The Minority Marksman.
"When you meet a swordsman, draw your sword: Do not recite poetry to one who is not a poet."
-a Ch'an Buddhist axiom.
The Ruskies would agree.
DESERT STORM FILLED SOVIET MILITARY WITH AWE
Iran fought these guys to a standstill for a decade.
How much of their military is fighting for passion for country, vs for food, conscription, bloodlust and money, I wonder? For how long would that enthusiasm hold out against a no holds US effort?
"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." - Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Constitution, Draft 1, 1776
The USA is not going to stay in Iraq forever, and I don't see it "winning" this super expensive and everlasting war, and even less hearts and minds...
Levelling the country and its neighbours is not a realistic option, even less than the "nation building" pipe dream.
How do you think americans will look back to this mess twenty years from now?
...supposing you manage to get out by then
I'm thinking that at this point if there were any ongoing negotiations with the Iraqis secretary Pompeo would express that to the media. I think the US had an agreement that they were in a training capacity only and the Iraqis see the drone strike and other Iranian militia strike as some kind of huge violation. The strike killed an Iraqi military officer. I'm not sure the US knew who was in those vehicles for sure, or maybe they did and didn't care.
I'm sure they're communicating at the top levels but Pompeo sounds like there really isn't anything to discuss. We're here and we're staying here. Of course if Trump changes his mind (he does that) then maybe it's just a temporary position for media consumption.
I'm thinking a few moves ahead so mostly it's just a ball game for me. I don't have any skin in the game anymore.
Last edited by Borderland; 01-05-2020 at 05:07 PM.
In the P-F basket of deplorables.
Okay, so we had 1518 casualties in Desert Storm. You're saying that means it wasn't a walkover? Did you ever look at Iraqi casualties?
And the 39,145 number you're using reflects the entirety of our involvement in Iraq, not just the steamrolling of their military. How many were lost in the 21 day push to Baghdad?
Dude....I don't even know where to start. The capabilities brought by our fleet of B52s today is in a different league compared to the capabilities that B52s brought in the 60s.
Just because they have a token number of somewhat modern fighters on top of their larger amount of obsolete fighters, which they can barely keep flying as-is and have no industry to fall back on in wartime to fix that (unlike us), and might get a lucky shot with an old beyond-service-life missile (if it even fires), doesn't mean that their military poses any significance of more than a speed bump.
You've really got to get a better argument than, "well we lost 1500 soldiers in Desert Storm, and we have B52s" to why their military is some sort of magical fucking gem that would perform 4 decades ahead of where it's actually capable.
Last edited by TGS; 01-05-2020 at 05:07 PM.
"Are you ready? Okay. Let's roll."- Last words of Todd Beamer
Iran's in a tough spot.
They're going to have to let this one slide or suffer a military hardware downgrade like Saddam did in the 1st gulf war.
The highway of death comes to mind here.
In the P-F basket of deplorables.
In other words, they are EVIL and DUMB, and have no qualities that we associate with rational actors, much like children, while we have our flaws, but we are moral and " the good guys." Or so the neo-conservatives have been bleating since 1979. And Iranian nukes have been "here in 16-24 months" since 1985.
But, besides Israel, our tightest "friends" in the region had a group of their citizens commit the most lethal terrorist act in history on our soil, and they show every sign of being a threat in that manner for the forseeable future. And they assassinate their own citizens with impunity.
But my god, "Iran, the North Korea of the Middle East."
We need to get the hell out of the ME. I could give a shit about moral culpability at this point. The ME needs a good century to tear itself apart without the West trying to hold together a plan of nation-states that was designed to keep to the ME weak and easily manipulated from the start. (Particularly Iraq-- those assembled to create it openly stated "this will never work.")
But as anti- Iran setiment has been inculcated as patriotism by our elites for over 40 years, of course that's not happening.
Last edited by Baldanders; 01-05-2020 at 05:20 PM.
REPETITION CREATES BELIEF
REPETITION BUILDS THE SEPARATE WORLDS WE LIVE AND DIE IN
NO EXCEPTIONS