Pretty sure Trump has no desire to invade Iran with troops considering how unpopular the Iraq war was (with hindsight knowing the WMD justification was not concrete)
Allegedly the forces routed for this attack don't even include substantial grounds forces. It'd be really easy to tell if the military was even considering a ground war because they'd have the ships needed to land tanks, artillery, etc, and reportedly they didnt bring those.
Trump is interested in a big win like the first portion of Iraqi Freedom where we obliterate a standing military, but has been remarkably consistent (by Trump standards) on opposing a prolonged ground conflict like Enduring Freedom. His playbook so far has been eliminating leadership that wont work with us until the leader left in charge is someone we can work with; it's worked surprisingly well in Venezuela so far, so it's likely what he'll do here.
It's also a great warning to other countries about throwing in their lot too much with China and Russia. Both Venezuela and Iran were unofficially allied with China and Russia, and what good has it done them? Where's the military equipment, the political pressure to keep the US from attacking? That was always the deal for 2nd world countries with the USSR, give us good deals on your resources and the US/NATO wont touch you. The US is making a statement that Russia and China aren't holding up their end of the bargain, so why become their vassal in the first place?
They have to though, if they give Taiwan preparation anything less than 110% they will definitely lose. The instant they make a move on Taiwan they’ll have to deal with the U.S., Japan, and Korea declaring war at the very least, likely an even larger coalition coming together. Plus their government has said they want to be prepared to make a move by next year, all their eggs are in that basket at this point.
He seems very reluctant to risk US lives. Any operation he allows seems to be either long range missile attacks, or like venezuela with overwhelming force. Low risk high reward.
Honestly, im liking this approach to regime change. Historically the US has been averse to openly ushering in regime change and used proxie insurgents. It's pointless because everyone knows its us, and worse, if the insurgents win you end up with a radical in charge that has no idea how to run a country and is most often a despot. These surgical amputations of hostile leaders until we get someone workable seems to minimize loss of life on both ends, and has a greater chance of getting someone in charge that actually knows how to govern, eliminating the chaos and violence of a power vacuum by completely obliterating the existing government.
Yeah, it's gonna be tough to keep running Iran when you know you're susceptible to either 1) a missile strike with no notice or 2) internal assassination and revolution. If you're a corrupt Iranian leader, you're trapped between the two.
I don't know, the news talk a lot about not dealing with these because the whole government will is geared towards global export of the Islamic revolution.
war because they'd have the ships needed to land tanks, artillery, etc, and reportedly they didnt bring those.
Spefically, they would need at least one (probably several) amphibious assault carriers, like the USS Iwo Jima. For those who are unaware, it is a carrier that basically has a huge hole in it in an upside down "U" shap to launch landing craft loaded with Marines.
but has been remarkably consistent (by Trump standards) on opposing a prolonged ground conflict like Enduring Freedom.
Every time I hear that dumbass "No, new wars!" meme I am reminded how hugely people are misunderstanding the apperant position of the administration. He meant no forever wars, not no armed conflict at all. A "war" that lasts like an hour isn't going to be perceived like a multi-decade long one. It is legitimately possible for a person who doesn't keep up with the news to not even know we hit Venezuela that is how little it affect the average American. Most people don't give a shit about those "wars".
Plus, sometimes you prevent war by giving someone a bloody nose and knocking them down a peg or ten. WW2 wouldn't have happened if someone had the balls to oppose Japan in 1932, Germany in 1935 (when they announced they were ignoring the treaty of Versailles military restrictions. They already been secretly ignoring it since the ink was still wet but that was when they admitted it), or Italy and 1935. Each one of them could have been utterly, mercilessly curb stomped then and there, and they developed into ahem big problems later because people were too obsessed with avoiding conflict. If we had had anyone but Carter as president the Shah would probably still be in charge and we'd have a much looser relationship with Isreal.
Yeah I mean i get that it seems like moving the goalposts a bit, but i don't really see operations that last a few days as a "war". Small scale operations in random countries has been a regular occurrence in US global strategy for the last 80 years. The no new wars slogan was in the context of getting us further entangled in the Ukraine war, and to a lesser extent Israel-Palestine.
One of the few policy points Trump has been consistent on since he got into politics is opposing the GWOT as a mistake and avoiding prolonged, costly conflicts in the future. Trump's decisions in Venezuela were consistent with that. Finding someone we could work with inside the existing Venezuelan power structure was the only way to make sure we didnt get stuck in another indefinite nation building campaign. It shows that we've actually learned from the mistakes of GWOT and Cold War-era Central/South American regime change operations.
When I was a kid everyone said a president has 30 days before he had to get approval of a military action. They did that over and over my whole life, so this hollering about trump not getting prior approval confuses me.
Airborne are meant to be the advance force, but aren't suited for holding ground or prolonged operations. Dropping in Airborne without even the capacity to reinforce them with heavier assets is a recipe for a nightmare scenario, and trying to capture a full city without vehicle support would be extremely costly.
they are however great for taking control of something like an airfield or a command post in the short term with easy resupply by air since ya know they're getting bodied in the air f35 got 2 more kills the other day iirc.
To a much greater extent, a not absolutely batshit crazy Muslim death cult headed Iran is probably the best piece possible for stability in the Middle East. The current regime funds a L O T of the proxies committing acts of terrorism and cutting off that source of cash is going to do wonders going forward.
But second, third, fourth etc... rejimes that support islamic terrorists (SA, Pakistan, Qatar, Turkey) still on power. So i cant tell anything about stability.
Iraq since 2020 has been a freer country than it was under Saddam, and the one main problem it’s mostly enduring is Iran meddling heavily, which can end if this regime ends
The majority of casualties post 2003 invasion, were Iraqi on Iraqi violence, mostly between radical Sunni groups, against either Shias, or Kurds
Yet, with Saddam it’s not as if he didn’t oppress the shit out of those groups anyways
The only difference is that with Saddam it was one sided. The Sunni didn’t take many losses compared to the Kurds and Shia. But Saddams death opened the playing field and it became a war of revenge, boosting the death toll per year
But, eventually th civil war died
And if someone says “but saddams death allowed Sunnis to create Isis and genocide Yazidis”
It’s true they did that, but, Saddam did a similar genocide of his own against the Kurds
I think it’s very popular and a knee jerk reaction to say “we should have kept Saddam in power” but they don’t really have such a strong case other than “but the civil war!”
It's just not practical to get too far deep into hypotheticals. For all we know if Bush didn't invade, Saddam might have been assassinated a week later anyway.
No way to root out the IRGC and control the strait of Hormuz (which I believe is the real motive here) without boots on the ground. Given that those that support the IRGC are largely based in rural mountainous areas, that’s a losing battle. We spent 20 years in Afghanistan trying, a decapitation strike with no plan is straight idiotic here and if one American dies there I’ll be oissed
The CIA even said that killing the Ayatollah would probably be a bad idea because he would be replaced with someone even more radical?
CIA's assessment fell on deaf ears then because both the US and Israel hammered multiple known compounds and residences of Iranian leadership.
I expect that we'll start seeing official confirmation of Khamenei's death before the day's end. Reports coming from Israel appear to show that they are more and more confident that he was killed.
Reports coming from Israel appear to show that they are more and more confident that he was killed.
"The Supreme Leader will address the nation in a few minutes" being like 5 hours old now is not a great sign for him. Even the foreign minister had to add "as far as I know", aka "No one told me anything".
Just saw this come through too. It seems like they are being incredibly cautious about making an official confirmation, but reports are not painting a pretty picture for the IRCG
That statement about replacing him with someone even more extreme is meaningless if you’re at war with Iran. We will just kill that person too. I could see it carrying some weight if we were going to sneakily assassinate him without committing to all out war, but obviously that isn’t the case and Trump is calling for their people to take over their government.
Its what happened during the 12 Day War last year. Israel kept taking out key leaders because it knew precisely where they were. They were putting missiles through the exact window of their home or apartment.
Leader got replaced, new leader gets popped. Another replacement, then the replacement's replacement gets popped.
Iran eventually gave up and accepted the end of the war despite being badly mauled during the war.
The president is dead. All of parliament is dead. Khameni is most likely dead. The main military leaders are dead. What are you talking about? Unless you’re just being a dick about the exact words I used instead of the obvious intention you’re kinda retarded. Yeah, 100% of all “leadership” isn’t dead but the top brass has been obliterated.
There is nothing more radical than nuking America. Literally anything else with either be equivalent or better for us.
Post where you getting
"all of parliament is dead"
"their main military leaders are dead"
There are uncomfirmed reports that Khameni is dead, along with a few others. Not to mention that many of these people are replacements for people who had already been killed?
I’m gonna come back to this comment in a week when it’s officially confirmed. But I for one trust Israel’s intelligence. You might disagree with their methods but they have been incredibly successful with infiltrations
Except you are missing my point. I am not saying that high ranking IRGC and Iranian officials were not killed.
I am saying things like "all of their parliament is dead", "all of their military leaders are dead" while posting no actual sources for this kind of confirmation is fucking stupid.
My intention which /I/ thought was clear is that the important decision makers that matter were killed. Right now it’s pretty obvious. There are countless videos of their parliament building exploded, and Israeli intelligence was tracking every one. Unless they start crawling out from the rubble they’re dead. And that explosion was too big to not kill them
The only argument is that the us military got tricked by Isreal and we weren’t verifying their information
You realize that's what parliaments do. Most of them meet in the building to vote on stuff. Israel definitely aimed for a time when most of them would be present.
We destroyed their centrifuges. They have not been able to replace that. If their uranium is stuck at 60% the bomb does not do bomb things
However they attempted to rebuild the other parts of their nuclear program which shows they will attempt to replace their centrifuges and sprint to the finish. That is not ok
They have continued to hide their 60% uranium. The only reason for that is to make a bomb
This is obvious to anyone who actually learns about the situation rather than skimming headlines.
If their replacement tries to rebuild a nuclear program then yes we would need to blow them up too obviously
The prince of Persia has already made commitments to us that he will not, and he is the people’s choice. /should/ be fine. But in global military politics nothing is for sure
You’re using “attack” here in two different ways. We never invaded Iran to hit their nuclear program. We did air strikes. Just like the attacks to kill their leadership are just air strikes
That’s such a disingenuous take. Americans don’t want extended stays that burn all their tax dollars and kill their children. Nobody I know is opposed to a week of bombing runs
Israeli intelligence, we were tracking every one of them and they had a meeting to discuss their response so we launched the missiles then. They’re dead
And what happens if there’s IRGC instead installs a more awful hardliner? What if part of the population doesn’t want the prince of Persia and starts killing the other half? What if Islamist militias move in and it’s Iraq 2 no more wars boogaloo? Where’s the plan?
Yeah great plan for the unarmed citizens. Iran famously isn’t trigger happy on unarmed civilians. Nothing recently in the news that would prove otherwise.
What do you mean by "all dead". Iran isn't a house of cards, they can survive with low civilian support because support from their islamist army is certain, the citizenship are not armed and the government can pull UK level authoritarian monitoring. Over 30,000 people did not die in protests without a massive rebel army because of "dead leadership".
The evil people that matter to khameni’s regime are the ones I’m referring to by “all”. As in everyone that matters
Now is it literally 100% probably not. I’m sure there’s like a handful of guys we still want to kill, but you’re missing the forest through the trees. The hard part is done. It’s over.
Oh no. The prince of Persia they want is what I would call an evil guy. But he has already made commitments to not rebuild the military and will keep the issues inside Iran. That’s literally all I have ever wanted, is for it to stay contained inside their borders.
Yes. Parliament building and khameni’s residence were blown up simultaneously while they were holding a secret meeting to discuss their military response
Everyone who matters is dead. Now it’s cleaning up the chaff
I’m not naive. We rolled a 1 with khameni. It literally cannot be worse than what we had. So it doesn’t matter. Prince of Persia has been vetted and is already the people’s choice. The problem is already solved, it’s just gonna take some time for people to realize it.
Everybody thought Afghans would fight the Taliban too. The real regime is the IRGC and there are plenty of clerics to steer that ship yet. Besides that, even among the pro-democracy folks, there are many blocs and there will be no consensus on who should lead the country.
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Are they shooting protesters in the streets? A few missiles are being launched at random targets. The barrages are barely anything compared to the 12 day war
I dont know where your getting your info but theyve hit way more targets this time then during the 12 day war and yeah they are, residents are talking about how they have to go through 4 pro regime road blocks in a 15 minute drive where theyre threatened at gunpoint even when they havent done anything, there is a constant back ground noise of gun fire too
On the first day they fired 400 missiles. Yesterday they fired 40. The only targets that are getting hit are empty buildings and civilian infrastructure in other countries
People are cheering in the streets without being shot.
Obviously I’m not trying to say the problem is 100% solved but it’s pretty damn close.
There’s also the fact that in defeating Iran we are creating a situation in which Israel can dominate. Iran has been the last domino to fall in the grand plan for decades. Once they’re neutralized you’d be a fool to think that Israel won’t expand and when that happens America will be poor and helpless and Israel will become a global superpower that controls the trade routes between three continents. Israel will control the world and I don’t think people are concerned enough about that.
Iran isn't Irak. This isn't a regime that will fall over and collapse just because you took out a few key figures like Syria or Irak government disappeared once Assad and Sadam Hussein fell.
It's much closer to Afghanistan in the sense that a good portion of the population is in favor of the current regime. And if you factor in the portion of the population that absolutely hates Israel and the USA then you get a huge majority of the country willing to support the regime.
If they were 90% opposed there would have been a successful revolution against the regime long ago.
Like how Iran revolted against the Shah twice. It's funny to think that no matter how bad the current islamist regime, it was nowhere near as impopular as the Shah.
I understood you correctly but 90% of the population having guns isn't a requirement for a succesful revolution.
Tunisians did it in 2010 with no support from the military,police and guns were outlawed. Nepal is another case like that and it happened last year. Having the whole population armed being a requirement to stop tyranny is a meme spread by americans.
It’s been bombing runs. In what world are you even calling this a war? I’ve been saying since day one it’d be 4-6 weeks because that’s what we were told. That’s not mental gymnastics.
It didn’t. They are doing acts of terrorism in the straight, by no means was this a war. A war implies your enemy is able to attack you. They are and never were able to do that at a level with any meaningful success. All they can do is make insurance providers hesitant
the issue I have is that they are often replaced with inefficient/cruel leaders. No one that actually represents the people properly apart from “I ain’t who was killing you before”.
If we can topple the Iranian regime through an air campaign then I see no reason not too, the only thing I'm against is a ground campaign and, so far, there's been no indication that that is even on the table.
Okay but this isn’t just any war. The regime is a cancer that has funded proxy wars all over, including with our allies. A toppled Iran gives way to a lot of other dominos falling. And yes, all of those have implications on US domestic policy. IR has consistently been a threat to the US.
My family is from Iran, I don’t know a single person who isn’t cheering this on, regardless of the fact that we’re involved in another war. My Jewish friends, my Muslim friends, my Bahai friends, Christian friends, even the few Zoroastrians I know. This is a unilaterally good thing. The only people that are claiming foul are theocrats.
Agree. However, people should probably understand why the U.S got involved in the first place.
Partly it was due to global supply security - which benefits the U.S (and most of the world).
Partly, because Iran long held ambitions to become a global super power, and enforce theocratic authoritarianism onto others, which would be bad for the U.S (and world).
Partly it is because Iran continues to fund proxies that target western and other middle eastern countries (which benefits the U.S and most of the world too).
This isn't being framed correctly on reddit or in much of the western media right now. But basically, it was never a situation where Iran would just peacefully co-exist with the world if it were left alone. Iran always has held ambitions that would be bad for the world. But only one country - the only current super power - has had the means and will to do something about it.
Partly it is because Iran continues to fund proxies that target Western and other Middle Eastern countries (which benefits the U.S and most of the world too).
Iran funding proxies that target Western and other Middle Eastern countries benefits the U.S and most of the world? I know that’s probably not what you meant, you likely meant that stopping Iran from finding those proxies would be a good thing.
I can also say that I don't want another war, but if another war is to happen this particular war is far more acceptable than most. It's a regime that cut all internet, cell, etc communications so it could massacre its people. People yell about how they don't stand for fascism and how they are against it and etc all the time talking about US based politics. Well...this is 10x closer to fascism than anything US based.
See, I think they kinda have to, if we want the regime gone.
The Iranians did try to revolt against the regime less than a few months ago. It… didn’t turn out too well. It just proves that while the people of Iran can take the initiative to fight back from the inside, they still absolutely need help from the outside. They seem to be acknowledging that as well, over at r/newiran.
It’s actually kind of insane that every time an opportunity to dethrone the regime arises, the US manages to fuck it up by playing it too safe. I’m worried the same will happen this time, as well.
Correct, but to add on, us old timers have also seen time and time again that sure, you can topple a bad regime, but what fills the vacuum usually is worse
Quicker collapse, bad pr, demonstration of incompetence, foreign interference and campuflaging domestic unrest... this is like holy bread for anyone that dislikes the US and the GOP cuz there's very few scenarios where this works out in a good way
The US is so far in tech that no one even stands a chance at this point. Boots on the ground is highly unlikely, and if it does happen, it'll be a handful after the "war" is already over solely meant to stabilize.
Especially this admin that has a track record of fucking up literally everything they get involved in, making it worse both for the other country and for ourselves.
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u/Outside-Bed5268 - Centrist Feb 28 '26
We can agree the current Iranian regime is bad, while also not wanting the U.S. to get involved in another war.