No. of Recommendations: 32
Before the Iran war:
1) Iran didn't control Strait Of Hormuz, now does
2) Iran oil was sanctioned, now it's not
3) US bases in Gulf were assets, now liabilities
4) Inflation was declining, now it’s increasing
5) Gas prices were low, now they’ve doubled
Right, plus:
6) A slightly different regime that was strongly against nuclear bomb ownership.
Also, nobody asks whether this was wrong - and here's the machinery that ensures they never will.
Indeed the bombing of Iran for regime change was not only a strategic failure, but it has set international US power projection concretely further back.
Iran is far more powerful than our own propaganda led the US/Australian/Canadian/British/etc public to believe.
A threat invoked for decades without materializing is not intelligence — it's a pretext. The Iranian nuclear programme is a multi-decade made-up story, similar to the shorter-lived Weapons of Mass Destruction propaganda, to help sell the war to the public.
The problem with Iran is similar to the problem with Russia, and the problem within China. In all 3 cases, they (1) are not obedient to our wishes, (2) they are sovereign and relatively powerful, and (3) they exist.
Whenever you have 1, 2 and 3 all true, they are necessary and sufficient conditions for the country to be smeared as an enemy of the US as the official National Security Council narrative, followed (unconsciously obediently) by the media (if don't want to be seen as 'awkward' amongst peers, if not viciously attacked if the article was actually influential; thus writing in boards like this, or university campuses, is not a problem), drummed into the public over years - and decade-long propaganda campaigns to be laid out by the US inside the target countries, the diaspora (often by definition less keen on their own countries by selection-bias of having moved) nurtured by the repeated messages.
The propaganda is repeated for years, and whether or not that leads to favorable policies for the US or Europe, sometimes the strategy shifts to regime change by means of setting up violent conflicts - not directly, but overwhelmingly using proxies. The violence is achieved by identifying, then supporting, and mobilizing proxy forces. You don't need to give a proxy day to day instructions - they just need to be against the regime you want to overthrow, and then you fund it (thus you fund Israel, you fund Azov Battalion, you fund Al Qaeda in Syria, you fund Contras in Nicaragua, you fund Mujahideen in Afghanistan, you fund FNLA in an Angola, and so on.
Indeed, I have lumped State Actor, Non-State Insurgents, and Terrorist Groups, together as willing proxies. Now these proxies have nothing in common with each other except one thing - and the only thing that matters to the funding policy: They will act independently, yet toward a shared strategic alignment with the National Security Council, facilitated by the CIA (examples are endless, including the 12 intelligence nerve-centers not placed on the Russian border by accident) to go after the government that is targeted for weakening or ideally overthrowing.
This is long standing bilateral doctrine, along with practical procedure, of the US system since 1945. It is not a theory by an observation of fact over many iterations, in many regions, and over many decades. You can list the countries, the proxies, and if you dig a bit deeper, the propaganda campaigns.
The propaganda campaigns inside Iran had some limited success, but overall failed. If you can't round up enough proxies such as terrorists, after after that you move onto bombing directly.
Sometimes we (*) bomb directly, when we are low on willing proxies. The problem is that we tried to bomb Yemen for 7 months, and as that failed, at which point we turned the camera away. Iran is far more powerful than Yemen, the military just as well widely distributed, and their technology very advanced contrary to our propaganda.
It would not surprise me in the least if most of the US bases (numbering 19 significant in total) across the broader Middle East will either not be operational, or not exist, 2 years from now. Why? Because (1) the US's hysterical anti-Iran stance is too very deep-seated, so even though they'll ease off the bombing, and (2) Iran is the second-most militarily powerful country we have gone after, and like Russia viewing the CIA offices on its border and NATO arms throughout Ukraine, Iran view the 19 significant US militrary basis *actually firing at it right now* as imminent threats.
After having negotiations with the US twice sabotaged by US bombing in the middle of the negotiation, Iran has had enough, and I believe its good-will has been exhausted.
However you know what disappoints me? What disappoints me, when the US wars are commented upon, is that they are nearly always described, at least by US leaders and US media (the public are often far more switched on), in terms of the degree to which the war was a strategic failure. The discussion boundaries are limited to whether the war initiatives by the US are strategically useful or not.
What is not mentioned is whether it is morally acceptable or not. Feel the word 'morality' has been over-used? Then think of it as 'betrayal of your own deeper values', or - I could put it humorously, 'what a 7-year-old would understand'. This part is out of bounds of discussion, and as a result, often - to my dismay - glossed over, or hardly even thought about. In fact, it is hardly thought about because of it being, not strictly censored, but the question of morality 'avoided' - with a similar effect to censorship - continuously. Out of sight, eventually out of mind.
The effect is a psychological sickness.
Of course, the question of morality - the direct effects of bombing a population - should be the central part the discussion in the media, rather than secondary, or as it happens, effectively censored out of the discussion, and eventually, even one's actual thoughts.
In nearly all cases, and the contrary cases have a profoundly high hurdle-rate to pass, war should be condemned and fought against purely on moral grounds, even if there is some minor strategic benefit.
- Manlobbi
(*) Forgive me for using 'we' in place of 'US leadership', but we'll entertain the notion that we live in a system of democratic representation, for a moment, including the 'we' amongst countries where US military bases have been installed.
