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American airstrikes hit eighty-five targets at seven facilities in Iraq and Syria that the IRGC and affiliated militia used to attack US forces
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- Title
- US bolsters defenses around Jordan base as it readies strikes in response to drone attack
- Published
- Feb 2 2024
- Word count
- 560 words
Think about how crazy this is. The US hit 85 targets at 7 locations in 30 minutes.
That's definitely a powerful message.
As I understand, this is also just part one of the response so there will be more to come.
I wonder if whichever IAMG pulled off the actual strike is getting reamed right now. Was the current escalation in Palestine really enough to get Iran to tell them to escalate or was this just a group with the means deciding to strike?
I mean, Israel/Palestine has been going on for years. Huge numbers of unarmed journalists and children shot by the IDF and none of those groups decided to direct anything at Jordon. Most don't even get close to Al-Tanf. After the Hasakah battle and the ongoing bombing in Kurdish Iraq, it's not like anyone with a brain didn't know the amount of airpower still in the region.
Is this actually a "The US is distracted by Israel and Ukraine, strike while the iron is hot" from their partners in Iran or a couple pissed off guys who have access to the training to make the strike, ya know?
I have to assume it was Kata'ib Hezbollah because they've been uppity for a long time and announced they were standing down after the attack. They seems to be stupid enough and to likely have the resources to do something like this. And it sounds like Iran wasn't too happy with it and obviously the US hit them pretty hard, so I have to imagine that yes, they are getting reamed. As far as I'm aware, we've been kind of halfheartedly hitting them the past few years just like somebody swatting at an annoying bug, so I wonder if their stupidity led them to believe we wouldn't retaliate very strongly for this. So now we have to remind them that we could repeat what we did in 1991 and 2003...hopefully without actually repeating either of those years.
Even this time, the US publicly gave advance notice saying "we're going to respond soon." This gave Iranian assets an opportunity to relocate, but it also helps limit rising tensions since the response is telegraphed.
It's becoming clearer and clearer that Israel's intention is to leave the Gaza strip and create a km wide DMZ, effectively occupying new land for all intents and purposes. This kind of thing doesn't sit very well with the Palestinians who have historically had to fight tooth and nail for every meter, and I doubt that Iran is very happy about it, too.
Also, Gaza is not the only scene anymore. Ever since the war started, the entire northern border of Israel was evacuated to the south, and it is unlikely that the citizens will agree to return if Hezbollah isn't cleared from Southern Lebanon (which is a pipe dream that will only be achieved with a similar level of devastation to Gaza, if even).
I just struggle to see any of this fizzling out peacefully. I don't think a lot of the world knows just how far reaching the destruction is. Images are starting to come out, and it's looking very, very bad. With every big attack we inch a little closer to an explosion, and there's really no saying when it'll happen. Iran has been smuggling an insane amount of forces into Syria, and I don't believe it's for nothing. I hate to say it, but I think global powers are far too optimistic if they think that they can somehow implement a two state solution anytime within the next fifty years.
The only real hope we really have is a diplomatic miracle between Saudi Arabia, the US, and Israel. Normalization with SA would severely impact Iran's influence in the area and give the far far far less extreme PTO a lot more legitimacy. But I'm not holding onto hope for that. I expect so much more death before we even entertain the idea.
How is that becoming clearer? I haven't heard about that idea but I also haven't heard much about the war recently except "the Palestinians are right!" and "the Israelis are right!"
Israel has been blowing up Palestinian buildings near the border to create a larger buffer zone inside Gaza. Of course, they've been destroying buildings within central Gaza too which the Israeli army says contain Hamas tunnel connections etc.
Edit: clarified where buildings are being destroyed.
They're destroying Israeli buildings near the border?
Unfortunately, no. If they were destroying Israeli buildings and giving up some of their own territory to build the buffer, there would be fewer people upset: https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-war-gaza-strip-buffer-zone-72a782ddd532a4331b660a735e36acb0
Palestinians have noted a clear 1 km zone of destruction along the border. It's the best guess. This happening would make it much, much harder for Hamas to claim victory, as land loss is a material thing that you can't really handwave away. Hamas losing support is very bad for Iran. This may be pushing them to be more aggressive, hence the attack on Jordanian soil.
Iran makes it very difficult to know exactly what's going on in the middle east. It's entirely possible that they'd authorized the attack knowing that it would get a response.
Granted, I'm not an expert by any stretch. I just scour telegram for the few channels that aggregate news about the war from both Arabic and Hebrew sources.
Israel has said that's what they want.
...
https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-war-gaza-strip-buffer-zone-72a782ddd532a4331b660a735e36acb0
Yeah, I don't know, Israeli "anonymous government officials" always say all kinds of shit. I base most of my assumptions on what's actually on the ground, ie, the Palestinians reporting the destruction and satellite images. I don't really like spreading those Israeli government messages because they're not really trustworthy imo. They say what the public wants to hear.
Is there any reason to disbelieve it? I mean, they said they want to make a buffer zone, and you can see in the satellite photos that they are destroying buildings where the buffer zone would be. Also, it’s not just anonymous government officials talking to the AP, they are saying the same thing to their allies, who are broadly condemning it. It seems like uniform messaging and actions.
The older I get, and the more I learn about our world, the more I question why America has any right to have bases all over the world or to act with the audacity that it does. I also continue to grow more suspect of America's reasoning for their military actions, citing other country's hostile actions or posturing as the driving force to justify our unreasonable meddling. When America cites Iran's growing hostility, I think about how often America has acted within other country's borders or how many bases exist near Iran. When I think of that, the natural question is, is it unreasonable for Iran or any country to be pissed we're acting the way we are? How would the US feel if other country's were operating military operations within our borders or near them... oh wait, we did have feelings about that! America is such a hostile aggressor, but our propaganda makes it seem like we're the reasonable ones.
You're certainly right, at least to a degree, but almost all of these countries where we have bases are places where we were invited. A lot of them spend billions of dollars trying to keep us there. Qatar gives the US a lot of sweetheart deals and spends their own money building up the bases that the US uses, and that has probably helped keep things more peaceful in the region. Sure, you could interpret it as confrontational towards Iran, but Qatar is Iran's biggest (only) friend in the Gulf region so Qatar probably feels that it helps keep them safer from Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Without an American presence in the Middle East, Iran might have moved troops into Iraq or possibly all the way to Syria, which I would have to imagine would result in even more violence than just the airstrikes that the US has made against ISIS, as another example.
Plus, especially in that region, I think that almost everyone benefits greatly from the stability of the US dollar, not only through the stability of the US economy, but also because of the increased trade that it facilitates, which leads to international collaboration instead of international conflict.
I don't mean to absolve the US, but I think that it's a little short-sighted to act like it's not beneficial to everyone involved for the US to partner with countries that ask it to do so.
The real reason they want the US bases around is just plain trade protection. Without the USA's constant (expensive) patrols of major economic routes, global trade collapses into piracy in months. It's already started, because the US is slowly pulling back from the middle east. They are not going to bear the costs for this forever. The various regional powers are going to have to learn to field (and pay for) their own naval patrols and defensive operations in the future.
Combine that with the Panama Canal's main water supply from Gatun Lake drying up due to climate change and the destabilization of trade through the Red Sea due to Houthi strikes. It's not been a good decade for globalization... in fact this may be the last decade of globalized trade.
This particular attack was just the Pentagon's way of reminding everyone that if you kill Americans, shortly afterwards they can and will kill all of the middle managers and leaders in your organization at once, and turn your weapon/drone stockpiles into fireworks while doing it.
Iran's puppets are more interested in escalating this than Iran itself is, count on it. Iran loves to sell the 'jihad against the infidels' just like republicans like to sell the 'coming for your guns' rhetoric. Neither one of them believes it or ever intends to do anything about it, they just find it useful to energize and manipulate their bases. Iran's leadership is probably reading the riot act to whoever did this, assuming the strikes didn't make chewing them out a moot point.
There is no way the USA is going to strike targets within Iran unless they are first attacked by Iran. That would be real escalation and nobody in power wants to deal with it.
There’s one exception to your last paragraph: I believe that the U.S. would launch preemptive strikes on nuclear facilities if there was intelligence that Iran was within days of acquiring a nuclear weapon.
I'd bet on that too. Stuxnet was a pretty creative way to slow them down.
I'd be surprised if Iran would use those weapons as anything other than diplomatic tools, though. Israel's nukes are aimed at their heads and that's not something they can defend against. They'd genocide themselves along with whomever it was they were attacking, and they know it.
The American defense and foreign policy circles learned a lesson from North Korea: gaining nukes makes regime change (especially of the kinetic variety) far more difficult. Even if Iran does want to just Sabre-rattle, many in the U.S. Government believe even letting them possess nuclear weapons is unacceptable. I wouldn’t be surprised if some generals advocate for nuclear strikes on their enrichment and production facilities.
Can you say more on this? This was surprising to read.
I'll link you to a short summary of the problem. Peter Zeihan can explain the issues better than I can. There's also the longer version and the really long version.
I think it's fair to say that Peter is overly pessimistic at times, so look at his take as a worst-case scenario and more like a list of challenges to be overcome than some ironclad prophecy - he'd tell you that himself. A revolution in AI or manufacturing or energy can also radically change the predicted outcomes. Forecasting the future is tricky business, but that's geopolitics in a nutshell, no guarantees. Personally I'm more optimistic that regional powers will step up and work on maintaining that security, and the USA will be happy to provide help such as intelligence even if they aren't the ones patrolling everything. I also think the US will come back around in a decade or so, but we've got our own political shift and a gridlocked government to deal with first.
America is certainly preferable to the alternative super powers.
Fairness isn't necessary to minimize global instability and promote a global economy. In fact, fairness is often antithetical.
If the US relaxed, lowered military spending, and stayed out of foreign affairs you'd see a dramatically worse world almost instantly.