THE IRAN WAR SO FAR - BY BIG SERGE...

 

Big Serge is the best military historian there is - and this is his analysis of the war on Iran so far. As a tangential point he fails to mention the global impacts of the attacks on Iran.

One of the reasons that the NATO block doesn't want to get involved is that they think the war on Iran by Israel and the USA will not be successful and will draw attention away from Ukraine which is their No 1 priority. If the initial attack on Iran had 'worked' they would be fully behind damning the 'terrorist regime' (sic). But is has so-far failed.

Serge is absolutely right in my view in maintaining that they key thing for the USA and Israel neo-fascists is the crippling of Iran so that it has massively reduced influence.

How Iran reacts to this is the key thing. Will it seek closer links with Russia and China? One can only hope so. Will it go for a nuclear weapon? This is logical. Will it begin to assassinate political enemies in Isael and the USA? What (after all) is the difference between terrorism from the air and the terrorism of the suicide bomber?

At any rate, while the war in Iran is currently in the spotlisght and could indicate the beginning of the end for the USA(and Israel) in the Middle East (West Asia), the key geopolitical battle is in Ukraine and the way this will reshape the world. And a central point that Big Sege does not mention is this: in the age of information warfare, the USA has lost the propaganda war over Iran. Most of the world now sees the USA as 'the great satan'....because it is. And now the 'little satan' mantle has moved from the UK to Israel......

'....many are frustrated that Washington will not give a firm answer on whether it seeks regime change in Iran. I would argue that this is in fact a signal of American indifference towards the outcome. To the White House, it does not particularly matter whether the existing state acquiesces to American demands (for now loosely defined as “unconditional surrender”), or whether the state collapses outright. In either case, internal disarray and a crippling loss of state capacity are expected to weaken Iran for a generation. It is not that the White House does not know whether it wants regime change or not; it simply does not care.

The American strategy, as such, seems to be little more than throwing bombs at a power vacuum, either until the state collapses, surrenders, or its capacity to retaliate and reconstitute itself are so shattered that the difference no longer carries a distinction. From the American perspective, this would seem to offer flexibility and free the United States from particular commitments to Iranian political factions, forms of governance, or personnel. One advantage, apparently is that it bypasses the “foreign policy blob” altogether. By avoiding a commitment to any particular political outcome in Iran, focusing instead on the material degradation of the state, Trump avoids firm commitments and retains nominal flexibility. Bomb the state until it either collapses or behaves, and in either case it will be crippled. In theory. On paper.......

One thing is clear. Iran has, to this point, paid dearly for its inability to set meaningful deterrence. A vast array of conventional missiles and drones, a robust security state, and a web of sectarian proxies: all reasonably good assurances of the state’s safety, on paper, and yet here we are, with the war brought home to Tehran. In any world where the Iranian state survives, it will surely be eagerly seeking more meaningful and lasting levers of deterrence. A quick perusal of recent history reveals a long list of destroyed states and trashcanistans. North Korea is not on that list. Perhaps Iran will think smaller, rather than bigger, and look for safety in the infinitesimally small space inside a splitting atom.'




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