Iran v US confrontation

Giggsyking

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He's blustering that the US has Qom in its crosshairs if Iran follows through with any attacks.
I dont think he is that naive to do that. He will just unify the the whole country (Iran) behind their government.
 

Giggsyking

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Plenty of such sites throughout Iraq as well. It’s too ludicrous to contemplate though...

(...wakes up tomorrow morning to footage of Khadhimain ablaze...)
Come on, he cant be that naive, he cant make 25m Iraqi Shia boil, IF IRAN attacks an american base. He will solidify the Iranian influence in Iraq if he do so.
 

2cents

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Come on, he cant be that naive, he cant make 25m Iraqi Shia boil, IF IRAN attacks an american base. He will solidify the Iranian influence in Iraq if he do so.
Yes I agree, but if he’s not talking about the shrines then I’d love to know what is he referring to? He’s gonna bomb Persepolis?
 

berbasloth4

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someone needs to just bomb the whitehouse. Americans using bullying tactics as the norm. going to feck us all up
 

Synco

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True, but I doubt even Trump is dumb enough to do that. He is however more than capable of blustering that he might, which would at a minimum cause the Iranians to think twice about how to proceed.
Isn't that creating a similar effect to a lesser extent? I remember Bush's ramblings about a 'crusade' being a complete PR desaster.
 

berbatrick

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Isn't that creating a similar effect to a lesser extent? I remember Bush's ramblings about a 'crusade' being a complete PR desaster.
Not just Bush
https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/06/201369121946527287.html

The quote I was looking for in the article, from a US general - "My God is bigger than his."

Highlight which I didn't know about:
In the spring of 2004, a Bradley armoured vehicle drove through the streets of Samarra, sending 25mm shells crashing into Iraqi households while a US interpreter on a loudspeaker shouted the chant: "Jesus kill Mohammed." In the words of one of the men involved in the firefight: "Each time I go into combat I get closer to God."
 

Raoul

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Isn't that creating a similar effect to a lesser extent? I remember Bush's ramblings about a 'crusade' being a complete PR desaster.
That's how he talks. He said this....


then literally a couple of months later he was shaking hands with the guy.


He's a bullshitter, a salesman, and demagogue - all wrapped in one person.
 

Denis79

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People have to realise that there is a World outside of the USA and the UK. The majority of people on this Earth live outside these two countries so it is given that most people may not support their stance on many things.
Agree.
 

berbatrick

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That's how he talks. He said this....


then literally a couple of months later he was shaking hands with the guy.


He's a bullshitter, a salesman, and demagogue - all wrapped in one person.
The very hard work, going against the express wishes of the US govt, in that instance was done by the then newly eleted S Korean president. He met Kim when this was going on and soon after the Trump meeting happened. I am not sure there is a similar figure here, unless there's a coup in SA.
 

starman

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We need a alien invasion to teach the US a lesson and put them in their place. If Hollywood movies have taught me anything is they only tend to attack the US
 

Synco

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@berbatrick @Raoul
Not sure my point came across. It was: The most stupid thing a US president can do in the Middle East is using the terminology of religious war. (Just speaking of their self-interest here, specifically regarding the region's Shia population.) Same goes for threatening to level landmarks of Persian culture, which includes the anti-regime Iranians as well.

Actually carrying out such attacks would still be much worse of course, but bragging about it will likely have the same effect to a lesser extent.
 
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langster

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Yes Trump is a bullshitter, a coward, a fecking ignorant moron and a demagogue all wrapped in to one.

What everyone is missing is he's also fecking batshit. He's insecure, paranoid, obsessive, compulsive, suffers from severe narcissistic personality disorder and is also a sociopath.

He has proven he will lie and cheat and blag and bullshit to cover his own ass. It's simply all about him. Worse still, he has been empowered by the fact he feels he is above the law because he has had no comeuppance, no consequence for any of his actions. If anything, he's emboldened because he's always defended so staunchly.

Lives mean nothing to him. He is ignorant about everything and all he sees is a diversion from his impeachment topped with him looking badass.

Trump is the most predictable, unpredictable man on the planet.

Saying he won't escalate things further by attacking holy sites is like saying he would pivot after he was elected. It's like people have learned nothing and want to be made to look stupid all over again. The minute this is made personal to him and he feels like he's being attacked personally is the minute all bets are off.
 

Wibble

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Does anyone really believe that this assasination was due to some immediate threat and not muscle flexing revenge for the attempted US Embassy invasion?
 

Organic Potatoes

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Does anyone really believe that this assasination was due to some immediate threat and not muscle flexing revenge for the attempted US Embassy invasion?
There’s a narrative about Soleimani orchestrating a new force with a mandate specifically to attack Americans with new weapons ferried across the Iranian border. But it is more believable to see it as just a tit-for-tat...

 

langster

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Does anyone really believe that this assasination was due to some immediate threat and not muscle flexing revenge for the attempted US Embassy invasion?
He's a fecking chancer. I think he did it because he could. He could do it whilst showing off to his kids and mates at Mar-a-lago bigging himself up and showing his power whilst simultaneously pissing Congress and the Dems off by telling his mates before them. He also did it to help slow the Impeachment news and to make himself look big again. Also, he did it to hide the news about the whistleblower from Deutsche Bank revealing his loans were all Russian backed and approved.

Only last week he was slagging his intelligence agencies off, now he's acting on their info?

Bollocks. It's all about him.
 

RedTiger

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He's a fecking chancer. I think he did it because he could. He could do it whilst showing off to his kids and mates at Mar-a-lago bugging himself up and showing his power whilst simultaneously pissing Congress and the Dems off by telling his mates before them. He also did it to help slow the Impeachment news and to make himself look big again. Also, he did it to hide the news about the whistleblower from Deutsche Bank revealing his loans were all Russian backed and approved.

Only last week he was slagging his intelligence agencies off, now he's acting on their info?

Bollocks. It's all about him.
I think he's pushed himself into a corner by distancing himself from the US security apparatus. In any other presidency if the embassy was attacked they would have had the CIA do something Covert but Donny doesn't trust the CIA so his only options are regular military responses.
 

luke511

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We need a alien invasion to teach the US a lesson and put them in their place. If Hollywood movies have taught me anything is they only tend to attack the US
I'm hoping for an alien intervention as well, the world needs a serious reality check.
 

berbatrick

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@berbatrick @Raoul
Not sure my point came across. It was: The most stupid thing a US president can do in the Middle East is using the terminology of religious war. (Just speaking of their self-interest here, specifically regarding the region's Shia population.) Same goes for threatening to level landmarks of Persian culture, which includes the anti-regime Iranians as well.

Actually carrying out such attacks would still be much worse of course, but bragging about it will likely have the same effect to a lesser extent.
I agree, I was adding that the religious framing of the war went far beyond Bush's words, it was amplified by commanders and adopted by the invading army.
 

Synco

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So you’re suggesting condemnation of these people as well as US foreign policy in the Middle East are mutually exclusive? Does condemning one endorse the other?
It shouldn't be, but in reality that's often exactly what happens. The violence emanating from one side gets ignored or justified, while violence from the other side gets scandalized in the harshest terms. If one points out this discrepancy, the usual response is accusations of downplaying evil, often accompanied by whataboutism. There are pro-Western and anti-imperialist variants of this, and both are popular.
 

VidaRed

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Also that shows the absolute ignorance of the man. Cultural sites in Iran and Iraq aren’t just important to the Iranian and Iraqi people, they’re important to the whole of humanity. It’s pretty much the birthplace of civilisation and intellectualism.
Doing so will bring usa in league with the taliban and isis who demolish historical structures.
 

Organic Potatoes

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I'll be very surprised if there isn't a big terrorist attack in the US in 2020.
I’d be very surprised if there is. The unfortunate citizens of Iraq, Syria, etc. will bear the brunt of this violence. You can add more Gulf States to this if it heats up.

The revenge will be mostly regional. But as usual, the innocent will still suffer.
 

berbatrick

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One of Obama's favourite journalists:

If this is what Iran can do to American brains I wonder what would happen if the USSR was still around. "Attach nuclear bombs to meteorites to destroy humanity, part of which is Soviet"
 

DOTA

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I'll be very surprised if there isn't a big terrorist attack in the US in 2020.
If there's anti-war terrorism in the US my money would be firmly on someone who likes Trump and thinks Jews brainwashed him in to attacking Iran.
 

Carolina Red

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https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/04/us/politics/trump-suleimani.html

So the option of killing Suleimani was the extreme option meant to get him to choose one of the more reasonable options, but he was getting mad watching TV and worrying about looking weak.
:lol: feck me

“Know your audience” comes to mind

Doing so will bring usa in league with the taliban and isis who demolish historical structures.
We will bitch and moan about taking down statues of traitors to the United States, but gleefully cheer a president who threatens to destroy priceless world history sites.

We are a shambles.