Quasem Soleimani Taken Out

[eyeball]

5 minutes ago, DogOnPorch said:

You're free to believe Iran.

No I'm not. That's why we had the IAEA to verify compliance.

You chose to believe Prez Numbnutz instead.

[DogOnPorch]

Just now, eyeball said:

No I'm not. That's why we had the IAEA to verify compliance.

You chose to believe Prez Numbnutz instead.

 

I trust my own sources. Iran is a religious dictatorship. They show what they want the planet to see.

Much like the Red Cross saying the Jews were doing fine after visiting Theresienstadt....your experts.

[eyeball]

8 minutes ago, Zeitgeist said:

Trump’s refusal to conform America to the Paris Accord AND China’s lax provisions are the real problems.  America First on trade and now this are mere sideshows to justify continuing the same budgets and consumerism.  Don’t believe the hype.

Trump's refusal stems directly from American's inability to control him and do their will - that's the real problem.  And it's like this pretty much around the world.  A miniscule number of people in power driving the planet off a cliff with the mass of humanity strapped into the backseat.

[DogOnPorch]

1 minute ago, eyeball said:

A miniscule number of people in power driving the planet off a cliff with the mass of humanity strapped into the backseat.

 

....said one the Yeoman to the other as they marched towards Agincourt.

Edited January 5, 2020 by DogOnPorch

[eyeball]

5 minutes ago, DogOnPorch said:

I trust my toaster.

FIFY

[DogOnPorch]

Just now, eyeball said:

FIFY

 

It is smarter than IAEA inspectors.

[eyeball]

2 minutes ago, DogOnPorch said:

 

It is smarter than IAEA inspectors.

Ah, right I forgot. It was Trump's toaster.

[kactus]

I was reading about the death of this general and there are several points that begs a question depending on how one assesses this situation. Whilst I am no advocate of the Iranian regime it is important to establish some facts....

 

This general is well known for his fight against ISIS

 

Quote

While Qasem Soleimani was seen by the Americans as a key adversary involved in plotting attacks against their allies and assets, it is important to remember the role both he and Iran played in the fight against ISIS.

https://edition.cnn.com/middleeast/live-news/baghdad-airport-strike-live-intl-hnk/h_02d5a17ad0eebe80128bda0388b8be36

The timing of this assasination is crucial. Trump facing impeachment this will provide him a golden nugget to get the distraction. Besides the republican house of senate majority will ensure he gets off the hook. But the question is what is the US strategy taking down a man when the president does not consult his allies in Europe and pissed off when Europeans are not supportive of him. It is debatable the killing of Soleimani formed an assasination or a targeted killing. It is all semantics but if it is former then it can be considered as violation of international laws by committing an act of terrorism against a high profile official. 

 It is the same thing when Trump threatens to target and destroy 52 sites in Iran including 'cultural sites'  that is against the international law and Mike Pompeo has to retract from comments made by Trump about targeting cultural sites! 

It is debatable whether the killing of General Soleimani by the US will strengthen the solidarity of Iranians behind the current regime especially at a time when the public discontent with the regime was at peak as evident by recent rallies and arrests. Same thing can be said about hardcore Trump supporters, who rally behind him for taking this action.

 

 

 

 

[DogOnPorch]

2 minutes ago, eyeball said:

Ah, right I forgot. It was Trump's toaster.

 

Stick to being Lewis. I'll be Martin.

[DogOnPorch]

1 minute ago, kactus said:

 

 

This general is well known for his fight against ISIS

 

...and the torturing & killing of his fellow Iranians.

[kactus]

This is some Market initial reaction oil price fear of an Iranian retaliation on supply oil that I think might happen

 

1- Possible oil supply disruptions

2- Attack on Saudi installations

3- Closing of straight of Hormuz

 

Possible scenarios this may not happen. Market discounting all disruptions:

a. Iran needs Iraq oil export revenue

b. Saudi installation well defended and any disruption temporary

c. closing straight of Hormuz temporary as it would affect China and South East Asia Iran's biggest allies

d. Oil demand and supply not as tight as predicted with some hidden 4-5 mil hidden supply available from Norway and African countries

e. World Economy 2020 better than expected as China, EU and US plan economic stimulus therefore possibly a demand surprise.....  

 

 

[kactus]

18 minutes ago, DogOnPorch said:

 

...and the torturing & killing of his fellow Iranians.

 

40 minutes ago, DogOnPorch said:

Good news...the Earth will recover. And Iran will be long gone...many problems solved.

 

[Moonlight Graham]

2 hours ago, eyeball said:

No its not easy. The only tool we have is moral suasion but...we sell weapons to dictators so that would be a pretty short dead-end to nowhere too I guess.

The problem with these things is also power vacuums.  It's easy to say we should stop selling weapons to regime X or Y, but they're just going to buy them from some other country, probably our enemies who will make tons of money from it while developing new weapons technologies they can use against us too.  It's also easy to say the US and the west should just leave the middle east, but again a vacuum would form and Russia or China etc would swoop in to fill the void and have more control over global oil resources.  No sane person would want that.  There's no easy solutions.

The best option is to project power while also trying to respect human rights in the countries we have a sphere of influence in.  Regime changes are usually about protecting our interests, not the rights of the people of those countries.

[Moonlight Graham]

1 hour ago, eyeball said:

No I'm not. That's why we had the IAEA to verify compliance.

You chose to believe Prez Numbnutz instead.

The Iranians can't be trusted.  But Trump is just making things worse.

[bush_cheney2004]

2 minutes ago, Moonlight Graham said:

The Iranians can't be trusted.  But Trump is just making things worse.

 

No, Trump is reversing Obama's huge mistake(s)....giving Iran billions to spend on arms and proxies.

Edited January 5, 2020 by bush_cheney2004

[kactus]

10 minutes ago, Moonlight Graham said:

Regime changes are usually about protecting our interests, not the rights of the people of those countries.

Bingo.....

[CITIZEN_2015]

5 hours ago, DogOnPorch said:

 

...and the torturing & killing of his fellow Iranians.

I read somewhere that this general told Iraqi PM during the peak of anti-government protests last fall that the Iraqi regime should learn from Iranian regime how to quick;y put down the protests (like shooting unarmed protesters in the hearts and heads as they did last November). I cannot guarantee the authenticity of this as it was in a few articles but how could they know? Also I read he was dispatched to Iraq to help putting down widespread anti-government protests and we saw over 400 shot and killed in a few weeks. Not to mention the fact that he was instrumental in Bashir Assad's murderous regime to survive.  Regardless it is true that he fought against ISIS and defeated them out of Iraq but he was a top revolutionary guard general likely why many Iranians abroad are celebrating his assassination, 

Edited January 6, 2020 by CITIZEN_2015

[OftenWrong]

5 hours ago, eyeball said:

No, it's the result of Operation Ajax. Every dot leads back to the day the British and Americans started acting like their enemy and overthrew a democracy.

The neocons failed because they couldn't acknowledge this fundamental point of deliberate departure from virtue.  We'll fail too for the same reason.

I was talking about the shift in power in Iraq. 

Or was it about Iran... the two words just became even more interchangeable and confusing in our media dialogue than before.

[OftenWrong]

5 hours ago, Argus said:

Mine neither. Clearly he was an evil man. Whether it was worth killing him given he's been instantly replaced is another question about which I lack sufficient information to answer.

Maybe it's like Marshall McLuhan said, "The Missile is the Message". See, you get that? There is a reason his name was Marshall.

[OftenWrong]

5 hours ago, Zeitgeist said:

Iran is problematic but ultimately Iran will have to stand down and they will.

Agreed, Iran is still looking for a way to remove the sanctions against them, and is willing to make some concessions. Question is how far are they really willing to go, and how credible. Looks like they were caught trying to set up some kind of covert ops to attack targets of interest, and the US stopped the attack from happening. Given their General had already been involved in other attacks against US interests in the past, I see no reason to doubt the US government's story.

[CITIZEN_2015]

4 hours ago, Moonlight Graham said:

Regime changes are usually about protecting our interests, not the rights of the people of those countries.

In this case changing the regime in Iran would hit a thousand birds with one stone. The middle east and the whole world would become a much safer place and Iranians will be liberated too. They waited too long and see what happened with Nazi Germany. Do not make the same mistake twice or this time the world would pay the price with billions not just 50 million. The US and Europe must find the balls to take the surgical action and remove the cancerous organ before it is too late.

Edited January 6, 2020 by CITIZEN_2015

[Moonlight Graham]

2 hours ago, CITIZEN_2015 said:

In this case changing the regime in Iran would hit a thousand birds with one stone. The middle east and the whole world would become a much safer place and Iranians will be liberated too. They waited too long and see what happened with Nazi Germany. Do not make the same mistake twice or this time the world would pay the price with billions not just 50 million. The US and Europe must find the balls to take the surgical action and remove the cancerous organ before it is too late.

Nobody has any right to do another regime change in Iran, nor would it be successful, judging by Syria and Iraq and Libya and the Shah in Iran.

Iran is more of a pest than a true threat to the US.  They don't even have a nuclear weapon.

[CITIZEN_2015]

2 hours ago, Moonlight Graham said:

Nobody has any right to do another regime change in Iran, nor would it be successful, judging by Syria and Iraq and Libya and the Shah in Iran.

Iran is more of a pest than a true threat to the US.  They don't even have a nuclear weapon.

Yes the Iranian people have that right and wanting to do just that except that they stand no chance alone due to brutality of the regime and need international support. They have brought nothing but death and destruction to that nation. So who are you to say they don't have that right!!!???

A regime change in Iran will be successful as the nation of Iran is not Arab or the same as Iraq and Syria or Libya divided and without any history together. Syria, Iraq and Libya did not even exist a century ago. Iran has been there for 25 centuries. They have stood together and overcame many invasions and will overcome this satanic invasion too. In fact you are following the same line as Iran regime that they messed up those two countries so that they use this exact excuse. We have had lots of peaceful and constructive regime changes in Eastern Europe and South American past few decades why Iran will be Syria or Iraq?

You are living in a dream world if you think that. They have already caused many US casualties all over the middle east but also like a cancer spreading to the whole region inflaming the whole region one by one eventually reaching Europe and North America as well.

Edited January 6, 2020 by CITIZEN_2015

[cannuck]

Got to keep your eye on the ball (sorry, Eyeball, that wasn't intentional).

Reality is the world has NO other policeman than the US.  The only other superpowers, i.e. China and Russia, are hardly champions of human rights.  Throw into that mix two more absolute fruitcake cultures in Iran and NoKo that are on the brink of becoming nuclear powers.   All of the hand wringing and ass kissing from the globalists and looney left, not to mention the totally ineffective, totally corrupt UN is doing nothing but playing into their hands - buying them the time to complete their nuclear ambitions. SOMEONE really has to step in and deal with this in real time.   The second part of this is the notion that Donald J. Trump RUNS the USA.   He is nothing but the mouthpieces (granted, a loud and profaine one) for a much longer term, very large and well established mechanism that provides him with the information and ideas about what is actually happening in the world.fd

Crossing this particular jackass off of the list might advance several very important elements of stability.   For one, it might provide an excuse to finally bring Iran's nuclear ambitions (and brutal regime) to an end.  THAT will send a message to Kim, Vlad and Xi - all of whom played the Obama administration like a fiddle - that the US is no longer asleep at the policman-of-the-world switch.  It will also pull out the huge financial, military and ideological backing that drives much of the Islamic fundamentalist movement in the ME and the world.

If you think a rising sea level, rising temperature and all of the other climate change possibilities are dire, WTF do you think a nuclear winter will look like????  THAT is what is really at stake here, and Trump is the only game in town that can bring any effective deviation in that direction.

[marcus]

On 1/4/2020 at 11:58 AM, Shady said:

Except that hasn’t been the case.  They’ve been treated like pariahs since they started acting like it.  Basically when they took over the American embassy and held them hostage in 1979/80

OMG! HOSTAGE TAKING SO SO BAD!

That's a good boy. They tell you to be up in arms about a hostage taking from 40 years ago where no one was skilled, while  totally ignoring the hundreds of thousands of people who have been killed, maimed and forced into living in misery because of U.S. actions. Things like shooting down a passenger airplane. Or directly assisting Saddam to attack Iran and working with him to hit the Iranians with WMD. 

Your ignorant outrage is comedic.