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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   10961 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 15, 2026

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Deal reached to end Iran war

Details of the deal are not publicly available right now. However, Trump has authorised an end to the US naval blockade, and Iran has agreed to reopen the Strait.

Not surprisingly though, Israel continues to bomb Lebanon and refuses to cede lands seized in southern Lebanon.

But MORE surprisingly, Trump actually reprimanded Bibi.

Trump has pressed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to stop hitting Lebanon hard while a deal is near, but the prime minister has defied him. Trump told Fox News he had asked Netanyahu what he was doing, using an expletive. "What the f*** are you doing?" Trump says he told Netanyahu. Trump described the attack on northern Israel as "very small and meaningless, nobody was hurt, injured, or killed, and should not disrupt this important process".

Iran wants a ceasefire deal to include the fighting in Lebanon. It’s unclear whether that would mean Israeli forces' withdrawal and when. Most of Hezbollah's attacks in recent weeks have targeted Israeli troops inside Lebanon.

"A strong response is coming," said Ebrahim Azizi, who heads the Iranian parliament’s national security commission and is close to top leaders.

And Iran’s parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, a lead negotiator for Tehran, warned the US on X after Israel's strikes that "if you lack the will and ability to fulfill your commitments, speaking of continuing the path is not possible".

The deal does not solve the thorniest issues between the US and Iran, including Iran’s nuclear program or its billions of dollars in frozen funds, but offers a 60-day framework for technical discussions on those issues, according to Pakistani and regional officials familiar with the ongoing negotiations. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

Under the deal being discussed, US and Israel appear to have fallen short of their original goals of destroying Iran’s missile and nuclear programs and ending its support for armed proxies in the region. It is not clear how the deal will address these issues, or if they will be part of the final agreement.

Critics in Trump’s Republican Party, struggling with an unpopular war ahead of the midterm elections, have criticised the emerging deal. Some said it did not improve on the terms of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal that Trump withdrew the US from during his first term and which he still describes as "bad".

So it seems we were lucky to return to the pre-war status quo, even Trump had to tepidly admit that he bit off more than he can chew and Iran's regional dominance is not going anywhere.

So it seems we were lucky to return to the pre-war status quo, even Trump had to tepidly admit that he bit off more than he can chew and Iran's regional dominance is not going anywhere.

Not that this was anyone's plan but we learned/reconfirned some things.

  1. Alternate oil routes: solid idea.
  2. Anti-mining tech: in
  3. Anti-drone tech: in
  4. If you're going to decapitation strike a regime do it before they brutally suppress a popular uprising
  5. The Gulf states seem pretty useless
  6. Europe seems pretty useless
  7. Starlink: seems easily jammed
  8. Can we develop alternate energy faster already
  9. Blockading Iran's blockade: seems like reasonably good counter-leverage

Iran learned some things too

  1. SOH blockade: surprisingly good leverage, invest heavily in that tech
  2. Houthi relationship: develop at all costs, must be able to shut down red sea route
  3. Moar ballistic missiles
  4. Moar drones
  5. Hamas attack on Israel: pretty costly!
  6. Nuclear program: yes
  7. Internet blackouts: very effective
  8. China: probably a great economic ally on a lot of gear
  9. Russia: useless

All in, I think life for Iranians gets steadily worse from here but at least they can say they're scoring points for the Islamic revolution.

Iran can blockade the strait to cause pain but it's not limitless. We can blockade them back and inflict pain too. Eventually both sides lose the will to keep going, but it might be an inconvenience to Trump whereas it's a lot more punishing for Iran.

Anyway, maybe we can try a decapitation strike again in a few years and see if we do any better at

Nuclear program: yes

Seems like this is mainly giving excuses for others to pound on Iran, without establishing much deterrence. It seems like instead they managed to get enough without even touching nuclear stuff. If they totally got rid of the nukes and doubled or tripled down on conventional weapons, I bet the Americans would just leave them alone. The nuclear program is probably a white elephant anyways, where if they spent all that money on missiles and air defense they'd probably have done better. Israel is still gonna start shit but probably won't do much alone.

Of course just because it's a smart move doesn't mean Iran is going to take it though.

Nukes effectively deter a US invasion, which is a real risk if the neocons return to power, and Iran can see that the US would beat them in a conventional war if the US was willing to accept the cost of victory (i.e. a choice between a prolonged occupation and likely Iraq-style quagmire or a Houthi-on-Hormuz failed state).

The product of two small probabilities (the neocons returning to power, and them being dumb enough to launch a real regime change was against Iran) is even smaller, but I think it is high enough to be worth worrying about, and so did MAGA in 2024 given that "vote Trump so you don't have to fight in neocon Kamala's Iran war" was a winning message with military-age men, so it wouldn't surprise me if the mullahs do.

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