the media environment I'm exposed to. Pairing that with my supreme lack of faith in the current administration, I have this kneejerk response that any ammunition we're throwing into the middle east is probably being wasted compared to the alternative option of putting it into Ukrainian stockpiles.

the majority of rabidly pro-israel partisans I've met are republican and therefore at least defacto ukraine-skeptic

To be fair, if you are trying to prevent nuclear proliferation than you should be skeptical of Ukraine. The longer the war drags on, the higher the odds of them procuring a nuclear weapon go. (How high or low those odds are I'm not sure, but I wouldn't rule the possibility out.)

In either case, the invasion period is exhibit A for getting nukes. We talked them into giving up nukes in the 1990s. We promised protection. They got invaded. And North Korea isn’t being invaded because of those nukes. I mean, if I’m on the outs with a superpower, my best hope of avoiding “liberation” is nuclear weapons. So no matter what happens between Israel and Iran, they aren’t going to stop trying.

As I've discussed before, the Ukrainian hold on the actual nukes seems to have been pretty tenuous at best (and the idea that the United States promised them protection in any meaningful sense is false) – but yes, I agree that the Big Lesson of Current Era is "have nukes."

And North Korea isn’t being invaded because of those nukes.

I sort of doubt this, honestly, there's little appetite for even the conventional damage North Korea could do.

Said regime hates the US with a burning passion, both for backing the monarchy and for getting in the way of a regional Islamic revolution in the entire region.

I feel like this is so emblematic of the blinders people have. Really, you think Iran hates the US for the Islamic revolution and not the US-Israeli "alliance" and its belligerence towards all Iran's regional neighbors- Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Lebanon, and so forth. Saying it's about the Islamic revolution just makes me wonder what planet you are living on. Israel has said it will only accept the "Libya model" of nuclear disarmament. The "Libya model" means: you give up your nuclear program, then we topple your regime. The notion Iran just has some irrational hatred towards the US is so ridiculous.

Personally, it makes me understand why some people think Israel is simply America's attack dog, doing the dirty work we don't want to be involved in directly.

Again- living in the land of pure fantasy. Israel got America to do the dirty work in Iraq and Afghanistan and Lebanon and Syria. How many troops did Israel deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan? Zero, despite the loss of thousands of American lives. And now it is plainly obvious that Israel initiated war with Iran with the intent and plan to force the United States to enter the war. They have already requested US assistance to enter the war and admitted they can't achieve their war objectives without the United States.

I agree with the thrust of your post in that I am not isolationist, I understand America as an Empire with imperial interests and obligations. But doing so leads to the obvious conclusion that Zionism is and has been immensely harmful to the imperial interests of the United States, and that toppling the regime in Iran is foremost a play for the interests of International Zionism and not the United States or Europe.

An aversion to quagmires and wars of questionable outcome seems to make a lot of people (...) think that any American intervention is some kind of ill fated, possibly bloodthirsty action.

"An aversion to quagmires" is probably my core objection, so I was curious how you're going to address it, and I can't say you offer much of a response. To begin with, the argument is not so much "any American intervention is some kind of ill fated, possibly bloodthirsty action", and more "don't listen to literally the same people who were in charge of the previous quagmires" and "please, I am begging you, give me the barest semblance of an indication that you learned anything at all from recent history". Specifically: what do you think made the previous interventions fail, why do you think everybody arguing for them missed the factors leading to their failure, why would this intervention fare any better, and why do you think you're not missing any factors the same way interventionists missed them recently. Bonus points if you answer: what consequences will you accept if it turns out you're wrong.

Notice also that I said "interventions" in plural. Iraq was not the only example of one, and you know it. Interventionists had free rein over the region for most of my adult life, they regime-changed like half a dozen countries, and they made a mess out of everything they touched. The fact that we've spent the last decade witch-hunting literal nobodies for crimethink like "men and women are different", but these people still get to be taken seriously, is a testament to how sick our societies are.

As an aside, to illustrate where I'm coming from: In political terms I am completely disinterested in the outcomes of the world apart from America.

What are the practical consequences of this? Would you give the throne to king Zahir Shah, instead of forcing him to renounce his claim to it, if most of his country accepted his reign? Would you cut Israel loose, if it brought the rest of the Middle East into the fold?

Said regime hates the US with a burning passion

Also an aside, but I find it hard to believe. Please don't flood me with official statements of said regime, because I don't consider them particularly meaningful. I may be typical minding, but from what I can tell politics inherently demands such levels of rat-fucking, backstabbing, and shifting allegiances, that anyone who holds reins over any country, of any significant size, being able to hold to a grudge in such a principled manner would be almost admirable.

Nuclear weapons are a complete game changer, making your nation functionally immune to any threat to its sovereignty.

Okay, so if that's true then why do you then say in the very next paragraph

Iran already has MRBMs that could be converted to take a nuclear payload right now. Those threaten our bases and our allies. They have a functional space program, and if you have put a satellite in orbit you can build an ICBM. Those threaten the continental US. Iran has demonstrated that it has the intent to strike the west and US if it can. They are working on the capability, and once that's done, an active nuclear arsenal presents them the opportunity at any time.

and then later

A United States is impossible to invade. A broken one is anything but.

?

It seems to me that obviously either nations with nuclear warheads can be threatened, in which case they can be deterred. Or they can't be, in which case the United States (and Israel) has nothing to worry about. But you seem to be trying to have it both ways!

Look, I actually would like to remove the Iranian regime, and I don't particularly want Iran to get nuclear weapons.

But there are (at least) three things that need to be considered. (Just going to ignore for the moment the legal problems with preemptively striking another nation, but suffice to say that as I understand it it's legally problematic, to the extent that international law means anything.)

FIRST, the United States does not have infinite capacity to do things. If we actually want to fight China, which we've said we want to be able to do publicly, that means very specifically that we cannot write blank checks where ballistic missile interceptors, smart munitions, etc. are involved. We are already arguably under-equipped to deal with the very real Chinese threat, which will likely be a more serious threat to American hegemony than anything that Iran can do. And part of the reason we are under-equipped to fight China is because we canceled procurement and research programs throughout the Global War on Terror to fund the Global War on Terror – effectively eating our own seed corn.

And the only reliable way to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon is regime change. (And even then...I wouldn't exactly consider it "reliable.") Which will either require local Iranian collaborators (in which case Israel is likely already better situated than the United States to procure them) or "someone" (the United States) to invade and pacify the country. (Or some third, arguably worse option, like creating a massive humanitarian crisis to cause the country to collapse entirely). So asking the United States to "make sure Iran doesn't get a nuclear weapon" is arguably a much more serious ask than our last Middle Eastern incursion, depending on how serious you are about it

SECONDLY, the United States declining to enter the fight may actually in some ways be good for Israel because it could force Iran to withhold a portion of its offensive weapons as a deterrent package. If the United States intervenes at a massive level to accomplish regime change, there's really no point in Iran not firing every last missile that it has. So the US standing out is forcing Iran to make choices about whether or not to empty out its war reserve. Since Israel appears to be successfully hunting Iranian ballistic missile on the ground, this hesitation likely makes the Iranian ballistic missile stockpile less effective (assuming a fixed capacity to destroy ballistic missiles on the ground, the Israelis will destroy a larger number of ballistic missiles on the ground over time if fewer numbers are ordered to launch any given salvo).

FINALLY, the strategic interest of the United States in the conflict lies, as you suggest, in removing Iranian nuclear capability. Trump hopes to do that via negotiation. Israel's actions may force Iran back to the negotiating table, in which case US involvement would be counterproductive (since it may drive Iran away from the negotiating table). Currently the good cop/bad cop (or, if you prefer, Great Satan/Little Satan) routine seems to be worth a shot.

If the good cop/bad cop routine fails, then – while it is in the interest of Israel to push for US involvement as early an often as possible in order to decrease the cost of the conflict on Israel – it is in the interest of the United States to make Israel bear as much of the burden as possible. (We've poured billions of dollars into their ballistic missile defense, it's not as if we are obliged to give them a carrier strike group, too!) If Israel conducts the war successfully, they may reduce the cost of a limited US intervention (destroying the buried nuclear facilities with bunker busters – although it's possible that some of them are buried even too deeply for oversized US ordinance!) to near-zero. While this by itself likely cannot terminate Iran's nuclear program – as they have built up nuclear capability once, we should presume they can do it a second time – it can likely scrap a lot of difficult and expense work and (presumably) set them back for a while. Kicking the can down the road, but sometimes that's all you can do – and it might be all that's necessary. The Iranian regime may not last forever.

Given the above, it seems to me that it would be unwise for the United States to do anything at this point besides let things play out. Diplomacy may still work. If Israel can actually do "everything except the MOP up" then, yeah, sending them a dozen MOPs [I think technically Israel could deliver them via C-130, which would be pretty funny] or whatever is probably a decent deal for the US. Shooting down a few Iranian ballistic missiles to test our capabilities is also probably smart. But what exactly is the US interest in intervening right now and potentially foreclosing a path to bringing Iran to the table?

Two caveats. Firstly, my thesis was not "the US should strike NOW", but that Israel succeeding here is undoubtedly very very good for us, and if they needed help to succeed, I'd want to do so. I say that as someone with skin in the game.

It seems to me that obviously either nations with nuclear warheads can be threatened, in which case they can be deterred. Or they can't be, in which case the United States (and Israel) has nothing to worry about. But you seem to be trying to have it both ways!

Secondly, allow me to rephrase: Nuclear weapons make you functionally immune to a conventional invasion and will make anyone think twice about even striking within your borders. At any point during a real conventional invasion you can consider (or declare) your existence threatened and use them to great effect, either wiping out entire armies or the invaders' home front. They do not make you immune to internal rot, discord, economic decline, or anything else, as the USSR will gladly tell you. That this is your opening argument is disheartening, because I find it quite intellectually dishonest to feign ignorance of that distinction.

As such, I don't worry about someone invading the United States. If decades of discord and hostile messaging (bolstered by adversaries who are quite happy to watch us tear ourselves apart without firing a single shot) leads to the United States to cease to exist as a political entity, then we would be quite susceptible to invasion, be it by a hostile force or something more covert. A "North American" continent with dozens of individual nation states that are likely at each others' throats would present a foreign actor many potential inroads into allying with, occupying, subverting, or otherwise controlling part of the landmass. As I live on that landmass, I'd like the huge boon that "two massive oceans and only two continental neighbors" to stay that way. We already have Chinese and other agents coming through our weak border to the south. Imagine that ten or a hundred fold. That is why we can be both a nuclear power and vulnerable.

Nuclear powers can also be defeated abroad, as in within other people's borders, without really having the right (in international eyes) to use the nuclear option. We have failed to achieve many military objectives, as has Russia, and neither have deployed nuclear weapons. But it also means no one can ever go to the source. As for Iran, yes, they have weapons that can reach us, but they are not yet nuclear capable. Once they are, you essentially waive all your chances to military deterrence. And from there stems the problem. A nuclear Iran can proxy war to their hearts' content. A nuclear Iran can threaten to retaliate to conventional Israeli strikes with nuclear weapons (whereas now only Israel can), leading both to consider a nuclear first strike necessary to preserve their existence/secure their victory, depending on perspective. A nuclear Iran can lock up within its borders when its armaments are exhausted and refill its stockpiles and have a credible threat against anyone trying to stop them. They go from being a regional power to a fact of life unless some sort of unconventional method deters them or causes their regime to collapse. Once again, see America. I am reasonably hopeful that we won't collapse in the near future, and I am also reasonably sure that a nuclear Iran would also last quite a while. Even if they didn't, those nukes would have to go somewhere once they collapse, and that's a huge security risk. All you need is one powerful higher up or base deciding they wanted to get massively rich, or being insanely anti-Israeli/American/whatever to sell or use them.

These were all real arguments up to the end of the Cold War, and they ring true now. Every single nation that develops its own nuclear weapons increases the risk of some sort of horrible outcome, be it an entrenched regime, accident, or sale to/use by crazies within or without the government. I don't want it to happen.

FIRST, the United States does not have infinite capacity to do things. If we actually want to fight China, which we've said we want to be able to do publicly, that means very specifically that we cannot write blank checks where ballistic missile interceptors, smart munitions, etc. are involved. We are already arguably under-equipped to deal with the very real Chinese threat, which will likely be a more serious threat to American hegemony than anything that Iran can do. And part of the reason we are under-equipped to fight China is because we canceled procurement and research programs throughout the Global War on Terror to fund the Global War on Terror – effectively eating our own seed corn.

I agree with this. I admittedly did not make this clear enough in my post, but I must say I am aware of the looming threat of China to American interests and I don't want to be bogged down in this. I really hope that Israel succeeds or Iran comes back to the negotiating table, as you said. However, there are two issues here. Firstly, Iran has been "at the negotiating table" several times, including with previous administrations, leading to billions of funds going into their pockets in return for them only pursuing civil nuclear reactors... which they then proceeded to ignore completely. Secondly, the inverse of your statement is true as well: Iran does not have infinite capacity to do things either. They have already used a huge amount of missiles in the current exchange, and their IADS seems to be in shambles. They may already be close to their limit as far as projecting power is concerned, and dealing with them now is a lot more appealing than waiting for an armistice where they are able to refill their reserves. If they actually nuclearize, or perhaps state their intent to use those weapons against the US, and we suddenly have to divert resources back to them to stop an imminent threat, it will be a lot costlier, and likely bloodier.

And the only reliable way to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon is regime change.

I don't know that this is true. There was a lot of fear about Iraq getting one, and after we utterly demolished their ability to make war in the first Gulf War, they were never a credible threat. That's why the "they're making WMDs" justification for Gulf War 2 is a persistent joke.

Second (another commenter posted in response to this but I'm going to put my reply here, as it's relevant and I've received a number of replies) I think the biggest issue with Gulf War 2 (other than doing it) was that we picked the worst middle ground imaginable. We banned every single Ba'ath party member from ever being in government, which is not even a thing we did with the Nazis or Japanese. This essentially left a fledgling government in the middle of a war zone filled with the unqualified, malcontents, and sometimes literal terrorists in power. That Iraq even exists after ISIS is kind of a miracle to me, not that they're somehow doing great. I think we should have either:

  1. Completely obliterated their military again, ousted their leaders that time, and left.
  2. Actually worked with the remaining government to allow for some kind of legitimate regime change.

Both of these things are something I would accept, at least on the home front. "Don't fuck with the US or they'll show up, kill all your leaders, and break all your stuff" is at least something we can credibly do multiple countries. We cannot get continuously bogged down in a 20 year nation building/peacekeeping quagmire.

SECONDLY

I somewhat responded to these points above, but I agree partially. I'll explain below.

If Israel conducts the war successfully, they may reduce the cost of a limited US intervention (destroying the buried nuclear facilities with bunker busters – although it's possible that some of them are buried even too deeply for oversized US ordinance!) to near-zero.

As I said above, I want this to happen. As with Ukraine, I like the idea of adversaries blunting themselves against our allies at zero cost to American lives and (relatively) low cost with materiel. As it is, if we're going to have to strike, I want to strike while the iron is hot and their munitions and defenses are depleted. If we're not going to take our hands off the steering wheel of the entire region and withdraw entirely (which I think is a bad idea outside the scope of this already long-winded discussion), then I want it done now when it's going to be the easiest for us to do.

The Iranian regime may not last forever.

I hope it doesn't. The average Iranian is not a lover of their regime, which is why we see regular protests despite the authoritarian nature of their government. While I've mentioned I prioritize American interests over others, I don't want a single life to be lost. But I have to be realistic and consider the fact that their nation will be able to do damage as long as they're in power, even more if they nuclearize.

Nuclear weapons make you functionally immune to a conventional invasion and will make anyone think twice about even striking within your borders.

They pretty obviously don't.

It's definitely true that nuclear weapons are very powerful and that having them ups the ante for an invader. But we've had a lot of experience recently concerning the limitations of being a nuclear-armed power and that's not reflected here. I agree with you about the issues with soft power but both in your original post and here you're using language that suggests that having nuclear weapons gives you some kind of immunity while Russia – the world's nuclear power – has been subjected to a conventional land invasion and have been struck within their borders innumerable times by Ukraine. Israel's nuclear weapons may have caused Iran to think twice, but it hasn't stopped them from repeatedly launching conventional ballistic missiles at Israel many, many times.

Once they are, you essentially waive all your chances to military deterrence.

Deterrence was invented to deal with the problem of other people's nuclear weapons. (This is an exaggeration, but it's very common to see the word "deterrence" preceded by the word "nuclear.")

I don't disagree with everything you say: yes, the US is vulnerable to internal unrest, as all countries may be, yes having nuclear weapons does allow you to use them to effectively defend yourself, thereby making it more likely that attackers will not attempt to militarily conquer you in your entirety but they're not magic.

I don't know that this is true. There was a lot of fear about Iraq getting one, and after we utterly demolished their ability to make war in the first Gulf War, they were never a credible threat.

Presumably if the Iranians can enrich uranium once, they can do it again. Israel killing every single nuclear scientist and obliterating every nuclear facility might set them back a generation, and that might be long enough for the problem to become moot. But generally speaking, if Iran can do it once, they can do it a second time.

I could be wrong about this, but my recollection was that Iraq was never nearly as far along the "make nuclear weapon" tech tree as Iran was, and their reactor (the one destroyed by Israel) was constructed and serviced by France. I don't think Iraq had nearly the in-house expertise Iran does (Israel's campaign against Iranian scientists notwithstanding).

Secondly, Iran has relatively good relations with North Korea and might simply be able to procure functional nuclear weapons from them (I have no idea what North Korea considers sane or not).

We cannot get continuously bogged down in a 20 year nation building/peacekeeping quagmire.

But that's what would be required if our goal is to prevent Iran from ever developing a nuclear weapon using military force alone. Quite possibly boots on the ground could be avoided, but it would require, presumably, an indefinite persistent air interdiction of any nuclear capabilities.

Or how else do you propose to once-and-for-all prevent them from rebuilding their nuclear capabilities? The other paths are 1. overwhelming humanitarian disaster (such as nuclear weapons) of such magnitude as to turn Iran into a political non-entity, 2. some sort of deal, or 3. installing or allowing to be installed a new regime.

I want it done now when it's going to be the easiest for us to do.

I think we're both on the same page here, but it won't be easiest for us to do it now, it will be easiest in probably one or two weeks or so.

You opened your original post saying that you were arguing in opposition to the "let the two parties sort it out" position, but it seems to me that you're happy to let Israel sort it out and your main concern is that they will be unable to "finish the job." What exactly do you think the US can do that Israel cannot?

It's true that the US has MOPs that may be able to penetrate some of the Iranian underground facilities. If they can't, we'd need to use nukes (which Israel already has). If Israel has airspace control over Iran, they can (I think) keep the bunkers closed indefinitely by bombing their entrances, so it's unclear that the US has a huge advantage over Israel in this regard. The main abilities the US brings to the table are

  • MOPs (which may or may not work, but can't guarantee that Iran won't just rebuild what has been destroyed)
  • A very large army (but you don't want ground occupation)
  • Hundreds of interceptors (but we don't want to use them, because China)
  • More air power of the sort Israel essentially already has (which seems relatively pointless right now if the Israeli air campaign is as effective as is currently believed, doesn't it?)

So what exactly do you think the United States should do?

Russia – the world's nuclear power – has been subjected to a conventional land invasion and have been struck within their borders innumerable times by Ukraine.

I mention in my reply that strikes within a border are different than a conventional land invasion. Secondly, said Ukrainian land invasion barely penetrated the Russian borders before they were expelled. It was also a retaliation in an active conflict - likely to pull Russian forces off the front line - which colors it differently than, say, an unprovoked mass invasion of Russia. Put differently: If Ukraine was magically and decisively winning this war, and pushed the Russians back to the border, I seriously doubt they'd get much further than there, out of a very founded fear that Russia would use nuclear weapons against them. Russia has said they would use nuclear weapons if their sovereignty was threatened. While this was a veiled threat along the lines of "Ukraine and the occupied portions of it are part of Russia, so don't you dare take them back", I don't doubt it would ring very true if Russia proper was legitimately under threat of losing territory.

You opened your original post saying that you were arguing in opposition to the "let the two parties sort it out" position, but it seems to me that you're happy to let Israel sort it out and your main concern is that they will be unable to "finish the job." What exactly do you think the US can do that Israel cannot?

A very large army (but you don't want ground occupation)

You can invade a country without a prolonged occupation. Once again, see the first Gulf War. We rolled over then-one-of-the-largest armies in the world in a month and then immediately pulled out. I mentioned I wouldn't be explicitly against killing their leaders and leaving, but thoroughly gutting the military and their nuclear stores/bunkers (very easy to do if you've conquered them and can walk right up!) and leaving the leadership humiliated would even be fine by me. It would leave a very credible threat in the Iranian government's mind that we could do it again, because we already did it when they had years to build up their defenses. I don't want to be involved in nation building because (this is a separate thesis of mine) modern militaries, at least the United States', seem to be incapable of totally subduing an enemy via mass bombardment (i.e. killing a shitload of civilians), or nation-building. I don't think the former is necessarily "what it would take", as I am against civilians dying, so blowing up all their major military and nuclear assets and making them toothless for a good long time would be as good a solution as any.

On this note, a large army would likely not be the primary thing we'd need to fight China if they up and decided a US invasion of Iran was the perfect time to strike. In the short term, it would be primarily a naval and air defense, with the biggest land target I can think of being Taiwan (who has their own army - and ideally we'd want to keep the Chinese marines from ever making a landing, making them secondary). I'm not saying an army couldn't or wouldn't become necessary in the long term, only that a land component would not necessarily be a huge limiting factor. A CSG? Maybe, but we do famously have many more than only one CSG. And as you mention below, Israeli air support may prove mostly sufficient in such a circumstance.

More air power of the sort Israel essentially already has (which seems relatively pointless right now if the Israeli air campaign is as effective as is currently believed, doesn't it?)

Obviously this is a developing situation. Since I made the original post, Iran has apparently come crawling back to the bargaining table since the Israeli air campaign so completely dominated them. I genuinely hope this puts a bow on the whole situation, and the US never needs to lift a finger to change this. As I said, I have skin in the game when it comes to American conflicts, and one less is fine by me.

You opened your original post saying that you were arguing in opposition to the "let the two parties sort it out" position

The attitude was "let the two parties sort it out regardless of the outcome". The second part is what I take issue with. I have no need for an American flag to be on the wikipedia page for this conflict, I just explicitly and powerfully do not want a nuclear Iran - or any new nuclear country that has even a chance in hell of using them.

very easy to do if you've conquered them and can walk right up

Taking a stroll on the moon is quite easy, if you've successfully travelled there by rocket. You just skipped the hard part.

Successfully invading Iran would be an insane clusterfuck, and would be the biggest Chinese strategic victory this side of the 1940s (followed shortly by a bigger one, conquering Taiwan).

I actually would have said it would be impossible to invade Iran period a week ago. but they've folded so hard I'll downgrade to "unbelievably expensive and profoundly wasteful".

Russia has said they would use nuclear weapons if their sovereignty was threatened. While this was a veiled threat along the lines of "Ukraine and the occupied portions of it are part of Russia, so don't you dare take them back", I don't doubt it would ring very true if Russia proper was legitimately under threat of losing territory.

Yes, I agree with you there.

We rolled over then-one-of-the-largest armies in the world in a month and then immediately pulled out.

The United States and its allies did enter Iraq, but it never got within 100 miles of Baghdad. If Iraq had had a credible WMD program, it would not have been sufficient to neutralize it.

On this note, a large army would likely not be the primary thing we'd need to fight China if they up and decided a US invasion of Iran was the perfect time to strike. In the short term, it would be primarily a naval and air defense, with the biggest land target I can think of being Taiwan (who has their own army - and ideally we'd want to keep the Chinese marines from ever making a landing, making them secondary).

Yes, correct. But the US doctrine is to fight with air support, meaning that US munitions stockpiles would be degraded in an invasion of Iran (as would US missile interceptors given Iran's large stockpile of ballistic missiles). Obviously a sufficiently thorough destruction of the Iranian military by Israel makes that moot, but that hasn't happened yet.

I genuinely hope this puts a bow on the whole situation, and the US never needs to lift a finger to change this.

SAME.

I just explicitly and powerfully do not want a nuclear Iran - or any new nuclear country that has even a chance in hell of using them.

Sovereign states have the right to develop nuclear weapons, if they so choose, and invading them for doing so would be a violation of international law. Many of the next countries to develop nuclear weapons will likely be US allies (Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Japan, perhaps Taiwan and Poland; contrast with of course Iran and perhaps Belarus). That's part of why stopping a Chinese invasion is so crucial to US defensive strategy, as a successful Chinese invasion of Taiwan dramatically increases the odds of nuclear proliferation.

On the one hand, I understand the desire to limit nuclear proliferation. On the other hand, I think that the nuclear asymmetry arguably makes the world more unstable and more prone to violence.

Because nuclear weapons are, though not a magical item, a potent deterrent, the best method to prevent other countries from getting them might be to explicitly carve up the world into nuclear power blocs (US, Russia, China, India) and give the nuclear sovereigns explicit hegemony and dominion over the other nation-states. The nuclear sovereigns could agree to use their nuclear weapons against any country that attempted to develop or field any independent nuclear capability. They might even be able to develop a shared nuclear monitoring and weapons sharing framework that could gradually grow in time into the true planetary sovereign, the single nuclear monopower.

This would of course be a complete overturn of the post-WW2 global order, but under that current system unilaterally invading countries that decide to develop nuclear weapons is illegal. Doing so would freeze the number of nuclear powers at their current levels (and possibly reduce them), at the price of the destruction of the sovereignty of most nations on Earth – but you seem quite comfortable to ignore national sovereignty if weapons of mass destruction are in play.

Otherwise, if the United States wants to ensure a nuclear-proliferation-free Earth (I am not sure this is actually a good idea, but running with your goal here for a moment), it is presumably on the hook to (illegally) invade and de-nuclearize any country, which means that it is in the national interest of countries like China and Russia to proliferate nuclear weapons programs to hostile states, forcing the United States to bear the costs of intervention. (Of course the United States can play the same game, but doing so risks...proliferating the weapons!)

A quick response, as I'm mostly on board with your response (and I'm burning my night!):

The United States and its allies did enter Iraq, but it never got within 100 miles of Baghdad. If Iraq had had a credible WMD program, it would not have been sufficient to neutralize it.

This was because Iraq capitulated. The regular army had surrendered by the tens of thousands and only the Republican Guard remained. I don't mean they would walk right up or go unopposed - but had they chosen to do so, they could have. It was a common criticism of the war at the time that we did not go far enough (not even Saddam, just allowing the Republican Guard to escape/continue).

But the US doctrine is to fight with air support

In this case, as we've agreed, the Israelis are doing quite alright in that regard (RIP F-14s). Not that I think we'd need no air support - despite anti-Israel concerns, neither the US or Israel is at the other's beck and call, and only a fool would assume there is no situation where US forces would need support - but the cost would be greatly diminished due to Israel's exceptionally successful air campaign.

On the other hand, I think that the nuclear asymmetry arguably makes the world more unstable and more prone to violence.

I actually somewhat agree with your overall assessment. Rational actors will likely never use them unless pushed to the brink. And they contribute to a lasting peace. But my worry is that an increasing number of countries with nuclear arsenals greatly increases the odds that an irrational actor gets into power, or that poor safeguards are implemented. To separate my feelings from my (theoretical) policy suggestions: I am against any country nuclearizing. I am not in favor of world policing literally any country nuclearizing. But Iran, or as worse hypotheticals, Syria, or Sudan - those are problems. With the African continent in mind, I am counting my lucky stars that South Africa denuclearized before going through its current continually corrupt and often hostile decline. That would be another situation where the world (i.e. the US because no one else has power projection) would need to step in and make sure nothing went missing. That is my concern.

I hope it doesn't. The average Iranian is not a lover of their regime, which is why we see regular protests despite the authoritarian nature of their government.

The protests are probably just Western-sponsored nonsense, perhaps with some sponsored by the Iranian intelligence services to sucker any dissidents out in the open.

This is a very good post. I would add another couple of points:

  1. Actually invading Iran would be very difficult, much harder than Iraq, and would risk turning into America’s Ukraine War.

  2. From the Israel perspective, a secular Iranian nationalist government isn’t necessarily going to to be a lot friendlier. There are many Iranian dissidents who think that the Islamic Republic government is cowardly and has been going much too easy on Israel over the last two decades. And that is somewhat true, the Ayatollahs are unpopular and any foreign adventure is risky because of their low support at home. There are very good non-religious, non-ethnic reasons for Iran and Israel to be at each other’s throats. Each stands to be the major regional power in the Middle East and the town isn’t big enough for the two of them. In the long-run, a secular Iranian government with high levels of popular support that is competent and actually has its shit together is probably a lot worse for Israel.

There might tension between USA and Iran, but depending on the situation countries can make up quickly. Vietnam normalized relations quite quickly, right after a brutal war that left most of their country in ruins and millions dead. But in this case for better or for worse, the US is fanning the flames of antagonism against Iran. The fact is that the US is constantly messing around with Iran's business, far far more than the Iran is able to mess with US business.

Iran has no blood feud with the US. Their people and culture have no multi generational conflict with the US. If the US just let Iran do whatever it wants, which to be fair includes many quite terrible things, then I really think that they would be willing to forget past injustices and not bother trying to mess with a country halfway around the world.

Iran has no blood feud with the US.

Iran certainly has a blood feud with the US. The people of Iran as a whole may or may not (depends on just how bad the Shah was, and how much they blame the US for that), but the current leadership (as a class) does. They encourage chants of "Death to America". They refer to the US as the Great Satan. When someone tells you in no uncertain terms that they are your enemy, it makes sense to believe them.

It is true that if Iran were to just do whatever it wants, they likely would mess with the Little Satan (Israel) first. I don't know if the Ayatollahs are even crazier than the Kims, and would nuke Haifa and Tel Aviv as soon as they got the bombs. But it's definitely a possibility.

So do you think it was a mistake to make nice with Jolani? He's ex al-qaeda and had ties to ISIS. The majority of deadly attacks in the west, 9/11, charlie hebdo, bataclan, nice, etc. Were either ISIS or al-qaeda, either directly or inspired. Iran's / hezbollah / houthi attacks have been more military targets and less civilian. Yet the US had no problem making nice with him and removing the bounty from his head the second he happened to topple a country that was an impediment to the expansion of their empire, but no real threat to American lives.

The Iran thing really has nothing to do with keeping us safe, and everything to do with expanding our dear leaders' geopolitical power.

Jolani is at least pretending to be an ex-terrorist. Iran is steadfast in its hatred of the US.

So Stated preference > Revealed preference? For me it's the other way around.

Iran's rhetoric and actions match. There is no reason other than wishful thinking to believe they are willing to consider anything other than active enmity with the US.

If they wanted to do this, why muck about for the last 30-40 years without getting nukes? It really doesn't take that long. They've got plenty of engineering expertise and oil money to spend on it.

The US and Israel have been working actively (e.g. Stuxnet) to prevent it.

They encourage chants of "Death to America". They refer to the US as the Great Satan. When someone tells you in no uncertain terms that they are your enemy, it makes sense to believe them.

Why? It makes about as much sense to me as believing any other political slogan.

There is no doubt that Iran is currently hostile to the US, but the kinds of statements issued by countries currently engaged in hostilities tend to be pretty deranged generally, so I don't know if what they're saying should be enough to take them as expressions of genuine irreconcilable hatred.

They have been consistent in both expressing "Death to America" and calling the US the "Great Satan" since the formation of the current regime.

What I'm saying is: yeah, and? Propaganda against hostile states can get pretty deranged, that doesn't mean a given regime actually believes it.

The current Iranian regime has always been hostile to the US, they have always been open about it, and they have consistently made this clear in word and deed. There is no reason to believe otherwise, except perhaps the polyannaish idea that one can always smooth things over by diplomacy.

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Because not only are those slogans backed by authoritative position statements from senior members of the Iranian state, they are backed by decades of observed actions, including state sponsorship of terrorism and proxy-militia attacks on American civilian, military, and diplomatic efforts in other countries.

'You should not believe any given political slogan' is not the same as 'you should not believe any political slogan.' Many political slogans are, in fact, generally accurate indicators of policy direction. Nybbler made the appropriate calibration from taking a statement to the directionional.

I agree that comparing the slogans to observed actions is a good way to gauge whether or not the statements carry weight. But do the observed actions of Iran indicate a burning irreconcilable hatred, or standard-issue hostility, the likes of which various states have entered into, and exited from, countless times throughout history?

But do the observed actions of Iran indicate a burning irreconcilable hatred, or standard-issue hostility, the likes of which various states have entered into, and exited from, countless times throughout history?

Setting aside that both degrees are the likes of which various states have entered into, and exited from, countless times throughout history-

-and that distinction is largely irrelevant when you working within a single leadership generation, which Iran still is for the founding revolutionary leadership class whose personal vendettas still apply even if their successors in a few generations change their mind and shift category-

-either would suffice for what Nybbler said.

This is the position Nybbler made that you quoted to dispute-

When someone tells you in no uncertain terms that they are your enemy, it makes sense to believe them.

-and no part of this position on the nature of animosity, which makes it a distinction without a difference. Whether the Iranians elites have a 'burning, irreconcilable hatred' or not doesn't challenge the premise.

If someone with 'standard-issue hostility,' where 'standard' includes decades of terrorism in foreign countries against US institutions and directly supporting attacks on US forces when the US and Iran are not at war, is telling you in no uncertain terms that they are your enemy, it (still) makes sense to believe them.

and that distinction is largely irrelevant when you working within a single leadership generation

I'm pretty sure we can find many historical examples beginning / ending hostilities within the same generation.

and no part of this position on the nature of animosity, which makes it a distinction without a difference. Whether the Iranians elites have a 'burning, irreconcilable hatred' or not doesn't challenge the premise.

I thought the question they were discussing was whether or not Iran has a blood feud with the US? Maybe I misunderstood something, but how would you describe the concept if not a 'burning, irreconcilable hatred'?

If someone with 'standard-issue hostility,' where 'standard' includes decades of terrorism in foreign countries against US institutions and directly supporting attacks on US forces when the US and Iran are not at war, is telling you in no uncertain terms that they are your enemy, it (still) makes sense to believe them.

I mean, yes, all those things are quite typical of states currently engaged in hostilities, and yes "hostilities" implies they are currently your enemies. "Blood feud", on the other hand, would imply that the hostilities cannot be ended by means of rational persuasion, and will continue to re-flare no matter how conciliatory one of the sides is.

I'm not even necessarily denying the idea that such a blood feud exists, I just don't know if the statements from the Iranian government, no matter how deranged, are a good argument for it's existence.

I'm pretty sure we can find many historical examples beginning / ending hostilities within the same generation.

I'm also pretty sure you can admit that Iran specifically is already in its second, leaning into third, generation of participants.

If you want to go by senior leaders, they already are in the second senior leader generation and are well staged for a hardliner to lead the third. If you want to go by major institutional leaders, the late Soleimani of the IRGC was around 20 during the revolution and 60 when he died as the head of the IRGC, which is to say that most of the revolutionary paramilitary types are being done by younger men of post-revolution generations. The Iranian Revolution is about 46 years old, which is to say a child born after the 'new' Iran has had time to grow under up, be properly educated, fight, have kids, and for those kids to have been properly educated and in their fighting / parenting years as well. The Iranian theocracy absolutely has a revolutionary veteran ingroup for people who were involved in the revolution from the start, but the age of the average iranian- 34- means that most of the actual feuding-execution has been conducted by considerably younger people for a generation or two already.

When we look at historical examples of participants ending a feud in any generation, the proponents for ending it are generally not both declaring themselves an enemy while continuing to conduct routine hostilities to their end-of-life years. Almost as importantly, their key pillars of support tend not to gained their privileges with joining in on the feud, and don't stand to lose substantial influence and wealth if they let the feud go away.

Iran is the sort of structure you'd expect to see continue on a conflict across leadership generations. Both the autocrat-level senior leader selection processes and the state-within-the-state role and incentives of the IRGC support continuing the conflict. The senior leaders select for, and remove on a basis of a lack of, commitment to the Cause. Even the nominally elected representatives are pre-screened at the candidate selection level, and the non-elected power centers are even more deliberately managed.

This selection structure is in turn enforced by an institution that would lose its perks and privileges if the hostilities were to end. The IRGC is both a revolutionary-enforcer private army, but also a state-within-a-state whose privileges are justified by defending the revolution and executing the feud by, yes, bringing death to Americans. (And others.) This is the 'worst' of three worlds in terms of 'ending hostilities within the same generation'- selection for revolutionary fervor, material incentive for continuing, but also the prospect of punishment if a non-revolutionary successor took over. Then the IRGC would get fewer perks, and possibly more prison sentences for those things like domestic detentions and torture of political dissidents opposed to the revolution.

if we want to characterize Iran's leadership structure, they'd be closer to historical analogs of Imperial Japan- where being insufficiently hardline could get someone assassinated or the government functionally self-couped- rather than, say, Gaddafi in Libya, who happily engaged in European terrorism before trying to reconcile later. Japan notably continued its feuding until its government was forcibly resolved, and Gaddafi's feud was not as over as he might have thought when the European successor-governments saw an opportunity to strike back at him with US support.

I thought the question they were discussing was whether or not Iran has a blood feud with the US?

They were, but your question was not that question.

You quoted the section about believing someone who declares themselves an enemy, as opposed to Nybbler's characterization of a blood feud. Your response questioned why to believe a self-declaration of enemyship by comparing it to any other political slogan, as opposed to any other kind of conflict. Your basis of argument specifically ignorred the sort of validating actions (that would give slogans credibility) that is the understood background context of the US-Iranian feud.

Maybe I misunderstood something, but how would you describe the concept if not a 'burning, irreconcilable hatred'?

I wouldn't.

Partly because even irreconciliable feuds can be reconciled, because 'irreconciliable' is a judgement of the involved people's character, not an objective fact of nature. People's characters change with time and context, such that things that were impossible for them at one point are imminently possible at another. Reconciliation is usually by the descendants (future generations) rather than the initiators (the current Iranian leadership generation), and the more degrees of separation the better. I do not recognize / subscribe to a fundamental distinction between an irreconcilable geopolitical and a feud that could eventually ends, for the same reason I do not hold the same for any other 'unending' human relationship. There are no unending human relationships, because there are no unending and unchanging humans to have them. There are no permanent geopolitical conflicts, because the people having the conflicts change out.

The other part is I don't think 'blood feud' is a coherent enough concept to be meaningfully definable. I would certainly recognize as a metaphor for multi-generational hostility. I would also recognize it as a metaphor for hostility-on-general principle. But because 'blood feud' is so nebulous, it is also non-falsifiable. If your concept of blood feud is [A] and Nybbler's is [B], and Phailoor's is [C], Nybbler is not wrong for not being aligned with [A], or even in asserting [B] when rejecting [C].

Given that Nybbler's argument uses blood feud in the way Phailoor was using it- namely as Phailoor's short-hand for a conflict that is (as he put it) mostly a response to the US and which would end if the US stopped acting- and that Nybbler's point was far more about 'believe what they say' than 'there is a blood feud specifically because they say there is'- I also wouldn't read into blood feud as any sort of specific concept by either of them.

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