A lot of commentators have noticed we seem to be getting quite close to some major multi state military action.
Part of the problem is there are a bunch of leaders who would quite welcome some “wag the dog” action. Trump, Bibi and MbS all have good reasons to point to Iran and keep pointing and jabbing the finger, for fear their domestic audiences might start paying attention.
And there are clear indications that the Israelis are prepping to deal with Hezbollah. Which inevitably opens the door to Iranian intervention in support of them. I can imagine Bolton thinking it would be a shame to waste the opportunity (to paraphrase Rahm).
I have also seen commentators suggest part of the issue that the US is raising with Lebanon concerns the dispute concerning territorial waters of certain oil and gas development blocks. By standard maritime convention these are Lebanese, but the US has been pressing for Lebanon to cede them. For that matter the Sheba farms are Lebanese as well.
I still doubt this will end in war cos Bibi is smart, and doesn’t enter into bets which might take him down. But his room for maneuver is diminishing all the time. But if you really want to defuse the threat which is Hezbollah, how else would you go about it, other than asking US B52 to do the job?
They are logical, if one is bluffing about creating nukes. If one is serious about it, they keep the most sensitive, expensive and time consuming part of the process, uranium enrichment, secret. Like everyone who has developed nukes before. They do not announce to potential adversaries they are enriching uranium and how much. They just complete their bomb in secret and surprise the world with a test, when it is far too late to do much about it.,
Seoul is fairly close to the border with NK. It is within artillery range from NK. We do not want to see it being bombarded. The South Koreans do not want to see it being bombarded. Even the Chinese don’t want to see it being bombarded. When Trump and Kim got overly bellicose a while back, China and both Koreas entered talks and kiddie tabled the US, essentially defusing much of the situation. Leaving Trump to have his pointless summits with Kim. (Essentially excuses for Kim top take vacations)
The point is that they’ve been terrible destructive to human life, and they continue to be terribly destructive to human life.
and as I’m not a military historian or I don’t geek out on gear built to kill people, how about using more commonly understood terminology here.
And they do that how with inspectors all over the place, and pretty destructive embargoes in place, for a while now (and back again)?
I’m well aware.
Did I say we did?
What exactly is your point here, because it’s not really clear? Iran is a normal actor, at least as normal as the the other regional regimes. If they want a nuke, they’d want one more for defensive and negotiating purposes. Given that they LIVE in the region, and have allies in the region, setting off a nuke in the region would not be in their interests. Plus, they are in an antagonistic struggle with both the Saudis and Israelis, both of whom do the exact same things that the Iranians either do or are accused of doing, on a regular basis, with our backing and blessing. They have allies whose lands are literally being expropriated by foreign powers. They have US military bases in almost all of their neighboring countries. And now NSA Yosemite Sam is doubling down on war-like rhetoric. In what way is this a threat to our national security. This sounds much like more a threat to Iranian national security. Add to that, it gives the hardliners fuel to push back the reformers once again. At best, what’s going to end up happening is Syria 2. How is that even remotely what we need in the world right now?
Iran’s nuclear ambitions appear as phony as our current pretext to conflict. If Iran wanted to hide its uranium enrichment activities, it could easily do so even with inspectors running around and embargoes. That has never been the difficult part for them. The fact they are announcing their uranium enrichment efforts to the world tells me that they are driving trollies their adversaries and full of crap.
Both Iran and Trump want a limited conflict or some kind of air strikes for the same purpose. To shore up support for unpopular governments. Neither wants a full blown war. “Wag the Dog” situations on both sides
Our ability to even engage in a full blown war with Iran like the invasion of Iraq is fairly limited. Mostly by a lack of manpower in our infantry and already being engaged in current conflicts.
I agree completely.
I am picturing a more half-assed outcome of the US fire some missiles at Iran, Iran uses the opportunity to crack down on dissent. Both sides declare victory and go repeat the farce until there is a Democrat in the White House and another deal is struck.
I think the real problem here is that the Middle East is a powder keg of ancient rivalries and intertwined hostilities/alliances. Any fireworks there are unlikely to remain contained for very long. I am honestly surprised Yemen has not evolved into a larger conflict yet. Involving Iran and the US will draw in allies, Saudi and Israel, things proceed from there. I am no historian, @anon61221983 would be the authority on that, but the very fragile and largely illusory “peace” in the area would not, I suspect, long survive a US/Iranian conflict.
Okay, let’s squash that thinking here. The current divisions within the middle east are of modern origin. Just because they have a religious veneer doesn’t mean that’s not the case. As soon as we get into the “ancient hatreds” mind set, we have lost any chance of fixing anything ([ETA] or to think critically about it), because we assume it’s intractable and “just the way it is.” We might as well just assume that god wants it, and that means we can’t solve it. I don’t and won’t give in to that kind of fatalism.
Actually, it’s more of a Saudi/Israel collab at this point. The Saudis don’t want Iran to have a Assad for all their help in his civil war. It’s really one messed up situation that the US keeps playing as if it’s in control over these two countries who are literally marching the rest of us into a potential world war (Russia don’t like anyone messing around in Central Asia but them). Then we got the war walrus who really is…just totally ‘normal’ with his war walrusing ways. All I can say is how long until the Screaming Orange decides to attack Iran anyways?
This is just one of my pet peeves, that these are ancient divisions, and inevitable. It glosses over the specificity of the events in question, and assumes there is not fix. There is certainly not an easy fix, and the language employed tends to reflect assumed ancient hatreds (especially the Sunni-Shia split in this case, but also the Jewish-Muslim-Christian one), but it ignores history and the actual political motivations that we can address.
Funny thing is that between the two they have enough fire power to do the job themselves. Especially if the job is a surgical strike on Iranian nuke facilities and not an all out war to end wars. For the latter Israel has nukes and the means to lob them into Tehran.
Israel bringing the US into this by way of an intel drop is funny business.
I will say that the complexity of the situation seems like it would defy the “bumper sticker” level of thinking that our politicians since Carter seem to have taken, and seems to have reached it’s zenith in our current dictator-wanna-be. And I am no sort of expert, so I certainly suggest no solutions. Looking at it from my level of knowledge, it certainly seems unsolvable, other than by the people in that area. But the same is said of conditions I deal with on a daily basis. However, in those areas, I just actually know what I am talking about!
