US-Iran War Has Begun! Iran launches dozens of ballistic missiles!

[11B4V]

This was a straight up assassination and very bad.

[garbon]

Garbon, am I supposed to feel sorry for a guy who orchestrated a lot of suffering and killing via Iran's proxy wars in the region?

Feel sorry for him? No, not at all. Worry about the impact this might have? Well, your call.

Then why did you quote the second Tampax post?

Because I think it would be a shitty call not to worry.

Which Tampax said he did in the post you quoted. I don't follow your line of reasoning.

From his post it could be inferred, he'd be happy or not worried if the US had a thought about 'how they are going to end it'.

I don't see a significant difference between what he wrote and worrying about the impact this might have.

Understood.

[HisMajestyBOB]

While this is a major escalation, I am confident that our level headed president, aided by a robust and well funded foreign service, have a comprehensive strategy and will lead us to a great diplomatic victory with minimal bloodshed.

[mongers]

This was a straight up assassination and very bad.

This.

[mongers]

While this is a major escalation, I am confident that our level headed president, aided by a robust and well funded foreign service, have a comprehensive strategy and will lead us to a great diplomatic victory with minimal bloodshed.

And this.

[Maladict]

[OttoVonBismarck]

I mean this guy is someone who it's great to see dead because he was a huge piece of shit.

But the chief concerns I have:

1. The Trump Administration has no logical or effective decision making apparatus, so is prone to making bad decisions. We don't know the deliberations that went on here, but they probably weren't intelligent, coherent, or "ordinary." Since Trump has made sure most of the people who have deliberations like that no longer serve in the administration. This also means that our response to the next Iranian action is going to run through this same defective decision making apparatus.

2. This could just be "needless" escalation. To me needless escalation that leads to more deaths on both sides, but in which there is no strategic shift behind it, is just Trump getting people killed and killing people for emotional, stupid reasons.

Concerns I don't necessarily have:

1. This leading to a War in Iraq (with the U.S.) Iraq has basically been at war since we toppled Saddam, but we have mostly not been fighting it since 2011, other than what was a very limited ground force commitment to the war against ISIS. We only have around 5,000-7,500 boots on the ground in Iraq, who are mostly in advisory, base protection etc roles. For us to have an Iraq War 3.0 we'd have to deploy a major force to Iraq. I think Trump is extremely anti-deployment of any large forces, so I suspect there is really no chance this happens. Our enemies in the region can't bring a conventional war to us, we'd have to choose to engage in one with them which I don't think Trump will do.

2. This leading to a split in Iraqi/U.S. relations. This has been a fear a lot of the think tank people have been spreading. The reason I don't fear this is I think Iran had basically politically outmaneuvered us in Iraq a long time ago. Iranian backed militias had been integrated into the Iraqi military. A large portion of Iraq's Parliament are Iranian sympathetic. Iraq's top end political leadership likes the advanced military support we give them, but because of the nature of Iraq's Shiite population, its Shiite religious leaders, its Shiite militias, for better or worse Iran has largely been out positioning us in terms of influence with Iraq's government for years. Killing this guy on Iraqi soil (and also taking out one of the Iranian back militia leaders, himself now an Iraqi military member due to the aforementioned integration of these groups into the government) certainly might "skip forward" a few steps, but I think we'd largely "lost" the "soft power" influence battle in Iraq a long time ago to Iran. I mean these Shiite militias are basically the "insurgents" we fought for years under Dubya's Presidency, and they are basically part of the Iraqi political establishment now.

3. This exacerbating popular dislike of America in Iran. Again this is like #2, most Iranians hate us and have for 40+ years. This doesn't help, but I saw no real evidence the Iranian public had ever been moving toward or was particularly open to positive vibes towards America.

[The Minsky Moment]

To the extent Trump had a strategy in the region, it was to reduce commitment and entanglement.  That's a legit strategy to have - in fact it was Obama's, although Obama never pulled off a move quite as stupid as ditching the Kurds without warning (the Syria not line in the sand was close).  Problem is this move doesn't fit the Trump strategy.  Dropping bombs on a nominally allied nation and assassinating a high-ranking Iranian leader doesn't facilitate disengagement.  Obviously Iran will respond and will do so in way that either sucks the US further in or causes the US to back down from escalating violence.  If the former, Trump just blew up his entire regional strategy to kill one guy.  If the latter, it was totally counterproductive and will further the slide in US credibility.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Well it's like I said:

The Trump Administration has no logical or effective decision making apparatus, so is prone to making bad decisions. We don't know the deliberations that went on here, but they probably weren't intelligent, coherent, or "ordinary."

When that's how decisions are made, poor decisions are the norm.

I'd say more broadly the thing that someone in the administration should probably consider is if all we were willing to do is kill this guy, and we aren't actually shifting to some sort of genuinely bellicose strategy towards Iran, we're going to get all the negatives with no real positives. Like as shitty as this guy was, he wasn't Osama bin Laden or al-Baghdadi etc. Iran is a big country with a big military, Suleimani had multiple younger aides he had already been grooming to replace him. It's like if Iran killed an American general, does that change one iota our capacities? No, and killing this guy doesn't for Iran either. All it really does is say we're spoiling for a fight, but if we don't actually have some strategic willingness to fight Iran then what's the benefit in looking that way.

I don't really know the right strategy for dealing with countries like Iran fwiw. If you look at the middle east you have four major-ish powers in Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Egypt. We've tried:

Iran - Isolation, sanctions, proxy wars
Turkey - Formal alliance
Egypt - Bribes
Saudi Arabia - More or less formal alliance built around money and oil

While we're obviously in worst shape with our relationships with Iran, arguably all four of these relationships have had lots of bad outcomes for the United States, either directly or indirectly. Like Saudi Arabia is still a pretty stalwart ally, but is doing all kinds of shit that probably aren't in our long term interests in the region.

I honestly don't know what we identify as successes in our post-WWII involvement in the Middle East, other than maybe our support for Israel.

[The Brain]

When Trump has his third term secured I'm sure he will chart a stable course in the Middle East.

[Hamilcar]

This is so fucking stupid.

[Hamilcar]

At least American kids are safe from being drafted. The US military needs their Roombas more.

[Zanza]

Saudi Arabia is still a pretty stalwart ally, but is doing all kinds of shit that probably aren't in our long term interests in the region.

I guess they are selling oil, but in what other aspect are they of any benefit to the US? Al Qaeda was mostly Saudis, they are financing Wahabbism around the globe, killing WP journalists, and financing ISIS...  what does the US get out of that alliance? Defence exports?

[Razgovory]

To the extent Trump had a strategy in the region, it was to reduce commitment and entanglement.  That's a legit strategy to have - in fact it was Obama's, although Obama never pulled off a move quite as stupid as ditching the Kurds without warning (the Syria not line in the sand was close).  Problem is this move doesn't fit the Trump strategy.  Dropping bombs on a nominally allied nation and assassinating a high-ranking Iranian leader doesn't facilitate disengagement.  Obviously Iran will respond and will do so in way that either sucks the US further in or causes the US to back down from escalating violence.  If the former, Trump just blew up his entire regional strategy to kill one guy.  If the latter, it was totally counterproductive and will further the slide in US credibility.

Well, Iraq will probably expel American military forces as a result of this, which is disengagement.

[OttoVonBismarck]

They don't really mess with Israel, they intelligence share and have given us military access to their country at times. I mean we basically staged our invasion of Iraq in Saudi Arabia, something Turkey for example wouldn't have allowed. Saudi Arabia contributed a lot to the war against ISIS, there were rich individual Saudis who made financial contributions to ISIS, which isn't that easy to control. Wealthy American Irish were the major funders of the IRA fwiw and we remained good allies with Britain during the Troubles.

I'm not really trying to defend or advocate for the Saudi relationship, just explaining the answer to your question. I don't think the middle east would be better if we had a Saudi like relationship with Iran and an antagonistic relationship with Saudi, or an antagonistic relationship with Saudi and Iran etc. That's specifically why I said the different tacts we've taken with different Middle Eastern countries have all combined to suggest at least to me, there aren't really any wins here that I've seen.