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  1. #241
    Banned Kellhound's Avatar
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    1. That is a strategic nuclear weapon, one that Russia knows it cannot use lest they be wiped off the face of the earth by the US counter strike.
    2. See #1 above.
    3. See #2 above.

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    Quote Originally Posted by PACOX View Post
    I don't they post you replied to is overestimating Russian hardware but but Russia's involvement wouldn't be direct.

    Russian hardware would miraculously find its way to Iran. There would be a lot of 'Russian tourists and trainers' hanging around Russian bases.

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    Russia only cares about a quarter of Ukraine.
    Russia would do that for Syria long before they did it for Iran.

    Russia cares about all of Ukraine, being back under the control of Russia.....

  2. #242
    Quote Originally Posted by Kellhound View Post
    1. That is a strategic nuclear weapon, one that Russia knows it cannot use lest they be wiped off the face of the earth by the US counter strike.
    2. See #1 above.
    3. See #2 above.

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    Russia would do that for Syria long before they did it for Iran.

    Russia cares about all of Ukraine, being back under the control of Russia.....
    Didnt russia test those missiles from caspian sea to syria with ease

  3. #243
    Banned Kellhound's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ianus View Post
    Didnt russia test those missiles from caspian sea to syria with ease
    Russia fired their equivalent of the US Tomahawk, hardly a supersonic, let alone hypersonic, missile.

  4. #244
    Sorry guys I'm behind on replies and such.

    I will say that Iran's calibrated response illustrates the tough bind their in. They launched ballistic missiles which evidently killed no US troops. They were either intercepted by missile defense (which Iran knows the US has) or hit outside the base. Iran seemingly wanted to make a statement to restore its honor, and not actually do something to provoke a war with the US. By launching missiles at the US in the region, they can save face and look strong (when they are weak), but it's something they can also walk away from without further escalating. This is a variant of the "escalate to descalate doctrine".

    Iran has threatened to attack inside the US if we respond. Clearly, they want to save face and walk away, because their room to escalate past this without directly attacking the US (somewhere, not necessarily inside the United States) is limited, if it exists at all.

    The US has thus seized escalation dominance from Iran, with Iran trying to seize it back. Iran not directly attacking the US shows that restoring conventional deterrence is working. Now we need to go further.

    Those missile sites and launchers. The biggest hole in the Iran Deal was the lack of coverage of Iran's ballistic missile capability. Obama was a fool for agreeing to the deal that did not cover them. He though they would not negotiate on that topic. He was wrong. They arguably matter more than the nuclear program, because nuclear deterrence would remain regardless of the deal over uranium enrichment or not, but missiles can be used conventionally at a level far below nuclear deterrence (as they have here).

    The United States must removed Iran's missile capability. They've shown they're willing to use them against us and our allies and target US interests in the region. That is unacceptable and we need to move deterrence forward by launching a bombing campaign inside Iran. We can do one of two things. First, we can bomb all their missile launching sites and production facilities (the disarmament option). This may be too escalatory at this stage. Alternatively if the US wants to escalate in a more limited fashion, it can determine which launchers were used in these specific attacks and destroy just those.

    Regardless the United States needs to illustrate its resolve and escalation supremacy by not letting these attacks go unanswered. I would suggest the alternative option I gave above before a comprehensive disarmament bombing campaign - destroy the specific launchers and threaten to expand the bombing campaign to all ballistic missile capability if Iran retaliates.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ianus View Post
    finally someone that will put cowboys in their place.. cowboys think they can do whatever they want without consequences.. i can bet that russia and china will pseudoproxy support iran
    Russia and China won't do shit.

    And this certainly won't put the US in its place. We'll almost certainly Strike Iran as soon as we can get some subs and stealth bombers in position.

  5. #245
    Quote Originally Posted by Ianus View Post
    Didnt russia test those missiles from caspian sea to syria with ease
    Nope. The supersonic ones are a new batch. The ones tested in Syria, although extremely impressive, are more conventional. Their main point is that they are portable enough to be fitted on something like a canoe or a blow up sex doll floating in the middle of the sea. Makes even small Russian vessels a real threat to fleet groups. But the new ones, although already accepted into their military, have limited testing. I would think that it will take them some years to work out the details and quirks. On the other hand, this conflict does potentially provide opportunities to test them. Not directly of course. But if Iran would have the need to engage some non-US target, especially if the target would be inside Iran's border, I would not be surprised to find suspiciously familiar wreckages.

  6. #246
    Quote Originally Posted by Kellhound View Post
    It also looks like a good portion of the wreckage was on fire before it hit the ground, lots of charred metal but little evidence of ground fires.
    Wait I missed this part. Is the thought that Iranian missile defense accidentally took down the flight (thinking it was a military aircraft)? Or that - for some reason - Iran decided to take it down?

  7. #247
    The Undying Breccia's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Skroe View Post
    Wait I missed this part. Is the thought that Iranian missile defense accidentally took down the flight (thinking it was a military aircraft)? Or that - for some reason - Iran decided to take it down?
    The leading theory is that Iran shot the plane down by accident. I cannot think of a valid reason from existing public news Iran would intentionally murder Ukrainian civilians.

  8. #248
    Quote Originally Posted by Skroe View Post
    Wait I missed this part. Is the thought that Iranian missile defense accidentally took down the flight (thinking it was a military aircraft)? Or that - for some reason - Iran decided to take it down?
    From reports 1 of the engines were on fire as it was landing. It could be an engine malfunction. Or some sam operating mistaking an Airliner for a bomber. No confirmation yet on which.

  9. #249
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gaaz View Post
    Nope. The supersonic ones are a new batch. The ones tested in Syria, although extremely impressive, are more conventional. Their main point is that they are portable enough to be fitted on something like a canoe or a blow up sex doll floating in the middle of the sea. Makes even small Russian vessels a real threat to fleet groups. But the new ones, although already accepted into their military, have limited testing. I would think that it will take them some years to work out the details and quirks. On the other hand, this conflict does potentially provide opportunities to test them. Not directly of course. But if Iran would have the need to engage some non-US target, especially if the target would be inside Iran's border, I would not be surprised to find suspiciously familiar wreckages.
    The missiles they launched were not extremely impressive, they did in 2015 what the US did in 1991. As for their portability, they are again on par with the US Tomahawk.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Skroe View Post
    Wait I missed this part. Is the thought that Iranian missile defense accidentally took down the flight (thinking it was a military aircraft)? Or that - for some reason - Iran decided to take it down?
    There is not enough information to conclude what happened yet. Timing is suspicious for an accidental SAM hit from Iranian air defenses, but no evidence has been presented for that. All that is know is there was significant fire damage to the plane prior to impact.

  10. #250
    Quote Originally Posted by Gaaz View Post
    Nope. The supersonic ones are a new batch. The ones tested in Syria, although extremely impressive, are more conventional. Their main point is that they are portable enough to be fitted on something like a canoe or a blow up sex doll floating in the middle of the sea. Makes even small Russian vessels a real threat to fleet groups. But the new ones, although already accepted into their military, have limited testing. I would think that it will take them some years to work out the details and quirks. On the other hand, this conflict does potentially provide opportunities to test them. Not directly of course. But if Iran would have the need to engage some non-US target, especially if the target would be inside Iran's border, I would not be surprised to find suspiciously familiar wreckages.
    More specifically, those missiles used in Syria basically was Russia showing it finally caught up to where the US was with cruise missiles in the 1990s. They're Russian Tomahawks. Something the USSR would have had in the 1990s too had it not fallen. A lot of Russia's military advances the last few years have been regenerating late-USSR stuff that would have entered service alongside their US peers in the 1990s, had history worked out a bit differently.

    There is only a few legitimate "Tomahawk-like" missiles in the world (though there are lots of things called cruise missiles, most of which are very airplane like). The main other one is the Anglo-French Storm Shadow.

    Russia blows a lot of hot air with its hypersonic weapons. The US approach to hypersonic engines is the better long term approach to both their Russian/Chinese boost-glide ballistic missile re-entry vehicle approach and range-limited approach of BraMos and things like it. A Hyper sonic cruise missile with 250 mile range or so isn't dangerous. A boost-glide re-entry vehicle is only useful in World War III. The United States building a hypersonic cruise missile that could fly thousands of miles, and perhaps one day, launch into Asia from the United States, is the only avenue offering true advanced capability. But it's also by far the most technically challenging approach.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Breccia View Post
    The leading theory is that Iran shot the plane down by accident. I cannot think of a valid reason from existing public news Iran would intentionally murder Ukrainian civilians.
    I mean, without knowing more, the most logical explanation short of a bizarre coincidence of a mechanical malfunction would be that the Iranian military, expecting a US air attack (which will come), put its air defense on alert and some moron threw the wrong switch.

    If the Iranian military did have an accident, maybe Iran will do better than Russia did with MH17 and fess up to the mistake early. Or maybe we'll just get to go down the greatest hits of paranoid conspiracy theories where it was a US F-22 that shot it down, because of course, right?

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    Quote Originally Posted by mvaliz View Post
    I'm just going to leave this post right here, and is going to be my go-to response for many weeks to come...
    Launching air strikes on Iran for a few weeks would not be war with Iran. It would be a punitive expedition. It would be the modern day equivalent of the US sending some forces into Mexico 100 years ago to find Pancho Villa, or Operation Desert Fox, or the US

    War with Iran would involve a full scale AUMF (which Trump won't get), the deployment of hundreds of thousands of troops to the region, a call up of the National Guard and reserves, and months spent propositioning heavy forces in Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan to attack the country and destroy its leadership.

    There will not be war with Iran. But Iran will get roughed up. And for this missile attack, they absolutely have to be. We have to send a message about deterrence against that sort of thing.

    I will say again: Trump should order the launchers that fired those missiles destroyed. I think going beyond that at this juncture is too escalatory.

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    Why there were no US casualties:
    https://www.latimes.com/world-nation...fense-official




    Iran launched 15 missiles. 11 hit targets, according to a U.S. defense official
    Iran launched 15 missiles, of which 11 hit their targets and four failed in flight, according to a U.S. defense official, who said there were no reports of U.S. casualties in the attack.

    Ten of the missiles hit the sprawling Asad Air Base in Iraq’s western Anbar province. U.S. radar was able to track the missiles in flight and, as a result, personnel at the base were able to take cover. The U.S. made no effort to intercept the missiles, the official said.

    One missile hit the Combined Joint Operations Center in Irbil, where the U.S. trains Iraqi Kurdish fighters and also runs a large air operations control center covering northern Iraq and parts of Syria.

    The official, who was not authorized to speak on the record, said the U.S. Central Command was aware of reports of Iraqi casualties in Irbil but that those remained unconfirmed.
    So this is interesting, because it shows something I've talked about for years here: duds.

    Iran launched 15 missiles. 11 made it and 4 failed. That is a 26% dud/failure rate. Every arsenal in the world has duds in them. Even nuclear arsenals. Engines fail, fizzles happen. It's something that is endemic to stockpiles that you have lying around for years. Sometimes there is an undetected failure within a subset of that stockpile. To offer conversational context to this, the US has an expected dud/failure rate for its nuclear arsenal of about 5%, or approximately 77 warheads out of 1550.

    I only mention it because it's interesting to see it happen in action.

    Moving on, US radar detecting the missiles is a cruical proof of real-world benefits of investing heavily in missile defense, something Democrats did not take seriously until about 2012.


    Expert on Iranian arsenal thinks Tehran used short-range ballistic missiles in attack
    Fabian Hinz, an expert on Iran at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, said it appears that Tehran used short-range ballistic missiles in the attack.

    Iran’s technology has advanced rapidly in recent years. If the missiles work properly, they are accurate within 10 or 15 meters, down from hundreds of meters two decades ago, Hinz said.

    It’s hard to say at this point how much damage the Iranians were trying to inflict on the bases.

    “The Iranians are very proud of being able to target specific buildings,” Hinz said. “They would have satellite pictures, they would have targeting information.”

    However, Hinz said firing missiles as a mere show of force would be dangerous given the possibility of a missile veering off course even if it’s targeted at an empty part of the base. “You could do that, but it would be incredibly risky.”
    Consistent with what I posted. Iran seems to be able to more so want to save face than start a larger conflict. Unfortunately for them this can't end on such terms.


    Lastly I just want to draw a threat to something.

    I made a big post a few months ago about the emerging missile threat in the world. Some folks didn't take it seriously, preferring to rant against the Military Industrial Complex. Well, exhibit A... the world is brimming with missiles that can do considerable damage if used in such a fashion, are accurate, and have great range.

    The US needs to continue to invest heavily in tactical and strategic missile defense, including with space-based missile defense. The future has arrived with this strike, because if we ever get into a mix up with China, they will be able to launch a lot more than 15 missiles.

  11. #251
    Hello WW3, started by an orange with an ego.

  12. #252
    What happened to "if Iran attacks, they will be hit hard and hit fast" ?

    It's been hours since the attack, no reported attacks on Iranian soil yet ?
    "I feel bad for Limit , they put in so many hours only to come in second place" - Methodjosh

  13. #253
    Quote Originally Posted by Poe View Post
    What happened to "if Iran attacks, they will be hit hard and hit fast" ?

    It's been hours since the attack, no reported attacks on Iranian soil yet ?
    Pointless shit-talking by our WWE Superstar President.

    Trump tweets like like the least-capable forum trolls there are, and he talks on TV like he's Booker T or Jake the Snake Roberts cutting a promo for a match at Summerslam.

    Iran should be hit for its missile launches (hit those specific launchers). But he'll probably make this stupider before its over.

    There is a good chance this ends here though, as President Individual-1 Sniffles McNoWall has successfully put the US in a place where it has to respond but because restoring deterrence requires strategy and he is a weapons-grade moron, he'll declare victory and go home.

    And we'll all go back to our lives until Iran responds in the next two years when they bomb some Trump hotel or something in Argentina or Turkey.

    At least Obama set his red line by mistake before he let Bashar Al-Assad waltz over it. Trump set a red line because he thinks being President is a TV show (he literally likes to come out to the Theme from Air Force One at his rallies) and this is his action episode, and he'll let Iran do what it wants because he doesn't treat it seriously.

    The US has a golden opportunity to restore conventional deterrence here, but I bet $20 he goes in the other direction and undermines it because he has no plan to speak of other than talk to his boys Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson and spit the difference.

  14. #254
    The Unstoppable Force Puupi's Avatar
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    Any concrete info about the casualties yet? Just woke up.
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  15. #255
    Quote Originally Posted by Puupi View Post
    Any concrete info about the casualties yet? Just woke up.
    No casualties at all.

    Iran fired the missiles at the bases, but evidently around them. 15 were fired, 11 landed (4 failed midflight). US radar detected them and forces at the base took cover, but they did not launch missile defense interceptors.

    The thinking is Iran wanted to send a face-saving message of defensive retaliation (it even claimed the right to do so under the UN charter) but it did not want to escalate the conflict into a war against the US, as having those missiles strike US forces and kill Americans would have brought about. The missiles are accurate to about about 15 meters.

    So now they can say they sent a message and defended Iranian honor, but didn't do something that got US forces killed and escalated further. It did say if the US retaliated it will attack inside the US. So this is a classic exit ramp approach. "Escalate to de-escalate" as its called.

    The US should not exit the conflict on these terms, as launching missiles at US forces, even without casualties, is unacceptable given the magnitude of risks to US forces missiles pose (consider, a big portion of a carrier strike group is built around protecting a carrier from missiles). The US should strike the launchers that fired these missiles and then attempt an exit on those terms.

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    I am going to repeat now what I said in 2015/2016 and have said many time since:

    The Iran Deal, which we SHOULD NOT have left, was a complete fucking abortion we never should have entered (entering was bad, exiting was worse). The fact that it did not require Iran to destroy its ballistic missile stockpiles and limit ballistic missile technology is legitimately the crowning failure of the Iran Deal. Iran would be deterred in its nuclear quest, even if it got one, by our nuclear arsenal. If it used a nuke, no more Iran... just like with North Korea. But ballistic missiles, which can (and often do) have conventional warheads, can be used in attacks well short of nuclear war... as Iran did here.

    Iran using ballistic missiles in this fashion is the crowning failure of that miserable deal. We never should have left, but Obama royally fucked up in not demanding Iran cut its ballistic missile arsenal, then walking away if they refused.

    The ballistic missile arsenal is the most functionally dangerous thing Iran has. Same with North Korea. It allows them to do things well short of ratching up to a nuclear exchange and allows them to hold US and regional forces at risk in a way that a nuclear response would not be proportional. As they did here. Iran has made clear: they hold the entire region at risk with it's ballistic missile arsenal.

    Obama wanted that deal way too badly and everyone knew it. It exists in contrast so much with NewSTART, that I have spent years heaping praise on Obama over. With NewSTART, Obama took Russia to the cleaners and Republicans, who resisted it until Obama cut a deal with them, made NewSTART better. But NewSTART had a price for its 67 votes in the Senate: $1 trillion in nuclear modernization over 30 years. Obama didn't want to cut a deal with Republicans over the Iran deal and didn't want to tell the other partners that it wanted to twist Iran's arm hard on ballistic missiles.

    It should have. Because the US negotiating team over NewSTART got Russia to agree to absolutely ridiculous things. then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev giving away far too much during NewSTART is believed to be a big reason that Vladimir Putin returned to office in 2012 (the ruling Russia clique saw it as a big strategic fuck up).

    The Iran Deal team, on the other hand, seemed eager to give away the farm. And now we've seen its failure of omission first hand.

    The next Democratic President should not open any negotiations with Iran on any topic unless its ballistic missile arsenal is on the table. They cannot be allowed to have it. It matters much more than them having a nuclear bomb at this point.

  16. #256
    Does it seem possible that Iran is willing to give up their ballistic missiles at this point? I agree that while nukes being as destructive as they are, it's extremely unlikely that Iran would ever use them, and missiles beeing a far more "usable" weapon, they also pose the bigger threat.

    At this point however it seems to me that those missiles are far more important to Iran's self-perception, as a strong regional power. Currently I do not see any way of cutting a deal with Iran to remove them, add how the US left the previous deal that Iran agreed to, and it's two rather convincing reasons for the Iranians to avoid a deal.

    The only likelyhood for this to happen, is that the internal protests in Iran somehow manages to take over. But as we saw with Gaddafi, regimes will commit atrocities before accepting reforms, and beating the shit out of Libya was after all a far more manageable task than invading Iran. In that case we'd probably just see another terrorist nest develop as we did with Iraq.


    So it's decades of positive diplomacy or status quo, with Iran also developing their nuclear arsenal.

  17. #257
    Herald of the Titans CostinR's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Crispin View Post
    The only likelyhood for this to happen, is that the internal protests in Iran somehow manages to take over. But as we saw with Gaddafi, regimes will commit atrocities before accepting reforms, and beating the shit out of Libya was after all a far more manageable task than invading Iran. In that case we'd probably just see another terrorist nest develop as we did with Iraq.


    So it's decades of positive diplomacy or status quo, with Iran also developing their nuclear arsenal.
    Gaddafi was running a fairly wealthy well off country. I believe that in 2011 it was one of the most prosperous if not the most prosperous African nations. So if NATO had not intervened he would have won and been left standing.

    Iran in contrast is broke. They don't have money thanks to the severe sanctions imposed on them by the United States, and even when Obama removed those sanctions with his deal their economy wasn't doing that much better. They simply can't sustain a proxy conflict with the United States, not like this.

    The WORST decision the US could make would be to invade Iran. Let them bleed out. This isn't North Korea which can survive, partly thanks to China, due to how much of a cult of personality goes on there. Iran has elections, deeply flawed but it has them, it has a society that isn't completely brainwashed and has access to modern media tools.
    "Life is one long series of problems to solve. The more you solve, the better a man you become.... Tribulations spawn in life and over and over again we must stand our ground and face them."

  18. #258
    Time to strike them back and make sure that they will never own nukes.
    Democratic Socialist Convention : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPLQNUVmq3o

  19. #259
    Was what i expected some strikes to not lose face. Looks like they only managed to kill iraqis and perhaps a aircraft with 175 civilians.
    Last edited by ParanoiD84; 2020-01-08 at 10:46 AM.
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  20. #260
    Quote Originally Posted by Crispin View Post
    Does it seem possible that Iran is willing to give up their ballistic missiles at this point? I agree that while nukes being as destructive as they are, it's extremely unlikely that Iran would ever use them, and missiles beeing a far more "usable" weapon, they also pose the bigger threat.

    At this point however it seems to me that those missiles are far more important to Iran's self-perception, as a strong regional power. Currently I do not see any way of cutting a deal with Iran to remove them, add how the US left the previous deal that Iran agreed to, and it's two rather convincing reasons for the Iranians to avoid a deal.

    The only likelyhood for this to happen, is that the internal protests in Iran somehow manages to take over. But as we saw with Gaddafi, regimes will commit atrocities before accepting reforms, and beating the shit out of Libya was after all a far more manageable task than invading Iran. In that case we'd probably just see another terrorist nest develop as we did with Iraq.


    So it's decades of positive diplomacy or status quo, with Iran also developing their nuclear arsenal.
    Realistically will they give it up? Probably not at this point. They'll almost certainly have to be disarmed someday, or contained. Missile defenses have been springing up over the middle east over the last 15 years for this reason.

    But back in 2014/2015, during the Iran deal negotiation period? There was an opening, especially if the US would have paired it with a first step to a regional settlement (or at least a bilateral one that would have seen a normalization of relations). But negotiating it would be incredibly hard, and Obama wanted an easier win.

    It was a terrible mistake. I said it at the time and I'll say it again now.

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    Quote Originally Posted by CostinR View Post
    Gaddafi was running a fairly wealthy well off country. I believe that in 2011 it was one of the most prosperous if not the most prosperous African nations. So if NATO had not intervened he would have won and been left standing.

    Iran in contrast is broke. They don't have money thanks to the severe sanctions imposed on them by the United States, and even when Obama removed those sanctions with his deal their economy wasn't doing that much better. They simply can't sustain a proxy conflict with the United States, not like this.

    The WORST decision the US could make would be to invade Iran. Let them bleed out. This isn't North Korea which can survive, partly thanks to China, due to how much of a cult of personality goes on there. Iran has elections, deeply flawed but it has them, it has a society that isn't completely brainwashed and has access to modern media tools.
    I mean frankly, we've been waiting for Iran to bleed out for years, along with never antagonizing the mythical Iranian populace Megazord, lest they do something about their leadership... some decade.

    We should not invade Iran. But they need a hard shove.

    We should consider striking the missile launchers that launched this missiles, striking all missile facilities, or striking Iran's oil production capacity and starving the beast further.

    We could order their offshore oil rigs to be evacuated, and then destroy them for example.

    So far, aside from Soleimani and his entourage, the US hasn't killed Iranians in this. We should keep it that way. Which makes the option of hitting the missile launch sites, appealing, but tricky. How do we do that without doing that? Because if we kill Iranian troops, it is escalation and Iran will target US troops in their follow up. Escalating to de-escalate would require something along the lines of doing something intimidating but relatively bloodless.

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