Thanks again for the piquant analysis. So the IRGC-State's strategy depended on a buffer zone in Syria, and they went all-in on it, with huge opportunity costs for procurement. But they lost, and they were not exactly on the right side of history in Syria anyway. OK, makes sense. The Israelis are many things, but not stupid, and Netanyahu realized he could cut the Gordian Knot.
But where's the theory of political victory? Where's the plan to transform a bombing campaign against a helpless Iran into stable regime change? The Trump base is devouring itself with rage about "Iraq 2.0." They have to be sold the delusion of a short sharp war -- again. Israel's political capital and reputation is also in the toilet.
Netanyahu has no plan, just bomb Iran and watch social media for reactions. He needs some new war to overshadow Gaza massacres and the mess there and internal Israeli problems too. Bombing Iranian nuclear facilities, what social media say? Aah good. Bombing Iranian TV, what social media says? Oh, wrong. Talk about regime change? Aah good. Etc.
BTW. if regime in Iran falls, there would not be any democratic rule, but a civil war like in Iraq or Syria.
Probably. But I think Iran is not a tribal fabric like the other countries where "divide et impera" keeps on working. What they *could* go for is a CIA/Mossad-supported secular/liberal/Pahlavist counterrevolution, but I don't think that is going to happen while there is an external enemy to rally against - we saw this movie in the 1980s. The "best" case for Netanyahu is a weak Iranian state too distracted by fighting regional separatist movements to go straight ahead and restart the nuclear programme in anger. Again this is just kicking the can down the road for "Jewish Rhodesia." Meanwhile, thanks to Israel, Western and American "soft power" is officially about as dead as the USSR.
Persians are chauvinists, other nations inside Iran do not feel it good. E.g. some Balochis are already fighting for independence, many Azeris (Turkish) would like to join Turkey or Azerbaidjan. Yes some naive people would speak about how they go together well, but not all feel the same. It was similar in former Yugoslavia - nationalists will take upper hand over idealists (just because it's simpler to persuade people with rage than with tolerance.) The only chance for Iran to avoid civil war in case of regime fall is to remember 2 very bad examples in their neighbourhood.
Drone warfare and US air superiority could also change the calculus for separatist movements. But this is a recipe for a bloodbath, not a "secular Iran."
Iran is the only natural country not created by Brits in that region including Pakistan. Arabs owe to Lawrence of Arabia. Iranians have field medalist and highly qualified person in there diaspora uncanny compared to other gulf states.
Agreed, Iran is not tribal and its civil society is much more developed than people want to give it credit for. Example being a colleague of mine dwent to Iran for a private medical operation to skip the NHS queues.
States were never ethnically "clean" (yes it is a stupid term), as the borders were always changing. Sometimes they were made less ethnically "unclean" (another stupid term) by their government by mass killings and mass expulsions.
The concept of national states itself is an invention of the 19th century.
Iran isn't different in it's ethnic compositions. Just take a short look back in time after WW II when Iran had to struggle to get back full control over the whole state.
Shah Pahlavi was a brutal dictator. That's why Iranians started revolution against him in 1979, some of them hoping in democracy. There were more groups sometime fighting together, sometimes each other .... and the winner was islamist Khomeini.
So, Pahlavi has some support, but far from majority of Iranians. (Iranian opposition is fragmented.)
Yes the responsible Israelis are not stupid, but short sighted. Even Bibi thinks Erez Israel is now close, which is his true politicial goal additionally to not going to prison.
Dumpf gov about Ayatollah Ali Khamenei assasination: "Have the Iranians killed an American yet? No. Until they do we're not even talking about going after the political leadership," said one of the sources, a senior U.S. administration official.
Meanwhile a U.S. citizen has been killed in Kyiv by Russian attack. Dump gov condemns the attack. Real powerful MAGA reaction.
That would require Putin being ready to sell at least a licence for their production and the production of their engines to Iran. Which is what he refused to do even for 24-30 Su-35s, which is why the deal fell through.
But yes: an IRIAF with 200-300 Su-35s would've been 'nothing but trouble' for the IASF.
One consistent reasoned thread running throughout all of it is criticism of the IRGC.
What was the road not taken then? Playing catch-up building garbage "jihad self-sufficiency" jets like F-5 clones? (The great movie "Mansour" on YouTube shows what a project that was.)
Buying jets along with manufacturing facilities from China? I think Xi has missed a trick here. And Putin has led Iran into many dead ends.
China is likely to fill in the empty space formerly occupied by Russia, it's what they do. I think Tom mentioned they were sending transports filled with who knows what to eastern Iran.
Dear Tom, thank you! About the terms, you are using "anti-Semitic" often, but I was wondering about the roots of the term, and it seems technically speaking Arab nations are Semites too. So anti-Semitic is a bit biased term. I was thinking of replacement and Judeophob sounds a bit more precise, maybe? Though it is probably not the precise too, since not every Jew around the world is the same. So anti-Zionist would sound most precise, but then all sarcasm is going out with that change too 😅 Sorry can not hold myself 😂
Do you know of any average person attitude on the streets of Tehran towards all this? Is there massive support or standing aside, or?
Will this be Ukrainian style "2 weeks" campaign. Or they would reach their goals soon you think?
Dear Tom, you are not only obsessively focused on calling yourself anti-Semite, but also you are now calling me anti-Semite, which sounds quite compulsive. I thereby recall my like on your original answer, since the only true Semites may interpret this as a sign of supporting your unconfirmed anti-Semitism. And also I am adopting a policy of being zip-lip on the topic for any following instance of the same 🤐
The oldest and the fartest among the old farts in Iran is still there. I guess that if he is eliminated, Iran will actually have a chance against Israel in the long term.
Waiting to see such theories being confirmed ever since he's coupped himself to power and locked half the Iranian Shi'a clergy into a house-arrest... some 30 years ago...
Khomeini's great grandson is a junior cleric running around with a black turban, so he could be future Supreme Leader. Probably more likely than Don Jr. ever becoming president.
Why are Iranian missiles so inaccurate (for example, the attack on the of center Mossad where the missiles deviated by up to 2 km, see. https://ibb.co/PZsMjYKs) Could it be that Israel is spoofing GPS coordinates for importen targets?
Some are inaccurate - see liquid-fuelled models of their '1st Generation' (though many meanwhile modified to carry MIRVs), perhaps also those of the '2nd Generation'.
But, who's said their 3rd Generation IRBMs are inaccurate?
I judge the inaccuracy based on the fact that the impacts on the photograph are so far from the target they were aimed at. However, if the missiles are guided by GPS coordinates, they can be easily spoofing. Or can they? Or are Iranian missiles guided in some other way?
They do have one high-res photo-recce satellite in orbit (Khayyam or something), and several smaller systems, too. That's why yesterday the Israelis targeted the Iranian Space Agency HQ.
The fact stuff like Iron Dome (meanwhile used in sheer desperation, in hope one might hit anything), David's Sling, Arrow II and III is 'trailer mounted' is not making them 'mobile', and even less so 're-deployed every 5 minutes'.
And how do missiles/drones target Israeli air defense systems? This is also relevant for Ukraine - I heard a song on TikTok from a Russian soldier about how Petriot was destroyed yesterday during an attack on Zhulyany.
it's a public secret that one of PSU's Patriot SAM-sites is 'permanently' deployed at the Zhuliany Airport. So much so, one can see revetments constructed for protection of their launchers on the Google Maps.
Extracting coordinates for such strikes is anything else than hard. Doesn't mean the entire battery is destroyed if one launcher is knocked out, though.
The same is valid for the ways the Iranians are targeting Israel.
Regardless of the fact that Iran, as a whole, stands no chance against Israel and the US, whose primary goal is to create a lot of spectacular TV images, is this tactic of firing salvos of "only" 10 to 30 rockets and then quickly hiding the TELs the "best" the Iranian military can do in this situation? Or is it just another tactic that must be considered ineffective overall?
So Tom, are you saying Western military jet fighter aircraft have taken part in exercises in China? Maybe I misunderstood. If so, that is truly incredible!
Even if just if it was in the ME, still pretty mad!
Thanks again for the piquant analysis. So the IRGC-State's strategy depended on a buffer zone in Syria, and they went all-in on it, with huge opportunity costs for procurement. But they lost, and they were not exactly on the right side of history in Syria anyway. OK, makes sense. The Israelis are many things, but not stupid, and Netanyahu realized he could cut the Gordian Knot.
But where's the theory of political victory? Where's the plan to transform a bombing campaign against a helpless Iran into stable regime change? The Trump base is devouring itself with rage about "Iraq 2.0." They have to be sold the delusion of a short sharp war -- again. Israel's political capital and reputation is also in the toilet.
Netanyahu has no plan, just bomb Iran and watch social media for reactions. He needs some new war to overshadow Gaza massacres and the mess there and internal Israeli problems too. Bombing Iranian nuclear facilities, what social media say? Aah good. Bombing Iranian TV, what social media says? Oh, wrong. Talk about regime change? Aah good. Etc.
BTW. if regime in Iran falls, there would not be any democratic rule, but a civil war like in Iraq or Syria.
Probably. But I think Iran is not a tribal fabric like the other countries where "divide et impera" keeps on working. What they *could* go for is a CIA/Mossad-supported secular/liberal/Pahlavist counterrevolution, but I don't think that is going to happen while there is an external enemy to rally against - we saw this movie in the 1980s. The "best" case for Netanyahu is a weak Iranian state too distracted by fighting regional separatist movements to go straight ahead and restart the nuclear programme in anger. Again this is just kicking the can down the road for "Jewish Rhodesia." Meanwhile, thanks to Israel, Western and American "soft power" is officially about as dead as the USSR.
Persians are chauvinists, other nations inside Iran do not feel it good. E.g. some Balochis are already fighting for independence, many Azeris (Turkish) would like to join Turkey or Azerbaidjan. Yes some naive people would speak about how they go together well, but not all feel the same. It was similar in former Yugoslavia - nationalists will take upper hand over idealists (just because it's simpler to persuade people with rage than with tolerance.) The only chance for Iran to avoid civil war in case of regime fall is to remember 2 very bad examples in their neighbourhood.
True.
Drone warfare and US air superiority could also change the calculus for separatist movements. But this is a recipe for a bloodbath, not a "secular Iran."
Yugoslavia was an artificial construct, being was six countries in one.
Iran is the only natural country not created by Brits in that region including Pakistan. Arabs owe to Lawrence of Arabia. Iranians have field medalist and highly qualified person in there diaspora uncanny compared to other gulf states.
Natural like European borders before WWI?
Natural like an old civilization. Not like gulf kingdom states . Iran only mistake is poking Israel.
Ähem, take a look at what was Iran at the end of 18th century. Yes in 1917 the British even tried to convert it into a protecorate, but failed.
Russians were there in WWI too, then Britain and Russia repeated the same show in WWII.
Agreed, Iran is not tribal and its civil society is much more developed than people want to give it credit for. Example being a colleague of mine dwent to Iran for a private medical operation to skip the NHS queues.
States were never ethnically "clean" (yes it is a stupid term), as the borders were always changing. Sometimes they were made less ethnically "unclean" (another stupid term) by their government by mass killings and mass expulsions.
The concept of national states itself is an invention of the 19th century.
Iran isn't different in it's ethnic compositions. Just take a short look back in time after WW II when Iran had to struggle to get back full control over the whole state.
This may be a possible scenario
https://www.rbc.ua/ukr/news/chas-povernuti-iran-sin-povalenogo-monarha-1750194493.html
Shah Pahlavi was a brutal dictator. That's why Iranians started revolution against him in 1979, some of them hoping in democracy. There were more groups sometime fighting together, sometimes each other .... and the winner was islamist Khomeini.
So, Pahlavi has some support, but far from majority of Iranians. (Iranian opposition is fragmented.)
Israel has already won, if the only mission was to destroy Iran's nuclear capability.
This leads me to believe Israel's objective is to destroy the IGRC and the religious dictatorship.
Fordow needs a bunker buster, at the minimum.
Iranian capabilty is weakened, but not destroyed. Fordo has not even be bombed yet, because Israelis know they are not able to even damage it.
Netanjahu's objectives of Iran war are inside Israel.
IMHO their only true goal is Erez Israel. Everything else is just PR stuff for the masses, including government change.
Bibi talked via TV in ENGLISH to Iranian people instead of using FARSI! Simply too lazy to get a minimum of credibility.
Yes the responsible Israelis are not stupid, but short sighted. Even Bibi thinks Erez Israel is now close, which is his true politicial goal additionally to not going to prison.
It is, as per Tom's current refrain, completely antisemitic to read Genesis 15:18–21.
"piquant" - neat!
Dumpf gov about Ayatollah Ali Khamenei assasination: "Have the Iranians killed an American yet? No. Until they do we're not even talking about going after the political leadership," said one of the sources, a senior U.S. administration official.
Meanwhile a U.S. citizen has been killed in Kyiv by Russian attack. Dump gov condemns the attack. Real powerful MAGA reaction.
Did an Iranian fleet of 200-300 Su-35 or Su-27 would have made any difference in the outcome.. ?
Yes, fleet in being. Always matters
Only problem, it would be entire production run of the last 20 years, so...
200-300 Su-35s?
That would require Putin being ready to sell at least a licence for their production and the production of their engines to Iran. Which is what he refused to do even for 24-30 Su-35s, which is why the deal fell through.
But yes: an IRIAF with 200-300 Su-35s would've been 'nothing but trouble' for the IASF.
I"m just overwhelmed by the sarcasm or, rather, the mixture of sarcasm, injured perplexity and angry sincerity and don't know what to believe.
I suppose the author won't want to clarify but perhaps some observer?
What is he saying?
I"m thinking this:
. Iran has no chance.
. Israel and Russia are in bed together.
. the whole show is run by oligarchs, jewish, arab and russian
. the Irani forces are worse even than the russians were in '14.
. nevertheless the iranians are scoring some hits.
is that it? anywhere close?
One consistent reasoned thread running throughout all of it is criticism of the IRGC.
What was the road not taken then? Playing catch-up building garbage "jihad self-sufficiency" jets like F-5 clones? (The great movie "Mansour" on YouTube shows what a project that was.)
Buying jets along with manufacturing facilities from China? I think Xi has missed a trick here. And Putin has led Iran into many dead ends.
China is likely to fill in the empty space formerly occupied by Russia, it's what they do. I think Tom mentioned they were sending transports filled with who knows what to eastern Iran.
Dear Tom, thank you! About the terms, you are using "anti-Semitic" often, but I was wondering about the roots of the term, and it seems technically speaking Arab nations are Semites too. So anti-Semitic is a bit biased term. I was thinking of replacement and Judeophob sounds a bit more precise, maybe? Though it is probably not the precise too, since not every Jew around the world is the same. So anti-Zionist would sound most precise, but then all sarcasm is going out with that change too 😅 Sorry can not hold myself 😂
Do you know of any average person attitude on the streets of Tehran towards all this? Is there massive support or standing aside, or?
Will this be Ukrainian style "2 weeks" campaign. Or they would reach their goals soon you think?
It's anti-Semitic to complain about the indiscriminate use of 'anti-Semitism'...
...and, please, NO: you can't post such blasphemies around the social media. No, really: you can't.
Zionists insist that Arabs are no Semites. Only Zionists are Semites. Especially when coming from Russia.
Besides, they're feeling offended and finding it very anti-Semitic to call them Zionists...
(....just summarising different 1st-hand-experiences...)
Perfectly true. I have received hysterical accusations of antisemitism for referring to the "antisemitism card".
Dear Tom, you are not only obsessively focused on calling yourself anti-Semite, but also you are now calling me anti-Semite, which sounds quite compulsive. I thereby recall my like on your original answer, since the only true Semites may interpret this as a sign of supporting your unconfirmed anti-Semitism. And also I am adopting a policy of being zip-lip on the topic for any following instance of the same 🤐
Honestly, after going through this, all the groups in this war look pretty much alike. It's almost as if it doesn't matter who gets wiped out.
This is nothing else but two gangs of idiotic, fascistoid megalomaniacs fighting each other to the last Iranian and Israeli.
and yet one is very different than the other.
In the grim darkness of future, there is only War.
"It’s becoming quite pointless to post such features if I all the time have to remind about them, because people are not reading them… isn’t it? "
People new to this blog will be very thankful being notified of the existence of said articles.. I know I was. I hope you continue posting/reporting
And we who have read it might remember. It’s not like I remember everything I read.
No one does.
The oldest and the fartest among the old farts in Iran is still there. I guess that if he is eliminated, Iran will actually have a chance against Israel in the long term.
Waiting to see such theories being confirmed ever since he's coupped himself to power and locked half the Iranian Shi'a clergy into a house-arrest... some 30 years ago...
Doesn't he have a 55-year old heir?
Khomeini's great grandson is a junior cleric running around with a black turban, so he could be future Supreme Leader. Probably more likely than Don Jr. ever becoming president.
Why are Iranian missiles so inaccurate (for example, the attack on the of center Mossad where the missiles deviated by up to 2 km, see. https://ibb.co/PZsMjYKs) Could it be that Israel is spoofing GPS coordinates for importen targets?
Some are inaccurate - see liquid-fuelled models of their '1st Generation' (though many meanwhile modified to carry MIRVs), perhaps also those of the '2nd Generation'.
But, who's said their 3rd Generation IRBMs are inaccurate?
I judge the inaccuracy based on the fact that the impacts on the photograph are so far from the target they were aimed at. However, if the missiles are guided by GPS coordinates, they can be easily spoofing. Or can they? Or are Iranian missiles guided in some other way?
AFAIK, 1st Gen = INS; 2nd Gen = INS + GPS; 3rd Gen = INS + some sort of terminal guidance.
How Iranians get intel on Israel military mobile targets? They own satellite program seems modest. Do they have some intel form Russia or China?
They do have one high-res photo-recce satellite in orbit (Khayyam or something), and several smaller systems, too. That's why yesterday the Israelis targeted the Iranian Space Agency HQ.
The problem with hi-res satellites is to get real-time data. But it's possible Israelis do not move their SAMs often ....
The fact stuff like Iron Dome (meanwhile used in sheer desperation, in hope one might hit anything), David's Sling, Arrow II and III is 'trailer mounted' is not making them 'mobile', and even less so 're-deployed every 5 minutes'.
And how do missiles/drones target Israeli air defense systems? This is also relevant for Ukraine - I heard a song on TikTok from a Russian soldier about how Petriot was destroyed yesterday during an attack on Zhulyany.
Sergey,
it's a public secret that one of PSU's Patriot SAM-sites is 'permanently' deployed at the Zhuliany Airport. So much so, one can see revetments constructed for protection of their launchers on the Google Maps.
Extracting coordinates for such strikes is anything else than hard. Doesn't mean the entire battery is destroyed if one launcher is knocked out, though.
The same is valid for the ways the Iranians are targeting Israel.
Thanks Tom,
Sorry but I did get it - do you think that the missile targets of Iran make sense or not? To me it seems that attacking Mosads HQ is pointless
Is discussed in the Part 2 now.
Regardless of the fact that Iran, as a whole, stands no chance against Israel and the US, whose primary goal is to create a lot of spectacular TV images, is this tactic of firing salvos of "only" 10 to 30 rockets and then quickly hiding the TELs the "best" the Iranian military can do in this situation? Or is it just another tactic that must be considered ineffective overall?
That's IRGC's PRBS. They've meanwhile learned their lesson.
Good to see you putting the “sarcasto-“ back in sarcastosaurus!
Love it
So Tom, are you saying Western military jet fighter aircraft have taken part in exercises in China? Maybe I misunderstood. If so, that is truly incredible!
Even if just if it was in the ME, still pretty mad!
Yes, UAEAF deployed its Mirage 2000s there, plus C-17s etc...
Spellcheck is a thing. Do better.
Ignoring is the best advice. Don't read.
It's sort of fascinating to have the Iranians be the "good-guys" that aren't targeting civilians like Israel always does.
Definitely 'unusual'.
BTW, as of today, HR-groups reported 587 Iranian civilians as killed by the Israelis, and 24 Israelis killed by Iranians.