There shouldn’t be a single Trump building in the country that isn’t smothered in protests 24/7.
2 Likes
7 Likes
6 Likes
4 Likes
Trump’s foreign policy behaviour isn’t just incompetence and corruption; it’s too consistent.
He’s fully under Putin’s control; I think he is literally, explicitly taking orders from Vlad on what to do.
Whatever they’ve got on him, it’s more than just a pee tape.
6 Likes
[quote=“mdh_AcerPlatanoides, post:35, topic:687, full:true”]
If you really think that is a plausible thing Trump could do, I encourage you to start a thread and lay out some thought through thoughts on how that could come to pass. Please reference previous successful invasions of Persia, ever. Consider NATOs response.[/quote]
The tactical difficulty of invading Persia isn’t particularly relevant. The scenario I foresee is Trump and Putin deliberately working to start a war between Iran and the Saudi-led Sunni alliance, with the intention of moving in to seize the entire Middle East once the two sides have fought each other to exhaustion.
NATO’s response is of limited relevance because NATO no longer exists. None of the European countries have any faith in the US honouring their commitments; the treaty is a dead piece of paper.
Germany and France could handle Russia on their own, but they don’t have the firepower to take on the US. So I expect them to hunker down and rearm as fast as possible while extending diplomatic contacts towards China.
The UK appears determined to be Trump’s lapdog, but the unstable government could change that rapidly. I don’t know enough about Spanish or Italian politics to predict their response.
Both Flynn and Mattis were very recently retired and very recently appointed to senior national security roles. And I don’t see any reason to believe that their attitudes were unique amongst US military commanders. The chorus of support for Mattis when he was appointed suggests that his views have wide popularity.
Trump has delegated much more operational authority to the field commanders than was previously the case. He’s doing it to provide himself with scapegoats when things go wrong, but for the moment the officer corps are delighted. They’re off the leash.
(I hope that continuing here is okay; let me know if not)
1 Like
Haha this thread is a great idea!
As opposed to what the house of saud been doing since about 1946, to the US and others since then, to Russia?
The arab nations won’t bite on that. They fight over falcons and water, like rational people. We are their military, and their actual militaries senior officers have ALL been trained at US war colleges. This does mean they are in our pocket. This does not mean they are our stooges, or idiots.
What do we have that they need and can’t get elsewehere? I cant think of anything, so I don’t see us getting their goat the way the house of saud has had ours for generations. How would we get their goat, after getting ours back, of course?
You’re coming at that from last week. Just yesterday the G20 became the G19. They’re moving on without us, not folding deflated in our withdrawl. I don’t think we get to pretend Europe doesn’t exist in this US-Russia alliance you seem to see as a done deal.
Well, France is a nuclear power, and there are about 20 other nations just in Europe that you’re rounding off, in error.
The very unpopular ‘dead man walking’ PM sure does. The voters however, at last check Labour just took the lead from the Tories.
Who said unique among commanders? I specifically cited senior enlisted ranks. For a reason. Generals don’t fight wars, and good generals don’t start them.
And retired generals don’t do either.
That sounds like a violent fantatsy. I am sorry you’re so scared. The world changed, but we’re not going to start a proxy war with Iran, and we’re not going to ally with Russia against Europe within our lifetimes.
Hype is so easily bought into, but all mass-hysteria (in the actual meaning of the word, a mass panic, and not the weird misogynist interpretation of one-half of the term) fades.
totally great. I don’t mind sharing my thoughts.
I really would like to allay some of your fears, but I’m not sure how to. I don’t mean to be contrary.
1 Like
Except we’ve been pouring money and arms into Saudi Arabia/Egypt/Jordan for quite a while now. They certainly couldn’t go up against us, but they can sure as hell destroy their neighbors. Just look at what the Saudis have done to Yemen. They are in the middle of a famine, not because of our occasional drone sorties, but because the Saudis have been waging a war there for the past few years. While they have been trained and armed by us, that doesn’t stop them from using that weaponry and knowledge for their own purposes effectively in their own neighborhoods. They don’t need anything else from us, because they’ve gotten so much already. If we cut them off now, it would matter little, I think, as they’re already armed to the teeth, at least for a war with Iran (or even better, Doha).
4 Likes
For sure. they can totally punch down at Yemen with our help.
But Iran?
Or even better, Jerusalem?
As with John Deere tractors, none of our fancy gear works without firmware updates. The computers won’t work right if we don’t approve of the war. In short.
My point is that we’re their stooge, currently. What they would do if they suddenly had the power in the relationship… would be this, because they DO have more than 50% of the power. Reversing that means crossing a rubicon, and I don’t see us moving that way. In reality, or even in posture.
1 Like
That’s the thing, they’ve already had our help and don’t really need it.
It depends on whether or not they can pull Egypt and Jordan into the fight. But starting a war isn’t the same as winning it and thinking one can win a war isn’t the same as being able to win it. They don’t need the capability to defeat Iran, they just need to THINK they can. [quote=“mdh_AcerPlatanoides, post:24, topic:648”]
Or even better, Jerusalem?
[/quote]
Why would they? That is one power they know they can’t defeat, not because of their own capabilities vs. the Israelis, but because they know we’d actively intervene on behalf of the Israelis. [quote=“mdh_AcerPlatanoides, post:24, topic:648”]
My point is that we’re their stooge, currently.
[/quote]
I don’t know. It seems like a mutually beneficial relationship at this point. We’re getting support for our war on terror policies, and they are allowed a free hand in throwing their weight around.
But what do you think is the Rubicon here? War with Iran? Why is that the red line we wouldn’t want them to cross, especially with the current American and Israeli government? All we need is some cooked up Gulf of Tonkin BS, and we’re good to go.
3 Likes
If they didn’t have our help, they’d be doing it from jeeps and pre-1990 air power.
This is why assad has to dump drums of chemicals out of very old helicopters, and isn’t using his french mirage jets. He can’t fly those without France’s permission. Old helicopters with WWI era ‘bombs’, sure, Assad can pull that off without anyones help with what he has.
And he has more than the Saudi’s do. And most of the people in his nation are from his nation and would fight for it, quite unlike Saudi Arabia or those states.
Seriously, who wants to invade iran, why??? The Saudi’s would lose that war pretty profoundly which is why they fight it with proxies. And I can’t even imagine how they’d get there, since their navy is a coast guard and it isn’t set up for amphibuous assault. The Chinese and their one carrier could probably stop by if they weren’t busy in their own yard.
Lots of people would like to see Iran progress along a timeline which was interrupted in the 50s. They’re a proud people, and rightly so. I fully see their current regime as a transient response to US imperialism in much the same way North Korea is. People as individuals and en masse react poorly to big thumb pressing down on them.
We have a president who puts off an “angry unpredictable daddy” vibe. Cooler heads still exist at very very high levels in all these places, but there will be responses. If WWIII breaks out over the arab states attacking Iran I’ll be glad to admit my mistake. Things have to be possible to be plausible, and the Saudi’s can’t do much more than shake a fist at iran, and vice versa to be honest.
2 Likes
I think we’re just past where they think they need our continued patronage. Whether they do or not is another story. The fact that they’re able to dominate Yemen the way they are contributes to their view that (with regards to their neighborhood, with Egypt’s backing) they are likely able to dominate the block easily, if not through actual force, through it’s threat (pointing to Yemen as an example of what they can do).
I’m curious what makes you think that? Given that we’ve been selling the Saudis some serious arms since the 1990s? And again, the Saudis seem to have Eygpt’s full backing, and they too have been rolling in $$$ and tanks from us for quite a while now. This doesn’t have to be a force that equals us, the Russians, or the Chinese, but it has to be surperior to their neighbors like Yemen, Qatar, and possibly Iran (though right now, it’s all proxy wars, and shows no real sign of being other wise).
Which should tell you something about the capability (or perceive capability of Iran) who are likely the prime funder of the Syrian army (and Russia). Don’t forget that Iran has (until very recently) been under a pretty drastic set of sanctions which the Saudis have not suffered under, meaning that publicly speaking at least, Saudi military capability would likely outstrip the Iranians. This happened in the Iran-Iraq war, too. The Iranians (with our covert, Regan era help) built up their military during the war, not prior to it. [quote=“mdh_AcerPlatanoides, post:26, topic:648”]
The Saudi’s would lose that war pretty profoundly which is why they fight it with proxies.
[/quote]
But how do we know this? What makes a country that just struggled through endless sanctions pretty much since the revolution in 1979:
I really don’t get why people think Iran is some incredibly dangerous, all powerful force, when outside of the Iran-Iraq war, they have been dealing with what they see as their problems via smaller scale support of groups like Hezbollah, who depend on asymmetrical war fare (trained by the Iranian revolutionary guard). It’s the Saudis who have been carrying about nation-destroying war and who have decided that they are some how the key bulwark against Iranian aggression. [quote=“mdh_AcerPlatanoides, post:26, topic:648”]
Things have to be possible to be plausible, and the Saudi’s can’t do much more than shake a fist at iran, and vice versa to be honest.
[/quote]
That might likely be true, I honestly don’t know. I don’t think that sanctions and arms sales make the two equivalent - I don’t see how they can be, given what we know about the situation. But either way, it doesn’t matter if one or the other is superior, just that one thinks they are superior.
2 Likes
I think I accidentally started this thread by a throwaway comment. I feel totally unqualified to comment on the matter above. I would just mention in passing that I have been reading a book which deals, inter alia, with the OSS in WW2 and the politics around it and it was this prompted my original comment.
2 Likes
How confident are you that Trump would go to the defence of Israel?
2 Likes
I don’t know about @mdh_AcerPlatanoides, but I’m highly confident we would, no matter who was president. Israel and it’s defense is one of the few reliable issues in American FP - the end of the CW didn’t change that. Even Trump’s relative antisemitism doesn’t mean he’ll change directions on the issue. Something major would have to happen for that to change, I think.
But it’s highly unlikely that the Saudis would do that in any case, because we’ve likely given more $$$ and support to the Israelis vs. the Saudis, and the countries in the region have gotten their asses kicked several times already by the Israelis. Nothing much has changed on that front. Plus, it would be one place where Egypt would sharply break with the Saudis because they want to keep the current status quo on their borders.
5 Likes
3 Likes
You’re coming at that from last week. Just yesterday the G20 became the G19.
They’re moving on without us, not folding deflated in our withdrawl. I don’t think we get to pretend Europe doesn’t exist in this US-Russia alliance you seem to see as a done deal.[/quote]
What’s left of the EU will hold together for now, but NATO without the US is simply not NATO. The North Atlantic bit was fundamental.
The US-Russia alliance is a done deal because Trump is Putin’s wholly-owned puppet. US national interests have nothing to do with it.
The very unpopular ‘dead man walking’ PM sure does. The voters however, at last check Labour just took the lead from the Tories. [/quote]
Which doesn’t matter until the government is forced to call an election. We’ll probably see a few intra-party leadership fights before that happens.
[quote=“mdh_AcerPlatanoides, post:21, topic:648, full:true”][quote=“Wanderfound, post:20, topic:648”]
Both Flynn and Mattis were very recently retired and very recently appointed to senior national security roles.
[/quote]
Who said unique among commanders? I specifically cited senior enlisted ranks. For a reason. Generals don’t fight wars, and good generals don’t start them.
And retired generals don’t do either. [/quote]
I find this frequently-expressed belief that the US military is somehow too competent and honourable to ever allow itself to be used in unjust aggression to be horrifyingly destructive and utterly divorced from reality.
There is nothing in US history to suggest that the US military shows any resistance at all to destructive military adventurism.
In its entire history, the USA has not had a single decade of uninterrupted peace. Start at the 7:50 mark in this for the list:
The behaviour of the US military during those actions does not suggest that they are any more ethical than other militaries.
The fact that a military is well trained and disciplined does not suggest that it is more likely to resist being used for evil. Quite the opposite.
[quote=“mdh_AcerPlatanoides, post:21, topic:648, full:true”][quote=“Wanderfound, post:20, topic:648”]
, but for the moment the officer corps are delighted. They’re off the leash.
[/quote]
That sounds like a violent fantatsy. I am sorry you’re so scared.[/quote]
I would appreciate less of the claimed mind-reading and condescension shown here.
[quote=“mdh_AcerPlatanoides, post:21, topic:648, full:true”]The world changed, but we’re not going to start a proxy war with Iran, and we’re not going to ally with Russia against Europe within our lifetimes.
Hype is so easily bought into, but all mass-hysteria (in the actual meaning of the word, a mass panic, and not the weird misogynist interpretation of one-half of the term) fades.
[/quote]
The fascist bastards running Trump view the world as a Manichaean struggle between white Christians and everyone else. This applies to both Putin and Bannon; the Russians got in on the modern Islamaphobia train long before the Americans did.
They aren’t trying to avoid war. They’re trying to win.
3 Likes
(sanctions recently lifted, but likely to be reimposed. And Iran has not recovered from their impact yet)
The war in Yemen is already a Saudi/Iranian proxy war.
1 Like
But no discussion of stamping out this threat would be complete without mentioning the government that gives terrorists all three—safe harbor, financial backing, and the social standing needed for recruitment. It is a regime that is responsible for so much instability in the region. I am speaking of course of Iran.
From Lebanon to Iraq to Yemen, Iran funds, arms, and trains terrorists, militias, and other extremist groups that spread destruction and chaos across the region. For decades, Iran has fueled the fires of sectarian conflict and terror.
It is a government that speaks openly of mass murder, vowing the destruction of Israel, death to America, and ruin for many leaders and nations in this room.
Among Iran’s most tragic and destabilizing interventions have been in Syria. Bolstered by Iran, Assad has committed unspeakable crimes, and the United States has taken firm action in response to the use of banned chemical weapons by the Assad Regime – launching 59 tomahawk missiles at the Syrian air base from where that murderous attack originated.
Responsible nations must work together to end the humanitarian crisis in Syria, eradicate ISIS, and restore stability to the region. The Iranian regime’s longest-suffering victims are its own people. Iran has a rich history and culture, but the people of Iran have endured hardship and despair under their leaders’ reckless pursuit of conflict and terror.
Until the Iranian regime is willing to be a partner for peace, all nations of conscience must work together to isolate Iran, deny it funding for terrorism, and pray for the day when the Iranian people have the just and righteous government they deserve.
…from a speech delivered to the key backers of Daesh, giving them a green light to attack Iran, and implying no US intervention if they do so.
Rather glaringly fails to mention the Russian involvement in backing Assad, too.
3 Likes