The Houthis created a fake audio of a major Yemeni commander telling his troops to retreat which was subsequently amplified on Twitter/X, telegram, etc.
Apparently, this helped the Houthis advance quickly as the opposition forces were in disarray.
If that's true, it's insane that it worked. It should be obvious to not take orders from twitter. There's a chain of command for a reason and random people on social media are no part of it. Sounds like the opposition forces would have to be so stupid that any number of Looney Tunes style tricks would have worked. Maybe next they can send out a rabbit in a dress to make opposition fall in love with it.
This belies a fundamental misunderstanding of Yemeni society. Arab political structure is based on tribal loyalty. Leaders of tribes pledge allegiance to other tribes or coalitions of tribes. They're not part of the same command structure because such a thing does not exist. Twitter is also ubiquitous in Arabia.
> The US President routinely announces policy decisions on social media…
Yes, our current President also does stupid things, and our military forces shouldn't be using his incoherent ramblings on Twitter to make snap judgements on the battlefield without checking with their chain of command either.
You have far, far too much faith in the professionalism of armed forces in the developing world. 99% of it is just random 22 year old guys with guns and dual-use communication tech.
I dont know that its a matter of professionalism. Everyone in the world has known that AI can generate video and audio that is imperceptibly fake, for years. And thats to say nothing of man-made forgeries in the years prior.
I have a hard time seeing people on the front line throwing down arms and running away because of an unsourced twitter clip.
We, as in the terminally online, have known that AI can generate imperceptibly fake footage. There are still plenty of average people who still gets caught off guard.
You gotta touch grass and get outside and talk to normies.
And then recognize that the normies you talk to are VASTLY MORE internet-savvy than the illiterate child soldiers on the front lines in Yemen. You have no concept of the info environment they live in. It is all magic electronic soup.
That sounds like a fake storyline. The much simpler explanation
is that the local Saudi merc army sucked. If you followed the
whole conflict in the last 20 years this is largely the case -
the Saudis aren't really great at warfare, typically depending on
foreign mercenaries (also for cleaning etc...). These in turn
have very low morale.
yeah and so does the ardupilot documentation including examples. A basic guidance system, which is like single waypoint navigation, is a solved problem. It's in basically every prosumer drone too.
OK, that is a plausible argument given Dario's public positions. I have to admit that I keep cutting them some slack for standing up against automated kill chains, and domestic surveillance.
To be clear, I don't think they're doing it because they want all the money, I think they truly believe that this is existentially threatening, and are trying to regulate their open source competition away because they think that's the way to be safe. That they can be trusted with the power, but if it's out and about, that's unsafe - they like to compare it to nukes, and they want nuclear non-proliferation.
This is the most "I get both sides" issue in my mind these days. I am still not sure where I fall, or if there is even a correct position with which to agree. It really seems like there are no good options.
On the one hand, if all knowledge work ended up in two dude's hands, that is really bad. On the other hand, if every surviving child victim of war (US, RU, IL, CN, whatever) has access to the knowledge to make custom viruses for a few grand, that is also really bad.
Automated kill chains and domestic surveillance are happening regardless of what one corporation wants. These technologies will never be inaccessible to the government or government contractors who already have zero issues navigating red tape.
The point of regulation is to kill competitors and prevent private individuals from having unfettered access.
That's why relying on mercs (which is what both UAE and Saudi chose in Yemen) is a double edged sword. At some point the cash isn't enough of a motivator and they will just run away.
We seem to be in need of a mercenary Uber, where individual mercenaries will have their reputation and the potential customers will be able to check it.
The Houthis also explicitly allow Chinese vessels and Chinese ships have been able to traverse the red sea without issue. Which means China actually has more ability to access oil than other countries right now.
I suspect the Chinese won’t be happy with the pipeline and refinery attacks on Saudi Arabia but i also assume that there will still be plenty of Chinese bound oil for the foreseeable future.
Yeah Chinese oil reserves were much larger than was publicly known. They immediately cut imports by a massive amount as soon as the war started and have been able to keep it up for months. Without that the economic fallout would have been far greater.
Not that they are doing it for this reason, but they have done a lot to shield trump from the consequences of his stupid war. But those supplies can only hold for so long; things can get much worse for the world economy in the near future.
China took 5.5 million barrels per day of demand off of the table overnight. A quarter of what went through the strait. They single-handedly stopped catastrophe by months.
Even with that, global strategic petroleum reserves are quickly draining. Last I looked, the US was down to ~290M. There is a legal limit of 250M (though laws don’t matter anymore). The structural floor is also estimated to be somewhere north of 200M.
The world is about to not be able to meet all oil demand for any price.
Well at some point the problem becomes so acute that others in the world are going to have to step up and help solve it.
Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. It's an intolerable premise and if the price to be paid is global oil catastrophe it's a price well worth paying and America will force the issue as we have. You can deny this or you can accept that other actors have agency in the world and interests and they may take action that negatively affects you indirectly. You can help them, ignore them, fight against them. But we live in a world where other countries and other people will do things and you have to figure out how to best deal with it.
We have seen what happened with North Korea, but at least China and Russia can somewhat keep a lid on it. Which is the minimum they owe the rest of us since they created that problem. Iran's government is ideological in a way that westerners don't really understand (and to some extent Putin is too via his desires regarding Ukraine but the Russian system isn't too alien to our own views - they play tennis and vacation in Europe and all that stuff). Their government is simply not interested in the things that you and I are interested in.
With Iran you add in the pursuit of a nuclear weapon, Iranian continued attacks coordinated in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and Israel via Palestine and it's desire to continue to destabilize the region, supporting Russia's war against Ukraine, and helping Russia evade sanctions (never mind domestic repression and murder) and you've really got a problem on your hands that needs solved one way or another if we're going to go the whole peace and stability for the globe route. The primary problem right now is that the rest of the world would rather see the United States take care of this problem (and it's having a tough time but there's a lot of nuance there) then to help because if you are Europe you're somewhat on Iran's side for some god awful reason, if you are Russia, well you work with Iran, if you are the gulf powers you have no power besides your oil, and if you are China you are not going to spend any resources (nor do you have power projection capabilities). So what do we do?
You can sit here yelling until you are blue in the face that this is Trump's war, or he shouldn't have started it (ignoring history) or some nonsense about ancient colonialism (Iran itself is attempting to be a Neo colonial power) or how Israel is so bad or something but Iran's behavior in the region simply cannot continue if you value peace and stability and global trade. Yea whatever Trump isn't a force for that either I get it, but that's not a good argument to make things worse by also letting Iran do crazy shit.
China's stockpiles are dwindling, strategically that's bad for China especially if they want to invade democratic Taiwan. You still need oil to run the military, no amount of batteries are going to power jet fighters or missiles for the foreseeable future. But dwindle they will and eventually China (and others) will be forced to buy oil and it will raise prices. We're all going to have to deal with that eventuality.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine also cut off large amounts of oil and gas supplies via sanctions, and the United States clamping down on both Venezuela and Iran has further restrained oil supplies as the US has also gone after Russian shadow fleet tankers which were adding additional capacity to the market. The EU has done a little bit here too after the US led the way.
Global chokepoints are a problem. Having so much of the world (primarily Asia) rely on oil and gas from the Middle East where you've got these militant groups funding by Iran who can at a whim decide if they don't get some concession that they're going to cut off oil for everyone else is intolerable. Again, say what you want but we as a planet should not be beholden to this kind of behavior.
> Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. It's an intolerable premise and if the price to be paid is global oil catastrophe it's a price well worth paying
Says you.
All other nuclear nations behave (even Pakistan and India, which are at each other throat all the time). What makes you think that Iran won't? It will also have Russia and China keep a lid on them, same as North Korea. And I don't buy the "Iran is different" gospel. North Korea and China have completely different mindsets than the western world and still play ball.
Additionally, if Iran really is that adamant in getting nukes, I can see them asking some enriched material to Russia as a payment to the 100s if not 1000s of drones they are giving them. They share a "land" border through the Caspian sea and smuggling a few 10s of kilos of enriched material would be relatively easy.
Finally, it is not a good proposition if the hypotethical benefits will be reaped by US/Israel while the suffering is globally spread.
Iran is Muslim. They believe in eye-for-an-eye punishment unlike the west. And, since they adopted Palestine, and Israel killed 70,000 innocent Palestinians, Israel knows they have it coming to them. This is why they're so concerned with "justifying" their actions. This is also why they are so adamant on ensuring Iran not have power. Because Iran is the most likely state to give the west what it deserves for terrorizing the middle east for decades.
Russia, China, the U.S., North Korea, Israel. These are all countries that absolutely do not behave. Each commits atrocities on a regular basis. Them having nukes makes accountability much more difficult.
Just to be clear: the current situation is a huge mess caused by one deranged leader.
> Just to be clear: the current situation is a huge mess caused by one deranged leader.
Sorry that's just dead wrong. This doesn't happen in a vacuum. I mean you could simply add Netanyahu and make your statement incorrect here. Nevermind all the other actors, Iran's deranged death cult, and more.
my reflex was to think that sounds like a lie israel would tell to get trump to go to war with iran, but i realize my reflexes aren't always right, so i looked it up and it turns out, yes, it's obviously an israeli lie and the only reason you'd believe it is because you really want to.
> Just to be clear: the current situation is a huge mess caused by one deranged leader.
Agreed. The situation is worse than before the U.S. attack.
Iran has proven they can control the straight, threatening the world's energy supply. This is a more powerful weapon than a nuke (which multiple agencies, including U.S. intel, said they didn't have when this all started). New leadership in Iran is more galvanized against the U.S. than ever.
The U.S. already lost this war. Iran is dictating terms. Allies in the region have seen that the U.S. cannot protect them, and are making other accomodations, reducing U.S. influence in the region and beyond.
> The U.S. already lost this war. Iran is dictating terms. Allies in the region have seen that the U.S. cannot protect them, and are making other accomodations, reducing U.S. influence in the region and beyond.
> They share a "land" border through the Caspian sea and smuggling a few 10s of kilos of enriched material would be relatively easy.
I'm not a nuclear weapons expert but from what I understand the United States and others are pretty easily able to identify where enriched material comes from. Also we probably have eyes on the material in general and can see where it is being moved. It has to be stored in places, put into a missile, &c.
But if your argument were to be taken to be correct you're also highlighting the problem with the JCPOA. Well, one of them at least.
Well that's a big IF. Iran wasn't allowing inspections, also we shouldn't need a special deal with Iran or else they build nuclear bombs and try to kill people.
But what I meant was that if a weapon was used we'd be able to identify the signature of the material used and pinpoint the exact location on earth that it came from. In other words, if Russia "easily" (again that's an another feather in the cap agains the JCPOA) sent material to Iran and they used it and built a bomb and used it we'd know it came from a Russian mine. Of course they could maybe steal material from somewhere else and then Russia could transport that but hey, look where we're at. We've got Russia who invaded Ukraine supplying nuclear material to Iran to build a bomb. Maybe we shouldn't be on team Russia/Iran yea?
I keep wondering about this western worldview where they keep equating a militant failed state with the largest democracy in the world. I can't fathom why they do it.
It's funny reading literature from the mega hawks in US politics during the Cold War.
Descriptions of the Soviet leadership basically word for word use the same apocalyptic terms used for the ayatollahs/IRGC by current neocons about Iran. Just swap in "Islamist" for "Communist" as the current ideology that makes any kind of realpolitik impossible.
"These leaders aren't rational like previous adversaries, they don't fear annihilation, in fact they want catastrophe to prove their own fatalist belief system. There can be no negotiation with this sort of enemy, their singular goal is our destruction even at the cost of their own lives."
It's always different this time, and all assumptions about self-serving human nature need to be thrown out the window. Anyone who thinks force isn't the only solution is a naively deluded suicidal peacenik. All out war right now on our terms is the only rational way to avoid world destruction.
If we accept your premise, the current war has made us less safe, because we've had previous, stronger nuclear deals that have now been torn up in a failed attempt to replace their leader with someone more favorable to the US.
Iran probably wasn't following the JCPOA, denied inspectors access to certain sites, and you'd also have to say you 100% trust American intelligence to verify that Iran isn't building a nuclear weapon in secret and if you want to do that I've got a war to sell you in Iraq.
Separately that doesn't resolve the other issues, funding militant groups, &c.
Using your reasoning, you can basically throw out any structured system that doesn't comply with your own untrustworthy feelings of security.
You can essentially point at any shadow within the borders of Iran and claim there are hidden actors conspiring towards your undoing.
What aside from their total annihilation or subjugation would ever convince you of your (Israel's) safety?
But using your own reasoning then Iran is a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty so they are also throwing out a structured system that doesn't comply with their own feelings.
There's zero evidence its less possible, including counter evidence it remains possible because we keep being told we have to attack Iran to prevent them from attaining a nuclear weapon.
So apparently, we've yet to do anything to prevent them from doing it.
They killed more than 30,000 of their own people including children and support terrorist regimes in multiple countries that also kill children.
> There's zero evidence its less possible
On the other hand we bombed the nuclear facilities so what increase in nuclear weapons capability do they have that you are thinking about here? If there's something that has changed I'd be curious to read about it or your thoughts since that would change my opinion.
So your argument is its cool that we killed children because they've also killed children? Hell of a take.
The evidence we bombed their nuclear facilities is essentially this administration telling us we bombed their nuclear facilities.
This administration does not have a track record of providing the public with honest assessments of their success.
If we've successfully stopped them from developing a nuclear weapon, which was stated as the point of our preemptive aggression, I'd need a very good reason why we continue to spend billions attacking them.
I think they are more motivated than ever and other countries will follow. North Korea shows that Trump will kiss the ass of countries that have nuclear weapons, no matter how bad they are. And he will kick around countries that don’t have them. If I were Iran, I would put every possible effort into obtaining nuclear weapons. Probably from Trump’s best friend Kim Jong Un.
When are you talking about and what is that based on? It was the US that withdrew; the other countries continued. US intelligence concluded that Iran had no nuclear weapons program (or maybe, no active one; I don't recall).
> you'd also have to say you 100% trust American intelligence to verify
Nope, the plan was for the IEA to do their thing with on-the-ground inspectors, sensors, etc. As just one example, nuclear materials leak radiation and they can find indications of it in air, soil, etc., around faciltiies. Edit: Also, many other countries were involved and looking closely, including European powers and Israel.
> Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. It's an intolerable premise
Actions have consequences. The continual attack on the sovereignty of countries around the world has made nuclear weapons one of the few ways to avoid being a client state of the US at the expense of your own population. Iran has figured out another method it seems.
This is blowback. The simple lesson that we refuse to learn.
There is no large country left which is not an American client state to pursue nuclear weapons . India was in the 90s, and they pursued nukes, tested them and got sanctioned by the west.
They don't announce their secret nuclear weapons programs before they are complete (though they are sometimes discovered), but some countries have violated international law and developed them, precisely to protect their sovereignty:
- North Korea
- Israel
- India
- Pakistan
All retain their sovereignty, though I can't prove any causal effect and certainly nuclear weapons isn't the only cause.
Others have pursued them, includng Libya, South Africa, etc. Libya agreed to surrender their program, and then their government was deposed with Western help. Ukraine gave up their nuclear weapons (left over from being occupied by the USSR) in exchange for peace from Russia, and you can see what happened. That doesn't encourage the next person to give up theirs.
India and Pakistan both rushed their programs back in the 40s/50s ( or maybe later I can't recall off the top of my head). Libya and South Africa were negotiated away. That leaves Israel probably from the, what, 70s or 80s? And North Korea was supported by Russia and China. I'm not sure you could consider any of those countries to be "pursuing nuclear weapons" today. Plus by that logic you'd have to throw in the US, UK, China, Soviets, and France too.
So when you sort of set aside countries from prior to, idk, 1980s ish you don't really have anyone at least publicly (to your point) pursuing nuclear weapons. However it's not just the enrichment of uranium which is tightly controlled it's also the missile technology to deliver the weapons. Keeping a nuclear program secret these days I think is quite a bit more difficult than in the past.
So when you look around today you've got Iran that we know of pursuing a nuclear program. I'm not sure anyone else is by virtue of how difficult (I think?) it would be to do so undetected. Though there are countries (Japan and Korea come to mind) who we think have the ability to scale up a program very quickly.
Japan and South Korea literally have 100s of American military bases on their territory. You really think they are sovereign nations who can pursue an independent nuclear program?
> Ukraine never had nuclear weapons. Russia is the sole legal successor of the USSR and these were all Russian nukes on Ukrainian territory.
Structuring the breakup so that the nukes are Russia's is not really different than Ukraine giving up the nukes on its territory.
Where did they draw the line? Obviously not all USSR assets are now Russian assets, as Ukraine still has (or had) its own stockpile of Soviet era weapons, and other things like Soviet era airfields.
Points 4 and 5 mention and are about use of nuclear weapons.
I think the memorandum was intended to be a security guarantee to Ukraine after they (and Belarus, and Kazakhstan) joined the NPT and transferred formerly-Soviet nuclear weapons to the Russian Federation. I don't know why anyone would suggest otherwise.
This is over simplified to the point of being misleading/wrong. Russia was the legal successor of the USSR for purposes of diplomatic continuity, but the other Soviet successor states divided portions of the Soviet military/equipment, split Soviet debt obligations, etc on a case by case basis.
I doubt that the world will subscribe to the idiocy of the current US admin. China will just push harder for renewables while Europe and the rest of the world will try to coup with the shock but I am certain they won’t go to war with Iran because they have no reason. Eventually US will have to decide if it’s going to do anything or just live with high oil prices for long or just go back home in a British Suez fashion.
> Eventually US will have to decide if it’s going to do anything or just live with high oil prices for long or just go back home in a British Suez fashion.
This is the flaw in your thinking. It won't be the US who alone decides to live with high oil prices, it'll be everyone.
Vague promises of "pushing for renewables" is a gross mischaracterization and misunderstanding of the importance of oil and gas to the global economy. Note, I'm not anti-renewable or whatever, but chalking this up to a "US problem" is willfully ignorant.
Declining to follow a blunderer into a blundered war really isn't a "decision to live with high oil prices" rather common-sense. This is the USA's mess.
You can be mad at America and ignore Iran's role if you want, but that doesn't lead you to anywhere productive. The United States like any country is an actor on the world stage that has interests and can take action to defend or assert those interests. If the world thinks this is a problem, they should have mediated between the United States and Iran and helped to prevent conflict. Instead they did next to nothing. War happened. Cue surprise and condemnation.
What is the world going to do? The US is the only country that has a "blue water" navy. That means not just enough ships to go to sea, but enough of a supply line to handle all the logistics of having ships anywhere in the world they want them, for as long as they want.
Everybody else (with sea access) has a coast guard, and maybe a few ships for show. China is making enough ships that in a decade they could be there, but it isn't clear they want to go there - they don't see to be building the world supply line needed (but around China they do have that power already).
That is if you don't like the current situation with the US deciding the rules of the sea, then you need to pay for your own navy.
> Europe and the rest of the world will try to coup with the shock
The two major economies in the EU (France and Germany) are both facing severe recessions and a parliamentary deadlock + soon to be elections would will be most certainly won by Putin's allies and/or radical communists.
All of this to say I would not hold my breath on Europe doing much at all in the coming months/years.
I was talking about France Unbowed (LFI) in France which is radical left parti (and allies of the French communists parti) that wants to burn the debt owned by the French state (their own words not mine) and could be in the second round of the French election vs the National Rally (far right).
Both the National Rally and France Unbowed are in favor of stopping Ukrainian foreign aid.
China is the reason we don’t have 5-6 dollar gas. They literally cut their imports to prevent economic disaster. If they begin buying at regular levels we would be the ones hurting more.
No that's not the only reason. High oil prices affect their economy quite a bit, and much of their imports form what I understand come from the Middle East.
High oil prices affect them less than any other country in the world. They have the largest oil stockpiles by far, eclipsing even the US, and they have unique access to oil sanctioned by the west.
China is essentially the only actor in the market that is able to weather this conflict in marathon fashion.
The US is the largest producer of oil and natural gas in the world (or #2 or something - besides the point). Your argument that only China can weather these price disruptions doesn't seem to hold water for that reason and because of Chinese actions to use that strategic supply to keep prices lower than they otherwise would be. It's not because it's some random benefit for the world (including the US) it's because their economy like any major industrial power relies on oil and gas (and coal) and keeping prices low to help their export-dependent factories.
They have their own advantages and strategies to deal with these things, but this idea that China just like sits around and "weathers the conflict" unscathed is just incorrect.
China's economy is one of the least dependent on oil and gas. Electricity is mostly coal, renewables and nuclear. Transport is increasingly electric (including trucks). Chemicals are moving from oil and gas to coal.
If global oil and gas prices rise, Chinese electricity and transport prices are largely unaffected, unlike the rest of the world. Even the US doesn't have that kind of resilience.
However, China is a net importer of oil and gas, while the US is a net exporter, so when it comes to trade the US is the main beneficiary, although it mainly benefits one single sector.
Iran's government is ideological as a fig leaf of continuity with the Revolution. True believers are few these days, and the IRG is largely keen to stay in power in order to protect its vast business interests.
How can other countries deal with Iran while Trump is in power and unilaterally cancels treaties and attacks countries without consulting others? It’s simply impossible.
"We have seen what happened with Venezuela, but at least Mexico and Canada can somewhat keep a lid on it. Which is above and beyond what they owe the rest of us since they did not create that problem. The United States government is ideological in a way that westerners don't really understand. Trump is too via his desires regarding Greenland and Canada but the American system isn't too alien to our own views - they play tennis and vacation in Europe and all that stuff. Their government is simply not interested in the things that you and I are interested in."
Bad argument for many reasons (and lazy). But Maduro was a criminal, supported Russia evading US and EU sanctions, and his gang and their disastrous economic policies resulted in around 1/3rd of Venezuelans leaving the country resulting in a humanitarian disaster.
Up until fairly recently, Israel was a stand-out in the region for actually having things like decently fair elections and a political class derived from a relatively wide sample of its populace. Other countries in the region were either Arab nationalist republics, Islamic republics, or authoritarian monarchies. While it was ethno-theocratic, it was one that seemed to balance religion with secular demands, and as it is, most countries around the world have at least some basis in ethnicity. The US is a notable exception for this, for what it's worth. This has begun to fade as a more conservative sector of Israeli society has begun carrying more political power, but it's not to the same extent as you find in other countries in the region.
Nuclear weapons are indeed bad and we used to try to negotiate ways between major powers to reduce their number. We don't do that anymore, for a variety of reasons. The more of them there are in different, independent hands, the more likely they are to be used. If they're used, there's a real chance that nuclear-armed powers make severe miscalculations about who is firing what at where. For example, a USAF radar operator watching an over-the-horizon system pointed eastward sees a large number of missiles being launched, and may assume that they're Russian missiles aimed at the US, when they are in fact Iranian missiles aimed at Israel. They might make a potentially species-ending mistake as a result.
The largest issue with Iran having nuclear weapons is that it almost certainly intends to use them against an already nuclear-armed power, Israel, in a way that really doesn't have any rational endgame. Iran is a Shia Islamic theocracy. Beyond the Western-ish influence that Israel brings to the region, there are serious theological implications from the existence of Israel. Islam has a core tenant that there is no higher power other than Allah and that Muhammad is his prophet. Allah is the same god that exists in Christianity and Judaism, and Muhammad is held as carrying on the thread of prophecy that began with the biblical Adam.
There's a lot in common in the three major Abrahamic faiths, and like all other faiths, people interpret it in different ways. The Iranian regime - who definitely does not represent all Muslims, let's make that clear right now - interprets it as the basis of their power. They are a group of clerics and scholars who govern a nation through interpretation and application of religious jurisprudence via one head cleric, the Ayatollah.
If you are a person who either rules a society based on any religious jurisprudence, or are working under that person - as all of the Iranian government does - you can't have too much tolerance for things that might undermine that religion. The Iranian theocracy's interpretation of the line of prophecy that Muhammad is a part of is that he is the "seal of the prophets", meaning that there will be no further revelations or corrections to the line of prophecy until the end-times. Muhammad is held up as having revealed corrections to the line of prophecy, meaning that while Judaism, Christianity, and other Abrahamic faiths are of the same prophecy, they ultimately got some things wrong.
Now let's get back to the existence of Israel. A short description of Israel in the context of what I've described is that you have a people who now control some of the Abrahamic faiths' most holy sites, and they're doing it based off of what is seen as the "wrong" prophecy.
If people who believe in the "wrong" prophecy are firmly in charge of the sites you consider holy, what does that say about your prophecy and your claim to power based on it? Sort of reduces its power, doesn't it? You can't have that. Something has to be done.
In the eyes of the Iranian theocracy, that "something" is funding, training, and commanding militia and military groups who are sympathetic to your understanding of prophecy and having them strike out at the theologically inconvenient people. Developing more powerful weapons to use while doing so is a natural part of this. What's more powerful than a nuclear weapon? Nothing. So you make that your ultimate goal. What they might do with it, who knows, but again, simply having more nuclear weapons in the hands of more independent actors raises the likelihood of their use with potentially catastrophic results.
The plight of the Palestinians just happens to be a convenient excuse for all of this. They're Arab and majority Sunni as opposed to the Persian and Shiite Iran. If there were a two-state solution as we spent most of the last 30 years working towards, it likely wouldn't satisfy the Iranians, which is why they don't recognize Israel at all instead of saying "we'd recognize you if you retreat to your pre-1967 borders and let the Palestinian Authority govern the West Bank and Gaza Strip."
"The largest issue with Iran having nuclear weapons is that it almost certainly intends to use them against an already nuclear-armed power, Israel, in a way that really doesn't have any rational endgame."
Besides the point and whataboutism, but I'm not advocating that Israel should have nuclear weapons. They do, and I'm not sure there's much we can do about it at this point. Same with North Korea. I'm opposed to the proliferation of nuclear weapons and just because one country has one doesn't mean other countries should go and get them too.
Maybe we should have brokered some kinda deal with Iran to prevent them getting a nuclear weapon then, huh.
At this point they'd be fools to not pursue getting one, and we killed everyone in a position of authority who was rational about it. Cats out of the bag, one more nuclear rogue state.
> Maybe we should have brokered some kinda deal with Iran to prevent them getting a nuclear weapon then, huh.
Maybe we should have brokered some kind of deal with Russia to prevent them from invading Ukraine. Do you trust American intelligence 100% to verify Iran is not building a nuclear bomb? And if they weren't, why also were they funding these militant groups? What's the point? It's Neo-colonialism in the Middle East.
> At this point they'd be fools to not pursue getting one, and we killed everyone in a position of authority who was rational about it.
The leadership wasn't really rational in your western sense. I'm not sure where you are coming up with that. If they were rational they wouldn't be murdering their own civilians, chanting death to Israel and death to America as a national past time (no sane nation does this, or if you want to argue they do then don't get mad when Americans are burning the Koran or whatever) and funding militants. You're trying to argue from a place that assumes your values about economics and prosperity and global human rights with an entity that does not care about those values.
If they were rational as you'd like them to be they'd just not do any of the things they've been doing. Why does Iran have to get special treatment to not build a nuclear weapon? Have you thought about that? Why do we have to pay them off? Why are they special snowflakes who get to hold the world hostage less they build nuclear bombs to threaten others?
> Cats out of the bag, one more nuclear rogue state.
That's the fault of the rest of the world then for failing to come together to stop the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
Burning the Koran is protected free speech, just as burning a flag is, or the Bible, or whatever else you'd like.
The point is we had a deal, and Iran kept their enrichment below weapons development levels for all of that time. Even a few years after the deal was broken by Trump, apparently. We could have kept that status quo going and not dealt with tolls in the strait and expensive military operations, and it would have been better for everyone involved. But now I don't see a path back to that, and no one is interested enough to stop the proliferation or put enough resources into it to "win". Blame whoever you like I guess, but I'm blaming Trump for tearing things up and kicking off this recent war.
Anchoring on this deal is a waste of time. We shouldn't have had to have a deal in the first place. They could just join other responsible countries like, idk, Vietnam, Brazil, and hmmm who else, Switzerland! in not pursuing nuclear weapons.
> We could have kept that status quo going
Like the last time the Houthis disrupted shipping? Or when Iran launched and supported attacks on Israel, plus continued disruption in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Iraq? (Yemen too but mentioned via Houthis). Idk if that's a tolerable situation.
I don't recall the houthis disrupting shipping before 2018. The status quo under before that point was fine for the global economy and for the US. If it wasn't fine for Israel, that's a problem for their own military to deal with, ideally without US backing that drags other countries into the issue.
Good luck with non proliferation but I think the very obvious "we can attack and invade countries without nukes but can't do that to countries with nukes" lesson is being demonstrated to everyone, so countries that don't want to be invaded will be trying to get them now. Anyone near Russia for sure, possibly even Switzerland eventually.
> Maybe we should have brokered some kind of deal with Russia to prevent them from invading Ukraine.
I understand history and contemporary events is not your strong suit, but such a deal was very much on the table in December 2021 and the Biden Admin laughed it off. Then again in April 2022.
Iran clearly has the capability to flatten every major hospital and university and desalination plant in Israel, like Israel has done in Gaza, but they don't.
It's also clear that Iran having nukes would be a strategic deterrent to Israel's ultraviolent territorial expansionism.
> Iran clearly has the capability to flatten every major hospital and university and desalination plant in Israel, like Israel has done in Gaza, but they don't.
I'm not supportive of Israel having nuclear weapons, but Iran won't do something like this because the Israelis might nuke them. That doesn't excuse Iran also building nuclear weapons. Neither should have them, in my view.
Iran also supports the militants that continue to create conflict in Palestine. It's not one-sided and any vague assertion that there's only one bad actor here is illegitimate.
The conflict in Palestine is created entirely by Israel. The militants are just the people who refuse to lay down and take it. This has become more and more obvious - if not through the genocide in Gaza, then through the rapid illegal colonization happening at an accelerated place in the West Bank.
It's not entirely created by Israel, and most of the militants are just lunatics who are thankfully killed. But that doesn't excuse Iranian funding of other militant groups in Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, or Iraq. Nor does it excuse Iran's material support of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, nor does that justify Iran trying to build a nuclear weapon.
Why did Iran willingly disassemble their other WMD programs, like bioweapons and chemical weapons, if they are irrationally bound to destroying Israel?
Chemical weapons are perfectly effective for that desire and dramatically easier to build and deploy than nuclear weapons.
So if you expect Iran to just explode Israel ASAP, why are they holding back right now with their weapons not targeting civilian infrastructure? Why did they stop pursuing cheap WMDs that don't need complicated enrichment?
Note that Iran is objectively not pursuing a nuke as fast as possible. They've had sufficient enriched uranium for a long time to be able to actually start building and testing physics packages and even get their first detonation test, but they instead have just been building a stockpile.
>I'm not supportive of Israel having nuclear weapons
Okay, then by your arguments about Iran, we should be invading Israel right? Like right now! They cannot be allowed to have nukes!
What about North Korea? It sure is funny how all the hand wringing about them getting nuclear weapons got quiet after they built a nuke and didn't use it
"Ancient" colonialism? The US and Israel are both actively seeking to expand their colonial territory.
This was an interesting piece of fiction you've written, with some very impressive mental gymnastics on display. However, it's so wrong that engaging with it would be doing you a disservice because it would make you think it's even an intellectually respectable position to have in the first place.
the reason China was using stockpiles is they want to time the gasoline price shock right to the midterm elections. The moment they stop using stockpiles and start purchasing the prices will jump
Eh? They didn't/aren't using their stockpiles to anywhere near the extent the US has! There reserves are much bigger - they have about a years supply - yet they used less in absolute terms than the US!
What they did was aggressively reduce demand by accelerating the switch to EV's and firing up a few more coal powerstations.
In terms of influencing the midterms - I suspect China isn't anywhere near the front of the queue in hoping Trump get's a beating given the chaos he is causing.
Complaining about foreign interference is ironically straight from the Hillary playbook.
> time the gasoline price shock right to the midterm elections.
Donald Trump can end this at any time if he wants. It would have been better to not have started it, thou. Less killing of innocent people, less spending on weapons, better mental health for USA soldiers...
And why is China suddenly at fault for America's actions?
Partially true. Seems most likely that Trump didn't like the Iranian provisions for reparations to end the war. A hard stance they've taken, one Trump would never go for (because of how incompetent it would make him look), and here we are.
lol. The orange man is doing more damage to the USA than China could ever do short of actual war. He is destroying the US militarily, economically and politically. They emphatically support his efforts.
At some point they might prefer stability and sanity. I would bet that at this point they don't care much either way.
China is playing long, most of the ~unchanging things are in their favor and the US already proved that they're unreliable. People won't forget that soon even if Trump is gone.
Stability and sanity is not happening whether the conflicts stop in Yemen+Hormuz or not. At that point it's just going to go back to tarriff wars and new terror campaigns that the US admin will start somewhere else
The context of this is which party China would prefer to win the midterms. The dems winning would distract Trump from being able to fuck up the rest of the world a bit.
My bet would be that China doesn't care much either way, they win regardless.
We agree that China won't care long term. They cannot lose in the current setup
In my view the worst that can happen for China is that Trump gets limited by anything. He's hurting US relations more than he's hurting China short or long-term. Relations take longer to build than trade
"Don't interrupt your opponent when they're making a mistake"
The USA can use that money that way. It's not though. Spending isn't decreasing and any savings in tax has easily been overwhelmed by the increased costs facing consumers, especially in the last two years.
It's so amazing to watch people (presumably Americans) over and over make everything about American domestic politics. That the only way to explain Trump's behaviour is on the domestic terms that Americans know and are comfortable with.
I see this over and over again with the Canada stuff. Or Greenland stuff. Not taking it seriously because "oh that's just Trump deflecting cuz of [Epstein|Midterms|etc]." Meanwhile the actual blast radius here is far far far outside of the domestic arena.
When will people just take this guy at his word? He says he wants to conquer or do X Y and Z. That's it. He said those things. Believe him. Stop trying to make it about yourself. (And also he wants to make personal money off manipulating the stock market and oil prices.)
It's not a good look, esp to the victims of Trump outside the US who have no power to vote in American elections and yet are victims of American power.
The problem is that "being at war" isn't really the problem, it's a symptom. A lawless and destabilized gulf region is the result of incomplete and inneffective military action, and in a darkly hilarious way is only treatable by more whack-a-mole warfare.
It wasn't a war we could win. We fought it anyway. Now we're stuck trying to lose in a tolerable way. Which requires more fighting.
At some point the balance will tip and China will take over patronage of the right selection of powers to push us out, which will disentangle western involvement (and make it their problem, of course). But at this stage there really is no hope for genuine stability.
While it is hard to say, all signs point to China not wanting to take over. That isn't to say they could, but China seems content to rule their corner of the world and let the US rule the ocean. (their corner includes Taiwan which the US is not content to allow China to rule)
More properly called Ansar Allah, supported by Iranian regime, and guilty of war crimes against everyone from fellow Yemenis to people thousands of miles away.
Women, gays and infidels are pubished by Houthi police.
> Women, gays and infidels are pubished by Houthi police.
The EU & US don't have ANY issues supporting and financing governments that punish gays and infidels. Hint: New Syrian government, Saudi government (which is also famous for publicly beheading gays)
So why not accept the Houthis too ? Otherwise, my apologies, your stance just sounds like the usual disgusting Western sanctimonious hypocrisy.
What would you expect instead? I think the US supports the Saudis because they are the primary competitor to Iran in the middle east. But no one (?) in the middle east has great support for women, gays, or infidels.
I think you're right that strategic / economic interests have outweighed cultural issues / human rights.
This is also mentioned in the article that you linked:
> In April 2016, during UN-brokered peace talks in Kuwait, Houthi representatives gave the United States a "sincere apology" for the "Death to America" slogan, claiming that the slogan was used for "domestic consumption as a means to attract support in the streets and create a common cause between their supporters to keep them united."
> During the Red Sea crisis, Houthi supporters waved the flag of Palestine every Friday during anti-Gaza genocide and anti-western attacks on Yemen demonstrations, alongside the slogan and flag of Yemen. A new Houthi slogan appeared after the group's re-designation as a terrorist organisation: "America is the mother of terrorism" set on a red background.
Donald Trump hosted roughly 20 oil and gas executives from major companies including Chevron, ExxonMobil, and Occidental Petroleumat his Mar-a-Lago resort on April 11, 2024.
His message to the room was essentially that giving $1 billion to his campaign was a low-cost investment that would guarantee massive financial returns for their companies
This is the ballad of the black gold
They call it Texas tea
But it's bigger than a cowboy with a lasso
It's deeper than a black hole
Create monopolies
Except they collect your fee when you pass Go
Crisis international
The government de facto
We got no control of this fiasco
Darker than the back roads
Bubble hotter than Tabasco
More than what you bargained for or asked for
The Houthi's have a Saudi backed adversary, I haven't heard about them lately in mainstream media how are they faring? I just thought they would be a tough resistance for the houthis restraining them from what they're currently doing
The Houthis are one side of a protracted civil war between North Yemen and South Yemen, which was until relatively recently two different countries, and the other side of that civil war is heavily backed by the Gulf States. The Houthis are also a Shiite minority opposing an overwhelmingly Sunni population.
They're making big noises about taking Sana’a in their current offensive and there's been heavier fighting than in recent months. Other than that, it's hard to tell. Personally, it seems like the Yemeni gov't forces have quite a hill to climb.
The mainstream media has made it sound like the fall of Mocha was at least somewhat surprising, but I don't think that's accurate. It was pretty clear the Houthis would reach the port as late as last week.
My understanding is that the Saudi are basically fighting the war in Yemen but denying it's them. The de jure government has effectively lost this war ATM.
Will this bring oil prices down in Europe? Oil tankers could still go to the mediteranian via the suez canal. This will not help asia, but I can imagine if it is too dangerous the go through bab al-mandab strait it is more lucrative to sell the crude oil to europe at a discount?
No. A cynic might think a significant part of this half-arsed Iran war was:
- make sure fuel prices increase globally
- The US economy is relatively well-shielded from the fallout by its own fossil fuel sources, local and in colonies like Venezuela.
- export more US fossil fuels, especially to Europe, at inflated prices. US insiders reap the profits.
- further kneecap European competitiveness in energy intensive sectors, steal market share. Oh well, small gift to China here too, but still a net win for the US.
I believe there were pieces of a plan. This global energy shift gambit being one of them. I don’t think there was a unified strategy with contingencies etc though (if there was it certainly wasn’t very good).
People are so politically blinded that it's almost impossible to explain the plan, but to anyone with the strength to keep a level head, it's pretty clear what the plan was, and frankly it probably had a 50% success chance. But Trump rolled a critical failure on it.
Iranians were rioting against the regime, Israel intelligence handed the US a report that the collective "Head" of the Iranian regime will be all together at one place, at one time.
Cut off the head, and the rioters riding high on the win will topple the rest. Coming off of the swift clean victory in Venezuela, and Trumps incredible desire to put feathers in his cap, it was an irresistible proposition.
So he decided to cut off the head, which was successful. The miscalculation however was that the rioters got scared/apathetic rather than motivated. The power vacuum was filled by the same people who were there before. I'm sure Mossad and the CIA were probably on the ground trying to ground swell support, but evidently it didn't happen.
The only people who ever would have taken any of this as a "Plan" are the moronic current admin.
Killing a few heads of Iran was known to not be an effective strategy, because the power is in the hands of the IRGC as an institution and large group, not the figureheads. This is especially hilarious when the Trump admin was so freaking stupid, they couldn't figure this out even after it didn't work the first time. They continued trying to kill random figureheads as if that plan would have had more success if you killed people nobody had previously heard of.
None of this is "miscalculation" or bad luck or taking a reasonable gamble. It's stupidity. There was not evidence to believe this plan had a strong chance. There was no organized resistance. Claims of supporting the Kurds, a group the Trump admin has fucked over more than once (nit: Other Kurds, they aren't a single group), happened only after the war was already going tits up and involved absurd tweets about "dropping them weapons" as if that's just a thing you can do on a whim and as if the Kurds themselves were willing, ready and able to resist the Iran regime.
We did not "Cut off the head" in Venezuela. We conspired with insiders to replace one figurehead with another. It was not a victory except for extremely weird people who think abducting a foreign head of state is somehow a good thing.
The Pentagon was actively telling the admin all of this, which is why some of them were fired.
What happened was even dumber than this absurd post-hoc rationalization: Israel was fucking pissed after Oct 7th, which is reasonable, and decided that "Mowing the grass" was done, and they were going to Finally fix this. They planned to attack Iran. Their strikes over the next year were done to enable this. Shortly before their planned attacks were to start, Bibi came to Trump and told him about this Righteous war they were about to do and got it in Trump's mind that it would be good for the US to look Strong if they attacked first, as Iran would probably attack US bases in retaliation anyway, and may end up pulled in regardless. IE, there's a chance Kamala would also have gotten sucked into this quagmire in some fashion, depending on how Iran had reacted to just Israel's strikes. Nobody was in a strong position to tell Israel "No, don't start this war, that's stupid, it's stupid, you've already neutered all the proxy groups, just take your victory and go home"
This is Israel's war. They don't mind the straight being screwed up. They don't mind the world economy falling down.
> Friedman [...] advocates a deal with Iran which would essentially allow it a secure sphere of influence in the region and an alliance with Turkey to counterbalance Iran and Israel.
The US sells oil and refined products to other countries. So a supply crunch would raise prices even there too. Everyday Americans are not getting fuel for cheap.
I have a suspicion that the caring is starting to mount, otherwise there’s no need to offer a $1.3T election bribe (which I’ll file a the other dividend / bribes that were never sent and the bridge Trump sold me)
Using that lens then you could view the Iran war is simply a failed ( so far ) attempt to grab Iranian oil revenues, perhaps emboldened by the relatively quick success of the Venezuela adventure.
The truth is probably much more multi-headed - though hard to see how the US would have gone to war without some assessment of their own energy situation.
The greatest happiness is to vanquish your enemies, to chase them before you, to rob them of their wealth, to see those dear to them bathed in tears, to clasp to your bosom their wives and daughters.
Sure, if you make oil prices increase, US oil companies and their shareholders rake in more cash. But it's harmful for the average American because filling up the tank costs a lot more. Then that price hike spreads to everything else that relies on oil (which is pretty much everything) leading to inflation and rising interest rates (already starting to happen, the shielding you mention doesn't seem to be working, which makes sense in a relatively free-market economy). If the situation drags on, unemployment rises due to soaring costs across the board, and the economy goes to hell.
A rise in crude prices might pay off for a small country that lives almost exclusively off it (say, Saudi Arabia, in the hyphotetical case that it could keep exporting as normal) but for the US? I don't think it does. Surely, Europe is more exposed than the US and will suffer even more, but this is not a zero-sum game.
So I don't think it's an elaborate plan, it's just Trump being reckless as usual.
I wouldn't assume this administration gives a shit about inflation or rising interest rates or how the rest of the economy is doing. Do you have any reason to believe they do?
> But it's harmful for the average American because filling up the tank costs a lot more.
The fun part about this is that it shows what people actually care about.
What happens if petroleum prices go up? People use less. It's the entire premise of a carbon tax. Fuel costs more so people buy a hybrid or electric vehicle, power utilities find renewables or nuclear more attractive relative to natural gas, etc. In a market economy this is the primary way to get people to switch from something to alternatives -- which is pretty important if you think climate change is a problem.
This is obviously not why Trump is doing it, but it's the consequence of it anyway. So now we get to see what people care about. Do you like higher oil prices because it speeds up the transition away from fossil fuels, or dislike them because of who it is that caused it this time?
If you think so little of them, then imagine what the people who pay $5M for a meal with him can convince him to do. Or what people who pay his son-in-law/iran-negotiator 25M a year can call and ask him to do.
We have no doubt that the best people are in US government and that they have the best tools at their disposal. Around the world, we are simply trying to figure out, while munching on plenty of popcorn, how this incredible sequence of actions will play out; a sequence clearly crafted using highly complex strategic planning tools that employ the most advanced techniques from game theory, AI, and who knows what else.
That's just the media noise. Yea there were purges. But its a big leap to go from "some" to "all" the best people. Government is the largest employer in the country. The nonsense you see constantly by politicians and other leaders is a tiny fraction of what the government workforce is. This is why despite the chaos you see in the media, life hasn't changed much for the great majority of people all things considered. The government remains functional where it needs to be.
The purges haven’t reached too deep into the rank and file yet, which is why the walls are still standing. But they’ve hit the top of the pyramid hard, which is why nothing makes sense.
Someone hasn't been paying attention to the Pentagon or State Department purges, both of which would lead precisely to this type of mistake.
We had a retard in the Oval Office 2017-2021 surrounded by "the deep state" (i.e. career managers of the ultra-complex organization called "the government"), and politically constrained by Congress.
Now we have that same retard, but supported by vast purges of aforementioned managers, and politically unconstrained by the cultists and cowards (the two forms of GOP representative) in Congress.
The US is the world's most vulnerable economy to oil shocks. I mean the real economy, not the farce that the markets currently are.
The Venezuela comment is extremely weird. You know Venezuela has negligible production, right, and that it would take 100s of billions of investments, over decades, to get reasonable production that would make a difference. That's ignoring that currently there is a laughably illegitimate puppet government -- literally just Madero's government minus him, as they did the coup with the US -- that has a 100% chance of a violent overthrow in the future. Which is exactly why all of the oil companies are shrugging and saying no thanks.
Venezuela is a farce -- much like $5000 "dividend" for a government literally on the precipice of bankruptcy, as Bessent runs around, near tears, trying to convince everyone that they're the house and he's the big dog German Shepherd instead of the face of a failing empire having its last pathetic gasp, to laughter all around -- that Trump thinks gives him leverage against Canada. It is unbelievably pathetic business, like renaming a 400+ year old name on a lake like a little bitch.
There is zero scenario where this has benefitted the US, but a drunkard incompetent secdef (sorry "secwar") convinced a foolish demented rapist, who already had Israel whispering in his ear, how easy and painless this foolish debacle will be.
This was clearly a secret attempt of Trump's to be the world's best president for getting off fossil fuels and moving to renewables. The man is playing 7 dimensional chess bro!
When all is said and done it will be he, not AOC or Bernie or any "Green New Deal" folks, that will be remembered by history as the president who did more to get people off fossil fuels than any other.
He's so clever that he's probably even playing chess in a Hilbert space. The whole world envies American voters, who will receive $5,000 if they re-elect this incredible genius.
I think the "stable" in stable genius actually refers to the points of stability under transformations. Brower's fixed point theorem. Do your own research!
Trump is just accelerating the course of history. The fall of American hegemony, the humiliation of the MIC, the petrodollar, the fossil fuels, the USD as reserve currency is like speedrunning the historical events to reach the next more balanced equilibrium state
This is part of the Houthis preventing Saudi Arabia from exporting any oil at all. So no I don’t think it’s gonna make oil lower. Higher probably. But oil is doing very weird things.
I've never seen oil prices decrease due to any regional disruption; the market is global. If the price in Alberta went up when the Straight closed, I wouldn't hold my breathe for Europe in this scenario.
>I've never seen oil prices decrease due to any regional disruption; the market is global.
oil spiked and then crashed during the gulf war & the iraq war in 03.
the gulf war probably because of western price control methods kicking in, the iraq war because of an increase in confidence that the region would produce oil after western 'securing' of oil fields allowing further volume investment from the UAE and friends.
I guess it really just depends on what the definition of 'regional disruption' is.
There’s no reason to think someone else won’t escalate this further disrupting supplies even more. That will push prices up.
Even if they don’t, if oil can’t get through this straight it will have to go somewhere else, which will increase shipping traffic and demand for “your oil” right? And wouldn’t that also push up prices?
VLCCs are too large to fit through the Suez Canal. I don't know how much of Saudi export is using VLCCs versus Suezmax or smaller tankers, but I've heard that much of the Red Sea oil export is currently going through Bab al-Mandab, not that I have a source on hand.
I wouldn’t count on safe Med passage, I think last month a drone attacked a ship in Egypt. And the channel to Suez isn’t exactly wide or out of range for Houthis.
GCC will have to talk to Iran now, there is no reasonable way out of this quagmire other than a regional accommodation with Iran. Talk about a regression but here we are.
Not really. It is very hard and expensive to get these oil well pumping again. That is why we had negative oil prices during covid. Plus, when we are talking about the Gulf states, they have extremely low production cost. The discount would be against world prices, not production cost.
It doesn't matter if in Texas wells are producing it at a penny for barrel, if the global prices are high that oil is going to be sold to Philippinos, Japanese, Italians or South Africans.
So, at the same time, it doesn't matter if some new routes open or close, it doesn't particularly favor one or the other buyer, it's still sold globally on a bid.
i don't see why deals can't change. It's just a contract, the IRS could create a tax incentive for US producers to sell to US refineries at a discount. US producers could do it on their own if they so chose as well.
The Iranian-backed Houthis also struck the Saudi East-West oil pipeline [0], pumping stations and refining capability. Reductions in export output initially estimated around 700,000 barrels per day now missing from the market.
> Will this bring oil prices down in Europe ... This will not help Asia
This hurts Europe more than Asia.
The UK, France, Italy, Netherlands, Denmark, and others are similarly opposed to the Houthis having conducted airstrikes on the Houthis (eg. 2025) as well as helping target them directly or indirectly.
And a large portion of global shipping is owned by Greek conglomerates - a country that is a close ally of Israel.
Most GCC states also have some form of defense agreement with the UK or France. If those turn out to be meaningless, it reduces their incentive to cut preferential deals with European states.
Additionally, this further enhances Turkiye and Pakistan's hand, as Saudi Arabia has signed defense pacts with both and Pakistan has threatened action against Iran yesterday if further incidents threaten Saudi Arabia. If they were able to dislodge the Houthis without direct European intervention, then it is a massive black stain on the EU's power projection capacity and it's claim that it should be treated as a great power. It also gives Turkiye additional leverage against the EU.
Finally, the Houthis struck the East-West Pipeline [0]. Much of the KSA's oil is in Eastern Saudi Arabia around Dhahran. Most large Asian states like China, India, Japan, and South Korea have continued operations in Iran that allowed them continued passage. European states lack access to GCC oil as a result of Perim island being controlled by the Houthis.
Yeah the EU leadership has been really shortsighted on these past decades (especially since the 10s), especially in their strategic energy and industrial sectors.
Be it the Ukranian conflict, the ME crisis, the NA wars and instabilities, etc. The EU is the one that geopolitically speaking lost the most.
Unless they're full puppets for foreign interests, I simply do not understand how they could leave foreign actors to dictate policies that affect thier own territory and enterprises without any sort of critical thought.
But even then, they could not have possibly been all mere puppets. And yet.
It was cheaper, I don't think it's much more complex than that. And with fossil fuels, countries without significant local production are always dependent on someone else, with most potential suppliers being problematic in some way.
Of course we should have gone for renewable energy more forcefully, but that wouldn't have resolved the issue. That change will take time, and you can't arbitrarily accelerate it.
Nuclear is cheapest, then lignite, then hard coal, and then gas. Germany phased out the cheapest option first, now continues with the second, and is expanding the most expensive.
The obvious choice would have been to do what China and India are doing - phase out gas power first and focus on electrification. But Europe did the opposite.
Well the US benefit massively because of their investments in shale gas. Meanwhile the Europe suffers massively and they banned shale gas although they could exploit vast resources.
Sure, the environment, etc but Europe hasn't invested strategically in that, either. China has.
EU opposes the Houthis because they are a horrifying slave state that distributes children as sex slaves to their troops.
EU opposes Russia because it is a horrifying fascist dictatorship that has repeatedly invaded it's neighbors, and constantly talks about it's historical claims to EU territory.
In the NA conflicts it's harder to draw such a clear line, because the conflicts typically have about 15 sides each, but the basic algorithm you can use is generally that EU tries very hard to pick sides based on morality, not geopolitical interests.
Those can be said for other economic partners that are being used so no. That's not it, that's just rhetoric for the masses. _You'll here the same thing tomorrow, after I say the complete opposite today._
"By some estimates, they influence 75% of legislation"
> But even then, they could not have possibly been all mere puppets. And yet.
Even if the lobbying was not reason for all the bad decisions of the EU, the EU parliament has no way to actually propose any laws on its own. All the laws emanate from the commission which is also bought and paid for by you guessed it, the lobbies.
The issue was 1990s-2000s Germany argued it was in Europe's best interest to integrate Russia into the European fabric, but 1990s-2000s France+UK+Italy argued it was in Europe's best interest to integrate the Mediterranean into the European fabric.
When the UK left the EU and France+Italy were in the midst of their economic doldrums due to the Eurozone crisis, this left the hard power states within the EU comparatively weakened.
But the collapse of Minsk II and the ongoing war in the Middle East led to a cascading crisis for a unified Europe.
Minsk per the people that brokered it was just a temporary patch to prepare Ukraine for the invasion. So no. That's not it.
It's business and by now it should be clear to anyone that there's no morality involved in this space.
There's nothing wrong with Russia as energy partner, as long as you don't shoot yourself in the foot by blowing up the alternatives. South of EU had proper energy supplies from ME/NA. For example crisis in ME was mitigated by Russian energy or NA energy (Algeria, Tunisia, Lebanon, etc).
The new hegemons like Turkey, Israel, etc came only later, yet we can't say they're Saints can we? Also to appease the US administration line a lot of green energy projects were put on hold, and were only restarted this year after the Hormuz situation.
The only real explanation is shortsightness for personal interests (but even then you'd have to have all your capitals abroad), or being a tool for foreign interests.
> Japan, and South Korea have continued operations in Iran that allowed them continued passage.
1.How do they pay Iran considering the sanctions?
2.Do you think EU shouldn't sanction Iran even though they violated NNPT and their terrible record on human rights because Iran can threaten them with a sufficient price?
> a country that is a close ally of Israel
Are they? They never sent a single weapon or soldier to help israel, they have no formal or informal mutual defense agreement. Israel buy no military equipment from Greece. You mistake mutual interest because of a common enemy - Turkey to close alliance.
1. Waivers, state owned enterprises, shell corporations, barter trades, and using their own currencies for transactions
2. I agree. I'm just being prosaic as to why European states are in the pickle they are today.
3. They are closely entwined via logistics, but Cyprus would be an even closer Israel-Cyprus ties. The reality is, the Saudi-Turkiye-Kuwait-Pakistan alliance is a direct reaction to the Israel-Greece-Cyprus-UAE-India cooperation or the now signed Israel-Greece-Cyprus trilateral.
The U.S. has proven to the world that rouge regimes can target strategic shipping routes to stay solvent and also that those are more powerful than nuclear capabilities. That Pandora’s box is now open thanks to this administration and we will see a wave of such incidents.
All we had to do was not bomb Iran (starting with a school full of girls). There was no benefit to the US in this war, it’s 100% for Israel. Bribery and blackmail, not democracy, are now determining world events.
This war started as a regime change operation in Iran, one of the shakiest regimes in the world pre-war, but ironically the war might end up with most of the nations who supported the war (either vocally or quietly) "regime changed" (loosely defined), including Israel, US, some European countries and now possibly some Gulf nations, awhile the Iranian regime seem to have tightened its grip more than ever.
Yet MAGA supporters were saying early in the war that they are "plan trusters" as prior US admins sucked at regime change because it is a "skills issue" and none of the prior admins had the triple digits IQ of Hegseth, Trump and Bessent.
If they were going to try this it needed to be done months earlier when the protests were raging. Instead the brain trust fumbled the initiative and let the Iranian leadership kill and scourge their local allies into compliance. Then fumbling the decapitation strike coupled with the decades of preparation for a decapitation strike (via redundancy of command) the genius brigade seemed to be unaware of because they fired all the experts, and the total repression of the protesting populace, led to an unusually strong system in Iran. They also almost certainly let racism play a big role in underestimating the Iranians, who are a very technically sophisticated society and have been preparing for this scenario since day one of the revolution.
Everything that’s happened was predictable and predicted, which is why other administrations who were more than happy to topple foreign governments when it suited them to not do so in Iran. MAGA feels like the junior dev that blames the compiler for their own syntax errors.
Not sure where you get the shaky regime idea, but Iran was not on the verge of collapse from protests prior to the war. It may have been on the verge of more aggressive clamping down from the IRGC, but collapse wasn’t around the corner.
All the Kingdoms in middle east are very fragile. Gulf coast countries economies are crashing due to the blockade. Bahrain, UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia. One Arab spring away from a new government and this could be the spark.
Do you even realize that one of the only reason anybody still supports this war is precisely because of comments like yours? By dividing people into teams, and antagonizing them, you result in people never willing to stomach giving an inch and doubling down on stupid.
Obviously this war has been the US' latest great failure, and at the beckoning of a foreign power which makes it especially catastrophic. If people could focus on this, rather than trying to divide things into teams and then sling mud, they'd have vastly better outcomes come November (and on) than just using it for divisive mudslinging which does nothing but ensure that all elections, regardless of how bad the decisions of a incumbent, or how awful a challenger, will remain these sort of 50/50 coinflips.
I am saying that adding your tribal bit to your post is just completely self defeating. And yes, the goal is indeed to avoid hurting people's feelings. I don't know why you'd mock that. People are not machines, and when you make somebody angry at you, or otherwise make him feel insulted - he'll happily argue that 2+2=5 just to avoid giving an inch to you.
Bridge building hasnt worked. Hillary's biggest campaign failure was drawing back from her deplorables comment, she should have leaned into it - thats what Trump did, go harder into division, and he's president now. Instead of being milquetoast corporate stooge full of fake politics talk, she might have seemed to actually stand for something. You're bringing 1990s politics into the 2020s and its proven multiple times it doesnt work any more. A small group of fanatics is actually more powerful than a large cohort of half-committed these days.
Do you realise that the only reason the average US taxpayer keeps getting wrecked into one pointless forever war after the other no matter who is in power is because the elites are never held accountable for their mad self-enriching adventures?
Holding people like Hegseth (who literally insider traded defense equities right before the start of the war) and Trump accountable (who practically made a gazillion insider trading each mad meme he posted while the world burnt) is not "dividing people into teams"
>This war started as a regime change operation in Iran
I believe this war started with a tomahawk missle murdering a school full of children and then the US denying involvement. I very clearly remember it. US attacks Iran unprovoked. First act, murder their children in school. If you wanted to solidify opposition to the US in Iran, I don't think they could have done a more effective job.
They haven't denied it yet, it's still under investigation. They may be able to workout they were the only country in this war with Tomahawks responsible for the triple-tap missile strike, after the mid terms. Or they may just move on from it and never talk about it again, like the Epstein files.
The U.S. leadership has a bad habit of starting conflicts that the bulk of the population doesn't want, which leads to large political costs and resulting half-measures. Our current leadership literally ran on "no more wars." Morons.
Ansar Allah (Houthis) is a terrible Islamist group that commits warcrimws against both Yemenis and people thousands of miles away.
Here’s just one example, executing men for gayness:
“In addition to death sentences that include crucifixion and stoning, the Houthi court sentenced 23 men to prison for periods of up to 10 years. Three of them were also sentenced to public flogging”
Saudi Arabia who they’re fighting against by proxy, and who we sell lots of bombs to, and are soon going to help get nuclear technology, not so great either.
Just so it's clear that you're trying to cause confusion: these are light water reactors that cannot in any way shape or form be used to make bombs.
Slightly harder to design and build. Much cheaper to run. Excellent for power. Bad for bombs.
And, yes, just to get ahead of your next question: the US (and Europe and Russia and China) have offered to help Iran create these. Explaining it to them. Send people and engineers who have done it. Just get them from us. Or for free. We have tried everything. Iran has systematically refused everything, yet insist their program is for peaceful purposes only.
I'm not saying Saudi Arabia is perfect, far from it. But they are not looking to destroy the world or the region, and yes, sorry to say, but Iran is.
I 100% agree Iran wants nukes, but I don't think it's a given they want to "destroy the region".
It is more likely they want to get the same level of safety countries with nukes get, e.g. North Korea's leadership is at no risen of getting a "democratizing" invasion.
Then again, who knows what the next leader will do.
>But they are not looking to destroy the world or the region, and yes, sorry to say, but Iran is.
Then why did Iran discontinue their other WMD programs, like much cheaper and easier to manage chemical weapons programs?
Why is Iran holding back and not targeting Israel's water infrastructure? If they just want to kill everyone they have options right now that they aren't taking.
Why does Iran hold back if they would use a nuke as soon as they get one because they just want to destroy the region?
Iran objectively wants to build a nuke, and has willingly sacrificed everything to do it, but it wouldn't have taken becoming a rogue state and trillions of dollars of GDP to kill Israel to their liking. Other than a nuke, Israel's retaliation options are fairly limited.
>Ansar Allah (Houthis) is a terrible Islamist group
IMO this is kind of bad framing because it suggests that they're the minority in Yemen, when in reality they basically are the government of 70-80% population of Yemen and absorbed 60+ percent of the Yemeni regular army.
They are basically at this point the de-facto Yemeni government
Ansar Allah isn't even close to a majority of the population of Yemen. Yemen is majority-Sunni. Ansar Allah is a militant Zaydi revivalist movement, and what they're attempting to revive is a Zaydi caste system.
> Ansar Allah (Houthis) is a terrible Islamist group that commits warcrimws ...
The Syrian President and current Western/Israeli "good boy" - belongs to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham which has committed warcrimes which make the Houthis look like choir boys. He was former Al-Qaeda too with a multi-million dollar bounty. Done an utterly ridiculous number of beheadings, chaining & rape of women, torture, the whole galore of works carried out by a popular ruthless terrorist in a long career.
Now he is fully supported by the US AND the EU.
So, any time, any citizen of a Western nation complains about "war crimes" and wants "regime change", I call them deeply disgusting, sanctimonious hyprocrites. You fellows have lost any and all moral standing to talk about "war crimes".
Geopolitics is way too complicated for such black and white thinking. Do you know who amongst the governments of those countries decided to back this Syrian president? I certainly don't. What percentage of the (huge) populations that you're damning as "deeply disgusting, sanctimonious hypocrites" do you think know who the current Syrian president is, his history, know who amongst their governments backed him, voted for the people who backed him? Humans just physically can't keep track of everything, especially things so far outside of their daily life and physical experience. You can't reasonably hold them responsible for everything bad that happens in the world that their countries contributed to, especially things that are entirely abstract for them.
> Geopolitics is way too complicated for such black and white thinking. Do you know who amongst the governments of those countries decided to back this Syrian president? I certainly don't.
I am very much against black and white thinking. But the typical US and even EU liberal citizen is mired in such thinking when it comes to talk about "war crimes and "regime change". If you don't know who in the EU govt decided to back this Syrian President, then I can only facepalm since even as a poor, "low-IQ" third-worlder (according to MAGA folks), I am educated on the same. Please look at Ursula von der Leyen and her €620 million support package.
Yes, I will hold you folks responsible. This is not some "abstract idea" - it is basic, common knowledge and you fellows always, always fall to your media propaganda.
The other side is Al Qaeda. So who do you support? Wipe out the Houthis and you'll get another Syria where Al Qaeda controls the country.
Edit: Downvote me as much you want doesn't change the facts. the front line fighters for Yemen government is Al Qaeda. It was same thing as Syria which is why we have an Al Qaeda leader as their president.
Saudi is the exactly same as Iran. Both far right countries. Both execute gays. Both don't support women's rights. Both execute kids. My point is there is no good side so the best option is not to pick a side and get out of the middle east.
As an American, I love that the American right wing immediately point out how Islamist treat gays, as if the American right isn’t still trying to outlaw gay marriage and kill trans people. Get a grip you guys.
Sure, but the scale of violence committed by the US and allies is very large. Are there theocratic states recently committing similar levels of violence?
Too often in the past, the oppression done by Middle Eastern governments is used to build political support for their destruction by the West.
During WW2, the Allies used flame throwers for goodness sake and killed a lot of innocent people taking Europe back from the Nazis.
If you made this argument in the 1940s, you would've been dragged out of your home and beaten half to death. And it would be for good reason. :)
There's no pseudo-intellectual moral argument that stands up to might-is-right. In the real world, that's how it works, regardless how much you disagree.
Why does that have to be the only reason? I personally think it has nothing to do with "Hacker" news, but I understand that sentiment has been in the fringe lately with HN becoming increasingly political.
There's a far cry between someone showing off some weird contraption they hacked together versus posting about the Houthi's military campaign. If you can't see that, then I'm not sure what else to say.
People can pretend whatever they want, but this affects technology heavily too.
Everything you buy has to be shipped. That needs gas. Everything with plastic has oil in it.
Economic downturns/depressions/panics affect investment and the amount of money available for companies to keep running. Plus consumer/business demand. Especially hard on startups who aren’t profitable or don’t even have a product out yet.
Even if you ignore the extremely obvious political stuff, this will directly affect the entire audience here.
His supporters are a minority. There are others who voted for him as they felt it was the least bad option, but they are not supporters (and many of them regret their vote, though they probably would have stayed home, or voted third party). The supporters are a loud and vocal minority though.
It’s in quotation marks because it’s a quotation. The BBC have not independently verified that the Houthis have taken control of the island, they are reporting what a government source has said.
It's funny to see the evolution of language. Quotation marks indicated that something was a direct quote. Then people started to use them as a sarcasm indicator. Now we're to the point where people can't even recognize them as indicating a direct quote.
I'm unconvinced that this is a pattern that is distinguished by the nation being reported on. Headlines vary. Both of your example headlines might appear at different times in the outlets I read.
I think this was just a stylistic choice and that this whole thread is a weird tangent.
“40 beheaded babies” and mass/systematic rape propaganda accepted with zero verification (journalism 101) and, once debunked, zero retractions were made
Hamas-run, but not Likud-run
Condemnation of atrocities by Israel and the US that comes from Israeli and Western voices is given significantly more weight than the same claims coming from Palestinian or Arab voices. After all, the native lacks the capacity to be objective.
Israeli gov statements are taken as undeniable fact, while Palestinian (Gaza or West Bank) gov spokespeople or even Palestinian people in general are barely even platformed
Over-representation of Zionists in editorial teams of every major newspaper and news channel across all Western countries, which (naturally) led to coordinated suppression of any Palestinian voice internally and externally (started to change only relatively recently).
On the BBC specifically, try reading through their articles, especially from early on, and tell me what the editorial slant is. Yes, most of the content is neatly wrapped in quotation marks, but what picture were they trying to paint?
My point is that both UK and Western media immediately jumped on and recirculated the claim in the first few days without confirmation. This was just enough to sear the image of beheaded babies into the minds of viewers & readers in the West, helping to justify Israel’s campaign to starve out the “human animals” and raze Gaza (a least in the mind of the avg citizen).
I don't think that's true and would be curious to see evidence otherwise.
I believe BBC and other outlets with journalistic standards use quotes when reporting what officials say and only drop the quotes when they have independent verification, like eyewitness reports from one of their own journalists.
Those have the same implication even if it's written slightly differently. "US insists" makes it clear that "open" is a claim by the US, not an independent fact. The first one doesn't match the supposed pattern where one side's claims are stated as facts, despite the lack of quotation marks.
I think it's a fair example given how untruthful the US administration has been about whether the strait is "open" or not compared to the practical reality. Both would work with or without quotes, but the Iranian one is quoted. Still doesn't show systematic bias, but it's what I asked for.
I'm pretty sure the Iranian one is quoted because they used the word, whereas the US one is not quoted because the statements that the reporting was pulled from never used the actual word "open."
I see how it would read as bias if one interprets them as scare quotes, but it really does just mean "this is verbatim" when used here.
Yes, it's been true for a long time. See the book "Manufacturing Consent" for example, but there's been lots of research since. There are numerous ways that the western media biases news to build support for the objectives of those in power.
I don't see anything stated as fact (without quote marks) here solely on the basis of Trump having said it, and I see use of quote marks for things he has said, eg. 'Trump says Iran war will end "immediately" after US midterm elections': https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/topics/cp7r8vgl2lgt
The BBC's main sin in relation to Trump is sane-washing, treating his bizarre outbursts as if they were reasonable things for a US president to say. Eg. were he to say "I have a solid gold prostate!" they'd have an Anthony Zurcher piece entitled "Is Trump's prostate really made of gold?" with a quote from a doctor saying "while it seems unlikely and would probably be uncomfortable, having a gold prostate would be unlikely to cause any noticeable side effects as the metal is inert" and a discussion of the benefits of replacing a cancer-prone organ with a noble metal.
Not reporting on Trump is not an option because his words and actions have huge ramifications for the world.
I think in general the press has gotten much better at just straight up saying that Trump is lying or wrong, as opposed to previous policy of only reporting counter claims from other parties.
Houthis 'take control' of Perim Island - government source
published at 09:00
Houthi rebels have "taken control" of Perim Island in the Bab al-Mandab Strait, according to a source. Earlier, we were reporting that the group had reached the key island.
The AFP news agency also says Houthis have "taken over" Perim Island, also referred to as Mayyun, according to eyewitnesses and a local government official.
"Boats carrying armed Houthi fighters reached Mayyun Island after government forces withdrew from it yesterday," the official tells AFP.
My point about verification is simply that if the BBC had independently verified it’s true then they wouldn’t use the quote in the headline. They’d just say taken control without quote marks, because it wouldn’t be a quote.
This is completely standard journalistic practice when reporting a quote on something that is currently contentious or unproven. For example, consider the two hypothetical headlines:
Activists decry police murder of protester
Activists decry police "murder" of protester
The first implies that the police murdering the protestor is an established fact. The second makes it clear that it is the activists who used the term "murder" rather than it being a non-contentious fact.
Both versions are fancifully direct in our era a media+police stenography, try:
Mayor denounces "radical activists" rioting and damaging city property in response to an officer-involved incident that resulted in one fatal kinetic altercation with a "loud and provocatively dressed" man.
Read McSweeney's guide to ambiguous grammar, where they lead you step by step from the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog to the ultimate say-nothing sentence speed was involved in a jumping-related incident while a fox was brown, and the punchline is you can then translate "the St Louis County Police Department was involved in an officer-involved shooting after officers came under heavy gunfire" to "a police officer shot a black person" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Michael_Brown)
But no, that's the language issued by police departments covering their asses. Journalists are a little bit covering their asses in making clear what is a quote and what isn't, but they're still responsible for what they choose to quote, and to be clear on whether they have verified the claims they're quoting.
Ideally, unverified claims shouldn't even be in an article. But when there _has_ been some kind of stramash, they just don't know who did what, the need to rush out an article to get clicks means they'll just quote both sides and try to give them equal prominence until they can do more verification.
oh like this article that says a child was hit by a "LAPD bullet" as though wild bullets roam the streets of LA looking for children instead of being fired from a gun by a person who made a decision.
It doesn't help when snippets are post leaving out the other context clues where things like "according to" or "anonymous source stated" or similar attribute of the quote. Just putting words between quotation marks does not lead me to believe they were quotes if there is no attribution. Otherwise, it's a Trump level "people tell me" type of "quote".
When I moved from the US to the UK, the use of quotation marks in news headlines was something that confused me. In the US, these would be "scare quote", with the quotation marks basically standing in for the words "so-called". In the UK, that is NOT their meaning. The quotation marks mean "we are not ourselves in a position to verify this, but it is the words that a source has told us". Very different meaning -- and once I got used to it, I think the UK use of language in this case is more honest and useful.
tl;dr: two countries, divided by a common language.
This is like this in most of Europe: when in "quotes", it is not the journalist, but the person who said something. For example, Obama said "Yes we can". He did not say yes we can, he said "Yes we can".
It is not about the quotes being verified or unverified. It is about something said by somebody, that you are reporting.
It’s not so much ‘we are not in a position to verify’ as the fact that the person who said the thing, and what they said, is itself newsworthy.
If you’re reporting that “Government sources say Houthis have ‘taken control’ of an island” then the fact that government sources used the words ‘taken control’ is itself interesting.
The headlines “Russia ‘will be defeated’ in Ukraine says Zelensky”, “Russia ‘will be defeated’ in Ukraine says Putin”, and “Russia ‘will be defeated’ in Ukraine says Taylor Swift” all tell of vastly different news events.
It's a garbage habit that they've all fallen into. The quotes will fall away when future stories refer back to this story.
That single quoted phrase was set in the context of other words, and that context defined its meaning. We know this to an extent that almost no one could have imagined since LLMs have become a huge part of the world.
My favorite example of this is how no article in Britain during Corbyn's leadership of the labor party would ever quote an entire sentence that he had said. Thousands of articles, and the quotes were all fragmentary phrases and lone words framed in editorial.
edit: Brits and the BBC especially do this more than most, likely because of their bizarre libel laws (that were once even worse than they are now.)
It's because they been taken to court for mindlessly parroting shit they hear, but instead of actually verifying the truth of the claim (ya know, the entire purpose of a journalist) they just put it in quotes as some kind of "buyer beware" disclaimer
My quibble here is with the house style "Iran-backed" that they attach to every mention of the Houthi's. While it's fine for governments to use that language, I don't think journalists should use it without being very specific to its relevance to the particular subject under discussion. The "Houthis claim major advance in Yemen - what you need to know" article could omit "Iran-backed" in its entirety and lose no information of substance, and amend the last bullet point to say that this is especially relevant given the current US-Iran conflict.
As I type this I feel somewhat vindicated by the update to the page, "Iran does not dictate every Houthi decision - but they appear increasingly aligned", which I think does a good job of clarifying the relationship. It does, however, say "Iran has publicly backed the Houthis during the latest fighting. The geography helps explain why", which is useful factual evidence (since Iranian officials have indeed made public statements in support of the Houthis) but the use of "backed" in this sentence is bad style since that word has been used in exactly this context to have a much deeper meaning than Iran saying "we've got your back bro"
The Houthis created a fake audio of a major Yemeni commander telling his troops to retreat which was subsequently amplified on Twitter/X, telegram, etc.
Apparently, this helped the Houthis advance quickly as the opposition forces were in disarray.
https://x.com/BashaReport/status/2097862335494795579
If that's true, it's insane that it worked. It should be obvious to not take orders from twitter. There's a chain of command for a reason and random people on social media are no part of it. Sounds like the opposition forces would have to be so stupid that any number of Looney Tunes style tricks would have worked. Maybe next they can send out a rabbit in a dress to make opposition fall in love with it.
This belies a fundamental misunderstanding of Yemeni society. Arab political structure is based on tribal loyalty. Leaders of tribes pledge allegiance to other tribes or coalitions of tribes. They're not part of the same command structure because such a thing does not exist. Twitter is also ubiquitous in Arabia.
Yep, the Commander In Chief only issues orders on Truth Social.
The US President routinely announces policy decisions on social media…
You’d lose a lot of money always waiting for news through officials channels.
Who knows how slow Yemini military channels are.
You’d bet your life on it?
> The US President routinely announces policy decisions on social media…
Yes, our current President also does stupid things, and our military forces shouldn't be using his incoherent ramblings on Twitter to make snap judgements on the battlefield without checking with their chain of command either.
Twitter is huge in KSA. Much more significant a share than other countries. Something like 60% to 70% of the population are active users.
Donald duck lies every other minute, especially on Fridays it seems. Fog is a tactic of war and a way to make money I guess.
Can't read the Twitter link, but that sounds made up.
Where in the battlefield decision making process are they listening to social media recordings to make combat decisions?
If it was involving a reasonably solid military I would agree.
Sauds, on the other hand . . .
It gave demoralized soldiers an excuse to flee rather than fight. Nobody was going to question the reprieve offered by an order to retreat, even fake.
What do you think the chain of command looks like in the third world?
Even in the Russia/Ukraine conflict they use Telegram for basic operations. All chat applications are dual-use.
> What do you think the chain of command looks like in the third world?
I have no idea, but Im certain that twitter recordings do not put frontline forces in disarray.
> use Telegram for basic operations
an encrypted private communication channel is very different than public social media
You have far, far too much faith in the professionalism of armed forces in the developing world. 99% of it is just random 22 year old guys with guns and dual-use communication tech.
> too much faith in the professionalism
I dont know that its a matter of professionalism. Everyone in the world has known that AI can generate video and audio that is imperceptibly fake, for years. And thats to say nothing of man-made forgeries in the years prior.
I have a hard time seeing people on the front line throwing down arms and running away because of an unsourced twitter clip.
We, as in the terminally online, have known that AI can generate imperceptibly fake footage. There are still plenty of average people who still gets caught off guard.
You gotta touch grass and get outside and talk to normies.
And then recognize that the normies you talk to are VASTLY MORE internet-savvy than the illiterate child soldiers on the front lines in Yemen. You have no concept of the info environment they live in. It is all magic electronic soup.
And most chat apps are either e2e encrypted or HTTPS, both of which are hard to break for third world nations.
But leaks of those messages onto twitter are probably the most valuable info source for what the enemy is doing.
Third world? Have we forgotten the Pete Hegseth Signal fiasco?
If this is real, the interesting part is this Adelalhasanii user who amplified it. Seems like a Yemini who's supportive of the Houthis.
That sounds like a fake storyline. The much simpler explanation is that the local Saudi merc army sucked. If you followed the whole conflict in the last 20 years this is largely the case - the Saudis aren't really great at warfare, typically depending on foreign mercenaries (also for cleaning etc...). These in turn have very low morale.
Holy shit. This is really interesting. AI used to impersonate, social media to amplify, and that led to a significant tactical defeat?
I don't want to live in interesting times anymore.
“Don’t believe everything you read on the internet” seems like the golden rule we’ve all forgotten
Yet here we are, believing that the Houthis used fake AI voice to achieve a battlefield victory.
Where men are men and 14-year old girls are FBI agents.
They also used Claude in a fairly sophisticated way to design their missile guidance system (PDF, search for GTG-87001).
https://www-cdn.anthropic.com/e50be2e51e7695dc4b1366a37a245a...
"AI is critical for National Defense."
"But I don't see it helping us, it's just helping our enemies get closer to parity ."
"Precisely. How else are we going to justify the budget?"
Where did Anthropic get that information to train their model on is a good question to ask as well.
The engineering library of your local college has all the information needed for ballistic guidance systems.
Or they don't have that information in the training data and it wasn't actually nearly as helpful for developing a missile as they claim.
yeah and so does the ardupilot documentation including examples. A basic guidance system, which is like single waypoint navigation, is a solved problem. It's in basically every prosumer drone too.
Yeah, I saw that. I wonder if there are any other AI labs that are naive (good?) enough to admit this type of thing.
Obviously, it's happening with all decent models.
It's not naivete/goodness, this is totally aligned with their playbook of trying to get AI to be heavily regulated.
OK, that is a plausible argument given Dario's public positions. I have to admit that I keep cutting them some slack for standing up against automated kill chains, and domestic surveillance.
To be clear, I don't think they're doing it because they want all the money, I think they truly believe that this is existentially threatening, and are trying to regulate their open source competition away because they think that's the way to be safe. That they can be trusted with the power, but if it's out and about, that's unsafe - they like to compare it to nukes, and they want nuclear non-proliferation.
Thanks for the thoughtful reply.
This is the most "I get both sides" issue in my mind these days. I am still not sure where I fall, or if there is even a correct position with which to agree. It really seems like there are no good options.
On the one hand, if all knowledge work ended up in two dude's hands, that is really bad. On the other hand, if every surviving child victim of war (US, RU, IL, CN, whatever) has access to the knowledge to make custom viruses for a few grand, that is also really bad.
Automated kill chains and domestic surveillance are happening regardless of what one corporation wants. These technologies will never be inaccessible to the government or government contractors who already have zero issues navigating red tape.
The point of regulation is to kill competitors and prevent private individuals from having unfettered access.
Makes me want to be a frontier model provider just to get the ring-side seat on what every bad actor in the world is doing.
Elon is tapping the empty seat next to him.
Oh wow! Dario and Scam were right!
We should stop everybody else from developing AI, except for both of them which are the most appropriate stewards for this technology.
[flagged]
Liable for Yemeni troops taking orders from social media?
Do they have a chain of command? Are people in charge?
This is the chaos that silicon valley and the current US government has fully gotten behind.
... even though they aren't?
That's why relying on mercs (which is what both UAE and Saudi chose in Yemen) is a double edged sword. At some point the cash isn't enough of a motivator and they will just run away.
It's not clear that non-mercenary Arab armies are much better in this respect.
It's not clear that Western armies are better either, as we've seen time and again in Iran, Afghanistan and Syria.
Iraq saw massive desertion amongst all non-mercenary ranks during Desert Storm and OIF.
We seem to be in need of a mercenary Uber, where individual mercenaries will have their reputation and the potential customers will be able to check it.
In the past you could just hire Swiss.
Please stop trying to design the torment nexus.
That's so 2009. What we need is mercenary Tinder.
One of the later, not as good, seasons of Westworld has that as an app
You joke but even though there’s not an app per se, Russia is using the “gig economy” to run sabotage ops in Europe.
How do they do that?
Likely Palantir built it already
I would bet that already exists since a while
It's called Blackwater.
Hideo Kojima intensifies
you just described a fixer
Xe Services rebrands yet again to eXe
My understanding is we haven’t gotten to full Hormuz apocalypse mode because the Chinese have a ton of stockpiles. And the Red Sea has been an option.
Those conditions seem to be changing.
The Houthis also explicitly allow Chinese vessels and Chinese ships have been able to traverse the red sea without issue. Which means China actually has more ability to access oil than other countries right now.
I suspect the Chinese won’t be happy with the pipeline and refinery attacks on Saudi Arabia but i also assume that there will still be plenty of Chinese bound oil for the foreseeable future.
Yeah Chinese oil reserves were much larger than was publicly known. They immediately cut imports by a massive amount as soon as the war started and have been able to keep it up for months. Without that the economic fallout would have been far greater.
Not that they are doing it for this reason, but they have done a lot to shield trump from the consequences of his stupid war. But those supplies can only hold for so long; things can get much worse for the world economy in the near future.
China took 5.5 million barrels per day of demand off of the table overnight. A quarter of what went through the strait. They single-handedly stopped catastrophe by months.
Even with that, global strategic petroleum reserves are quickly draining. Last I looked, the US was down to ~290M. There is a legal limit of 250M (though laws don’t matter anymore). The structural floor is also estimated to be somewhere north of 200M.
The world is about to not be able to meet all oil demand for any price.
China is also reducing gasoline and diesel use by adoption of EVs.
Per the OP, the Houthis say only Saudi ships are blocked, everyone else is safe.
Well at some point the problem becomes so acute that others in the world are going to have to step up and help solve it.
Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. It's an intolerable premise and if the price to be paid is global oil catastrophe it's a price well worth paying and America will force the issue as we have. You can deny this or you can accept that other actors have agency in the world and interests and they may take action that negatively affects you indirectly. You can help them, ignore them, fight against them. But we live in a world where other countries and other people will do things and you have to figure out how to best deal with it.
We have seen what happened with North Korea, but at least China and Russia can somewhat keep a lid on it. Which is the minimum they owe the rest of us since they created that problem. Iran's government is ideological in a way that westerners don't really understand (and to some extent Putin is too via his desires regarding Ukraine but the Russian system isn't too alien to our own views - they play tennis and vacation in Europe and all that stuff). Their government is simply not interested in the things that you and I are interested in.
With Iran you add in the pursuit of a nuclear weapon, Iranian continued attacks coordinated in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and Israel via Palestine and it's desire to continue to destabilize the region, supporting Russia's war against Ukraine, and helping Russia evade sanctions (never mind domestic repression and murder) and you've really got a problem on your hands that needs solved one way or another if we're going to go the whole peace and stability for the globe route. The primary problem right now is that the rest of the world would rather see the United States take care of this problem (and it's having a tough time but there's a lot of nuance there) then to help because if you are Europe you're somewhat on Iran's side for some god awful reason, if you are Russia, well you work with Iran, if you are the gulf powers you have no power besides your oil, and if you are China you are not going to spend any resources (nor do you have power projection capabilities). So what do we do?
You can sit here yelling until you are blue in the face that this is Trump's war, or he shouldn't have started it (ignoring history) or some nonsense about ancient colonialism (Iran itself is attempting to be a Neo colonial power) or how Israel is so bad or something but Iran's behavior in the region simply cannot continue if you value peace and stability and global trade. Yea whatever Trump isn't a force for that either I get it, but that's not a good argument to make things worse by also letting Iran do crazy shit.
China's stockpiles are dwindling, strategically that's bad for China especially if they want to invade democratic Taiwan. You still need oil to run the military, no amount of batteries are going to power jet fighters or missiles for the foreseeable future. But dwindle they will and eventually China (and others) will be forced to buy oil and it will raise prices. We're all going to have to deal with that eventuality.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine also cut off large amounts of oil and gas supplies via sanctions, and the United States clamping down on both Venezuela and Iran has further restrained oil supplies as the US has also gone after Russian shadow fleet tankers which were adding additional capacity to the market. The EU has done a little bit here too after the US led the way.
Global chokepoints are a problem. Having so much of the world (primarily Asia) rely on oil and gas from the Middle East where you've got these militant groups funding by Iran who can at a whim decide if they don't get some concession that they're going to cut off oil for everyone else is intolerable. Again, say what you want but we as a planet should not be beholden to this kind of behavior.
> Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. It's an intolerable premise and if the price to be paid is global oil catastrophe it's a price well worth paying
Says you.
All other nuclear nations behave (even Pakistan and India, which are at each other throat all the time). What makes you think that Iran won't? It will also have Russia and China keep a lid on them, same as North Korea. And I don't buy the "Iran is different" gospel. North Korea and China have completely different mindsets than the western world and still play ball.
Additionally, if Iran really is that adamant in getting nukes, I can see them asking some enriched material to Russia as a payment to the 100s if not 1000s of drones they are giving them. They share a "land" border through the Caspian sea and smuggling a few 10s of kilos of enriched material would be relatively easy.
Finally, it is not a good proposition if the hypotethical benefits will be reaped by US/Israel while the suffering is globally spread.
> even Pakistan and India, which are at each other throat all the time
Iran is way more aggressive in spreading influence in region (hoothis, hezbollah, hamas, Syria, Iraq, denying Israel existence).
Iran is Muslim. They believe in eye-for-an-eye punishment unlike the west. And, since they adopted Palestine, and Israel killed 70,000 innocent Palestinians, Israel knows they have it coming to them. This is why they're so concerned with "justifying" their actions. This is also why they are so adamant on ensuring Iran not have power. Because Iran is the most likely state to give the west what it deserves for terrorizing the middle east for decades.
Israel is a nuclear power. Seems obvious that if Iran gains and uses nukes, they'll receive nuclear retaliation. Does Iran want that?
There is no evidence Israel killed 70,000 innocents. But there is strong evidence Iran killed 40,000 demonstrators and Hamas killed 1,000’s innocent.
Yemen is far from Israel, the same as Syria is not tied to Israel. Iran confronts other Suni regional powers in addition to Israel.
> All other nuclear nations behave
Russia, China, the U.S., North Korea, Israel. These are all countries that absolutely do not behave. Each commits atrocities on a regular basis. Them having nukes makes accountability much more difficult.
Just to be clear: the current situation is a huge mess caused by one deranged leader.
> Just to be clear: the current situation is a huge mess caused by one deranged leader.
Sorry that's just dead wrong. This doesn't happen in a vacuum. I mean you could simply add Netanyahu and make your statement incorrect here. Nevermind all the other actors, Iran's deranged death cult, and more.
no, it is just trump. netanyahu's been pushing for this for decades, but prior presidents just didn't let themselves be pushed.
as for iran, they've been the picture of restraint since trump's first term.
> as for iran, they've been the picture of restraint since trump's first term.
They tried to assassinate Trump, before he did any of this!
my reflex was to think that sounds like a lie israel would tell to get trump to go to war with iran, but i realize my reflexes aren't always right, so i looked it up and it turns out, yes, it's obviously an israeli lie and the only reason you'd believe it is because you really want to.
There was DOJ prosecution under the Biden administration: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx28x187rmko.
I'm going to believe Biden's DOJ over Iran...
> Just to be clear: the current situation is a huge mess caused by one deranged leader.
Agreed. The situation is worse than before the U.S. attack.
Iran has proven they can control the straight, threatening the world's energy supply. This is a more powerful weapon than a nuke (which multiple agencies, including U.S. intel, said they didn't have when this all started). New leadership in Iran is more galvanized against the U.S. than ever.
The U.S. already lost this war. Iran is dictating terms. Allies in the region have seen that the U.S. cannot protect them, and are making other accomodations, reducing U.S. influence in the region and beyond.
> The U.S. already lost this war. Iran is dictating terms. Allies in the region have seen that the U.S. cannot protect them, and are making other accomodations, reducing U.S. influence in the region and beyond.
literally no part of this sentence is accurate.
> They share a "land" border through the Caspian sea and smuggling a few 10s of kilos of enriched material would be relatively easy.
I'm not a nuclear weapons expert but from what I understand the United States and others are pretty easily able to identify where enriched material comes from. Also we probably have eyes on the material in general and can see where it is being moved. It has to be stored in places, put into a missile, &c.
But if your argument were to be taken to be correct you're also highlighting the problem with the JCPOA. Well, one of them at least.
> the United States and others are pretty easily able to identify where enriched material comes from
Maybe, if you let them inspect the material…
Well that's a big IF. Iran wasn't allowing inspections, also we shouldn't need a special deal with Iran or else they build nuclear bombs and try to kill people.
But what I meant was that if a weapon was used we'd be able to identify the signature of the material used and pinpoint the exact location on earth that it came from. In other words, if Russia "easily" (again that's an another feather in the cap agains the JCPOA) sent material to Iran and they used it and built a bomb and used it we'd know it came from a Russian mine. Of course they could maybe steal material from somewhere else and then Russia could transport that but hey, look where we're at. We've got Russia who invaded Ukraine supplying nuclear material to Iran to build a bomb. Maybe we shouldn't be on team Russia/Iran yea?
> Iran wasn't allowing inspections,
That isn't what the International Atomic Energy Agency said https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/iaea-...
At least before Trump started playing games Iran was in compliance
> All other nuclear nations behave [...] What makes you think that Iran won't?
Iran already misbehaves, exporting violence to the entire region. How do you think they are going to act when they have nuclear weapons?
I keep wondering about this western worldview where they keep equating a militant failed state with the largest democracy in the world. I can't fathom why they do it.
> All other nuclear nations behave (even Pakistan and India, which are at each other throat all the time). What makes you think that Iran won't?
Because Iran's leadership is actually crazy.
And North Korea?
Crazy, but not universalist so they can only harm themselves.
For real, you just gotta go on Haqq Social and it's just endless deranged AI slop, these people are crazy.
Descriptions of the Soviet leadership basically word for word use the same apocalyptic terms used for the ayatollahs/IRGC by current neocons about Iran. Just swap in "Islamist" for "Communist" as the current ideology that makes any kind of realpolitik impossible.
"These leaders aren't rational like previous adversaries, they don't fear annihilation, in fact they want catastrophe to prove their own fatalist belief system. There can be no negotiation with this sort of enemy, their singular goal is our destruction even at the cost of their own lives."
It's always different this time, and all assumptions about self-serving human nature need to be thrown out the window. Anyone who thinks force isn't the only solution is a naively deluded suicidal peacenik. All out war right now on our terms is the only rational way to avoid world destruction.
Because they'll be the first to use it to kill millions since the 1940s
Plenty of nations have killed millions since the 1940s.
If we accept your premise, the current war has made us less safe, because we've had previous, stronger nuclear deals that have now been torn up in a failed attempt to replace their leader with someone more favorable to the US.
Iran probably wasn't following the JCPOA, denied inspectors access to certain sites, and you'd also have to say you 100% trust American intelligence to verify that Iran isn't building a nuclear weapon in secret and if you want to do that I've got a war to sell you in Iraq.
Separately that doesn't resolve the other issues, funding militant groups, &c.
Using your reasoning, you can basically throw out any structured system that doesn't comply with your own untrustworthy feelings of security. You can essentially point at any shadow within the borders of Iran and claim there are hidden actors conspiring towards your undoing.
What aside from their total annihilation or subjugation would ever convince you of your (Israel's) safety?
But using your own reasoning then Iran is a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty so they are also throwing out a structured system that doesn't comply with their own feelings.
There’s zero evidence Iran was developing nuclear weapons
Then I have some Siemanns Uranium Hexafluoride centrifuges for sale. Just have to come to Natanz, Iran!
They might have blown up due to the Israeli malware incident.
Do you think in the current situation they are more or less likely to try for a nuke than before?
I don't think there's any change. But I think it's less possible.
There's zero evidence its less possible, including counter evidence it remains possible because we keep being told we have to attack Iran to prevent them from attaining a nuclear weapon.
So apparently, we've yet to do anything to prevent them from doing it.
We've just killed children.
> We've just killed children.
They killed more than 30,000 of their own people including children and support terrorist regimes in multiple countries that also kill children.
> There's zero evidence its less possible
On the other hand we bombed the nuclear facilities so what increase in nuclear weapons capability do they have that you are thinking about here? If there's something that has changed I'd be curious to read about it or your thoughts since that would change my opinion.
So your argument is its cool that we killed children because they've also killed children? Hell of a take.
The evidence we bombed their nuclear facilities is essentially this administration telling us we bombed their nuclear facilities.
This administration does not have a track record of providing the public with honest assessments of their success.
If we've successfully stopped them from developing a nuclear weapon, which was stated as the point of our preemptive aggression, I'd need a very good reason why we continue to spend billions attacking them.
I think they are more motivated than ever and other countries will follow. North Korea shows that Trump will kiss the ass of countries that have nuclear weapons, no matter how bad they are. And he will kick around countries that don’t have them. If I were Iran, I would put every possible effort into obtaining nuclear weapons. Probably from Trump’s best friend Kim Jong Un.
> Iran probably wasn't following the JCPOA
Source?
> Iran probably wasn't following the JCPOA
When are you talking about and what is that based on? It was the US that withdrew; the other countries continued. US intelligence concluded that Iran had no nuclear weapons program (or maybe, no active one; I don't recall).
> you'd also have to say you 100% trust American intelligence to verify
Nope, the plan was for the IEA to do their thing with on-the-ground inspectors, sensors, etc. As just one example, nuclear materials leak radiation and they can find indications of it in air, soil, etc., around faciltiies. Edit: Also, many other countries were involved and looking closely, including European powers and Israel.
> Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. It's an intolerable premise
Actions have consequences. The continual attack on the sovereignty of countries around the world has made nuclear weapons one of the few ways to avoid being a client state of the US at the expense of your own population. Iran has figured out another method it seems.
This is blowback. The simple lesson that we refuse to learn.
> The continual attack on the sovereignty of countries around the world has made nuclear weapons one of the few ways to
Name the other countries pursuing a nuclear weapon. Maybe you are drumming up a fear that nobody else really has.
There is no large country left which is not an American client state to pursue nuclear weapons . India was in the 90s, and they pursued nukes, tested them and got sanctioned by the west.
They don't announce their secret nuclear weapons programs before they are complete (though they are sometimes discovered), but some countries have violated international law and developed them, precisely to protect their sovereignty:
All retain their sovereignty, though I can't prove any causal effect and certainly nuclear weapons isn't the only cause.Others have pursued them, includng Libya, South Africa, etc. Libya agreed to surrender their program, and then their government was deposed with Western help. Ukraine gave up their nuclear weapons (left over from being occupied by the USSR) in exchange for peace from Russia, and you can see what happened. That doesn't encourage the next person to give up theirs.
India and Pakistan both rushed their programs back in the 40s/50s ( or maybe later I can't recall off the top of my head). Libya and South Africa were negotiated away. That leaves Israel probably from the, what, 70s or 80s? And North Korea was supported by Russia and China. I'm not sure you could consider any of those countries to be "pursuing nuclear weapons" today. Plus by that logic you'd have to throw in the US, UK, China, Soviets, and France too.
So when you sort of set aside countries from prior to, idk, 1980s ish you don't really have anyone at least publicly (to your point) pursuing nuclear weapons. However it's not just the enrichment of uranium which is tightly controlled it's also the missile technology to deliver the weapons. Keeping a nuclear program secret these days I think is quite a bit more difficult than in the past.
So when you look around today you've got Iran that we know of pursuing a nuclear program. I'm not sure anyone else is by virtue of how difficult (I think?) it would be to do so undetected. Though there are countries (Japan and Korea come to mind) who we think have the ability to scale up a program very quickly.
India and Pakistan were late 90s.
Japan and South Korea literally have 100s of American military bases on their territory. You really think they are sovereign nations who can pursue an independent nuclear program?
> Ukraine gave up their nuclear weapons
Ukraine never had nuclear weapons. Russia is the sole legal successor of the USSR and these were all Russian nukes on Ukrainian territory.
> in exchange for peace from Russia
There isn't a single mention of nuclear weapons in the Budapest Memorandum.
> Ukraine never had nuclear weapons. Russia is the sole legal successor of the USSR and these were all Russian nukes on Ukrainian territory.
Structuring the breakup so that the nukes are Russia's is not really different than Ukraine giving up the nukes on its territory.
Where did they draw the line? Obviously not all USSR assets are now Russian assets, as Ukraine still has (or had) its own stockpile of Soviet era weapons, and other things like Soviet era airfields.
> There isn't a single mention of nuclear weapons in the Budapest Memorandum.
https://web.archive.org/web/20170312052208/http://www.cfr.or...
Points 4 and 5 mention and are about use of nuclear weapons.
I think the memorandum was intended to be a security guarantee to Ukraine after they (and Belarus, and Kazakhstan) joined the NPT and transferred formerly-Soviet nuclear weapons to the Russian Federation. I don't know why anyone would suggest otherwise.
This is over simplified to the point of being misleading/wrong. Russia was the legal successor of the USSR for purposes of diplomatic continuity, but the other Soviet successor states divided portions of the Soviet military/equipment, split Soviet debt obligations, etc on a case by case basis.
Nuclear weapons are a special case though. Plus Ukraine didn't have the ability to use them anyway without launch codes as far as I'm aware.
I believe Israel also didn't announce they have nukes, it's just mostly assumed they do.
I doubt that the world will subscribe to the idiocy of the current US admin. China will just push harder for renewables while Europe and the rest of the world will try to coup with the shock but I am certain they won’t go to war with Iran because they have no reason. Eventually US will have to decide if it’s going to do anything or just live with high oil prices for long or just go back home in a British Suez fashion.
> Eventually US will have to decide if it’s going to do anything or just live with high oil prices for long or just go back home in a British Suez fashion.
This is the flaw in your thinking. It won't be the US who alone decides to live with high oil prices, it'll be everyone.
Vague promises of "pushing for renewables" is a gross mischaracterization and misunderstanding of the importance of oil and gas to the global economy. Note, I'm not anti-renewable or whatever, but chalking this up to a "US problem" is willfully ignorant.
Declining to follow a blunderer into a blundered war really isn't a "decision to live with high oil prices" rather common-sense. This is the USA's mess.
Yes ofc its a world problem, and guess who the world is not going to be happy with?
You can be mad at America and ignore Iran's role if you want, but that doesn't lead you to anywhere productive. The United States like any country is an actor on the world stage that has interests and can take action to defend or assert those interests. If the world thinks this is a problem, they should have mediated between the United States and Iran and helped to prevent conflict. Instead they did next to nothing. War happened. Cue surprise and condemnation.
I think the world has had just about enough of wasting their time trying to mediate with your idiot of a president...
The entire world turning against American hedgemony is going to have "productive" repurcussions.
What was Iran's role? Defending themselves?
What is the world going to do? The US is the only country that has a "blue water" navy. That means not just enough ships to go to sea, but enough of a supply line to handle all the logistics of having ships anywhere in the world they want them, for as long as they want.
Everybody else (with sea access) has a coast guard, and maybe a few ships for show. China is making enough ships that in a decade they could be there, but it isn't clear they want to go there - they don't see to be building the world supply line needed (but around China they do have that power already).
That is if you don't like the current situation with the US deciding the rules of the sea, then you need to pay for your own navy.
> Europe and the rest of the world will try to coup with the shock
The two major economies in the EU (France and Germany) are both facing severe recessions and a parliamentary deadlock + soon to be elections would will be most certainly won by Putin's allies and/or radical communists.
All of this to say I would not hold my breath on Europe doing much at all in the coming months/years.
The election in Germany is predicted to be won by AfD. Are they communists?
They're in the Putin's ally camp in this metaphor I think, since they are against military intervention in Ukraine.
> communists
I was talking about France Unbowed (LFI) in France which is radical left parti (and allies of the French communists parti) that wants to burn the debt owned by the French state (their own words not mine) and could be in the second round of the French election vs the National Rally (far right).
Both the National Rally and France Unbowed are in favor of stopping Ukrainian foreign aid.
China is the reason we don’t have 5-6 dollar gas. They literally cut their imports to prevent economic disaster. If they begin buying at regular levels we would be the ones hurting more.
No that's not the only reason. High oil prices affect their economy quite a bit, and much of their imports form what I understand come from the Middle East.
High oil prices affect them less than any other country in the world. They have the largest oil stockpiles by far, eclipsing even the US, and they have unique access to oil sanctioned by the west.
China is essentially the only actor in the market that is able to weather this conflict in marathon fashion.
The US is the largest producer of oil and natural gas in the world (or #2 or something - besides the point). Your argument that only China can weather these price disruptions doesn't seem to hold water for that reason and because of Chinese actions to use that strategic supply to keep prices lower than they otherwise would be. It's not because it's some random benefit for the world (including the US) it's because their economy like any major industrial power relies on oil and gas (and coal) and keeping prices low to help their export-dependent factories.
They have their own advantages and strategies to deal with these things, but this idea that China just like sits around and "weathers the conflict" unscathed is just incorrect.
China's economy is one of the least dependent on oil and gas. Electricity is mostly coal, renewables and nuclear. Transport is increasingly electric (including trucks). Chemicals are moving from oil and gas to coal.
If global oil and gas prices rise, Chinese electricity and transport prices are largely unaffected, unlike the rest of the world. Even the US doesn't have that kind of resilience.
However, China is a net importer of oil and gas, while the US is a net exporter, so when it comes to trade the US is the main beneficiary, although it mainly benefits one single sector.
But also, the US makes more oil than it uses. With some nuance around how the refineries are set up vs type of crude produced.
China is the only reason you have 5-6 dollar gas and not, say, 30 dollars.
> Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. It's an intolerable premise
I’m not sure the only country that has used nukes on people should be the one to decide that
Iran's government is ideological as a fig leaf of continuity with the Revolution. True believers are few these days, and the IRG is largely keen to stay in power in order to protect its vast business interests.
Everyone should have nuclear weapons!!! (Oprah meme)
How can other countries deal with Iran while Trump is in power and unilaterally cancels treaties and attacks countries without consulting others? It’s simply impossible.
"We have seen what happened with Venezuela, but at least Mexico and Canada can somewhat keep a lid on it. Which is above and beyond what they owe the rest of us since they did not create that problem. The United States government is ideological in a way that westerners don't really understand. Trump is too via his desires regarding Greenland and Canada but the American system isn't too alien to our own views - they play tennis and vacation in Europe and all that stuff. Their government is simply not interested in the things that you and I are interested in."
Bad argument for many reasons (and lazy). But Maduro was a criminal, supported Russia evading US and EU sanctions, and his gang and their disastrous economic policies resulted in around 1/3rd of Venezuelans leaving the country resulting in a humanitarian disaster.
> But Maduro was a criminal, supported Russia
“The United States will never condone leadership by corrupt criminals who are supported by and support Russia”
Why can Israel have a nuclear weapon? It is also an insanely violent ethno-theocratic regime.
You can ask the same question of the US. They're the only ones to have actually used them (and they try to justify it still).
For all those who are about to reply saying it was justified because it saved American lives, why didn't you use it Afghanistan or Iraq?
Almost nobody today was alive when the US used nuclear weapons. We can ignore them at this point.
Judge the current US policy by the current US.
>Judge the current US policy by the current US.
Then it is obvious we need to preemptively nuke the USA right now.
Under what scenario would they use it against New York or Washington?
Believe it or not, they're not exactly a 1-to-1.
Up until fairly recently, Israel was a stand-out in the region for actually having things like decently fair elections and a political class derived from a relatively wide sample of its populace. Other countries in the region were either Arab nationalist republics, Islamic republics, or authoritarian monarchies. While it was ethno-theocratic, it was one that seemed to balance religion with secular demands, and as it is, most countries around the world have at least some basis in ethnicity. The US is a notable exception for this, for what it's worth. This has begun to fade as a more conservative sector of Israeli society has begun carrying more political power, but it's not to the same extent as you find in other countries in the region.
Nuclear weapons are indeed bad and we used to try to negotiate ways between major powers to reduce their number. We don't do that anymore, for a variety of reasons. The more of them there are in different, independent hands, the more likely they are to be used. If they're used, there's a real chance that nuclear-armed powers make severe miscalculations about who is firing what at where. For example, a USAF radar operator watching an over-the-horizon system pointed eastward sees a large number of missiles being launched, and may assume that they're Russian missiles aimed at the US, when they are in fact Iranian missiles aimed at Israel. They might make a potentially species-ending mistake as a result.
The largest issue with Iran having nuclear weapons is that it almost certainly intends to use them against an already nuclear-armed power, Israel, in a way that really doesn't have any rational endgame. Iran is a Shia Islamic theocracy. Beyond the Western-ish influence that Israel brings to the region, there are serious theological implications from the existence of Israel. Islam has a core tenant that there is no higher power other than Allah and that Muhammad is his prophet. Allah is the same god that exists in Christianity and Judaism, and Muhammad is held as carrying on the thread of prophecy that began with the biblical Adam.
There's a lot in common in the three major Abrahamic faiths, and like all other faiths, people interpret it in different ways. The Iranian regime - who definitely does not represent all Muslims, let's make that clear right now - interprets it as the basis of their power. They are a group of clerics and scholars who govern a nation through interpretation and application of religious jurisprudence via one head cleric, the Ayatollah.
If you are a person who either rules a society based on any religious jurisprudence, or are working under that person - as all of the Iranian government does - you can't have too much tolerance for things that might undermine that religion. The Iranian theocracy's interpretation of the line of prophecy that Muhammad is a part of is that he is the "seal of the prophets", meaning that there will be no further revelations or corrections to the line of prophecy until the end-times. Muhammad is held up as having revealed corrections to the line of prophecy, meaning that while Judaism, Christianity, and other Abrahamic faiths are of the same prophecy, they ultimately got some things wrong.
Now let's get back to the existence of Israel. A short description of Israel in the context of what I've described is that you have a people who now control some of the Abrahamic faiths' most holy sites, and they're doing it based off of what is seen as the "wrong" prophecy.
If people who believe in the "wrong" prophecy are firmly in charge of the sites you consider holy, what does that say about your prophecy and your claim to power based on it? Sort of reduces its power, doesn't it? You can't have that. Something has to be done.
In the eyes of the Iranian theocracy, that "something" is funding, training, and commanding militia and military groups who are sympathetic to your understanding of prophecy and having them strike out at the theologically inconvenient people. Developing more powerful weapons to use while doing so is a natural part of this. What's more powerful than a nuclear weapon? Nothing. So you make that your ultimate goal. What they might do with it, who knows, but again, simply having more nuclear weapons in the hands of more independent actors raises the likelihood of their use with potentially catastrophic results.
The plight of the Palestinians just happens to be a convenient excuse for all of this. They're Arab and majority Sunni as opposed to the Persian and Shiite Iran. If there were a two-state solution as we spent most of the last 30 years working towards, it likely wouldn't satisfy the Iranians, which is why they don't recognize Israel at all instead of saying "we'd recognize you if you retreat to your pre-1967 borders and let the Palestinian Authority govern the West Bank and Gaza Strip."
The irony of Americans chastising Iranians for not living in a democratic country given how Iran ended up as a theocracy...
They want to nuke the land they consider holy?
Then what is the point of a nuclear weapon? You're saying they won't use it anyway?
"The largest issue with Iran having nuclear weapons is that it almost certainly intends to use them against an already nuclear-armed power, Israel, in a way that really doesn't have any rational endgame."
Besides the point and whataboutism, but I'm not advocating that Israel should have nuclear weapons. They do, and I'm not sure there's much we can do about it at this point. Same with North Korea. I'm opposed to the proliferation of nuclear weapons and just because one country has one doesn't mean other countries should go and get them too.
Maybe we should have brokered some kinda deal with Iran to prevent them getting a nuclear weapon then, huh.
At this point they'd be fools to not pursue getting one, and we killed everyone in a position of authority who was rational about it. Cats out of the bag, one more nuclear rogue state.
> Maybe we should have brokered some kinda deal with Iran to prevent them getting a nuclear weapon then, huh.
Maybe we should have brokered some kind of deal with Russia to prevent them from invading Ukraine. Do you trust American intelligence 100% to verify Iran is not building a nuclear bomb? And if they weren't, why also were they funding these militant groups? What's the point? It's Neo-colonialism in the Middle East.
> At this point they'd be fools to not pursue getting one, and we killed everyone in a position of authority who was rational about it.
The leadership wasn't really rational in your western sense. I'm not sure where you are coming up with that. If they were rational they wouldn't be murdering their own civilians, chanting death to Israel and death to America as a national past time (no sane nation does this, or if you want to argue they do then don't get mad when Americans are burning the Koran or whatever) and funding militants. You're trying to argue from a place that assumes your values about economics and prosperity and global human rights with an entity that does not care about those values.
If they were rational as you'd like them to be they'd just not do any of the things they've been doing. Why does Iran have to get special treatment to not build a nuclear weapon? Have you thought about that? Why do we have to pay them off? Why are they special snowflakes who get to hold the world hostage less they build nuclear bombs to threaten others?
> Cats out of the bag, one more nuclear rogue state.
That's the fault of the rest of the world then for failing to come together to stop the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
Burning the Koran is protected free speech, just as burning a flag is, or the Bible, or whatever else you'd like.
The point is we had a deal, and Iran kept their enrichment below weapons development levels for all of that time. Even a few years after the deal was broken by Trump, apparently. We could have kept that status quo going and not dealt with tolls in the strait and expensive military operations, and it would have been better for everyone involved. But now I don't see a path back to that, and no one is interested enough to stop the proliferation or put enough resources into it to "win". Blame whoever you like I guess, but I'm blaming Trump for tearing things up and kicking off this recent war.
Anchoring on this deal is a waste of time. We shouldn't have had to have a deal in the first place. They could just join other responsible countries like, idk, Vietnam, Brazil, and hmmm who else, Switzerland! in not pursuing nuclear weapons.
> We could have kept that status quo going
Like the last time the Houthis disrupted shipping? Or when Iran launched and supported attacks on Israel, plus continued disruption in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Iraq? (Yemen too but mentioned via Houthis). Idk if that's a tolerable situation.
I don't recall the houthis disrupting shipping before 2018. The status quo under before that point was fine for the global economy and for the US. If it wasn't fine for Israel, that's a problem for their own military to deal with, ideally without US backing that drags other countries into the issue.
Good luck with non proliferation but I think the very obvious "we can attack and invade countries without nukes but can't do that to countries with nukes" lesson is being demonstrated to everyone, so countries that don't want to be invaded will be trying to get them now. Anyone near Russia for sure, possibly even Switzerland eventually.
> Maybe we should have brokered some kind of deal with Russia to prevent them from invading Ukraine.
I understand history and contemporary events is not your strong suit, but such a deal was very much on the table in December 2021 and the Biden Admin laughed it off. Then again in April 2022.
> I understand history and contemporary events is not your strong suit,
I'd check your understanding but ok.
> but such a deal was very much on the table in December 2021 and the Biden Admin laughed it off.
What was the deal then? And please let us know how acceptable it was to the EU and Ukraine as well. :)
Iran clearly has the capability to flatten every major hospital and university and desalination plant in Israel, like Israel has done in Gaza, but they don't.
It's also clear that Iran having nukes would be a strategic deterrent to Israel's ultraviolent territorial expansionism.
> Iran clearly has the capability to flatten every major hospital and university and desalination plant in Israel
its not clear at all. They clearly tried to hit Izrael with barrages of missiles, but looks like their targeting systems suck.
> Iran clearly has the capability to flatten every major hospital and university and desalination plant in Israel, like Israel has done in Gaza, but they don't.
I'm not supportive of Israel having nuclear weapons, but Iran won't do something like this because the Israelis might nuke them. That doesn't excuse Iran also building nuclear weapons. Neither should have them, in my view.
Iran also supports the militants that continue to create conflict in Palestine. It's not one-sided and any vague assertion that there's only one bad actor here is illegitimate.
The conflict in Palestine is created entirely by Israel. The militants are just the people who refuse to lay down and take it. This has become more and more obvious - if not through the genocide in Gaza, then through the rapid illegal colonization happening at an accelerated place in the West Bank.
It's not entirely created by Israel, and most of the militants are just lunatics who are thankfully killed. But that doesn't excuse Iranian funding of other militant groups in Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, or Iraq. Nor does it excuse Iran's material support of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, nor does that justify Iran trying to build a nuclear weapon.
Why did Iran willingly disassemble their other WMD programs, like bioweapons and chemical weapons, if they are irrationally bound to destroying Israel?
Chemical weapons are perfectly effective for that desire and dramatically easier to build and deploy than nuclear weapons.
So if you expect Iran to just explode Israel ASAP, why are they holding back right now with their weapons not targeting civilian infrastructure? Why did they stop pursuing cheap WMDs that don't need complicated enrichment?
Note that Iran is objectively not pursuing a nuke as fast as possible. They've had sufficient enriched uranium for a long time to be able to actually start building and testing physics packages and even get their first detonation test, but they instead have just been building a stockpile.
>I'm not supportive of Israel having nuclear weapons
Okay, then by your arguments about Iran, we should be invading Israel right? Like right now! They cannot be allowed to have nukes!
What about North Korea? It sure is funny how all the hand wringing about them getting nuclear weapons got quiet after they built a nuke and didn't use it
"Ancient" colonialism? The US and Israel are both actively seeking to expand their colonial territory.
This was an interesting piece of fiction you've written, with some very impressive mental gymnastics on display. However, it's so wrong that engaging with it would be doing you a disservice because it would make you think it's even an intellectually respectable position to have in the first place.
the reason China was using stockpiles is they want to time the gasoline price shock right to the midterm elections. The moment they stop using stockpiles and start purchasing the prices will jump
Blaming the current situation on the actions of China is beyond bizarre.
China has some influence. They did do what was said - but only if you take the absolute most charitable reading (which is a expected here).
Eh? They didn't/aren't using their stockpiles to anywhere near the extent the US has! There reserves are much bigger - they have about a years supply - yet they used less in absolute terms than the US!
What they did was aggressively reduce demand by accelerating the switch to EV's and firing up a few more coal powerstations.
In terms of influencing the midterms - I suspect China isn't anywhere near the front of the queue in hoping Trump get's a beating given the chaos he is causing.
Complaining about foreign interference is ironically straight from the Hillary playbook.
> time the gasoline price shock right to the midterm elections.
Donald Trump can end this at any time if he wants. It would have been better to not have started it, thou. Less killing of innocent people, less spending on weapons, better mental health for USA soldiers...
And why is China suddenly at fault for America's actions?
He can't. Bibi is in charge.
Partially true. Seems most likely that Trump didn't like the Iranian provisions for reparations to end the war. A hard stance they've taken, one Trump would never go for (because of how incompetent it would make him look), and here we are.
Well roughly now would be when you’d time a huge shock
OTOH midterm generic ballots are much more stable than top line presidential horse race polling. So it might only matter at the margins.
lol. The orange man is doing more damage to the USA than China could ever do short of actual war. He is destroying the US militarily, economically and politically. They emphatically support his efforts.
At some point they might prefer stability and sanity. I would bet that at this point they don't care much either way.
China is playing long, most of the ~unchanging things are in their favor and the US already proved that they're unreliable. People won't forget that soon even if Trump is gone.
Stability and sanity is not happening whether the conflicts stop in Yemen+Hormuz or not. At that point it's just going to go back to tarriff wars and new terror campaigns that the US admin will start somewhere else
The context of this is which party China would prefer to win the midterms. The dems winning would distract Trump from being able to fuck up the rest of the world a bit.
My bet would be that China doesn't care much either way, they win regardless.
We agree that China won't care long term. They cannot lose in the current setup
In my view the worst that can happen for China is that Trump gets limited by anything. He's hurting US relations more than he's hurting China short or long-term. Relations take longer to build than trade
"Don't interrupt your opponent when they're making a mistake"
IMO it is a good thing that the USA is no longer paying for (among others):
- NATO - Maintaining security on the high seas for other than USA shipping,
- tariffs imposed by other countries (yes, other countries have been imposing tariffs for decades):
https://wjno.iheart.com/content/2025-03-17-qa-how-many-count...
The USA can use the money saved for its own citizens (possibly even lowering their taxes!)
Wow, how shortsighted.
> - NATO - Maintaining security on the high seas for other than USA shipping,
NATO consists of a lot of countries, why would they only work for USA shipping? And where do you think that shipping comes from?
> - tariffs imposed by other countries (yes, other countries have been imposing tariffs for decades):
Of course they do. But they're not usually idiots about it.
> The USA can use the money saved for its own citizens (possibly even lowering their taxes!)
You advocate for tariffs but don't understand how tariffs work...
> The USA can use the money saved for its own citizens
How is that going? Any progress there? Are US citizens richer than they were before?
> Are US citizens richer than they were before?
Some of them certainly are richer, specifically people with the last name Trump.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/13/trump-presid...
The USA can use that money that way. It's not though. Spending isn't decreasing and any savings in tax has easily been overwhelmed by the increased costs facing consumers, especially in the last two years.
> The USA can use the money saved for its own citizens (possibly even lowering their taxes!)
I was feeling miserable reading this thread until I saw this, thanks for cheering me up.
It's so amazing to watch people (presumably Americans) over and over make everything about American domestic politics. That the only way to explain Trump's behaviour is on the domestic terms that Americans know and are comfortable with.
I see this over and over again with the Canada stuff. Or Greenland stuff. Not taking it seriously because "oh that's just Trump deflecting cuz of [Epstein|Midterms|etc]." Meanwhile the actual blast radius here is far far far outside of the domestic arena.
When will people just take this guy at his word? He says he wants to conquer or do X Y and Z. That's it. He said those things. Believe him. Stop trying to make it about yourself. (And also he wants to make personal money off manipulating the stock market and oil prices.)
It's not a good look, esp to the victims of Trump outside the US who have no power to vote in American elections and yet are victims of American power.
If Dems win next time around they should repeal the AUMF at the very least. We cannot be at war at all times.
There is no AUMF, and I believe Congress already repealed previous ones?
I thought the remaining issues were a dispute related to the timing requirements in the War Powers Resolution, plus unsettled Constitutional law.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authorization_for_Use_of_Milit...
The 2001 AUMF hasn't been repealed. It was used as recently as 2025 to justify attacks on Venezuelan ships.
I think USA has not been at war like less than 5 years in total since its creation.
source: https://www.raffaellocortina.it/scheda-libro/piergiorgio-odi...
I don't have the book here with me so I cannot check the exact amount of years but it's ridiculously small.
The problem is that "being at war" isn't really the problem, it's a symptom. A lawless and destabilized gulf region is the result of incomplete and inneffective military action, and in a darkly hilarious way is only treatable by more whack-a-mole warfare.
It wasn't a war we could win. We fought it anyway. Now we're stuck trying to lose in a tolerable way. Which requires more fighting.
At some point the balance will tip and China will take over patronage of the right selection of powers to push us out, which will disentangle western involvement (and make it their problem, of course). But at this stage there really is no hope for genuine stability.
One of the best solutions would have been doing what we can to get off oil.
Luckily, we reversed that policy and have been using as much oil as possible.
All hail the great barrel of goo.
While it is hard to say, all signs point to China not wanting to take over. That isn't to say they could, but China seems content to rule their corner of the world and let the US rule the ocean. (their corner includes Taiwan which the US is not content to allow China to rule)
Theres videos of American MRAP armored vehicles that they've captured starting to show up on Telegram/X etc now
More properly called Ansar Allah, supported by Iranian regime, and guilty of war crimes against everyone from fellow Yemenis to people thousands of miles away.
Women, gays and infidels are pubished by Houthi police.
Yes. So sad an American supported liberal regime wasn't installed by the US in Yemen.
> Women, gays and infidels are pubished by Houthi police.
The EU & US don't have ANY issues supporting and financing governments that punish gays and infidels. Hint: New Syrian government, Saudi government (which is also famous for publicly beheading gays)
So why not accept the Houthis too ? Otherwise, my apologies, your stance just sounds like the usual disgusting Western sanctimonious hypocrisy.
What would you expect instead? I think the US supports the Saudis because they are the primary competitor to Iran in the middle east. But no one (?) in the middle east has great support for women, gays, or infidels.
I think you're right that strategic / economic interests have outweighed cultural issues / human rights.
IIRC their official slogan has literally "Curse the Jews" in it.
Yep
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarkha
> "God is great, Death to America, Death to Israel, Curse on the Jews, Victory to Islam"
This is also mentioned in the article that you linked:
> In April 2016, during UN-brokered peace talks in Kuwait, Houthi representatives gave the United States a "sincere apology" for the "Death to America" slogan, claiming that the slogan was used for "domestic consumption as a means to attract support in the streets and create a common cause between their supporters to keep them united."
> During the Red Sea crisis, Houthi supporters waved the flag of Palestine every Friday during anti-Gaza genocide and anti-western attacks on Yemen demonstrations, alongside the slogan and flag of Yemen. A new Houthi slogan appeared after the group's re-designation as a terrorist organisation: "America is the mother of terrorism" set on a red background.
They did that just as they began the starvation siege of Taiz.
Donald Trump hosted roughly 20 oil and gas executives from major companies including Chevron, ExxonMobil, and Occidental Petroleumat his Mar-a-Lago resort on April 11, 2024.
His message to the room was essentially that giving $1 billion to his campaign was a low-cost investment that would guarantee massive financial returns for their companies
Reflection Eternal | Ballad of the Black Gold https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryFMKYNJeTM
The Houthi's have a Saudi backed adversary, I haven't heard about them lately in mainstream media how are they faring? I just thought they would be a tough resistance for the houthis restraining them from what they're currently doing
The Houthis are one side of a protracted civil war between North Yemen and South Yemen, which was until relatively recently two different countries, and the other side of that civil war is heavily backed by the Gulf States. The Houthis are also a Shiite minority opposing an overwhelmingly Sunni population.
They're making big noises about taking Sana’a in their current offensive and there's been heavier fighting than in recent months. Other than that, it's hard to tell. Personally, it seems like the Yemeni gov't forces have quite a hill to climb.
The mainstream media has made it sound like the fall of Mocha was at least somewhat surprising, but I don't think that's accurate. It was pretty clear the Houthis would reach the port as late as last week.
My understanding is that the Saudi are basically fighting the war in Yemen but denying it's them. The de jure government has effectively lost this war ATM.
Will this bring oil prices down in Europe? Oil tankers could still go to the mediteranian via the suez canal. This will not help asia, but I can imagine if it is too dangerous the go through bab al-mandab strait it is more lucrative to sell the crude oil to europe at a discount?
No. A cynic might think a significant part of this half-arsed Iran war was:
- make sure fuel prices increase globally
- The US economy is relatively well-shielded from the fallout by its own fossil fuel sources, local and in colonies like Venezuela.
- export more US fossil fuels, especially to Europe, at inflated prices. US insiders reap the profits.
- further kneecap European competitiveness in energy intensive sectors, steal market share. Oh well, small gift to China here too, but still a net win for the US.
It's nice to think there was some sort of plan, but the truth is much scarier.
I believe there were pieces of a plan. This global energy shift gambit being one of them. I don’t think there was a unified strategy with contingencies etc though (if there was it certainly wasn’t very good).
Why do you believe "there were pieces of a plan"? Any reporting to corroborate that theory?
"concept of a plan"
People are so politically blinded that it's almost impossible to explain the plan, but to anyone with the strength to keep a level head, it's pretty clear what the plan was, and frankly it probably had a 50% success chance. But Trump rolled a critical failure on it.
Iranians were rioting against the regime, Israel intelligence handed the US a report that the collective "Head" of the Iranian regime will be all together at one place, at one time.
Cut off the head, and the rioters riding high on the win will topple the rest. Coming off of the swift clean victory in Venezuela, and Trumps incredible desire to put feathers in his cap, it was an irresistible proposition.
So he decided to cut off the head, which was successful. The miscalculation however was that the rioters got scared/apathetic rather than motivated. The power vacuum was filled by the same people who were there before. I'm sure Mossad and the CIA were probably on the ground trying to ground swell support, but evidently it didn't happen.
Has the cut off the head strategy ever worked in any US operation for replacing a leader with someone outside of their existing network?
The only people who ever would have taken any of this as a "Plan" are the moronic current admin.
Killing a few heads of Iran was known to not be an effective strategy, because the power is in the hands of the IRGC as an institution and large group, not the figureheads. This is especially hilarious when the Trump admin was so freaking stupid, they couldn't figure this out even after it didn't work the first time. They continued trying to kill random figureheads as if that plan would have had more success if you killed people nobody had previously heard of.
None of this is "miscalculation" or bad luck or taking a reasonable gamble. It's stupidity. There was not evidence to believe this plan had a strong chance. There was no organized resistance. Claims of supporting the Kurds, a group the Trump admin has fucked over more than once (nit: Other Kurds, they aren't a single group), happened only after the war was already going tits up and involved absurd tweets about "dropping them weapons" as if that's just a thing you can do on a whim and as if the Kurds themselves were willing, ready and able to resist the Iran regime.
We did not "Cut off the head" in Venezuela. We conspired with insiders to replace one figurehead with another. It was not a victory except for extremely weird people who think abducting a foreign head of state is somehow a good thing.
The Pentagon was actively telling the admin all of this, which is why some of them were fired.
What happened was even dumber than this absurd post-hoc rationalization: Israel was fucking pissed after Oct 7th, which is reasonable, and decided that "Mowing the grass" was done, and they were going to Finally fix this. They planned to attack Iran. Their strikes over the next year were done to enable this. Shortly before their planned attacks were to start, Bibi came to Trump and told him about this Righteous war they were about to do and got it in Trump's mind that it would be good for the US to look Strong if they attacked first, as Iran would probably attack US bases in retaliation anyway, and may end up pulled in regardless. IE, there's a chance Kamala would also have gotten sucked into this quagmire in some fashion, depending on how Iran had reacted to just Israel's strikes. Nobody was in a strong position to tell Israel "No, don't start this war, that's stupid, it's stupid, you've already neutered all the proxy groups, just take your victory and go home"
This is Israel's war. They don't mind the straight being screwed up. They don't mind the world economy falling down.
>some sort of plan
George Friedman, The Next Decade
> Friedman [...] advocates a deal with Iran which would essentially allow it a secure sphere of influence in the region and an alliance with Turkey to counterbalance Iran and Israel.
Seems to be in contradiction.
I think the idea is 3 regimes in power to keep a balance between them instead of two rivals?
I observe mostly short term opportunism. Powerful people deliberately injecting chaos for financial profit.
Negative externalities:
- loss of trust
- loss of evidence based policy
- loss of long-term planning
- loss of talent
- financial loss for almost all except the rare insiders
Short-term benefits seem to be good enough for America in this new age.
The US sells oil and refined products to other countries. So a supply crunch would raise prices even there too. Everyday Americans are not getting fuel for cheap.
Nobody cares about everyday Americans, it's about American corporations. Exxon and friends are printing money.
I have a suspicion that the caring is starting to mount, otherwise there’s no need to offer a $1.3T election bribe (which I’ll file a the other dividend / bribes that were never sent and the bridge Trump sold me)
Using that lens then you could view the Iran war is simply a failed ( so far ) attempt to grab Iranian oil revenues, perhaps emboldened by the relatively quick success of the Venezuela adventure.
The truth is probably much more multi-headed - though hard to see how the US would have gone to war without some assessment of their own energy situation.
Realpolitik might just be the best way to do things after all.
Please don't leave us in suspense: what would "realpolitik" be in this instance?
The greatest happiness is to vanquish your enemies, to chase them before you, to rob them of their wealth, to see those dear to them bathed in tears, to clasp to your bosom their wives and daughters.
Sure, if you make oil prices increase, US oil companies and their shareholders rake in more cash. But it's harmful for the average American because filling up the tank costs a lot more. Then that price hike spreads to everything else that relies on oil (which is pretty much everything) leading to inflation and rising interest rates (already starting to happen, the shielding you mention doesn't seem to be working, which makes sense in a relatively free-market economy). If the situation drags on, unemployment rises due to soaring costs across the board, and the economy goes to hell.
A rise in crude prices might pay off for a small country that lives almost exclusively off it (say, Saudi Arabia, in the hyphotetical case that it could keep exporting as normal) but for the US? I don't think it does. Surely, Europe is more exposed than the US and will suffer even more, but this is not a zero-sum game.
So I don't think it's an elaborate plan, it's just Trump being reckless as usual.
I wouldn't assume this administration gives a shit about inflation or rising interest rates or how the rest of the economy is doing. Do you have any reason to believe they do?
> But it's harmful for the average American because filling up the tank costs a lot more.
The fun part about this is that it shows what people actually care about.
What happens if petroleum prices go up? People use less. It's the entire premise of a carbon tax. Fuel costs more so people buy a hybrid or electric vehicle, power utilities find renewables or nuclear more attractive relative to natural gas, etc. In a market economy this is the primary way to get people to switch from something to alternatives -- which is pretty important if you think climate change is a problem.
This is obviously not why Trump is doing it, but it's the consequence of it anyway. So now we get to see what people care about. Do you like higher oil prices because it speeds up the transition away from fossil fuels, or dislike them because of who it is that caused it this time?
I just dont think these guy are even capable to plan that much.
If you think so little of them, then imagine what the people who pay $5M for a meal with him can convince him to do. Or what people who pay his son-in-law/iran-negotiator 25M a year can call and ask him to do.
Then you probably believe that the US government only consists of the half dozen clowns you see on TV every day.
We have no doubt that the best people are in US government and that they have the best tools at their disposal. Around the world, we are simply trying to figure out, while munching on plenty of popcorn, how this incredible sequence of actions will play out; a sequence clearly crafted using highly complex strategic planning tools that employ the most advanced techniques from game theory, AI, and who knows what else.
That's the point this time around. They went full authoritarian and purged all the competent people.
That's just the media noise. Yea there were purges. But its a big leap to go from "some" to "all" the best people. Government is the largest employer in the country. The nonsense you see constantly by politicians and other leaders is a tiny fraction of what the government workforce is. This is why despite the chaos you see in the media, life hasn't changed much for the great majority of people all things considered. The government remains functional where it needs to be.
The purges haven’t reached too deep into the rank and file yet, which is why the walls are still standing. But they’ve hit the top of the pyramid hard, which is why nothing makes sense.
Its been way more effective at murdering US citizens for sure.
The ICE recruits are raising the bar.
Oh and now the FBI can consider those with a background in bestiality, so lots of fresh talent there
I personally believe the well-sourced journalism explaining how the President ignored the opinions of Government experts to do what he wanted.
> https://www.wsj.com/politics/national-security/iran-war-warn...
Yes, if the rest just listens and executes their wishes, then you're all clowns.
Someone hasn't been paying attention to the Pentagon or State Department purges, both of which would lead precisely to this type of mistake.
We had a retard in the Oval Office 2017-2021 surrounded by "the deep state" (i.e. career managers of the ultra-complex organization called "the government"), and politically constrained by Congress.
Now we have that same retard, but supported by vast purges of aforementioned managers, and politically unconstrained by the cultists and cowards (the two forms of GOP representative) in Congress.
You're missing a key part: energy prices in US go up too. It doesn't matter if US and its colonies are net producers.
You honestly think the Trump administration is intelligent enough to think all of that through and execute it?
Its almost like not having meaningful power projection capabilities when you rely on imports for essential industries is not good!
The US is the world's most vulnerable economy to oil shocks. I mean the real economy, not the farce that the markets currently are.
The Venezuela comment is extremely weird. You know Venezuela has negligible production, right, and that it would take 100s of billions of investments, over decades, to get reasonable production that would make a difference. That's ignoring that currently there is a laughably illegitimate puppet government -- literally just Madero's government minus him, as they did the coup with the US -- that has a 100% chance of a violent overthrow in the future. Which is exactly why all of the oil companies are shrugging and saying no thanks.
Venezuela is a farce -- much like $5000 "dividend" for a government literally on the precipice of bankruptcy, as Bessent runs around, near tears, trying to convince everyone that they're the house and he's the big dog German Shepherd instead of the face of a failing empire having its last pathetic gasp, to laughter all around -- that Trump thinks gives him leverage against Canada. It is unbelievably pathetic business, like renaming a 400+ year old name on a lake like a little bitch.
There is zero scenario where this has benefitted the US, but a drunkard incompetent secdef (sorry "secwar") convinced a foolish demented rapist, who already had Israel whispering in his ear, how easy and painless this foolish debacle will be.
ROFL.
This was clearly a secret attempt of Trump's to be the world's best president for getting off fossil fuels and moving to renewables. The man is playing 7 dimensional chess bro!
When all is said and done it will be he, not AOC or Bernie or any "Green New Deal" folks, that will be remembered by history as the president who did more to get people off fossil fuels than any other.
He's so clever that he's probably even playing chess in a Hilbert space. The whole world envies American voters, who will receive $5,000 if they re-elect this incredible genius.
I think the "stable" in stable genius actually refers to the points of stability under transformations. Brower's fixed point theorem. Do your own research!
I heard if you inject yourself with bleach you can perceive the higher dimensions. Many people say this.
Trump is just accelerating the course of history. The fall of American hegemony, the humiliation of the MIC, the petrodollar, the fossil fuels, the USD as reserve currency is like speedrunning the historical events to reach the next more balanced equilibrium state
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism
"MIC"???
Military industrial complex. all the companies who make an supply weapon or technology to the US military basically. lockheed and palantir and so on
military industrial complex
This is part of the Houthis preventing Saudi Arabia from exporting any oil at all. So no I don’t think it’s gonna make oil lower. Higher probably. But oil is doing very weird things.
I've never seen oil prices decrease due to any regional disruption; the market is global. If the price in Alberta went up when the Straight closed, I wouldn't hold my breathe for Europe in this scenario.
>I've never seen oil prices decrease due to any regional disruption; the market is global.
oil spiked and then crashed during the gulf war & the iraq war in 03.
the gulf war probably because of western price control methods kicking in, the iraq war because of an increase in confidence that the region would produce oil after western 'securing' of oil fields allowing further volume investment from the UAE and friends.
I guess it really just depends on what the definition of 'regional disruption' is.
Why wouldn’t they go up?
Instability is instability. Oil is fungible.
There’s no reason to think someone else won’t escalate this further disrupting supplies even more. That will push prices up.
Even if they don’t, if oil can’t get through this straight it will have to go somewhere else, which will increase shipping traffic and demand for “your oil” right? And wouldn’t that also push up prices?
VLCCs are too large to fit through the Suez Canal. I don't know how much of Saudi export is using VLCCs versus Suezmax or smaller tankers, but I've heard that much of the Red Sea oil export is currently going through Bab al-Mandab, not that I have a source on hand.
I wouldn’t count on safe Med passage, I think last month a drone attacked a ship in Egypt. And the channel to Suez isn’t exactly wide or out of range for Houthis.
GCC will have to talk to Iran now, there is no reasonable way out of this quagmire other than a regional accommodation with Iran. Talk about a regression but here we are.
Aren’t these groups working with, no against, China?
And against, not with, Western Europe?
So being prices down where, in eastern Europe?
most large tankers are too large for both the Suez and Panama Canals.
There are tankers built specifically for the Suez Canal
Suezmax tankers, panamax, etc. Anything bigger needs to go around
Which are already being used to transit the Suez Canal.
> if it is too dangerous the go through bab al-mandab strait it is more lucrative to sell the crude oil to europe at a discount?
I suspect they would sooner curtail production rather then sell at a discount due to route restrictions.
Not really. It is very hard and expensive to get these oil well pumping again. That is why we had negative oil prices during covid. Plus, when we are talking about the Gulf states, they have extremely low production cost. The discount would be against world prices, not production cost.
https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/james-franco-first-time
Oil is sold globally.
It doesn't matter if in Texas wells are producing it at a penny for barrel, if the global prices are high that oil is going to be sold to Philippinos, Japanese, Italians or South Africans.
So, at the same time, it doesn't matter if some new routes open or close, it doesn't particularly favor one or the other buyer, it's still sold globally on a bid.
i don't see why deals can't change. It's just a contract, the IRS could create a tax incentive for US producers to sell to US refineries at a discount. US producers could do it on their own if they so chose as well.
Until we bar export.
why would Exxon allow export ban and lose exorbitant profits ?
Not today.
The Iranian-backed Houthis also struck the Saudi East-West oil pipeline [0], pumping stations and refining capability. Reductions in export output initially estimated around 700,000 barrels per day now missing from the market.
[0] https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Saudi-Oil...
> Will this bring oil prices down in Europe ... This will not help Asia
This hurts Europe more than Asia.
The UK, France, Italy, Netherlands, Denmark, and others are similarly opposed to the Houthis having conducted airstrikes on the Houthis (eg. 2025) as well as helping target them directly or indirectly.
And a large portion of global shipping is owned by Greek conglomerates - a country that is a close ally of Israel.
Most GCC states also have some form of defense agreement with the UK or France. If those turn out to be meaningless, it reduces their incentive to cut preferential deals with European states.
Additionally, this further enhances Turkiye and Pakistan's hand, as Saudi Arabia has signed defense pacts with both and Pakistan has threatened action against Iran yesterday if further incidents threaten Saudi Arabia. If they were able to dislodge the Houthis without direct European intervention, then it is a massive black stain on the EU's power projection capacity and it's claim that it should be treated as a great power. It also gives Turkiye additional leverage against the EU.
Finally, the Houthis struck the East-West Pipeline [0]. Much of the KSA's oil is in Eastern Saudi Arabia around Dhahran. Most large Asian states like China, India, Japan, and South Korea have continued operations in Iran that allowed them continued passage. European states lack access to GCC oil as a result of Perim island being controlled by the Houthis.
[0] - https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/yemens-houthis-rea...
Yeah the EU leadership has been really shortsighted on these past decades (especially since the 10s), especially in their strategic energy and industrial sectors.
Be it the Ukranian conflict, the ME crisis, the NA wars and instabilities, etc. The EU is the one that geopolitically speaking lost the most.
Unless they're full puppets for foreign interests, I simply do not understand how they could leave foreign actors to dictate policies that affect thier own territory and enterprises without any sort of critical thought.
But even then, they could not have possibly been all mere puppets. And yet.
It was cheaper, I don't think it's much more complex than that. And with fossil fuels, countries without significant local production are always dependent on someone else, with most potential suppliers being problematic in some way.
Of course we should have gone for renewable energy more forcefully, but that wouldn't have resolved the issue. That change will take time, and you can't arbitrarily accelerate it.
No, gas has always been the most expensive source of electricity. Take a look at the German merit order from 2018:
https://www.ffe.de/en/publications/merit-order-shifts-and-th...
Nuclear is cheapest, then lignite, then hard coal, and then gas. Germany phased out the cheapest option first, now continues with the second, and is expanding the most expensive.
The obvious choice would have been to do what China and India are doing - phase out gas power first and focus on electrification. But Europe did the opposite.
Well the US benefit massively because of their investments in shale gas. Meanwhile the Europe suffers massively and they banned shale gas although they could exploit vast resources.
Sure, the environment, etc but Europe hasn't invested strategically in that, either. China has.
I guess you only need maybe 20% of them to be puppets to mess around. It’s a lot easier to damage than to build.
Aren't those really easy to explain?
EU opposes the Houthis because they are a horrifying slave state that distributes children as sex slaves to their troops.
EU opposes Russia because it is a horrifying fascist dictatorship that has repeatedly invaded it's neighbors, and constantly talks about it's historical claims to EU territory.
In the NA conflicts it's harder to draw such a clear line, because the conflicts typically have about 15 sides each, but the basic algorithm you can use is generally that EU tries very hard to pick sides based on morality, not geopolitical interests.
Those can be said for other economic partners that are being used so no. That's not it, that's just rhetoric for the masses. _You'll here the same thing tomorrow, after I say the complete opposite today._
> Unless they're full puppets for foreign interests,
The European parliament has been bought 10 times over by the lobbies.
See https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/08/lobbyists-euro...
"By some estimates, they influence 75% of legislation"
> But even then, they could not have possibly been all mere puppets. And yet.
Even if the lobbying was not reason for all the bad decisions of the EU, the EU parliament has no way to actually propose any laws on its own. All the laws emanate from the commission which is also bought and paid for by you guessed it, the lobbies.
The issue was 1990s-2000s Germany argued it was in Europe's best interest to integrate Russia into the European fabric, but 1990s-2000s France+UK+Italy argued it was in Europe's best interest to integrate the Mediterranean into the European fabric.
When the UK left the EU and France+Italy were in the midst of their economic doldrums due to the Eurozone crisis, this left the hard power states within the EU comparatively weakened.
But the collapse of Minsk II and the ongoing war in the Middle East led to a cascading crisis for a unified Europe.
Minsk per the people that brokered it was just a temporary patch to prepare Ukraine for the invasion. So no. That's not it.
It's business and by now it should be clear to anyone that there's no morality involved in this space.
There's nothing wrong with Russia as energy partner, as long as you don't shoot yourself in the foot by blowing up the alternatives. South of EU had proper energy supplies from ME/NA. For example crisis in ME was mitigated by Russian energy or NA energy (Algeria, Tunisia, Lebanon, etc).
The new hegemons like Turkey, Israel, etc came only later, yet we can't say they're Saints can we? Also to appease the US administration line a lot of green energy projects were put on hold, and were only restarted this year after the Hormuz situation.
The only real explanation is shortsightness for personal interests (but even then you'd have to have all your capitals abroad), or being a tool for foreign interests.
> Unless they're full puppets for foreign interests
It's an open secret that Russian money is deep, deep in European politics.
> Japan, and South Korea have continued operations in Iran that allowed them continued passage.
1.How do they pay Iran considering the sanctions? 2.Do you think EU shouldn't sanction Iran even though they violated NNPT and their terrible record on human rights because Iran can threaten them with a sufficient price?
> a country that is a close ally of Israel
Are they? They never sent a single weapon or soldier to help israel, they have no formal or informal mutual defense agreement. Israel buy no military equipment from Greece. You mistake mutual interest because of a common enemy - Turkey to close alliance.
1. Waivers, state owned enterprises, shell corporations, barter trades, and using their own currencies for transactions
2. I agree. I'm just being prosaic as to why European states are in the pickle they are today.
3. They are closely entwined via logistics, but Cyprus would be an even closer Israel-Cyprus ties. The reality is, the Saudi-Turkiye-Kuwait-Pakistan alliance is a direct reaction to the Israel-Greece-Cyprus-UAE-India cooperation or the now signed Israel-Greece-Cyprus trilateral.
I see, thank you for the prompt response, I think calling them close allies is overstating it.
A Pakistan-Iran war was not on my bingo card.
The U.S. has proven to the world that rouge regimes can target strategic shipping routes to stay solvent and also that those are more powerful than nuclear capabilities. That Pandora’s box is now open thanks to this administration and we will see a wave of such incidents.
All we had to do was not bomb Iran (starting with a school full of girls). There was no benefit to the US in this war, it’s 100% for Israel. Bribery and blackmail, not democracy, are now determining world events.
In other news, Cantor Fitzgerald lost about 150 information-technology workers when the north tower collapsed on this day 25 years ago.
This war started as a regime change operation in Iran, one of the shakiest regimes in the world pre-war, but ironically the war might end up with most of the nations who supported the war (either vocally or quietly) "regime changed" (loosely defined), including Israel, US, some European countries and now possibly some Gulf nations, awhile the Iranian regime seem to have tightened its grip more than ever.
Yet MAGA supporters were saying early in the war that they are "plan trusters" as prior US admins sucked at regime change because it is a "skills issue" and none of the prior admins had the triple digits IQ of Hegseth, Trump and Bessent.
Triple digit when summed I assume?
If they were going to try this it needed to be done months earlier when the protests were raging. Instead the brain trust fumbled the initiative and let the Iranian leadership kill and scourge their local allies into compliance. Then fumbling the decapitation strike coupled with the decades of preparation for a decapitation strike (via redundancy of command) the genius brigade seemed to be unaware of because they fired all the experts, and the total repression of the protesting populace, led to an unusually strong system in Iran. They also almost certainly let racism play a big role in underestimating the Iranians, who are a very technically sophisticated society and have been preparing for this scenario since day one of the revolution.
Everything that’s happened was predictable and predicted, which is why other administrations who were more than happy to topple foreign governments when it suited them to not do so in Iran. MAGA feels like the junior dev that blames the compiler for their own syntax errors.
Not sure where you get the shaky regime idea, but Iran was not on the verge of collapse from protests prior to the war. It may have been on the verge of more aggressive clamping down from the IRGC, but collapse wasn’t around the corner.
All the Kingdoms in middle east are very fragile. Gulf coast countries economies are crashing due to the blockade. Bahrain, UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia. One Arab spring away from a new government and this could be the spark.
Do you even realize that one of the only reason anybody still supports this war is precisely because of comments like yours? By dividing people into teams, and antagonizing them, you result in people never willing to stomach giving an inch and doubling down on stupid.
Obviously this war has been the US' latest great failure, and at the beckoning of a foreign power which makes it especially catastrophic. If people could focus on this, rather than trying to divide things into teams and then sling mud, they'd have vastly better outcomes come November (and on) than just using it for divisive mudslinging which does nothing but ensure that all elections, regardless of how bad the decisions of a incumbent, or how awful a challenger, will remain these sort of 50/50 coinflips.
“Someone was wrong, now I need to pretend they weren’t so that their feelings don’t get hurt so that we can all pretend it didn’t happen”
I am saying that adding your tribal bit to your post is just completely self defeating. And yes, the goal is indeed to avoid hurting people's feelings. I don't know why you'd mock that. People are not machines, and when you make somebody angry at you, or otherwise make him feel insulted - he'll happily argue that 2+2=5 just to avoid giving an inch to you.
Bridge building hasnt worked. Hillary's biggest campaign failure was drawing back from her deplorables comment, she should have leaned into it - thats what Trump did, go harder into division, and he's president now. Instead of being milquetoast corporate stooge full of fake politics talk, she might have seemed to actually stand for something. You're bringing 1990s politics into the 2020s and its proven multiple times it doesnt work any more. A small group of fanatics is actually more powerful than a large cohort of half-committed these days.
Do you realise that the only reason the average US taxpayer keeps getting wrecked into one pointless forever war after the other no matter who is in power is because the elites are never held accountable for their mad self-enriching adventures?
Holding people like Hegseth (who literally insider traded defense equities right before the start of the war) and Trump accountable (who practically made a gazillion insider trading each mad meme he posted while the world burnt) is not "dividing people into teams"
> the triple digits IQ of Hegseth, Trump and Bessent.
One digit each.
>This war started as a regime change operation in Iran
I believe this war started with a tomahawk missle murdering a school full of children and then the US denying involvement. I very clearly remember it. US attacks Iran unprovoked. First act, murder their children in school. If you wanted to solidify opposition to the US in Iran, I don't think they could have done a more effective job.
They haven't denied it yet, it's still under investigation. They may be able to workout they were the only country in this war with Tomahawks responsible for the triple-tap missile strike, after the mid terms. Or they may just move on from it and never talk about it again, like the Epstein files.
Attacking Iran and then backing down has just shown all the West's enemies that the US has no resolve.
The U.S. leadership has a bad habit of starting conflicts that the bulk of the population doesn't want, which leads to large political costs and resulting half-measures. Our current leadership literally ran on "no more wars." Morons.
You misunderstood; it was actually "no, more wars!"
Works on commission?
No! Money down!
... and now a low, and continuing to decrease, number of protective missiles.
Why exactly is the USA engaged in warfare there? Didn't Trump claim he will end perpetual warfare - and now he is doing the opposite?
Ansar Allah (Houthis) is a terrible Islamist group that commits warcrimws against both Yemenis and people thousands of miles away. Here’s just one example, executing men for gayness:
https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/03/27/yemen-houthis-sentence-m...
“In addition to death sentences that include crucifixion and stoning, the Houthi court sentenced 23 men to prison for periods of up to 10 years. Three of them were also sentenced to public flogging”
Saudi Arabia who they’re fighting against by proxy, and who we sell lots of bombs to, and are soon going to help get nuclear technology, not so great either.
https://www.humandignitytrust.org/country-profile/saudi-arab...
Just so it's clear that you're trying to cause confusion: these are light water reactors that cannot in any way shape or form be used to make bombs.
Slightly harder to design and build. Much cheaper to run. Excellent for power. Bad for bombs.
And, yes, just to get ahead of your next question: the US (and Europe and Russia and China) have offered to help Iran create these. Explaining it to them. Send people and engineers who have done it. Just get them from us. Or for free. We have tried everything. Iran has systematically refused everything, yet insist their program is for peaceful purposes only.
I'm not saying Saudi Arabia is perfect, far from it. But they are not looking to destroy the world or the region, and yes, sorry to say, but Iran is.
I 100% agree Iran wants nukes, but I don't think it's a given they want to "destroy the region".
It is more likely they want to get the same level of safety countries with nukes get, e.g. North Korea's leadership is at no risen of getting a "democratizing" invasion.
Then again, who knows what the next leader will do.
On that second note what about the plant in Bushehr?
>But they are not looking to destroy the world or the region, and yes, sorry to say, but Iran is.
Then why did Iran discontinue their other WMD programs, like much cheaper and easier to manage chemical weapons programs?
Why is Iran holding back and not targeting Israel's water infrastructure? If they just want to kill everyone they have options right now that they aren't taking.
Why does Iran hold back if they would use a nuke as soon as they get one because they just want to destroy the region?
Iran objectively wants to build a nuke, and has willingly sacrificed everything to do it, but it wouldn't have taken becoming a rogue state and trillions of dollars of GDP to kill Israel to their liking. Other than a nuke, Israel's retaliation options are fairly limited.
>Ansar Allah (Houthis) is a terrible Islamist group
IMO this is kind of bad framing because it suggests that they're the minority in Yemen, when in reality they basically are the government of 70-80% population of Yemen and absorbed 60+ percent of the Yemeni regular army.
They are basically at this point the de-facto Yemeni government
Ansar Allah isn't even close to a majority of the population of Yemen. Yemen is majority-Sunni. Ansar Allah is a militant Zaydi revivalist movement, and what they're attempting to revive is a Zaydi caste system.
> when in reality they basically are the government of 70-80% population of Yemen and absorbed 60+ percent of the Yemeni regular army.
sure, they took this by force while killing those who disagree. Its part of Sunni vs Shia confrontation, and Yemen is majority Sunni.
Their size - gained by brutal conquest - does not increase their legitimacy, it’s an Islamist group.
I decry the legitimacy of my coffee table, but my toe still hurts when I kick it.
Brutal conquest is a pretty well traveled path to legitimacy.
Power is taken, and regardless of the ideals of the takers, enough power grants legitimacy.
So is taliban, yet they both rule a country.
> Ansar Allah (Houthis) is a terrible Islamist group that commits warcrimws ...
The Syrian President and current Western/Israeli "good boy" - belongs to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham which has committed warcrimes which make the Houthis look like choir boys. He was former Al-Qaeda too with a multi-million dollar bounty. Done an utterly ridiculous number of beheadings, chaining & rape of women, torture, the whole galore of works carried out by a popular ruthless terrorist in a long career.
Now he is fully supported by the US AND the EU.
So, any time, any citizen of a Western nation complains about "war crimes" and wants "regime change", I call them deeply disgusting, sanctimonious hyprocrites. You fellows have lost any and all moral standing to talk about "war crimes".
Geopolitics is way too complicated for such black and white thinking. Do you know who amongst the governments of those countries decided to back this Syrian president? I certainly don't. What percentage of the (huge) populations that you're damning as "deeply disgusting, sanctimonious hypocrites" do you think know who the current Syrian president is, his history, know who amongst their governments backed him, voted for the people who backed him? Humans just physically can't keep track of everything, especially things so far outside of their daily life and physical experience. You can't reasonably hold them responsible for everything bad that happens in the world that their countries contributed to, especially things that are entirely abstract for them.
> Geopolitics is way too complicated for such black and white thinking. Do you know who amongst the governments of those countries decided to back this Syrian president? I certainly don't.
I am very much against black and white thinking. But the typical US and even EU liberal citizen is mired in such thinking when it comes to talk about "war crimes and "regime change". If you don't know who in the EU govt decided to back this Syrian President, then I can only facepalm since even as a poor, "low-IQ" third-worlder (according to MAGA folks), I am educated on the same. Please look at Ursula von der Leyen and her €620 million support package.
Yes, I will hold you folks responsible. This is not some "abstract idea" - it is basic, common knowledge and you fellows always, always fall to your media propaganda.
Aren’t they all? I guess it is better that they fight each other.
The other side is Al Qaeda. So who do you support? Wipe out the Houthis and you'll get another Syria where Al Qaeda controls the country.
Edit: Downvote me as much you want doesn't change the facts. the front line fighters for Yemen government is Al Qaeda. It was same thing as Syria which is why we have an Al Qaeda leader as their president.
https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019/02/middleeast/yemen-los...
Houthis are allied/in the early stages of an alliance with Al-Shabab though
Yes, but there is growing cooperation between Sunni and Shia Islamists. Support none, all kill gays, infidels and “misbehaving” women.
Saudi is the exactly same as Iran. Both far right countries. Both execute gays. Both don't support women's rights. Both execute kids. My point is there is no good side so the best option is not to pick a side and get out of the middle east.
Hopefully there will be another epic fury operation to clear the situation
As an American, I love that the American right wing immediately point out how Islamist treat gays, as if the American right isn’t still trying to outlaw gay marriage and kill trans people. Get a grip you guys.
Do they do double-tap strikes on schools and hospitals? Do they shoot children 355 times to make sure they're dead like with Hind Rajab?
Just trying to see how the compare to the US and Israeli militaries when it comes to war crimes.
The Century of American Humiliation continues
[flagged]
Religious flamewar is not ok on Hacker News, regardless of religion. No more of this please.
I realize that this thread has many ways of degenerating but what you posted here was particularly pure flamebait.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49660220.
Ok, I accept being deleted by moderator. Not intend to flamebait.
But why on 9/11 have front page about Houthis, many comments supporting them and others apparent unknowing who they are?
*Religious law is bad everywhere. Sadly Halakha is becoming the norm in once liberal Israel.
Nonsense, Halakha provides much stronger protections for how prisoners of war should be treated.
Wait until you compare Sharia law to laws proposed by evangelicals in the USA
Are you 11 or something?
Their other opponents, namely the US & Israel, killing thousands innocent of people every year, yet you don't really mind.
More than one thing can be bad at once. Opposing unprovoked wars and illegal West Bank settlements doesn't make theocratic law any less bad.
Sure, but the scale of violence committed by the US and allies is very large. Are there theocratic states recently committing similar levels of violence? Too often in the past, the oppression done by Middle Eastern governments is used to build political support for their destruction by the West.
Iran is known to have killed at least 10,000 of their own people just this year. The US has done bad too, but the scale isn't nearly as large.
> the scale isn't nearly as large.
This year.
... so far.
All sides are bad.
lol
Why do you have to immediately redirect
Are you sensitive to this topic or something?
This is bad faith and not a serious position.
During WW2, the Allies used flame throwers for goodness sake and killed a lot of innocent people taking Europe back from the Nazis.
If you made this argument in the 1940s, you would've been dragged out of your home and beaten half to death. And it would be for good reason. :)
There's no pseudo-intellectual moral argument that stands up to might-is-right. In the real world, that's how it works, regardless how much you disagree.
I wouldn't be surprised if this got downvoted off the front page in minutes, just like the other story about diesel being at all time highs.
There is a well coordinated group here that seems unusually allergic to inconvenient truths.
Why does that have to be the only reason? I personally think it has nothing to do with "Hacker" news, but I understand that sentiment has been in the fringe lately with HN becoming increasingly political.
Just to be clear, everything is political - whether you want to acknowledge it or not.
There's a far cry between someone showing off some weird contraption they hacked together versus posting about the Houthi's military campaign. If you can't see that, then I'm not sure what else to say.
It is also not really appropriate for HN.
What's appropriate for HN is decided by the attention of HN, no matter what you or I personally think or prefer.
Fuel prices is appropriate content for hacker news if EVs are appropriate content for hacker news. Just like electricity price is appropriate content.
Yes yes, my tinfoil protected brains thinks the same!
Or wait, maybe just flamewar style debates are not so welcome here, so people flag instead have another debate about who is more evil?
People can pretend whatever they want, but this affects technology heavily too.
Everything you buy has to be shipped. That needs gas. Everything with plastic has oil in it.
Economic downturns/depressions/panics affect investment and the amount of money available for companies to keep running. Plus consumer/business demand. Especially hard on startups who aren’t profitable or don’t even have a product out yet.
Even if you ignore the extremely obvious political stuff, this will directly affect the entire audience here.
As if the endless deluge of AI, Meta Glasses and Flock camera articles are full of friendly banter.
If you have showdead=true, you will see way, way more flagged comments under anything that is political, or even has a Israel connection in it.
Trump has decided that he'd sink along with the entire Middle east
What makes you think this, out of the non-stop parade of Trump crazy bullshit, is the issue that will finally sink him?
Wait for the November
Because his supporters have huge trucks and need tons of gas.
His supporters are a minority. There are others who voted for him as they felt it was the least bad option, but they are not supporters (and many of them regret their vote, though they probably would have stayed home, or voted third party). The supporters are a loud and vocal minority though.
Why all the quotation marks in the article? It's not like they interviewed toddlers that said funny things.
It’s in quotation marks because it’s a quotation. The BBC have not independently verified that the Houthis have taken control of the island, they are reporting what a government source has said.
They need to start doing this when other "regimes" make wild claims.
They always have.
It's funny to see the evolution of language. Quotation marks indicated that something was a direct quote. Then people started to use them as a sarcasm indicator. Now we're to the point where people can't even recognize them as indicating a direct quote.
I think the parent was pointing out that Israel's or USA's claims are usually stated without quotes, such as:
Israel invades Lebanon due to risk of Hezbollah attacks
rather than:
Israel says "risk of Hezbollah attacks" reason for invasion
I'm unconvinced that this is a pattern that is distinguished by the nation being reported on. Headlines vary. Both of your example headlines might appear at different times in the outlets I read.
I think this was just a stylistic choice and that this whole thread is a weird tangent.
This is a stunning amount of credulity after "looted vs found" and "https://x.com/i/status/1322999903753220099" -style memes.
I don't know what your comment means. Can you say more?
But generally, yes, I think cynicism has run amok among the very-online.
A few more examples:
“40 beheaded babies” and mass/systematic rape propaganda accepted with zero verification (journalism 101) and, once debunked, zero retractions were made
Hamas-run, but not Likud-run
Condemnation of atrocities by Israel and the US that comes from Israeli and Western voices is given significantly more weight than the same claims coming from Palestinian or Arab voices. After all, the native lacks the capacity to be objective.
Israeli gov statements are taken as undeniable fact, while Palestinian (Gaza or West Bank) gov spokespeople or even Palestinian people in general are barely even platformed
Over-representation of Zionists in editorial teams of every major newspaper and news channel across all Western countries, which (naturally) led to coordinated suppression of any Palestinian voice internally and externally (started to change only relatively recently).
And the list goes on.
As far as I can find, every mention of beheaded babies in the BBC is explicitly a statement of other people's claims and not a statement of fact.
I was not talking specifically about the BBC.
On the BBC specifically, try reading through their articles, especially from early on, and tell me what the editorial slant is. Yes, most of the content is neatly wrapped in quotation marks, but what picture were they trying to paint?
On UK media in general: https://www.declassifieduk.org/beheaded-babies-how-uk-media-...
My point is that both UK and Western media immediately jumped on and recirculated the claim in the first few days without confirmation. This was just enough to sear the image of beheaded babies into the minds of viewers & readers in the West, helping to justify Israel’s campaign to starve out the “human animals” and raze Gaza (a least in the mind of the avg citizen).
There's a well researched report on this bias:
https://cfmm.org.uk/resource/bbc-on-gaza-israel-one-story-do...
I don't think that's true and would be curious to see evidence otherwise.
I believe BBC and other outlets with journalistic standards use quotes when reporting what officials say and only drop the quotes when they have independent verification, like eyewitness reports from one of their own journalists.
Are there good examples of this from the BBC? Genuine question - no snark intended.
US insists Strait of Hormuz is open as it exchanges strikes with Iran - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cj9gkpp0dkeo
Iran says Strait of Hormuz is 'open' but tracking shows few ships moving - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwydexp39ddo
Those have the same implication even if it's written slightly differently. "US insists" makes it clear that "open" is a claim by the US, not an independent fact. The first one doesn't match the supposed pattern where one side's claims are stated as facts, despite the lack of quotation marks.
I think it's a fair example given how untruthful the US administration has been about whether the strait is "open" or not compared to the practical reality. Both would work with or without quotes, but the Iranian one is quoted. Still doesn't show systematic bias, but it's what I asked for.
I'm pretty sure the Iranian one is quoted because they used the word, whereas the US one is not quoted because the statements that the reporting was pulled from never used the actual word "open."
I see how it would read as bias if one interprets them as scare quotes, but it really does just mean "this is verbatim" when used here.
I am not saying this is necessarily incorrect but is it empirically actually true. Have people compared lots of different articles.
Yes, it's been true for a long time. See the book "Manufacturing Consent" for example, but there's been lots of research since. There are numerous ways that the western media biases news to build support for the objectives of those in power.
I don't see anything stated as fact (without quote marks) here solely on the basis of Trump having said it, and I see use of quote marks for things he has said, eg. 'Trump says Iran war will end "immediately" after US midterm elections': https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/topics/cp7r8vgl2lgt
The BBC's main sin in relation to Trump is sane-washing, treating his bizarre outbursts as if they were reasonable things for a US president to say. Eg. were he to say "I have a solid gold prostate!" they'd have an Anthony Zurcher piece entitled "Is Trump's prostate really made of gold?" with a quote from a doctor saying "while it seems unlikely and would probably be uncomfortable, having a gold prostate would be unlikely to cause any noticeable side effects as the metal is inert" and a discussion of the benefits of replacing a cancer-prone organ with a noble metal.
There is no way to win that battle.
Not reporting on Trump is not an option because his words and actions have huge ramifications for the world.
I think in general the press has gotten much better at just straight up saying that Trump is lying or wrong, as opposed to previous policy of only reporting counter claims from other parties.
They do.
It has nothing to do with verification.
They are simply reporting what sources have said:
Houthis 'take control' of Perim Island - government source published at 09:00
Houthi rebels have "taken control" of Perim Island in the Bab al-Mandab Strait, according to a source. Earlier, we were reporting that the group had reached the key island.
The AFP news agency also says Houthis have "taken over" Perim Island, also referred to as Mayyun, according to eyewitnesses and a local government official.
"Boats carrying armed Houthi fighters reached Mayyun Island after government forces withdrew from it yesterday," the official tells AFP.
My point about verification is simply that if the BBC had independently verified it’s true then they wouldn’t use the quote in the headline. They’d just say taken control without quote marks, because it wouldn’t be a quote.
My point is that they always use quotes when quoting even if it is verified by them to be true.
Reporting discourse is different from reporting fact, and I do not know the BBC for reporting unverified discourse or facts.
This is completely standard journalistic practice when reporting a quote on something that is currently contentious or unproven. For example, consider the two hypothetical headlines:
Activists decry police murder of protester
Activists decry police "murder" of protester
The first implies that the police murdering the protestor is an established fact. The second makes it clear that it is the activists who used the term "murder" rather than it being a non-contentious fact.
Both versions are fancifully direct in our era a media+police stenography, try:
Mayor denounces "radical activists" rioting and damaging city property in response to an officer-involved incident that resulted in one fatal kinetic altercation with a "loud and provocatively dressed" man.
> officer-involved incident
Ah, the past exonerative tense. https://archive.is/wPVdy
Read McSweeney's guide to ambiguous grammar, where they lead you step by step from the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog to the ultimate say-nothing sentence speed was involved in a jumping-related incident while a fox was brown, and the punchline is you can then translate "the St Louis County Police Department was involved in an officer-involved shooting after officers came under heavy gunfire" to "a police officer shot a black person" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Michael_Brown)
https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/an-interactive-guide-to-...
But no, that's the language issued by police departments covering their asses. Journalists are a little bit covering their asses in making clear what is a quote and what isn't, but they're still responsible for what they choose to quote, and to be clear on whether they have verified the claims they're quoting.
Ideally, unverified claims shouldn't even be in an article. But when there _has_ been some kind of stramash, they just don't know who did what, the need to rush out an article to get clicks means they'll just quote both sides and try to give them equal prominence until they can do more verification.
https://patch.com/california/northhollywood/my-daughter-died...
oh like this article that says a child was hit by a "LAPD bullet" as though wild bullets roam the streets of LA looking for children instead of being fired from a gun by a person who made a decision.
Do the BBC or other outlets use "officer-involved incident" without quotes?
It's generally police officials that use that terminology.
It doesn't help when snippets are post leaving out the other context clues where things like "according to" or "anonymous source stated" or similar attribute of the quote. Just putting words between quotation marks does not lead me to believe they were quotes if there is no attribution. Otherwise, it's a Trump level "people tell me" type of "quote".
In that case, that seems like a variation of the "past exonerative tense".
Do you consider every trial defendant to be exonerated?
Presumably to indicate that the parts in quotes are indeed quoted literally from the source that is mentioned in the same sentence?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journalism_ethics_and_standard...
When I moved from the US to the UK, the use of quotation marks in news headlines was something that confused me. In the US, these would be "scare quote", with the quotation marks basically standing in for the words "so-called". In the UK, that is NOT their meaning. The quotation marks mean "we are not ourselves in a position to verify this, but it is the words that a source has told us". Very different meaning -- and once I got used to it, I think the UK use of language in this case is more honest and useful.
tl;dr: two countries, divided by a common language.
This is like this in most of Europe: when in "quotes", it is not the journalist, but the person who said something. For example, Obama said "Yes we can". He did not say yes we can, he said "Yes we can".
It is not about the quotes being verified or unverified. It is about something said by somebody, that you are reporting.
This is precisely what the word quote means!
It’s not so much ‘we are not in a position to verify’ as the fact that the person who said the thing, and what they said, is itself newsworthy.
If you’re reporting that “Government sources say Houthis have ‘taken control’ of an island” then the fact that government sources used the words ‘taken control’ is itself interesting.
The headlines “Russia ‘will be defeated’ in Ukraine says Zelensky”, “Russia ‘will be defeated’ in Ukraine says Putin”, and “Russia ‘will be defeated’ in Ukraine says Taylor Swift” all tell of vastly different news events.
I don't think reputable US news outlets use quotation marks in the way you say they do.
Is it really a different meaning? Isn't the implication that they tried, and failed, to independently verify the claim?
No, it's a statement of who is making the claim.
Does “so-called” not mean “words that someone has told us”?
Huh? That's how quotation marks are used here in the US too
It's a garbage habit that they've all fallen into. The quotes will fall away when future stories refer back to this story.
That single quoted phrase was set in the context of other words, and that context defined its meaning. We know this to an extent that almost no one could have imagined since LLMs have become a huge part of the world.
My favorite example of this is how no article in Britain during Corbyn's leadership of the labor party would ever quote an entire sentence that he had said. Thousands of articles, and the quotes were all fragmentary phrases and lone words framed in editorial.
edit: Brits and the BBC especially do this more than most, likely because of their bizarre libel laws (that were once even worse than they are now.)
It's because they been taken to court for mindlessly parroting shit they hear, but instead of actually verifying the truth of the claim (ya know, the entire purpose of a journalist) they just put it in quotes as some kind of "buyer beware" disclaimer
Journalism is just as much reporting what different influential people say, whether the underlying statement is true or not.
> actually verifying the truth
That's the job of the reader, not the journalist. Unless you're living under oppression. So you have misunderstood the purpose of reporting.
The BBC only assumes government sources as truth when it's from the crown or Israeli / US governments
My quibble here is with the house style "Iran-backed" that they attach to every mention of the Houthi's. While it's fine for governments to use that language, I don't think journalists should use it without being very specific to its relevance to the particular subject under discussion. The "Houthis claim major advance in Yemen - what you need to know" article could omit "Iran-backed" in its entirety and lose no information of substance, and amend the last bullet point to say that this is especially relevant given the current US-Iran conflict.
As I type this I feel somewhat vindicated by the update to the page, "Iran does not dictate every Houthi decision - but they appear increasingly aligned", which I think does a good job of clarifying the relationship. It does, however, say "Iran has publicly backed the Houthis during the latest fighting. The geography helps explain why", which is useful factual evidence (since Iranian officials have indeed made public statements in support of the Houthis) but the use of "backed" in this sentence is bad style since that word has been used in exactly this context to have a much deeper meaning than Iran saying "we've got your back bro"
its a hint to the western audience that they're supposed to be sad about this.
The first question should be: who supplies their military equipment?
The next question should be: who benefits?