The Iran War (was Nuclear Program) thread

[Mik]

An interesting review of a book on imperial overreach.

https://claremontreviewofbooks.com/the-lamps-are-going-out/?utm_content=375012188&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&hss_channel=fbp-164771506031

[Renauda]

@Mik

Westad’s book on the Cold War is one of the best I have ever read - and I have read at least a dozen or more on the subject over the years.

This latest one on imperial overreach is now added to my running list of must reads.

[Mik]

It's fascinating to see how events in history are linked and caused by prior events, and to examine the similarities.

[blondie]

I’m trying to wrap my head around this $2M per ship thing.

[Renauda]

@blondie said:

I’m trying to wrap my head around this $2M per ship thing.

You’re not alone. It is an international waterway open for all commercial traffic. No one state along its shoreline can claim control or exact a toll. Iran’s present claim is groundless and contrary to maritime law. It alone could bring this ceasefire to an abrupt and violent end at the blink of an eye.

[89th]

What an odd situation. Hard to imagine Iran will just stop fighting. They had another country bomb the crap out of them and kill many of their leaders. But maybe they’ll just be fine with making extra money off of maritime traffic.

Would be the first time Trump has ever lost. Aside from every business and political venture he’s been apart of.

[Mik]

Wasn't that Iran's proposal? Can't imagine that will stand. They don't own international waters.

[Renauda]

Exactly. And if they were to try to enforce it, that alone would amount to a justifiable casus belli.

[Mik]

Maybe Europe is encouraging that for an excuse to appease Trump and get involved.

[jon-nyc]

Trump floats the idea of the US and Iran forming a ‘joint venture’ to collect the tolls together.

“We’re thinking of doing it as a joint venture,” the president told Karl, who shared Trump’s response on the social platform X. “It’s a way of securing it — also securing it from lots of other people. It’s a beautiful thing.”

https://thehill.com/policy/international/5821343-trump-us-iran-ceasefire-deal-joint-venture-strait-of-hormuz/

[Mik]

There’s just no idea too inappropriate.

[Renauda]

Inappropriate and detached from all reality.

[AndyD]

Fuck tolls.
These are international shipping waters.
I'd rather have a huge area of Iranian land cleared to the east of the waters and made uninhabitable.

And keep bombing the Iranian officials and army wherever they pop up.

I feel the same as the day after the Trading Towers fell or the Gazan terrorists invaded Israel.
Fuck them being in control of world shipping.

Trump's started this war, he'd better have the guts to finish it.
Not that the UK or USA actually need much oil from the area, but I feel very strongly about this defence of the free seas.

[jon-nyc]

@AndyD said:

Trump's started this war, he'd better have the guts to finish it.

I think that’s ultimately the problem. Bibi, for his own reasons, convinced Trump it would be easy and quick. Trump signed up for easy and quick and the pentagons plans for reopening the straight are probably complicated and long.

Not that the UK or USA actually need much oil from the area, but I feel very strongly about this defence of the free seas.

“Energy independence” is something of a myth (except in a blockade scenario). It’s not like we get to live in a world of $40 oil when the strait is closed. And the fact that a few American oil companies are raking it in is small consolation to your average Joe paying $5 at the gas pump.

[Tom-K]

We are forgetting that the reason all of this is happening is to keep Iran from becoming a nuclear threat. Now, if that was really going to happen, I haven't a clue. (And no one is even coming close to telling the truth about it.) But if it actually was than this closing of the Strait of Hormuz is just a blip.

[AndyD]

Yup.
If all you need is 4% enriched uranium for power plants, why do the Iranians, while also vowing to kill Americans, enrich their uranium in deep secretive bunkers to 60% and more? While also developing long range missile capabilities.

It's a no brainer.
Something proactive needed to be done.

[Mik]

Should have been done 2001-2008.

[jon-nyc]

@Tom-K said:

We are forgetting that the reason all of this is happening is to keep Iran from becoming a nuclear threat. Now, if that was really going to happen, I haven't a clue. (And no one is even coming close to telling the truth about it.) But if it actually was than this closing of the Strait of Hormuz is just a blip.

It's not clear we've done much about that other than delay it and make them even more determined. Solving that problem requires true regime change (you have to kill the king, not wound him). Trump clearly thought they'd do that, announced that as his goal even on the first day of the attacks. The problem is Trump doesn't seem to be wiling to pay the price required to do it, at least once he found out it wasn't going to come cheap.

[jon-nyc]

@Tom-K said:

Now, if that was really going to happen, I haven't a clue. (And no one is even coming close to telling the truth about it.)

I'm confident it was happening. I think people misunderstand when Trump or Bibi say 'they were 2 weeks away from a bomb'. That doesn't mean they would have had a bomb in mid-march had we not attacked 2/28. It means they have enough enriched uranium at 60% that, whenever they made the decision to do so, they could further enrich it to 90% in two weeks time. (or however many weeks it was). I think that was generally true and had been for some time, and may still be true. Whatever damage the GBU-57 MOPs did last June, it didn't take out all their stockpiles.

[bachophile]

either way, alot of people here feel we r really fucked.

unless he really does manage to talk the iranians into handing over the enriched unranium