• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

Has The US Just Declared War?

Salvador

RF's Swedenborgian
Yeah, thats probably not the case. If someone would cower like that, they probably would never make general. It's prpbably more akin to poking a wasp nest.

I'd like to see the next leading Iranian General dare rare his ugly face in public where it might be spotted miles away by U.S. military surveillance that'd prompt a U.S. military drone attack to once again take out Iran's crazed military leader.
 

Revoltingest

Pragmatic Libertarian
Premium Member
I'd consider a nuclear Iran to be an existential risk to anybody in or near the Middle East.
And yet we are a nuclear power, & tolerate other such powers in the
mid-east, eg, Israel, Pakistan. Is waging all out war against Iran the
best way to avoid all out war with Iran?
We've demonstrated to Iran that it needs nukes as a defense against
Ameristan. Criminy, we've killed hundreds of thousands of them, &
waged continuous covert war for many decades. I argue that the best
way to stop this enemy is to stop compelling them to be the enemy.
 

Kangaroo Feathers

Yea, it is written in the Book of Cyril...
The Viet Cong beat the USA with shovels.
Forgoing numerical superiority and individual soldier quality to rely on technological superiority has been the basis of Western military doctrine for the past 70 odd years. For some reason, we haven't yet learned after Vietnam and dozens of low level coflicts that, outside of major conventional set piece battles, technological superiority is not enough to win modern wars.

After 20 years fighting insurgents in the Middle East and not making much headway, our war planners are SLOWLY coming to the realisation troops on the ground have known for a while now, but, sadly, our politicians still seem wedded to the idea of highly technological, capital intensive wonder weapons suited for fighting a style of war that hasn't really been a thing since the middle of the last century.

Technological superiority just isn't enough to defeat a highly motivated, numerically superior force with home territory advantage. Just ask the Germans from the Eastern front in War 2... the handful that survived.
 
Last edited:

Kangaroo Feathers

Yea, it is written in the Book of Cyril...
A lot of US citizens live in urban sprawl and are very sensitive to supply chain problems. We depend on our grocery stores, our utilities. We rely on many things that people living in the countryside can procure for themselves. You don't live here, but sometimes where there are natural disasters that interfere with supply trucks a lot of people go hungry or have no drinking water. It may sound silly, but its real problem.

I have a few water filters, some dried stores and things like that. I don't rely on them all the time, but you know what if the food trucks for some reason stopped coming I'd be relying on them a lot. I also rely upon petrol. Without petrol I'm stuck many miles from other than what I can catch in the woods. I could find myself living off of worms and beetles inside of 4 months and all because the gasoline was disrupted or because the internet shut down or some silly thing like that.
I don't know that Iran has that sort of capability. I don't want to say "it'll never happen", but it seems unlikely. I'm not saying that Iranian 5th columnists couldn't cause some damage, but I doubt they'd have the ability to cause the sort of systemic disruption you're talking about. The Chinese? Different story.
 

Kangaroo Feathers

Yea, it is written in the Book of Cyril...
Your grasp of politics (of which military strikes is merely an extension) is a little old fashioned.
The US military can easily wipe out any conventional military force stupid enough to stand and fight. Iranian resistance is unlikely to be rows of soldiers parading in Tehran.

Anytime you go to war, Americans and their allies are in harm's way, as are civilians. Concepts like 'surgical strikes' are as much sales pitch as reality.

War remains dirty.
A million times, this. The Western coalition defeated Iraq's conventional forces in a couple of days... twice, with minimal own casualties. We then got bogged down in a war of insurgencies that, for all meaningful purposes, we lost, that's taken us 20 years, thousands of lives, and trillions of dollars, with no sign of ending any time soon. Attacking Iran will have exactly the same result, if not a much worse one.
 

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
I'd like to see the next leading Iranian General dare rare his ugly face in public where it might be spotted miles away by U.S. military surveillance that'd prompt a U.S. military drone attack to once again take out Iran's crazed military leader.
Which would solve, what exactly? Pissing them off and doubling down? Gifting martyrdom to some who crave and making heroes of them? Killing more innocents?
 

Salvador

RF's Swedenborgian
Which would solve, what exactly? Pissing them off and doubling down? Gifting martyrdom to some who crave and making heroes of them? Killing more innocents?

I don't consider the killing of Quds's military leader to be the killing of innocents; the Quds support terrorist organizations like Hezbollah and the Taliban.
 

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
I don't consider the killing of Quds's military leader to be the killing of innocents; the Quds support terrorist organizations like Hezbollah and the Taliban.
Those airstrikes you are so eager to launch do not have surgical precision. No bombing method is. People in the surrounding area are hurt and killed indiscriminately. Their homes and businesses destroyed, lives ruined, communities devastated.
 

Salvador

RF's Swedenborgian
Those airstrikes you are so eager to launch do not have surgical precision. No bombing method is. People in the surrounding area are hurt and killed indiscriminately. Their homes and businesses destroyed, lives ruined, communities devastated.

Based on pictures of the aftermath of the U.S. military drone attack against Qassem Soleiman, looks to me like this bombing was precise enough to destroy him and the car he was in without their being any significant collateral damage.

twisted-remains-of-one-of-the-vehicles-drone-strike-in-iraq.jpg
 

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
Based on pictures of the aftermath of the U.S. military drone attack against Qassem Soleiman, looks to me like this bombing was precise enough to destroy him and the car he was in without their being any significant collateral damage.

twisted-remains-of-one-of-the-vehicles-drone-strike-in-iraq.jpg
Yeah, close ups like that never show the full picture. They're pretty among 9/11 "truthers" because they allow you to insert whatever.
 
I think America really struggles with this. Take out a foreign general, cartel king pin, or corrupt foreign business man, we basically do nothing but help the next guy in line get a promotion. But they act like taking out the one actually accomplishes simething, despite the fact there are plenty in line to take the place of that one.

In this case, the replacement will have nowhere near the experience and capability of Suleimani. They have significantly reduced Iran's competence in overseeing their foreign military policy.

This may, or may not turn out to be a good thing though.

Maybe Iran's response is the bare minimum to save face, and their hand in the region is weakened by the significant loss of operational capability.

On the other hand, having a less competent strategist in charge of giving advanced weaponry to terrorists/militia groups, or with less ability to control them, or with a less cautious approach could turn out rather badly for the region. Sometimes it's better the devil you know.

It's also possible that militia groups who already have powerful weapons (anti-ship, etc) decide to take revenges into their own hands, and are already beyond the control of Tehran.

At this stage, no one can say.
 

Shad

Veteran Member
.

Tuesday (December 31)
Donald Trump warns Iran war with US is a 'bad idea' at New Year's Eve
ball at Mar-a-Lago


Thursday (January 2 )
US troops head to Middle East as Donald Trump says Iran will ‘pay price’
for Baghdad embassy riots


Friday (January 3--13 hours ago)
US kills Iranian general in rocket strike at Baghdad airport as countries
stand on brink of war


Friday (January 3--6 hours ago)
Iran strike | Has the US just declared war?


.

No it didn't as Iran's own acts would have done so first. Seizing of vessels without cause, mining international waters, attacks upon KSA, etc. Sending troops to Iraq does not mean a war is going to happen
 

Shad

Veteran Member
And yet we are a nuclear power, & tolerate other such powers in the
mid-east, eg, Israel, Pakistan.

Both are considered allies.

I argue that the best
way to stop this enemy is to stop compelling them to be the enemy.

Iran is not minding it's own business so all you suggesting is let Iran do what it wants.
 

ChristineM

"Be strong", I whispered to my coffee.
Premium Member
Can't or won't?

Both, i am bon wasting my time in a patriotic argument about the belligerent we can do what we want to you and that's ok but just you try it on us and you are in trouble because we have have the most powerful army to back up up.. attitude of a right wing militaristic government
 
Top