This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
But that is not how it works. Usually, when allies go at war against a common enemy is that none of them will end the war until both agree to end it. Israel is a sovereign nation, and it was not even represented during the MOU negotiations. Why would they feel bound by the resulting MOU?
Donald Trump and you seem to both assume the US can decide whatever, including starting or stopping a war with Iran, without consulting any of his allies, and those allies will just obey. But they are free countries, it just does not work this way.
When Rome went to war with her allies against their enemies, it was expected that the allies would cease warring when terms were signed by Rome, no? What kind of alliance do we have with Israel if they are willing to plunge us into an economic catastrophe for the sake of bombing Lebanon?
First, barbarians doing barbarian things has always been the case. You can read up on plenty of stories of this or that place getting ravaged by this or that tribe, which frequently has some kind of relationship with Rome that would nominally require them to not do so. Frequently they even plundered other roman allies. The reasons varied, both for why the tribe was doing it and also why Rome was tolerating it.
Second, if Rome really wanted to make sure that the allies kept the promise, they'd in fact have to crack down on them regularly, or at least threaten to do so. Can you imagine the US invading Israel and going all decimatio? No? Then don't expect them to feel bound by a piece of paper they didn't even sign.
More options
Context Copy link
Rome has no real allies by modern standards. The so-called allies were not sovereign states, most of the time they were bound by a treaty saying they would have same allies and same enemies as Rome. And also, I don't know how it is relevant. The roman world is long dead, and its customs with it.
Who of our allies are sovereign states moreso than the barbarian tribes in Roman?
The power gap between the US and everyone else besides China (not an ally) is equally large. We can if we wanted to debank and cut energy consumption in Europe atleast 50% if we wanted to. Probably can’t just kill them like the Romans could but even then we may be overestimating how easy it would be for the Romans to do that.
I could argue about the power gap, because some of those countries could also hurt the US if they wanted to. And also where does this 50% number come from?
But more importantly, sovereignty is not about the power gap. Vatican and Luxembourg are sovereign states, yet the power gap with their neighbors (let alone the US) is not good.
And if you wonder why those states can remain sovereign, it's because of the balance of power in the world. Geopolitics is not a zero sum game. If you let your allies down, nobody wants to be your ally anymore. If you threaten your allies, you might get what you want because they have no other choice right now, but suddenly, they are not your allies anymore. They are slaves, and they won't like it.
The US has built its alliance network on the premise that the allied would remain sovereign countries. The US are free to change their mind, but if you assume it will go unchallenged, they are just wrong.
The 50% of European energy supply comes from a rough guess of European inputs that are shipped in by sea which the US dominates the high seas. The US can basically cut off all trade Europe does with any other country besides Russia.
I have zero idea what Europe provides US as an ally today. They don’t have any fighting men or tech we need.
The lithography machines for semiconductors are built by ASML in Europe, and Facebook AI research as long as Google AI (DeepBrain) have labs in Europe. I'm sure there are other examples.
But more importantly Europe provides the US with scale. Software and weapon systems are conceived once in the US and sold all over the world.
And also Europe provides the US with logistics. The military operations in the middle east could simply not happen without logistics centers in Europe (unless the US finds reliable allies with Africa, but good luck with that).
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
This has been an overall issue with the Trump administration. The assumption that any decision made by the US is law, and that everyone else will follow regardless of whether they were present at negotiations or not.
You saw it as US reduced aid to Ukraine, assuming the EU would follow suit.
Next during peace negotiations when America decided to not invite Ukraine, and instead assumed they would acquiesce to whatever decision the two great powers came up with.
In the initial phases of the Iran war, Trump assumed the rest of NATO would help. Even though it was not in their interest and they had not been involved with invasion plans in the first place. This war was notably a surprise for almost all interested parties, yet the US expected help as if they had all agreed on a plan together.
Now you have these Iran peace talks in which one of the parties to the war is not involved. Then everyone acts surprised when said party ignores the terms of a deal they never agreed to.
It's like watching an asshole watch a 20 minute video on realism and then try to implement it IRL.
On the other hand, it does allow him to go back to one of his campaign messages: "everyone is a freeloader that won't help America when we need them."
More options
Context Copy link
Why would they? Trump is an egotistical fool who believes the flattery coming out of any dictators mouth but it doesn't change that nations like China and Russia are our enemies and have no actual reason to listen to him. Putin might have kept whispering in his ear during those late night gossip calls that "I never would have had to start the war under you Trump, this is Biden's war absolutely", but anyone with a brain knows that this isn't true. Putin started it because he wants Ukraine, the same reason he's not ending it now despite years of stalemate and a drain on his country's resources and population.
And Ukraine along with the rest of Europe doesn't want to be taken. You can get a lot out of allies as the top dog, but they're not going to the grave for you, allies doesn't mean chained up slaves.
Those make sense to fail, it's an egotistical idiot believing the lies of any adversarial tinpot who tells him nice things and wondering why his orders to our friends to jump off a cliff aren't being followed. Even the best and most powerful presidents would not succeed here, allies wouldn't kill themselves for a Reagan either.
But Israel is engaged in an offensive war in Lebanon! They're moving large populations out of their homes in mass genocide. And their constant attacks are directly screwing with the US plans to surrender and restore the world economy. If we can't even pressure the nation with no other allies but us, that directly relies on the US, into not engaging an offensive war to save the world economy then it seems the Trump admin has little influence anywhere when it matters.
Start threatening things like Magnitsky sanctions for all the war crimes and human rights abuses they do or cutting aid or whatever. Trump of course won't because he's a weak man who can't stand up to the Zionist lobby even if he wanted to. And Israel knows this, there is nothing Trump is willing to do to bring them to heel. The same thing Iran has learned. The same thing many of Trump's opponents targeted by political warfare have learned. The bark is louder than the bite, you push back against the bully and he eventually flees.
I think Trump is Jewish and it’s not that he can’t stand up to the Zionists. And the US economy is heavily ran by Jews. Israel is a rival tribe as well as an ally but they are practically the only other civilized nation in the world.
More options
Context Copy link
Is this meant to be satire, on people claiming everything is genocide?
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
“ The assumption that any decision made by the US is law, and that everyone else will follow regardless of whether they were present at negotiations or not.”
I don’t agree with your Ukraine point. The US decided they didn’t want to pay for Ukraine because it’s not America first and largely not a US interests. The Trump administration has been consistent in wanting Europe to spend more on their military. My understanding of the MAGA position is MAGA never had a problem with the EU paying for a European war.
As far as both countries on the same side needing to agree to continue a war it’s generally not that both countries need to agree to end it. Either can continue or end the war when they want to but when the stronger nation decides to end it usually the weaker ally has to follow the big dogs decision. If Israel keeps dragging us back into the war I honestly would have no problem with Trump bombing Israel. Remind the Jews whose daddy in this relationship. Might even be fairly popular in domestic politics.
France and Germany did not join the US in Iraq, so the US ability to dictate to its allies is at least somewhat limited. They aren't obligated to join everything the US decides to do.
Yes, the US got away with smashing a sovereign nation with no criminal charges or serious reprisals. But:
I'd have thought we'd be clear on this after this whole mess. Yes, the US doesn't have to go with its allies into Iran. Yes, the US can just kill a leader of a formidable nation and Trump will likely retire to golf in peace. What did you achieve though?
We basically won the war so we won’t agree. Their leaders are dead. All aims were not achieved like complete regime change but the reason we failed at that is primarily domestic US politics and an unwillingness to cause a lot of Iranian civilian deaths.
Whether the War was worth it is a much different question than whether the US is in charge.
How America chooses to cope is irrelevant. It's especially irrelevant because, for all of the talk that the US would see red bro and just crush if it really wanted to, the supposed wildcard President backed down. You can't even blame it on the effeteness of some Obama-style figure drunk on dreams of liberal internationalism. This is the most vocally ruthless Presidency in a while, that ran around threatening to wipe out their entire civilization and...what happened?
Maybe don't start wars you can't win without massive casualties you're not willing to inflict? Especially don't threaten it if you won't go through.
In any case, I don't see how this isn't a loss. The strait isn't open. The IRGC is still functional enough that the US has to negotiate with it to open it. The US is apparently going to have to pay danegeld and Trump has downplayed disarming them. Iran just now suspended talks again and is working (successfully) to drive a wedge between the US and Israel*
The reason regime change was such a central pillar of the thinking (not some sort of stretch goal) was that it was the only path anyone could see to stopping Iran's nuclear ambitions decisively. That failed.
* Regardless of how one feels about Israel, your enemy being able to do this to you is a sign of weakness.
People like you make me want to just kill every Palestinian and Iranian to prove a point we won because we can.
Iranian Nukes are pushed back a decade minimum. We can bomb then again in the future because easily because their air defenses don’t exists anymore. Their conventional military is degraded.
You are setting the win conditions to Iranian statehood or turned into glass. We don’t want that.
Can I see if we have any agreement on certain factual questions:
It’s a Win America is stronger today than it was pre-war. You’re not being honest if you disagree with this. And we can still come back and bomb the shit out of them again.
Sure this is more like winning the Championship 4-2 instead of beating Iran 11-0 and to use a soccer analogy getting Iran Relegation. Relegation was the desired outcome but we still won the championship.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Yes, but people like you make me want to defect to China. Going full psycho is not just another move you can pull out of your repertoire like you're playing blackjack and deciding whether to hit or stay. When you are in protracted legal wrangling over a breach of patent costing 10m USD, the reason you don't just pull out a gun and waste the judge, plaintiff and opposing council isn't because it won't work, it's because making it clear that you are a psycho with no switches except 'kill' and 'don't kill' acts as a strong signal to everyone else that they need to drop everything and focus on killing you now.
Case in point: all of Israel's former allies now loathe them. To the extent that there is any support for Israel remaining, it is that senior politicians manage to temporarily squeeze it out whilst avoiding increasingly bipartisan pressure from all the up-and-coming politicians. Whatever the provocation, going straight to 'kill everyone' is not a good move unless you are obviously so desperate that there is no other choice. America is very clearly not in that position.
Was there any way that Israel could have realistically fought Hamas without their former allies loathing them? They could have done better, but it would have still been enough that they'd be loathed, IMO.
More options
Context Copy link
You don’t pull out and kill the judge in a patent dispute is become the US federal government has a monopoly on violence here.
Who has an international monopoly on violence? That would be the US which makes them the judge in this case.
Yes we can just do things and there is no one that can stop us.
And spare me….but but but there are exceptions to the US having a monopoly on global violence. Yes I know it’s not a 100% true it’s only 80% true. We can bomb Israel tomorrow if they disobey us. We can cause Iranian population collapse if we want to.
I have no problem if you move to China.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Perhaps this is a sign of poor understanding of international relations on my part, but I would assume that you would at least want to present a shared front with your allies during formal negotiations. Make sure you have pressured your ally before negotiations if need be, so that you know ahead of time that they will officially support the deal you sign.
It seems that Trump just skips this entirely. He simply ignores his allies during negotiations, then expects them to support a decision that blindsided them completely.
Lipstick on a pig stuff. Yes Trump ignores the genuflecting to Europe etc to make them feel good that their opinion matters. But realistically the US opinion has been all that matters for decades.
Except that yet again, the gap between “the US is vastly more powerful than its allies” and “US opinion is all that matters” is biting the US in the arse.
How is it biting us in the arse? Ever since the rise of American Tech and Energy Independence what happens in the rest of the world just doesn’t matter to us.
The consequences to the US is a bunch of French men angry tweeting us they are freezing and can’t drive their cars because no petrol.
In this particular case, because America's ally Israel's opinion differs from America's and it's mucking up American diplomacy.
The US though is not bearing any of the costs. US consumer suffer some on high oil costs versus producers having windfall profits so they balance.
Probably costs us a little extra money running blockade but that’s probably not much more than just having sailors doing nothing and cruising around.
I am not opposed to bombing Israel to show them who’s in charge.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
I had several hypothesis regarding Trump choices. I thought there was some secret plan explaining his behaviour. For example, asking NATO for help without consulting them could have been a plan to undermine and ultimately dismantle it. But unless he also wants to alienate Israel, I think he has no plan beyond what we see.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Part of the problem with starting this war to begin with, and both the government of Israel and that of the United States are equally to blame here, is that the war wasn't sold to the American public beforehand in favor of launching a duplicitous surprise decapitation strike. This means that a lot of infrastructure that should have been set up before the war started still isn't put together by the end of the war. There is no combined command. There is little love between the peoples to allow for that kind of cooperation.
What was duplicitous about it? Everyone has known that the relevant aspects of the US Deep State have wanted to bah-bah-bah-bah bah-bah-bomb Iran for like... forty-ish years?
"Surprise" I could live with (although, it wasn't exactly surprising!), but nobody was saying "nah, we love Iran -- we'd never bomb them!"
Everything I was taught growing up that made Pearl Harbor "a day which will live in infamy."
It goes against my basic sense of Americanism.
I don't know enough about the prelude to WW2, but unless the Americans had been using insurgent movements in the Far East to attack Japan, its interests and its allies, funding and directing them more like an irregular part of their military than an ally, for decades, then the situation is not quite the same (I know the US did try to strangle Japan economically, but I think there's something different about economics and waging indirect warfare). Clearly Iran's been poking the bear constantly so getting a reaction at some point is to be expected. The situation more like a bully getting sucker punched after years of abuse; sure he can claim it came out of the blue and was unprovoked and that it wasn't him just his cronies that were doing the violent bullying and some dumb teachers might care, but he damn well deserved it and in a just world it would have happened sooner.
The US did fund Chiang Kai Shek and the Nationalists in the late 30's.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
The technical term for attacking a country you are at peace with without declaring war, or for resuming attacks when a valid ceasefire is in place without publicly announcing you are revoking the ceasefire, is "perfidious". The US attack on Iran should qualify (I won't argue the technicalities), either on basis that the US and Iran are not at war, that the US was a de facto party to the ceasefire ending the 2025 12-day war or because there was an implied ceasefire for the duration of the ongoing nuclear talks in Oman.
If any of the Iranian officials directly involved in the Oman talks were the subjects of a targeted killing this would also be a separate war crime (attacking diplomats) - although it now looks like this was a mad social media threat that was not carried out, rather than something that happened.
The US and Iran have been at war since about 1979 -- and Iran started it! Invaded sovereign territory, took hostages (diplomats!), the whole bit... seriously, I'm pretty sure there was never a truce declared or anything like that?
"Perfidy" AFAIK specifically refers to violating a flag of truce or wearing enemy uniforms -- surprise attacks don't qualify.
No, the US and Iran were not at war since 1979. Reagan and everyone else involved in Iran-Contra would have been executed for treason if that were the case.
Words have definitions, and war is one of them. If you seriously believe that the United States and Iran have been at War for 47 years, Oliver North is still alive. I suggest we get that treason trial started.
More options
Context Copy link
The US hasn't been at war with anyone since 1942, and 1979 was forty seven years ago. And... look, there is no possible way you would have accepted this reasoning if Iran had shot Donald Trump at a speech or had his secretary blow him up with a briefcase bomb in 2017. No way. Which to me just makes your reasoning look like, "America gets to kill anyone, anywhere, anytime as long as we don't like them and we didn't explicitly promise not to". That's not even perfidy. Perfidy implies the possibility of honour.
The fact is that any country can attack any other country at any time -- as you point out, formal declarations of war haven't been a thing for many many years; it really is the law of the jungle.
If Iran had bombed Trump's inauguration, that would be an act of war; there's no moral valance to that, just that they would get their asses kicked for it.
Did Egypt et al send a diplomat to Tel Aviv to formally slap Golda Meir with a glove or something in 1973? If you want to go to war, you just do it.
So, if Afghanistan decided to fly a plane into the Pentagon or White House out of the blue, there'd be no moral valence to it, just some random shit that happened, sucks for the victims?
Pretty much -- that's why countries (should) have air defenses and/or plausible deterence for such attacks.
More options
Context Copy link
Both are valid targets in war, and legitimate to open a war with.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
There's also the minor issue of Hezbollah. Israel's not just bombing Lebanon for kicks and giggles, despite what a lot of people seem to think, and Iran has more than a minor bit of influence over that side of the conflict... I don't recall anything in the MOU that says Hezbollah will start abiding by the terms of the UN resolution, for instance, or that it will cease all hostile activities against Israel.
Hezbollah is included, but you are right that they might not follow it either. It just makes less sense from my POV (the MOU was seen as a victory for Hezbollah, it would make no sense to undermine it).
So would that mean that, under the terms of this MOU, Hezbollah and all Iran's proxies will be permanently prohibited from attacking Israel? Peace in our time, indeed!
It is my understanding that the MOU only holds for a 60 days period.
Awful writing of the MOU, then, to use "permanent termination" in a 60-day MOU. But I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Seconded. The US-Iran deal is not bad for Hezbollah, e.g. it acknowledges that Iran has an interest in what happens in Lebanon.
It is also not bad for Hezbollah's overlords, i.e. the IRGC -- otherwise Iran would simply not have signed the deal.
My understanding is that Hezbollah did attack Israel with rockets when the Iran war began, and in return Israel bombed Beirut and invaded south Lebanon, and is openly destroying villages with the aim of displacing Lebanese.
Quite frankly, I do not like Hezbollah, but them attacking Israeli troops in Lebanon who are busy with genocide-through-displacement seems one of the less objectionable things they did.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link