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PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   1424 thread views

Transnational Thursday for March 19, 2026

Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.

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I get the impression that people thought I was being hyperbolic when I explained what "winning" looks like from the perspective of the US, Isreali, and Saudi right, rather than plainly stating a position.

Ideally, Iran makes a credible and verifiable commitment to dismantling their nuclear weapons program and stops supplying arms to HAMAS, Hezbollah, the Houthis, Russian Federation, Et Al. Less Ideally, we turn them into a failed state that wouldn't be able to muster up a nuclear weapons program even if they wanted one. If the choice is between reducing Iran to Afghanistan-esque hodge-podge of pre-industrial warring tribes and allowing the IRGC access to nuclear missiles we choose to turn Iran into another Afghanistan.

How is Trump supposed to accomplish that when he has no real staying power? He's sensitive to what the markets do and what the population thinks. He didn't spend any time actually prepping the American population for a real, prolonged war. All that propaganda about democracy and the free world and good vs evil has useful effects, and that stuff is not present atm. He's not in a strong position and is likely looking for some way out IMO.

You don't need "staying power" to cut off someone's electricity.

Again, I feel like people here aren't grappling with what I'm saying. You seem to think that this is nation building exercise rather than a punitive expedition.

You wrote:

reducing Iran to Afghanistan-esque hodge-podge of pre-industrial warring tribes and allowing the IRGC access to nuclear missiles we choose to turn Iran into another Afghanistan.

How are you going to do that in quick fashion?

The actual answer is that you're not. Iran is not Afghanistan. Destroying critical infrastructure in Iran isn't going to turn it into a bunch of warring tribes any more doing the same in Britain would. It's just going to lead to a lot of avoidable deaths of Iranian civilians.

I think you have assigned too much weight to the notion of a cosmopolitan UK. If you turn off the electricity, turn off the food, and turn off the water, how long do you think it would take for Anglicans and Muslims, Labour and Tory, Scotts and Britons, Britons and Welsh, Et Al to stop playing nice with each other and start stabbing? I do not think that it would take very long.

Nothing to do with cosmopolitanism and more to do with the fact that Britain just isn't a society divided like that. The idea that society is three meals from barbarism is not, in general, true. It is especially not true when it is coming under external attack.

By wiping out the state leadership and then blowing up all the powerplants.

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