Subject: Re: Iran's Missiles
And your point had zero to do with Jedi’s, which was that China helps. Because they do.

Not in any material way. Iran's missile production is almost entirely domestic. Intentionally. They are aware that it is possible to interdict arms imports, they maintain capacity to build a missile arsenal entirely with their own resources.

That's not to say China won't help out, in the same way that we are somewhat helped by Italy or Korea or some other country in our military preparedness. But Iran does not need China for its missile programs, and their assistance is not material to the overall strength of those programs. Which is why bombing their missile programs won't keep them from having missiles. They'll just rebuild everything after you stop bombing, and they don't need China to do it.

I get the feeling that some folks think Iran doesn't have any real economy, other than oil extraction. That it's like an agrarian or nomadic country, absent some oil production. That's not true. It's not up to the level of the OECD, of course, but they have a sizable heavy manufacturing and industrial sector. They have more than enough domestic resources to stand up a missile production program, no matter how heavily we bomb their current one.

They’re not going to give anything up voluntarily. Causal observers of foreign policy know that the Iranians always negotiate in bad faith, never keep their word, and as a regime exist to export mayhem and chaos. It’s a far better strategy to bring the chai to their doorstep and let them experience it rather than sit around and allow them to export it - at will - at little to no cost to themselves.

That may be true, but in no way affects whether we can eliminate their ability to have missiles just by bombing them. Whether or not voluntary suasion works doesn't affect whether bombing works. Nor does it mean that bringing "the chai" to their doorstep will work, either. Because it's not "rather than." Bringing the chai to their doorstep doesn't prevent them from continuing to export it. That's not something we "allow them" to do, but something they are able to to irrespective of what actions we take because they control a fairly large country and a fairy large economy with a decent-sized industrial and manufacturing base with large reserves of an important natural resource and geographic advantages with enormous political and economic implications.

Again, just because the status quo is bad doesn't mean that bombing Iran a lot will make it better. Just because alternatives to bombing Iran don't work doesn't mean that bombing Iran will work.