Iranian General Sulemain and others reported killed in Baghdad airstrike

[Blur4stuff]

The reasons Trump and Pompeo are giving for the assassination turn out to be complete lies based on evidence that doesn't exist. Doesn't matter if you want to point to deaths previous to the assassination. We now know for 100% fact that Trump did this to help himself. It had nothing to do with national security or safety of our troops/personnel. It had nothing to do with keeping Iran in check or taking out a bad person. Trump was desperate to help himself with impeachment and reelection so he was going to do something reckless just like he's done his entire presidency. Start a fire to distract from the previous fire he started.

This action all by itself is more than enough reason to have any president removed from office.

[JohnBrown1917]

The reasons Trump and Pompeo are giving for the assassination turn out to be complete lies based on evidence that doesn't exist. Doesn't matter if you want to point to deaths previous to the assassination. We now know for 100% fact that Trump did this to help himself. It had nothing to do with national security or safety of our troops/personnel. It had nothing to do with keeping Iran in check or taking out a bad person. Trump was desperate to help himself with impeachment and reelection so he was going to do something reckless just like he's done his entire presidency. Start a fire to distract from the previous fire he started.

This action all by itself is more than enough reason to have any president removed from office.

Yet, to some people supposed anti-trumpers he actually did an amazing thing... because Trump himself said so.

[Draco-Onis]

I'm not. But I'm saying the endemic issues of the region beyond that (and predate that) are worse. Way way worse. We certainly haven't helped, but even absent us, the lines drawn at the end of World War I, the endemic dictatorships, the House of Saud, the lack of Islamic religious form and so forth act as far greater generators of destabilization and danger.

And the US should absolutely keep doing what its doing to Iran's economy. That is muscular foreign policy. That's coercion. We do that elsewhere too because it works.


I'll say this once again: the US never should have entered the Iranian nuclear deal unless it also dealt with Iran's ballistic missile program and operated on a far longer time table than the ~10-15 year timeframe of the agreed to deal. It also never should have entered into force without requiring 67 votes in the Senate as executive agreements of this magnitude are utter rubbish and shouldn't be pursued as a matter of principle.

But that being said, once in the deal, leaving it was foolhardy and a big ass own-goal on our part.

But I'm sick to death of people thinking the Iran deal was some triumph. Obama's NewSTART deal with Russia was a triumph. I've cataloged how and why for years. The Iran deal was a farce. The same administration that produced a gold standard for diplomacy also produced a Cleveland steamer in the form of the Iran deal. Now that we're out of the Iran deal, so long as we lament that we left (under the principle of something is better than nothing), we should be free to point out that it was a really bad deal and Obama was a fool for entering it, and the West gave away far too much in order to achieve *something* with Iran.

As for carrots and sticks, as I explained above, there is no carrot Iran is legitimately interested in from us that is prefferible to their goal of regional hegemony. It's a very contemporary western mindset to think that if the carrots were greater Iran would respond. Contemporary westerners at large, overly informed by highly selective events of the 20th century (mostly involving the US and USSR) do not understand power politics which are older and generally more successful for a country engaging in them.

The US needs more sticks towards Iran. And Russia. And China. And North Korea. And fewer carrots. Because their ambitions will not be sated by some little deal with the US. That only deferrs the conflict and buys time for them to prepare to push their power further in the future.

Consider the INF Treaty's failure. Gorbachev's Soviet government found the treaty expressedly in the failing USSR's interests. Just under 20 years later Putin's Russian government decides that it is no longer in its interests. That is 2006. Bush and Obama spend years keeping Russia's violation of the INF Treaty on the DL, even from Congress, to try and (with carrots) entice Russia to adhere to the treaty, even as it is flagrantly violating it. It is 2016, a decade later, before Russia is openly declared in breach and 2019 until the US took advantage of it's rights under the treat in response to Russia's violations and formally withdrew.

From Russia's angle, the INF Treaty makes no sense for them. Putting ourselves in their shoes, if they feel a military threat from the US - which they do because the US exists - they are objectively acting in their interests to push INF aside. It makes more sense for them to have Intermediate Range missiles and hold all of Europe at risk, than it does to agree to any amount of US carrots. Putin's violation treaty was unacceptable to us, and our efforts (and NATO's efforts) to calmly and optimistcally bring them back into compliance were well executed and intentioned. But there was no world where Russia was ever getting more by playing ball with the US than it would get by building post-INF Treaty weapons.

This is something contemporary Westerners are having a hell of a time dealing with. Even at the upper echelons. Obama's foreign policy team just could not grasp why China would island build and hack and engage in break neck military rearmament, because the team members were comfortably living in a world where "win-wins" were always desirable. They had no tools for traditional zero-sum foreign policy. It's the same thing with North Korea - they will never denuclearize. And it is ultimately the same thing with Iran. A multi-generational struggle to become hegemonic in the Middle East, as they see they are entitled to, brings far greater rewards than any carrots we can offer them. But it is also entirely against our interests in the region, and in the interests of global security.

So basically, nice 1990s foreign policy, but Vlad the Invader, Jinping the Island Builder, Khameni the Conqueror and Rocketman shot it to death in the open over the last decade, and too many westerners just haven't realized how dead it is yet.

This is a big part of why I say the western world isn't ready for the New Cold War. Put aside the weapons programs... it doesn't even have the mindset yet. And frankly I doubt it will until China invades and "restores harmony" to some "unstable" country in an easy, low risk victory to test drive its new and growing expeditionary military power in an analog to the US's Invasion of Panama. And make no mistake. That is coming. Probably this decade. And US commentators would ask "why would China do this". And the answer is clear as day: they were building expeditionary forces... what do you think they were going to do with it.

Many in US is just ideologically in an obsolete place in the changing global security scene. Obama engaged in incorrect snark when he said Putin's 19th century foreign policy was out of place in the 21st century. Actually, it is perfecty at home in it. It is Obama's 1990s foreign policy that is out of place in a world where the Long Peace is rapidly being lost.

But really, let's keep offering carrots to the Iranians who have no interest in them in perpetuity.

You do realize your sticks only approach only leads to one path right? you are basically saying war is the only answer here guess you and Pompeo are on the same page after all. I disagree carrots do work before we stepped out of the deal Iran's leadership was experiencing it's biggest threat yet its people wondering why they are suffering with the sanctions gone. The Iranian government is corrupt to the core and all we have done is propped it up by giving it cover for its corruption without a foreign adversary to blame for all its woe its grip on power would erode.

- - - Updated - - -

There's been no price paid by the US. And the first layers of restoring deterrence have been successfully set.

The US is no longer fighting ISIS, we have the biggest troop build up in the ME during Trump's time, Iraq wants us out and we are blackmailing them to stay in. There's zero sign that Iran will stop using its proxies to attack the US and it's interest basically the status quo except we have lost ground. How exactly are you defining this deterrence?

Internationally, it's gone exactly as I anticipated.

And the international community proved itself irrelevant when it couldn't keep the Iran nuclear deal together because it was scared of Trump. If there's one major thing that Trump's leadership or lack thereof has proven is that the EU and its members are worthless.

[cubby]

We don't even know what the other options were but the killing was put in place because it was the dumbest most extreme move to make the others look better. Therefore without knowing those choices you can't dismiss them off hand and let's be frank you are basically betting that Trump made a good decision. I mean are you sure you want to take that bet?

We were told some of them, and the more "rational" choices included the two I mentioned - the Iranian Frigate and the Training Camp. It wasn't labeled the "dumbest" - you have got to stop interjecting your subjective assessments with objective fact - it was labeled the most extreme, thrown in there so that Trump could pick a lesser response. That doesn't mean the assassination choice was "bad" or "dumb". It just means it was extreme.

And in no way shape or form am I claiming Trump made a good decision, in fact it sounds like he lied to himself to justify the scenario in the first place. However, the policy is sound - killing the person who gave the order - because it punishes those directly responsible for the action, which in my opinion is both decisive and well over due.

Of course the reaction is our fault because of every action causes a reaction no matter how you slice it Iran's current status is our fault. Whether you want to go back to pulling out of the nuclear deal or our reaction to the Iranian people choosing a leader we didn't like then meddling giving the opening for extremists to take control. It's important not to rewrite history here we fucked up it was our government who pissed them off initially and our action with Iraq that has allowed their power to grow and flourish.

I don't even know where to begin to explain to you have the irrational reaction of an insane theocracy is somehow the United States' fault. If we invited them to peace talks and they blew up an ocean liner, would that be our fault?

We are not responsible for how others feel, and certainly not how they react.

[Skroe]

We don't even know what the other options were but the killing was put in place because it was the dumbest most extreme move to make the others look better. Therefore without knowing those choices you can't dismiss them off hand and let's be frank you are basically betting that Trump made a good decision. I mean are you sure you want to take that bet?

Of course the reaction is our fault because of every action causes a reaction no matter how you slice it Iran's current status is our fault. Whether you want to go back to pulling out of the nuclear deal or our reaction to the Iranian people choosing a leader we didn't like then meddling giving the opening for extremists to take control. It's important not to rewrite history here we fucked up it was our government who pissed them off initially and our action with Iraq that has allowed their power to grow and flourish.

Options? Is this some kind of joke?

Soleimani should have been droned in the 2000s. Bush and Obama both considered it. They held back. They were wrong to.

This is EXACTLY the kind of long overdue business we should be engaging in, because it is an excellent and effective first option.

Don't believe me? Let me give you a list of names.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/mueller...who-1531511838

Russian intelligence officers
Viktor Borisovich Netyksho, Boris Alekseyevich Antonov, Dmitriy Sergeyevich Badin, Ivan Sergeyevich Yermakov, Aleksey Viktorovich Lukashev, Sergey Aleksandrovich Morgachev, Nikolay Yuryevich Kozacheck, Pavel Vyacheslavovich Yershov, Artem Andreyevich Malyshev, Aleksandr Vladimirovich Osadchuk, Aleksey Aleksandrovich Potemkin

Manafort associate Konstantin Kilimnik

Internet Research Agency, Concord Management & Consulting LLC, Concord Catering
Yevgeniy Viktorovich Prigozhin, Mikhail Ivanovich Bystrov, Mikhail Leonidovich Burchik, Aleksandra Yuryevna Krylova, Anna Vladislavovna Bogacheva, Sergey Pavlovich Polozov, Maria Anatolyevna Bovda, Robert Sergeyevich Bovda, Dzheykhun Nasimi Ogly Aslanov, Vadim Vladimirovich Podkopaev, Gleb Igorevich Vasilchenko, Irina Viktorovna Kaverzina, Vladimir Venkov

You want to deter future 2016-style election hacks? Kill these men for their crimes. Openly. Loudly. Send a message Or if not that, if one so much as steps foot outside of Russia, they be bagged by the CIA and hauled to the US for interrogation, trial and life in prison. Punish the people who did it so the next time someone thinks of pulling a stunt like Russia did in 2016, they remember their predecessors who paid for it with their lives in due course. That they were never safe again.

I've been saying this literally for years. The Russians involved in the election hack need to be held accountable personally. They can never know safety. They should never know a good night's sleep again. That is the magnitude of what they did.

Now seeing frankly, you and others who have been hard aboard the Mueller train, the anti-Trump train, and the hold-Russia-to-account-for-2016 train get all squeamish because the US actually sent one of the people on its list to hell, I really start to think the lot of you signed onto the whole "we have to send a message to Russia" train without knowing what that meant. You didn't think it through.

Iran understands the language that took Soleimani off the table best. Similarly, those 34 Russians above suffer a series of unfortunate boating accidents and J-walking incidents, would send a message that Russia would understand the best way too.

Because they don't give a fig for your carrots. You can't buy their friendship. Not at this point. Not when they've calculated belligerence gets them far more than cooperation. You can only hit them with the stick and threaten to hit them more.

I've said it once and I'll say it again. You folks who were mad about Russia's interference in 2016 and want to deter future attacks like that and hold them responsible who are also unprepared to "deal" with the US killing Soleimani are non-serious. If you aren't willing to hold Soleimani, one of the worst of the worst, to account, then you aren't ready to hold some less-brand name Russians. And if you are too afraid of consequence of, in one of your words, hitting the Iran wasp nest with a stick to the point we had a weekend of imagining World War III scenarios then you're goddamn jokers if you think you'll ever be able to stomach imposing true consequences on Russia. Compared to Russia which is Hardcore Nightmare Mode, Iran is Normal Mode. If you can't beat Normal mode, you can't beat Hardcore Nightmare Mode. If you are afraid to do Normal Mode, then you shouldn't even try against Hardcore Nightamare Mode.

Some of you folks need to stick to Healthcare and Jobs and parochial concerns. You aren't cut out for the things that go on in this nasty, nasty world.

[Draco-Onis]

We were told some of them, and the more "rational" choices included the two I mentioned - the Iranian Frigate and the Training Camp. It wasn't labeled the "dumbest" - you have got to stop interjecting your subjective assessments with objective fact - it was labeled the most extreme, thrown in there so that Trump could pick a lesser response. That doesn't mean the assassination choice was "bad" or "dumb". It just means it was extreme.

And in no way shape or form am I claiming Trump made a good decision, in fact it sounds like he lied to himself to justify the scenario in the first place. However, the policy is sound - killing the person who gave the order - because it punishes those directly responsible for the action, which in my opinion is both decisive and well over due.

It's simplistic and idiotic and doesn't take into account any of the aftermath, at the end of the day how did killing him move the needle in our favor? by all accounts we've lost ground.

I don't even know where to begin to explain to you have the irrational reaction of an insane theocracy is somehow the United States' fault. If we invited them to peace talks and they blew up an ocean liner, would that be our fault?

We are not responsible for how others feel, and certainly not how they react.

History doesn't lie our actions in Iran are well known at this point even the CIA is no longer denying it I am not sure why you think we can just detach ourselves of all responsibility. We wanted someone in charge that would be a puppet and protect our oil interests it blew up in our faces and we've been paying the price of that ever since.

- - - Updated - - -

Options? Is this some kind of joke?

Soleimani should have been droned in the 2000s. Bush and Obama both considered it. They held back. They were wrong to.

This is EXACTLY the kind of long overdue business we should be engaging in, because it is an excellent and effective first option.

Don't believe me? Let me give you a list of names.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/mueller...who-1531511838

Russian intelligence officers
Viktor Borisovich Netyksho, Boris Alekseyevich Antonov, Dmitriy Sergeyevich Badin, Ivan Sergeyevich Yermakov, Aleksey Viktorovich Lukashev, Sergey Aleksandrovich Morgachev, Nikolay Yuryevich Kozacheck, Pavel Vyacheslavovich Yershov, Artem Andreyevich Malyshev, Aleksandr Vladimirovich Osadchuk, Aleksey Aleksandrovich Potemkin

Manafort associate Konstantin Kilimnik

Internet Research Agency, Concord Management & Consulting LLC, Concord Catering
Yevgeniy Viktorovich Prigozhin, Mikhail Ivanovich Bystrov, Mikhail Leonidovich Burchik, Aleksandra Yuryevna Krylova, Anna Vladislavovna Bogacheva, Sergey Pavlovich Polozov, Maria Anatolyevna Bovda, Robert Sergeyevich Bovda, Dzheykhun Nasimi Ogly Aslanov, Vadim Vladimirovich Podkopaev, Gleb Igorevich Vasilchenko, Irina Viktorovna Kaverzina, Vladimir Venkov

You want to deter future 2016-style election hacks? Kill these men for their crimes. Openly. Loudly. Send a message Or if not that, if one so much as steps foot outside of Russia, they be bagged by the CIA and hauled to the US for interrogation, trial and life in prison. Punish the people who did it so the next time someone thinks of pulling a stunt like Russia did in 2016, they remember their predecessors who paid for it with their lives in due course. That they were never safe again.

I've been saying this literally for years. The Russians involved in the election hack need to be held accountable personally. They can never know safety. They should never know a good night's sleep again. That is the magnitude of what they did.

Now seeing frankly, you and others who have been hard aboard the Mueller train, the anti-Trump train, and the hold-Russia-to-account-for-2016 train get all squeamish because the US actually sent one of the people on its list to hell, I really start to think the lot of you signed onto the whole "we have to send a message to Russia" train without knowing what that meant. You didn't think it through.

Iran understands the language that took Soleimani off the table best. Similarly, those 34 Russians above suffer a series of unfortunate boating accidents and J-walking incidents, would send a message that Russia would understand the best way too.

Because they don't give a fig for your carrots. You can't buy their friendship. Not at this point. Not when they've calculated belligerence gets them far more than cooperation. You can only hit them with the stick and threaten to hit them more.

I've said it once and I'll say it again. You folks who were mad about Russia's interference in 2016 and want to deter future attacks like that and hold them responsible who are also unprepared to "deal" with the US killing Soleimani are non-serious. If you aren't willing to hold Soleimani, one of the worst of the worst, to account, then you aren't ready to hold some less-brand name Russians. And if you are too afraid of consequence of, in one of your words, hitting the Iran wasp nest with a stick to the point we had a weekend of imagining World War III scenarios then you're goddamn jokers if you think you'll ever be able to stomach imposing true consequences on Russia. Compared to Russia which is Hardcore Nightmare Mode, Iran is Normal Mode. If you can't beat Normal mode, you can't beat Hardcore Nightmare Mode. If you are afraid to do Normal Mode, then you shouldn't even try against Hardcore Nightamare Mode.

Some of you folks need to stick to Healthcare and Jobs and parochial concerns. You aren't cut out for the things that go on in this nasty, nasty world.

Your solution to beating hardcore nightmare mode is to smash the TV to pieces and declare you win, again what is your end game? because all your solutions basically lead to one thing war. You want to kill people fine there is such a thing as plausible deniability, tact and "accidents", drone striking people and doing the end zone dance is idiotic. If we can't do these things better than the Russians then forget hardcore nightmare mode you are stuck on easy mode.

[cubby]

It's simplistic and idiotic and doesn't take into account any of the aftermath, at the end of the day how did killing him move the needle in our favor? by all accounts we've lost ground.

A General of Terrorists is dead. Iran and everyone else will rethink their support of people like this, and every leader ordering an attack on the U.S. will wonder post-attack if there is a drone with their name on it floating overhead.

Your solution to beating hardcore nightmare mode is to smash the TV to pieces and declare you win, again what is your end game? because all your solutions basically lead to one thing war. You want to kill people fine there is such a thing as plausible deniability, tact and "accidents", drone striking people and doing the end zone dance is idiotic. If we can't do these things better than the Russians then forget hardcore nightmare mode you are stuck on easy mode.

I love that you think we aren't already at war with Russia.

In your opinion, at what point do we start punishing those people who attack us? I'd really like you to answer that question. Because right now you sound like someone who just sits there and takes it, then wonders how we get a Trump into the White House.

[Kasierith]

Your solution to beating hardcore nightmare mode is to smash the TV to pieces and declare you win

You've accidentally come across the core dynamic of international politics. I say accidentally because you don't realize how what you've said is actually supportive of his position. There is no true rule of law in international politics. You can take your Geneva Conventions, and Iran China or Russia will readily shove them down your throat if it serves their purposes. INF is ultimately nothing more than ink put to paper well before those in control came into power. Alliances and treaties are ultimately changeable, held together by nothing more than mutual benefit.

In other words, if you want to win, and you want the others who are attacking you to lose, yes refusing to play the game they want you to play and operating laterally is a sound idea. The state department, the CIA, the NSA, they are not operating in terms of what individual acts are right or wrong. They are operating in terms of what helps and protects the American people. And while that needs to be curtailed and needs oversight because that sort of dynamic can and too often does go too far, at the end of the day institutions like that are necessary because what is out there is so much worse.

If you don't believe me, lets ask what some of those Hong Kong protesters shipped off to reeducation camps think on the matter.

[Skroe]

You do realize your sticks only approach only leads to one path right? you are basically saying war is the only answer here guess you and Pompeo are on the same page after all. I disagree carrots do work before we stepped out of the deal Iran's leadership was experiencing it's biggest threat yet its people wondering why they are suffering with the sanctions gone. The Iranian government is corrupt to the core and all we have done is propped it up by giving it cover for its corruption without a foreign adversary to blame for all its woe its grip on power would erode.

With Iran and North Korea? Frankly the only probable way to a new relationship is through a major war or internally-generated regime collapse. In a sense the US is here too with Russia - there will be no new relationship attempt with Russia until Putin is replaced by a successor. The things

This may make you uneasy but it is entirely consistent with history. In a different world, or an older world, we very likely would have already warred. We're all being held back largely by constraints of the modern world. But the relationships are that bad, and moreover bad for entirely valid reasons. Again, Iran's vision of hegemony in the Middle East, which it will go for regardless of US involvement of the region, is entirely rational from its perspective. Iran is a rational actor that does rational things, and trying to rule the region and isolate the Saudis will benefit them to a greater degree than regional cooperation will.

We're well into the post-carrot phase. There was *maybe* an opening around 1999 and 2000. But the point relations are at makes containment and deterrence by far the preferrable policy.

This basically comes down to if you can stomach that or not.

The US is no longer fighting ISIS, we have the biggest troop build up in the ME during Trump's time, Iraq wants us out and we are blackmailing them to stay in. There's zero sign that Iran will stop using its proxies to attack the US and it's interest basically the status quo except we have lost ground. How exactly are you defining this deterrence?

The US should leave Iraq if they don't want us there. But I have defined deterrence and cited experts on this very topic for many pages now. At this point, like Trumphadis, you're not accepting expert opinion because it undermines a pre-established ideological position.

Iran backed down after a saving face response that caused minimal damage and no casualties after months of ever bolder attacks, from shooting down a drone to having its proxies sack an embassy. Some of those proxies shooting mortars at the Green Zone shows how far down the threat of retaliation has come due to that deterrence.

And the international community proved itself irrelevant when it couldn't keep the Iran nuclear deal together because it was scared of Trump. If there's one major thing that Trump's leadership or lack thereof has proven is that the EU and its members are worthless.

A large part of that is due to well, luck and timing.

The EU is vastly weaker than it was in the first years of the 2000s. Its seen its position as an alternative to US economic might erode. It's seen it's foreign policy influence erode as well as the institution-centric 1990s and 2000s gave way to the classical Great Power competition approach of the New Cold War era. Brexit and the Euro Crises have deeply damaged it. The failure of international responses to Putin has eroded a model of world the EU worked well in.

Russia is weaker than it was in 2000. Back then, with its Soviet inheritence, it was the second most powerful country in the world. Now it's probably the fifth. Putin's modern Russia is certainly more adventurous. But that masks that Russia has in a sense, contracted its interests and capabilities to a more "defensible" core by a considerable degree.

China's had a rough go since 2010. They've been own-goaling themselves in their own region in terms of influence. "Sharp Power" has terrified everyone they deal with. The One Belt One Road initiative is mostly just words. Their economy officially growing at around 6-7% for the last decade is likely a lot closer to 1%. It was supposed by the World's largest economy by now, a date that keeps getting pushed back every year, as it doesn't actually grow by its stated number. Its military power has grown apace, but its attempts to set up alternative institutions have largely failed.

Meanwhile Barack Obama deftly managed a heroic recovery from the Great recession. A decade of solid growth and low unemployment has strengthened, rather than weakened the US's economic position. The US has grown in dominance the financial world. It's been engaging in the largest arms build-up since the Cold War. The US has benefited greatly from the failures (Brexit) and mistakes (Ukraine-Russia) of its competitors and alternatives. The US economy has transformed significantly to in just the past 10 years, with the US maintaining its leadership in technology. Trump is legitimately "the weak spot", because Obama's largely sueprbly functioning government, one his White House spent considerable energy modernizing, professionalizing and reshaping, was replaced by Trump's shambolic shitshow. Inertia of what Obama built has carried Trump far, but it won't last forever, and the next Democrat will have a hell of a repair job (and also a lot of people wanting to help with repairs).

But imagine the US with all its structural advantages, with a competent government running it? That would be something else. Hopefully we'll get there after the election.

In a different world, the US would pay dearly for electing Trump. A major misstep. But we've been extraordinarily fortunate that in this world, our competitors have weakened due to structural reasons or committed mistakes / have problems of their own which are worse than President RageTweet. This is why we're able to say the international community proved itself irrelevant. Because that community is only as good as the players who make it up. And mostly everyone is in a worse spot than they were in 2005. Except the US, which is a far stronger spot.

This is why the emerging model of the next several decades is believed to be by experts to be a strong and expansive US-dominated sphere, and a strong but smaller China-dominated sphere, and a weak international community of non-aligned and spoiler states between them. In 30 years (from 2000) seeing the world going from unipolarity to multipolarity to bipolarity. Because the US and China are getting stronger (and the gap between them narrowing) while everyone else is getting weaker (and the gap between them and the US/China expanding).

- - - Updated - - -

Your solution to beating hardcore nightmare mode is to smash the TV to pieces and declare you win, again what is your end game? because all your solutions basically lead to one thing war. You want to kill people fine there is such a thing as plausible deniability, tact and "accidents", drone striking people and doing the end zone dance is idiotic. If we can't do these things better than the Russians then forget hardcore nightmare mode you are stuck on easy mode.

I mean, we are in a war versus these countries in a sense. An undeclared one. A low level one. We aren't openly shooting each other yet very often. But where else do you think we are?

Russia has attacked us and is attacking our friends.
China is preping for the New Cold War with us.
North Korea is building nuclear weapons and long range missiles to attack North America. Who lives in north America?
Iran wants regional hegemony and has been attacking the US for decades.

Basically you want to not recognize a state that already exists, and find alternatives that do not exist.

Also taking these people off the board loudly sends the message. That is why you do it. Doing it discretely doesn't have the same deterrent effect. The entire point of it is to push the other side into a defensive position and knock their legs out from under them.

The end-zone dance, as you call it, is an essential component, because it sends the message of where the boundaries are. Again, what is your problem with that? Some mistaken sense that we should be "better"? That that? Because that's what Barack Obama got. And look what it got him. His legacy is now (1) deftly handled Financial Crisis recovery, (2) Obamacare, (3)being glacial in the response to the rise of China and Russian revanchism, which culminated with years of island building the US didn't respond to and the 2016 election attack.

Do better than Barack Obama. He became prisoner of his ideology that we were living in a world where "19th century geopolitics were obsolete", didn't see the world for what it is, and we're all paying for it with President Putin's Cockholster.

The best course - the one that advances the national interest the most - is to enthusiastically engage in deterrence and competition with these countries, rather than try an prevent furtherance of competition that has already been initiated. If properly executed, the US, in a powerful relative geopolitical position, stands to gain substantially from it.

[Draco-Onis]

A General of Terrorists is dead. Iran and everyone else will rethink their support of people like this, and every leader ordering an attack on the U.S. will wonder post-attack if there is a drone with their name on it floating overhead.




I love that you think we aren't already at war with Russia.

In your opinion, at what point do we start punishing those people who attack us? I'd really like you to answer that question. Because right now you sound like someone who just sits there and takes it, then wonders how we get a Trump into the White House.

You and @Skroe keep saying we've achieved deterrence that means that this act has stopped Iran from attacking the US and its allies. Do you honestly believe we've just done that? because if we haven't then you should use another word because that's not deterrence.

[Shadowferal]

Lets see who can assassinate the leaders of any country...for reasons because that always works.

Deterrence works. See how well it's working for us with Russia? North Korea?

[Skroe]

I love that you think we aren't already at war with Russia.

In your opinion, at what point do we start punishing those people who attack us? I'd really like you to answer that question. Because right now you sound like someone who just sits there and takes it, then wonders how we get a Trump into the White House.

Bingo. Bingo. Bingo.

I want to send you a fruit basket for putting it so perfectly.

This gets back to one of my favorite pet peeves - reporters asking "Mr. President, will you take X off the table"? I get why they ask it... it is a classic journalist question. But the implication is pretty nutty. The US should never take anything off the table, ever. No matter how unlikely. Even something as insane and improbable as nuking ISIS or sending the Marines to claim territory in the Moon. Because strategic ambiguity is itself a massive deterrent.

The US is challenged on so many fronts because our adversaries have heard loud and clear the message: the US has explained exactly what its red lines are, it probably won't enforce them anyway, so its low risk to step over them.

We'll have a far more stable international community when that changes. When deterrence and strategic ambiguity create a situation where countries inhibit themselves from certain actions because they either know the US will respond in force, or don't know where the US will or not.

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You and @Skroe keep saying we've achieved deterrence that means that this act has stopped Iran from attacking the US and its allies. Do you honestly believe we've just done that? because if we haven't then you should use another word because that's not deterrence.

You're being weaselly and know exactly the kind of deterrence it has achieved. It has been explained to you repeatedly at this point. You just don't want to yield.

It's deterred a direct military action akin to the US downing of a drone, sending conventional forces into Iraq, killing one of our leaders or US soldiers. It also dialed them back from having proxies stage things on the scale of sacking our embassy. It reduced them to just firing mortars at the Green Zone, which is not covered by that level of deterrence (it's too smalls scale to matter).

And it's not just me. It's the experts I've cited. People who literally teach this shit.

Honestly you just need to yield on the deterrence point. You've lost the argument on it. No need to die on that hill senselessly.

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You've accidentally come across the core dynamic of international politics. I say accidentally because you don't realize how what you've said is actually supportive of his position. There is no true rule of law in international politics. You can take your Geneva Conventions, and Iran China or Russia will readily shove them down your throat if it serves their purposes. INF is ultimately nothing more than ink put to paper well before those in control came into power. Alliances and treaties are ultimately changeable, held together by nothing more than mutual benefit.

In other words, if you want to win, and you want the others who are attacking you to lose, yes refusing to play the game they want you to play and operating laterally is a sound idea. The state department, the CIA, the NSA, they are not operating in terms of what individual acts are right or wrong. They are operating in terms of what helps and protects the American people. And while that needs to be curtailed and needs oversight because that sort of dynamic can and too often does go too far, at the end of the day institutions like that are necessary because what is out there is so much worse.

If you don't believe me, lets ask what some of those Hong Kong protesters shipped off to reeducation camps think on the matter.

Superbly put. @Draco-Onis needs to read about this and think about it carefully.

[cubby]

You and @Skroe keep saying we've achieved deterrence that means that this act has stopped Iran from attacking the US and its allies. Do you honestly believe we've just done that? because if we haven't then you should use another word because that's not deterrence.

So no answer to my question then? God forbid you take up a position on your own.

Yes, the assassination of General Sulemain was a deterrence. It will, as I've said many times already, make leaders question their decision to attack the U.S. I'm curious why you think it wouldn't.

You continue to dodge the very relevant points regarding how many attacks are ok before we can respond. You keep asking us questions that we answer very thoroughly, and yet provide no opinions of your own.

Do you think we aren't already at war with Russia?
How many Embassy's does Iran have to attack before it's ok for us to respond?
What's the difference between attacking an Iranian Frigate and killing the General? Why is the Frigate the better choice.

Why do you feel it's not good policy to punish those that attack us?

[Shadowferal]

Why on earth does anyone imagime deterrence works for every country?

[Draco-Onis]

So no answer to my question then? God forbid you take up a position on your own.

Yes, the assassination of General Sulemain was a deterrence. It will, as I've said many times already, make leaders question their decision to attack the U.S. I'm curious why you think it wouldn't.

You continue to dodge the very relevant points regarding how many attacks are ok before we can respond. You keep asking us questions that we answer very thoroughly, and yet provide no opinions of your own.

Do you think we aren't already at war with Russia?
How many Embassy's does Iran have to attack before it's ok for us to respond?
What's the difference between attacking an Iranian Frigate and killing the General? Why is the Frigate the better choice.

Why do you feel it's not good policy to punish those that attack us?

I find it funny that your hypothetical thinking about doing it is deterrence, there's zero reason to think the attacks will stop. I keep asking the same questions because you guys keep dodging the obvious pitfalls in your logic.

We have been in cold war with Russia for decades.
We can respond by attacking their assets, proxies and if you want assassinations do it in a way where we have plausible deniability every other country has learned that lesson even Russia.
Though I don't think those two are good options the Iranian frigate isn't a head of state and open Pandora's box where we have basically said it's okay to kill anyone you deem dangerous openly kind of makes us hypocrites when we condemn that kind of action.

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Bingo. Bingo. Bingo.

I want to send you a fruit basket for putting it so perfectly.

This gets back to one of my favorite pet peeves - reporters asking "Mr. President, will you take X off the table"? I get why they ask it... it is a classic journalist question. But the implication is pretty nutty. The US should never take anything off the table, ever. No matter how unlikely. Even something as insane and improbable as nuking ISIS or sending the Marines to claim territory in the Moon. Because strategic ambiguity is itself a massive deterrent.

The US is challenged on so many fronts because our adversaries have heard loud and clear the message: the US has explained exactly what its red lines are, it probably won't enforce them anyway, so its low risk to step over them.

We'll have a far more stable international community when that changes. When deterrence and strategic ambiguity create a situation where countries inhibit themselves from certain actions because they either know the US will respond in force, or don't know where the US will or not.

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You're being weaselly and know exactly the kind of deterrence it has achieved. It has been explained to you repeatedly at this point. You just don't want to yield.

It's deterred a direct military action akin to the US downing of a drone, sending conventional forces into Iraq, killing one of our leaders or US soldiers. It also dialed them back from having proxies stage things on the scale of sacking our embassy. It reduced them to just firing mortars at the Green Zone, which is not covered by that level of deterrence (it's too smalls scale to matter).

And it's not just me. It's the experts I've cited. People who literally teach this shit.

Honestly you just need to yield on the deterrence point. You've lost the argument on it. No need to die on that hill senselessly.

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Superbly put. @Draco-Onis needs to read about this and think about it carefully.

So your betting Iran will never attack us like that I will mark this post so I can laugh at you when it happens again.

[Dead Moose Fandango]

I only sorta worry it won't work very well as a deterrence simply because the US waited so long to kill the bastard. Otherwise? I won't say it wasn't warranted.

[cubby]

I find it funny that your hypothetical thinking about doing it is deterrence, there's zero reason to think the attacks will stop. I keep asking the same questions because you guys keep dodging the obvious pitfalls in your logic.

We have been in cold war with Russia for decades.
We can respond by attacking their assets, proxies and if you want assassinations do it in a way where we have plausible deniability every other country has learned that lesson even Russia.
Though I don't think those two are good options the Iranian frigate isn't a head of state and open Pandora's box where we have basically said it's okay to kill anyone you deem dangerous openly kind of makes us hypocrites when we condemn that kind of action.

You're hemming and hawing like it's some kind of theoretical discussion that if you guess right will get you an "A" on your thesis. The real world doesn't work that way. We have to make real decisions that affect people.

You still haven't answered why killing a bunch of random people on a boat or in a training camp is somehow better than killing the person who ordered the attack. The argument for deterrence is sound - military leaders will stop and second guess their decisions to attack the U.S. if they know it will make them targets themselves. All you've done so far is say "that's wrong" without and sound reasoning or logic. Deterrence works precisely the way we're describing it.

Your above reasoning, with plausible deniability for killing those responsible is how we got into this mess in the first place. Now, instead of pretending we weren't a part of killing those responsible, we shout it loudly from the towers. "Fuck yes" we did it, and we'll do it again, if we're attacked.

And we're not killing anyone we deem dangerous - you have to stop lying about what this policy involves - we are killing those who order attacks on the United States. How is that bad again to defend ourselves from direct attacks?

[Shadowferal]

Deterrence worked so well against Iran back in the 80s...and herr we are today...why? It sure as hell isn't because "deterrence." That's just a smokescreen.

[jonnysensible]

You guys are talking about deterrence the way goons talk about the death penalty being a deterrent, republican boomer mindset.

Nevermind completely misunderstanding the point of the ongoing Russian interference.

[Draco-Onis]

You're hemming and hawing like it's some kind of theoretical discussion that if you guess right will get you an "A" on your thesis. The real world doesn't work that way. We have to make real decisions that affect people.

You still haven't answered why killing a bunch of random people on a boat or in a training camp is somehow better than killing the person who ordered the attack. The argument for deterrence is sound - military leaders will stop and second guess their decisions to attack the U.S. if they know it will make them targets themselves. All you've done so far is say "that's wrong" without and sound reasoning or logic. Deterrence works precisely the way we're describing it.

Your above reasoning, with plausible deniability for killing those responsible is how we got into this mess in the first place. Now, instead of pretending we weren't a part of killing those responsible, we shout it loudly from the towers. "Fuck yes" we did it, and we'll do it again, if we're attacked.

And we're not killing anyone we deem dangerous - you have to stop lying about what this policy involves - we are killing those who order attacks on the United States. How is that bad again to defend ourselves from direct attacks?

I already answered your question those people don't have the rank, position and protections we usually afford to people as heads of government. You keep saying deterrence works, do you have any examples where it has? because history is filled with what this is which is escalation not "deterence" because that is how the real world works. In the real world your policy ends with millions of people dead in Iran not even going into the fact that you seem to think that Trump has a policy for Iran so far there's no evidence of such a thing.

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Deterrence worked so well against Iran back in the 80s...and herr we are today...why? It sure as hell isn't because "deterrence." That's just a smokescreen.

They were so dettered the situation got worse