No. of Recommendations: 15
And you don't know this either. You don't know where the material is or what the status of it is.
Ah, but I'm not out there writing articles claiming that "The strategy....is working." Right? If you're saying, "the strategy...might end up working if certain things happen," then that's far more defensible. But the author of that piece has no more idea than I do about where the material is or what the status of it is - so he has no real basis to claim that the strategy is actually working.
Why not...just let this thing play out for a while and see what happens? Why the rush to pass judgement and declare the entire thing a failure?
Partially because this is a major ongoing current event, and it's natural to talk about it? And as informed citizens, perhaps form assessments about whether or not the ongoing operations are achieving their strategic goals - so that we can exercise oversight and pressure on our elected officials to conduct those operations in a way that serves the country's interests? Of course we're going to discuss it. Of course we'll make assessments.
Partially because I genuinely do not understand how the military operation (what we're doing) is intended to accomplish our strategic goals (what we want) - so I am hoping that these conversations will help clarify that. I'm not rushing to judgement and declaring the thing will be a failure, because we don't know what is going to happen. But I do not see how the specific types of operations we are conducting (entirely attacking from long range with bombs and missiles) can accomplish the strategic goals we've set out (stopping Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, preventing them from being a regional threat). Those don't seem to be the sorts of goals that can be accomplished with bombs, because the bombs eventually have to stop - and so if the government is still largely the same, the threat profile after the bombs stop is still largely the same, except perhaps in the very short run. Drones and short-range ballistic (as opposed to cruise or guided) missiles are relatively simple, not overly expensive to build, and can be replenished fairly quickly. There's no indication that the nuclear program has been affected at all (because, again, it had already been "obliterated" within the year).
And mostly, I was responding to the article that you posted that wasn't "letting this thing play out for a while and see what happens." That article was "rushing to pass judgment" and declare that the entire thing "is working". Again, present tense. I'm pointing out that's not correct - if we're going to pass judgment on how things are going at the present moment, it's hard to see any strategic goal that we've accomplished that was worth the cost. We'll end up spending billions and billions of dollars and deplete our own military readiness, as well as precipitate an energy crisis, to mostly degrade Iran's conventional military and short-range ballistic missile threat. Which, great, Iran now doesn't have an air force or navy - but how much of an imminent threat to us (or really to anyone) were Iran's air force or navy or even ballistic threat that it was smart to do this now?
