Yeah, so let’s say it does happen. Who do you want to win?
I’ll lay my cards on the table. I don’t like the Iranian government. Their policies, generally speaking, are abominable to me. I believe in full equality between the sexes, don’t believe in religious states, and so on. Ideologically, these people are my enemies.
But the fact of the matter here is that it’s the US that has far more responsibility for starting a war here. Iran has not attacked the US. There is no legitimate case for war. The US tolerates far worse regimes if they are its allies (Hello Saudi Arabia!), so they aren’t doing it because they care about the Iranian population.
Even if the US did care, well, any war they wage will make the population far worse off, as it did in Iraq and Libya.
The US is by far and away the bad actor here. So, yeah, I hope it loses any war it starts. That’s unlikely, of course, but the next best outcome, that it further overstrains the US, and leads to its continued economic and political weakening, eventually leading to an outright collapse, is not.
The US is the world’s foremost rogue state. Russia doesn’t come close, despite all the squealing. The US attacks other countries all the time, constantly assassinates people, and imposes massive crippling sanctions for bogus reasons, which kill millions.
The US is evil.
So long as it is evil, it needs to either stop being evil, or lose its power.
Sooner rather than later.
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ponderer
I think you are wrong on this one. The US can definitely lose to Iran and it cannot win. You have to remember losing doesn’t always look like what we see in the movies. I remember reading about war games by the Navy in which the guys playing Iran used asymmetric warfare to cripple the “good” forces. In fact, they stopped the game and changed the rules so that the US could “win” those. This was a decade or more ago. Tripleing the price of gasoline will hurt the US and raise our already outrageous military budgets. Israel will pay an even higher price. Even if Russia and China stand aside, it will be a very long very difficult fight with our only goal to destroy their infrastructure (occupation is nonoption). The global financial depression that comes shortly after will rack Europe and the US. It will only go down hill from there. That’s why there is no chance of the generals letting that happen. It could break the military, it will definitely break Trump, and probably MIC or IIC an everyone with less then a hundred million in assets.
Ian Welsh
In an important sense the US lost in Iraq. It is losing and will lose in Afghanistan.
But it isn’t America that winds up a bombed out ruin.
Ten Bears
Iran has done me no harm. Speaking as a v-vet, having lost both Iraq and Afghanistan I have no doubt if we go after Iran we will get our asses kicked. Too little butter spread across too much bread.
Consider: this is what the christians are looking for. I would venture it is inevitable.
StewartM
You’re right Ian, American won’t end up a bombed-out ruin. But it will continue to be a crumbling ruin, falling apart piece by piece, because as you know while the sky’s the limit when it comes to foreign adventures, propping up whatever atrocity Israel is currently committing, and bailing out corrupt banks, “there’s just no money” left to fix even the basic things here at home, let alone improve things.
So ordinary people everywhere lose, just some more than others. Meanwhile, Wall Street and the defense contractors will make a killing.
KT Chong
Except nowadays the US does not win or lose any war anymore. All US wars just go on with no end.
Herman
Our alliances with Israel and Saudi Arabia have a lot to do with aggression toward Iran. We are entering an era that is looking like the pre-World War I era with more great power competition and entangling alliances that could result in major wars.
I am not at all a supporter of the regimes of Russia, China, North Korea or Iran but we are entering into a dangerous time and frankly I don’t think any power will “win” in a future major war since the world is more fragile than ever and modern weapons are so destructive that World War III might be humanity’s last war ever.
Nationalism is also on the rise and many populists overlook Trump’s war hawk stance on Iran just like how some liberals and even some left-wingers are hawkish or at least weak on foreign policy from an anti-interventionist perspective. The military is practically the only institution in America that has widespread popular support so it is tough to argue for anti-interventionism and for a more peaceful foreign policy without being accused of “hating the troops” or some other stupid accusation.
Bill Hicks
Iran–hands down. Hopefully, such a defeat would then trigger the collapse of the American empire. It’s the only way humanity might survive our downfall.
Rd
Ian, your perception of the government is somewhat skewed, perhaps thru the lens of MSM. Sure, there are characters within the gov that are of on the deep end, but not on the whole. In general, governments are a reflection of their own people. Some, more so than others. Iranians, in general, are conservative and religious people, except a minority who think they are more westerner than the westerner themselves. Like a small segment of Russians. Many of them are in California anyway. Even at that, they are still Iranians. Even among them, there were those who went back (volunteered) to fight during the Iran/Iraq war. And will do so, if need be.
however, war not likely, unless there is an accident. In that case, US allies in the southern Persian gulf will be damaged, there will be oil disruptions, and israel will be harmed too. If there were bullets flying around, very many of the israeli professional class will go back to their other homes in EU and US. Israel can not sustain herself in a war. They couldn’t deal with a few hundred crude missiles from Palestinians. Forget about dealing with Hezbollah, or the broader resistance. This is just posturing and barking.
The real war was lost in 1979. Considering US FP, in general, was based on dominating ME and its energy resources and petro $. Iran was/is the keystone to the ME. Losing Iran was the domino effect which started the loss of US dominance in ME. All the wars and chaos forced by US, has only helped to further lessen US influence. This barking too, in the ripeness of time, will diminish US presence in ME, even more.
However, there is a real economic war, and that does have serious impact on ordinary people. None the less, that DNA, in its 2500+ years, has experienced attacks and domination by outsiders 6-7 times. And every time has resurrected herself from its own ashes. This e-war is also teaching people to depend on themselves and not look at the westerners to provide for them.
The war saddam waged and supported by “all” thought them to rely on their own for defensive needs. This war, will instigate the necessity to build their own internal economy and lessen dependency on the western/outside products, which has been on going for some time. Most of the economy has shifted east. To compare, late 70s, with a population of 30M and 4.5 Mbpd, compared to some 1.5 Mbpd in recent ‘good’ times and some 80M population. You get the idea. It is the arrogant EU leaders who have to wonder where do they think they can sell their products to maintain their standard of living, as they loose their footing in ME?
And last, the resistance movements around the world, “seem” to be acting like a round robbin, like little bees buzzing the mad gorilla!! not in any order,
the Venezuelans issue arrest warrant for key opposition.
NK fires some rounds
Palestinians fire some rockets
Syria makes a move on jihadist
Iran firs a JCPOA shot
Venezuelans make further moves
NK fires more…
and the gorilla will tire. Besides trump is likely, only concerned about his re-election. A hot war is not going to help that, boasting, yes does help.
jeff wegerson
Don’t just stand there do something.
What? What? What can I do?
I guess I believe that Trump is with it enough to at least subconsciously pull off the “keep your friends close and your enemies closer.” That would be Bolton. With Bolton underfoot at least Trump has some idea of what he is up to. And if it weren’t Bolton it would be someone more capable and less obvious. And Bolton is capable of sucking up all the oxygen. So Bolton is in effect deployed to mess with the deep state. The escapades against Venezuela and Iran are meant to be distractions for media consumption. A way of not just standing there.
I can almost believe all that.
Tom
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/06/us/politics/china-hacking-cyber.html
“Rolls on the floor laughing”
NSA tried to hack China. China detected it, turned the tables and went on a rampage.
But seriously, now medical infrastructure is getting targeted by these secret cyber wars. It has long been suspected, but never proved that Stuxnet which was targeted against Iran may have spread to Japan and contributed to the Nuclear Disaster over there by causing fail-safes not to trigger.
Hugh
I do not foresee a war with Iran. The US currently doesn’t even have a permanent Secretary of Defense. And Trump’s foreign policy/national security team is made up incoherent idiots: Trump himself, Bolton, Pompeo, and Kushner.
Wars take planning. And an enormous amount of groundwork: political, diplomatic, and military. Large forces have to be deployed. The consent of allies has to be secured for rights of transit. Supply lines have to be secured. Forces have to have some place to deploy to. Forces already in the area: Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Qatar, Bahrain, Djibouti, Turkey, and Jordan have to be shored up, secured, or repositioned. None of this is going on.
Trump does not do policy. What we get instead is a lot of cheesy sound and fury which is mostly undercutting our place in the world.
ponderer
Ian, I concede your point is important. It matters where the cluster munitions that look like aid packages lie for children to find them. I think its just as important to note there isn’t any objective measure where we “win” our ME adventures. America the country, and its peoples don’t win anything from those. The only way “we” can “win” is by not getting involved. The idea of winning tied into the idea of American exceptionalism has been propagandized to the point of mass delusion. Too many people in the US don’t see that. Worse, they don’t realize the neocon /Israeli vision of “winning” is just destroyed infrastructure, wounded enemies who will nurse their hatred for generations, and debt their great grandchildren will be burdened with. The only rational option for “rooting” for the US in such a conflict besides not getting involved is to “lose” as quickly with as few casualties as possible. I think the military knows that even if they won’t say so publicly.
Tal Hartsfeld
The U.S. would be far better off simply taking care of its own intranational affairs and its own people, and being more sovereign and self-sufficient.
But we all know its government never will. Too many megalomaniacs in charge for too long to change its long-ongoing habits and, hence, to change course.
Anon
If the U.S. foolishly chooses to be the aggressor and start a war with Iran, they will lose and lose big (even if they \’win\’), per the dictates of history, and they will deserve to.
different clue
They say that ” out of evil, some good may come”. ( Well; they would say that, wouldn’t they)?
Does every mushroom cloud have a silver lining? Sometimes, maybe?
A lot of Trump voters thought they were voting against things like ” a war with Iran”. Of course Trump gave away his Presidency to the neocons and the koch-heads when he made Mike Pence his Vice President. Upon whose advice, I wonder?
So, the Axis of Pence, Koch and NeoCon will probably contrive a Tonkin Gulf type incident to pin on Iran. They will want to hand a war-under-way to the Department of Defense and try to leave the Armed Forces no choice but to go ahead and fight it. ( The DoD/Military’s other choice would be a Seven Days In May type of Military ” Constitutional Emergency” Coup to stop the Iran War in mid-start. If the “realists” are in charge of the actual loaded-weapons part of the military, that could happen. If the Rapturanian Armageddonites are in charge, they will bring the Armed Military wherever the Axis of Pence, Koch and NeoCon care to send it).
So . . . a silver lining? Maybe! If Trump’s Rogue Underlings can get a war with Iran started, Iran might have time to close the Straits of Hormuz in a long-term manner. Iran may be further able to destroy Saudi Arabia’s ability to ship any oil out through its “back door ports” on the Red Sea coast. In which case, oil could go to $300 a barrel . . . . or if we are being really optimistic, $500 a barrel. That would start a long enough deep enough Greatest Ever Depression in the history of the world. A Depression deep and long enough to shrink the Corporate Globalonial Plantation economy down to where carbon dioxide emissions drop enough to cool an overheated Earth.
And if Global Warming really IS a genuine problem, wouldn’t that be a genuine solution?
someofparts
Well, the neocons have always been warmongers. But now we have the Clintons and god-knows-who in the intel crowd making it clear to the Russians that they will prevent Trump from having any constructive dialogue with Putin. Looks to me like the Democrats have become warmongers just as dangerous as the neocons.
Bozo
Would you extend this argument to nuclear weapons / arms race, etc? Yes, these are bad, terrible even, but there is one rogue state that is less likely to attack you if you have a strong deterrent.
If you are, say, Russia, you don’t want a North Korea or an Iran close to your borders armed with nukes. But you also don’t want the United States to go in and attack / destroy those countries. Would you help them develop those, as a lesser evil, or the risks/ costs of doing so would be too high?
KT Chong
Tom,
The entire New York Times (NYT) article seems to suggest that China had somehow stole the NSA hacking tools without any provocation – until this sentence in the very long article:
“In this case, however, the Chinese simply seem to have spotted an American cyberintrusion and snatched the code, often developed at huge expense to American taxpayers.”
That was it. The one sentence in the entire article that actually clarifies that it was Americans who intruded, and then China snatched the code and repurposed it for their own use. For the rest of the article, NYT kept using the world “stole” and “stolen” to describe China’s action, as if China was the perpetrator and America was the victim.
different clue
@ KT Chong,
I gather the NYTimes often does this sort of thing. One has to parse some of their articles for hidden truth and facts as though one were parsing one of the Clinton’s speeches . . . or some Clinton testimony.
Trent
Who cares how you feel about the Iranian government? What do their policies have to do anything that pertains to your life? At this point anything that quickens the downfall of our corrupt ideology and returns America back to reality, I’ll cheer on. And if Iran handing us our asses quickens change I’m all for it.
todgermanica
It\’s hard to understand the soldier worship in US culture if, like me, you served in the US army during a nice, profitable war like Vietnam. Man, even some GIs made a fortune in looting, drugs, women, stolen black market army property, etc. Of course the officers controlled most of the best graft, RHIP. Lie, cheat and steal, prepare for a civilian career.
And now we\’ve got a commander-in-chief who\’s said frequently \”why can\’t we just take their oil…\”. That\’ll set the proper tone for our occupying US army troops (and don\’t forget the Marines!) Maybe we\’ll get a great War novel out of the upcoming clusterfuck. So we got that going for us.
Jelle Haandrikman
The War Nerd podcast did an episode about a possible war with Iran. It did not look pretty for the US and it’s allies. TL;DR: As soon SHTF, a couple of cruise missiles will go to the water desalination plants and power plants in Saudi Arabia. That will leave a lot of expats thirsty and really hot. Good luck with keeping your war effort going when an artificial country is dying.
They opened up the episode for free after all the war talk from last week.
Radio War Nerd EP #142* [REPOST] — Iran War Scenarios
https://www.patreon.com/posts/radio-war-nerd-26939754