SC will overthrow

The goal of the war seems to have shifted to opening the strait of Hormuz, which was open before the war.

I remain of the opinion that the forces being sent are not to capture islands or seize the nuclear material, the force in theater and being sent is grossly inadequate to those ends.

I heard on a military podcast that the marines are ideally suited for raids-get in do damage get out.

That might be their purpose

Or as a QRF for threatened embassies.

The Iraq situation is deteriorating, maybe they are reserves for that situation.

The thing to keep an eye out is if Piggy calls in the National Reserves. That would indicate a true land campaign.

But, again, we are at a serious operational disadvantage for any land campaign. As the Rus-Uk war shows drones completely change the battle front. Where can our troops safely assemble free of drone? Russia abuts Ukraine. We would have to set up a jumping off point for any campaign well within drone range. which will subject our forces to attack during assembly.

I honestly don't have any good concept of what the land campaign could encompass. Probably I am missing some basic options, I admittedly am not an expert on modern warfare, but the stuff being discussed, Kharge Island and seizing the nuke material seem like incredibly bad ideas.

It is obvious that Piggy is desperate. At best he is manipulating the markets for corrupt purposes. More likely he is flailing for a solution. Some in his circle may even be pointing out the poor situation he finds himself in, maybe.

It really would be helpful if Piggy wasn't surrounded by sycophants who tell him what he wants to hear.

Desperation breeds defeat. Enemies can smell it and exploit it.

Maybe Iran is taking enough damage for them to consider negotiating, but no matter what else, they will be coming to negotiations from a position of power.

That is the opposite of any reasonable goal America would want to achieve with Iran

The tea leaves have been hard to read as to what is actually going on with regards to negotiations, I admit I am not an expert on the diplomatic speak and the interworking of the various middle eastern regimes. But the Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Gaza war certainly had months and years of negotiations (in the Russian-Ukraine war that have not even reached peace).

So, my gut says these "negotiations" will go nowhere

Meanwhile, Piggy is sending more troops to the ME

Despite Hegseth's bizarre, childish rants, America's military is executing a war of diminishing returns. More and more effort to destroy less and less

Despite the Trump administration lies, Iran's military capability is nowhere near degraded. As has been explained repeatedly Iran is winning that war.

America has lost several strategic objectives since the start of the war:

1. Nuclear material still not seized.
2. Iran regime more radicalized and hard line
3. Iran more motivated to develop nuclear weapons
4. Strait of Hormuz under Iranian control
5. Military stockpiles being depleted
6. Nascent Iranian opposition silenced or moved towards agreement with regime.
7. Damage to Gulf State partners with long term questions as to our security agreements with them
8. De Facto lifting of sanctions against Iranian oil.
9. Lifting of sanctions against Russian oil, which will allow Russia to pursue their war with Ukraine with more resources
10. Stretching of our strategic/global resources in Europe and the Far East, denuding those areas of resources used as a deterrent to aggression
11. Further weakening of our relationships with our allies.

And to believe our administration the above is offset by us blowing up some speedboats and missile launchers

To be clear

America or Israel bombed regular armed forces of Iraq. Not some random militia group but the actual army of Iraq.

That is not good

Some other observations

Iran now controls the movement of around 20% of the world's oil

Basic supply and demand will cause the price of oil to rise

But that rate of movement means a volume of oil that passes through the system to the nations of the world on a daily basis.

A portion of that volume is no longer available. So, not only will rich nations be paying far higher prices, but poorer nations will also simply NOT have oil. These are nations with limited or no reserves or alternatives to rely on. That means these poorer nations will not have power for industry, for hospitals, for schools, for their economy. This war will cause massive harm to these countries

Israel is expanding its war on Lebanon even further expanding their "buffer zone", which in reality is Israel seizing recognized land from Lebanon.

In my opinion America MUST divest itself from this aggressor, immoral, genocide committing, criminal nation. Only then could Israel reverse course to the liberal democracy they need to be.

Another thing.

Iran is exporting MORE oil since the war began

Piggy has effectively lifted sanctions on Iranian oil.

Iran is making a great deal of money as a result of the 2 above factors.

Iran is ALSO extracting a toll on tankers traversing the Strait of Hormuz. Iran is selling its oil at a premium and exacting a toll and being paid in Yuan.

The value of the oil at sea that Iran will be able to sell with sanctions lifted alone is around $15,000,000,000

The "pallets of cash" Iran received as part of the JCPOA that republicans whined about was valued around $1,700,000,000

So, understand this, Iran, as a result of this war, has had their sanctions lifted.

Does anyone think they will agree to cessation of hostilities and a return of sanctions?

In summary Iran could end up not giving up its nuclear material, will have sanctions lifted, make MORE money from oil, extract a toll on oil traversing the strait

That is a deal only piggy could accomplish

IRAN KILLING PROTESTORS WHETHER 3000 OR 30000 DOES NOT JUSTIFY A WAR OF AGGRESSION

To be clear.

Broadly speaking thus war will end even remotely as a victory if ships can traverse the strait and gulf without constraint

Other ends (like denuclearization or arms control)are icing on that cake. And remember that "victory " is worse than we had pre war

To achieve that end Iran must agree to the terms ie to agree to not interfere with traffic

What will motivate Iran to agree to that? Well that's the $64000 question

Some think bombing sufficient

I don't

But anything beyond that is certainly difficult if not impossible to achieve

Iran will want some guarantee that Israel and America won't be back in a year. Given our untrustworthy behavior in negotiations and in fact Trump bragging about using negotiations to fool the Iranians I don't see that as an easy fix

Iran will want Israel to leave Lebanon which given how Israel dealt with Gaza doesn't appear as likely

Irans nuclear material seems critical to Israel buy in for any ceasefire and that is not even remotely possible to seize without Iranian agreement

America cannot achieve a separate ceasefire from Israel

So despite the lies that talks are in progress we are in the same irreconcilable dilemma

The war is lost and the only question is how much we will pay before trump realizes that fact

And this weekend piggy will come up with some other tactic to scam whil the war drags on

Here is a simple fact

The war won't be over until Israel withdraws from Lebanon.

Anyone think they will?

So, Piggy threatens power plants
Piggy tacos and says 5 more days
Someone bombs power plants

You wonder why Iran refuses to negotiate?

Probably our "ally" Israel

So, ummm, yeah, this weekend? Not looking good for deal

Attacks on Iran's energy-related facilities in Isfahan, Khorramshahr could complicate situation

By Mohamed Vall
Reporting from Tehran, Iran

There is now a confirmation from Fars news agency of attacks hitting energy-related facilities in Isfahan and Khorramshahr.

The report said that the attacks took place during the day on Monday.

What we don't know yet is if the attacks came before or after US President Donald Trump made the announcement extending his ultimatum against Iran, and giving instruction to the Department of War not to strike energy facilities and plants.

If the attacks happened after Trump's statement, then the Americans did not make good on their promise, and it will likely make the situation more complicated particularly for those in the business of mediation between the two sides.

Earlier, Iranian officials have been quick to deny Trump's claims of negotiations saying they have nothing to do with any proposals, direct or indirect.

Our ---- in chief is punting for a week in a desperate attempt to be able to create peace out of --------.

Meanwhile, Israel is seizing half of Lebanon.

There will be no peace agreement by Saturday

All I know is that every time a republican is president my retirement savings take a massive hit

Thanks magat scum

Says Israeli propaganda?

Maybe, just possibly, if America withdrew some of it's support, say made the support conditional rather than unconditional, Israel would be motivated to reach peaceful agreements with it's neighbors and pursue an actual 2-state solution instead of, you know, genocide and wars of aggression for territorial expansion.

Maybe

I know you don't like this, but do you really think the US would allow that to happen?
There are deep political and cultural ties that make that outcome extremely unlikely.

#58 | Posted by BillJohnson

What political and cultural ties are essential to America's national security or interests?

"good guys"...hmmm...killing their protestors pretty well negates that.

#59 | Posted by BillJohnson

America kills it's protestors

Just observing

"The Europeans were convinced that everything was going fine, Obama was convinced everything was fine. Biden was Convinced everything was fine."
I love how you used, "were convinced".
As if that makes it true.
Even you know it wasn't true, and had to qualify your claim before you said that everything was fine.

#57 | Posted by BillJohnson

Everything was fine until Piggy and Netanyahu decided to make it not fine.

Again

America and Israel attacked Iran during negotiations without warning or without a declaration of war. TWICE
America and Israel targeted and assassinated Iran's legal leaders-actions that are illegal under national and US law.
Also, America unilaterally withdrew from an agreement that kept Iran from pursuing nukes, which Iran was abiding with.

Israel's Smotrich says new Israeli border' in Lebanon should be Litani River
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has said that Israel's military escalation in Lebanon "needs to end with a different reality entirely, both with the Hezbollah decision but also with the change of Israel's borders".

Speaking to an Israeli radio programme, Smotrich went on: "I say here definitively ... in every room and in every discussion, too: The new Israeli border must be the Litani [River]."

Reminder

America and Israel attacked Iran during negotiations without warning or without a declaration of war. TWICE

America and Israel targeted and assassinated Iran's legal leaders-actions that are illegal under national and US law.

Iran changed death to America

Yep, the same

Is the illegal aggression of Israel and the United States a problem?

To be clear, Piggy this morning said and I paraphrase

They have nearly come to an agreement on most issues. "major points of agreement" "almost all points of agreement"

Then the next breath he says we have destroyed Iran's ability to communicate and is not sure if that has been conveyed "they're unable to talk to each other"

So, one must ask, if they are unable to talk to each other, how he came to "major points of agreement" "almost all points of agreement"

Literally the next sentence after we have "all points of agreement" to they're unable to talk to each other.

I know it is pointless to point out the fact that Piggy lies about EVERYTHING, but one would hope he would lie IDK, better, when we are in the middle of a war.

Seriously, magat scum is this acceptable to you?