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Notes -
Iran - US - Israel War Flareup
“Israel says it has launched attack on Iran, as explosions reported in Tehran”
“The US has begun Major Combat Operations in Iran” - Donald Trump (headline flashed up just now on my phone, no link yet)
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More to follow but thought I’d post quickly for any commenting.
So it is finally habbening. The "axis of resistance" doing nothing as predicted by most astute observers. After Syria and Venezuela, Iran is on the chopping block now.
Turbo America is here as promised, the real American century is just beginning. Next step Cuba, and then Russia.
China will be the final boss.
The US is not going to fight Russia and China anymore than the US fought the Soviet Union. Nukes prevent that and even so Russia and China can actually defend themselves.
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Syria was not a US op. Local Islamists (backed by Turkey and Saudi Arabia, but probably also the US, I think) defeated Assad (backed by Russia, which was otherwise occupied).
The jury is still out on Venezuela. Trump kidnapped Maduro, great. But he did not exactly bring freedom and democracy there. More like "it keeps shipping its oil to us, or else it gets bombed again".
Cuba is suffering badly from a lack of oil. But I am not sure that they will greet the Marines as liberators just because of that, sometimes foreigners have their own ideas on whom to blame for their hardships.
Your last two grand regime change operations were Iraq and Afghanistan. Iraq gave rise to daesh, which was eventually defeated. Today they seem democratic but mostly vote along ethnic lines, not exactly a bedrock of democracy. Afghanistan was of course a disaster, with the Taliban taking power as the last plane was lifting off.
For Iran, I am not holding my breath until Trump sends infantry to occupy it. Even then, it will likely be a costly asymmetric war for a few decades.
A regime change in Russia seems hard. They inherited the largest nuclear arsenal in the world, and the relevant population is somewhat in favor of Putin thanks to his propaganda. Good luck trying to invade them, too.
And a regime change imposed from outside in China is just as unlikely. They certainly have enough nukes to ruin your day, but probably threatening to tank the global market for rare earth elements would be enough to persuade any US president to not risk a head-on confrontation. Nor am I convinced that anyone else would back you if Trump decided to start WW3 by trying to invade China.
The US Oil embargo in 2011 was a major factor in Syria not being able to pay its military and secure armaments.
/images/17723060893272033.webp
Thanks, Obama?
In all seriousness, equating economic sanctions with hard power is more
That's what the DSA does, calling sanctions a "weapon of war" and demanding they be lifted from Iran and applied to Israel.
Not that I know what the rest of your point was going to be.
Whoops.
I was going to say something along the lines of: “soft power” arguments traditionally don’t score many points with neocons or knee-jerk nationalists. Trying to rehabilitate Syria as a success of the RBIO feels like it’s missing the point.
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Trump has done a real bang up job of rallying American allies over the last couple of months, so China is very likely to "face a de facto united West". It's not as if he's threatened to annex a bunch of NATO allies' territory and in general tried his very best to piss away every last piece of soft power the US wields.
The "real American century" is being ushered in by a fat retard in end stage dementia dismantling all US alliances and the final boss will be the one country it probably can't beat in a conventional war, gg.
Funny enough, Western Europe called for de-escalation but Carney signaled support for the U.S.
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Iran was never going to be an important player in a Taiwan contingency, and China has never had an ally who'd be important in it except for Russia (and, to a small extent, Pakistan). And although Anatoly just says it's a possibility, the idea of us getting a more united West from the current situation is not at all obvious.
Iran was always going to be important for Chinese contingency plans for dealing with a blockade of the strait of malacca, though.
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The US failed miserably in Yemen. The US managed a kidnapping in Venezuela, not regime change. The US is bombing Iran because they can't actually invade countries anymore.
What winning?
Venezuela is now basically a client state.
Not the only post today that things we lost Venezuela because it’s not in the news everyday. To the best of my knowledge Rubio is essentially the head of state of Venezuela at this moment.
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I assume you mean that from a national will standpoint, and not a capability standpoint?
In multiple ways. The US population is tired of these wars.
The US military is dumber, smaller, and worse equipped than before.
The US is stuck feeding a black hole of a war in Ukraine while trying to keep pace with China even though China is far more cost efficient and has a larger industrial base. A repeat of the Iraq war wouldn't be possible today.
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Sounds great to me - keep showing the world who controls it and no protracted engagement.
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