Let’s hope that the destruction of facilities comes with the regime change in Iran. otherwise it may have just given a brief pause and further escalation.
If the regime survives, now Iranian people have a very good reasons to ignore its shortcomings and tyranny and Do a proper sacrifice. It’s a natural resources rich nation of 90 million people. If they want to get serious, they can get serious.
As an Iranian, I want it clear: the Islamic Republic has destroyed Iran. For 46 years, they held our country hostage, suppressing us, dictating what we can wear, say, or believe, while chanting death to the West and chasing nuclear power. They’ve brutalized peaceful protesters, raped, imprisoned, and killed our people. Now, their so-called enemies have walked right in, understandably. A regime that has no mercy for us citizens can't be trusted with nuclear power. This is why we’re here: a paper lion with no real strength beyond the people it oppresses.
More to it, I've had personal experience with this brutal regime, they arrested my old cousin during the Mahsa Protests(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahsa_Amini_protests), she was taken to the Evin prison (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evin_Prison) and was tortured for 6 months. We had no news from her. When she was finally released, she was so skinny that you could see her rib bones. We managed to bring her to Canada and it took her over a year of medical care until she began to recover. She was only 20.
No one hates this regime more than Iranians.
With all that out of the way, Iranians have no choice now but the defend their homes against hostile forces. They will not simply sit back and watch Israel and United States bomb their land to oblivion and then demand unconditional surrender.
This attack will inflict more pain on Iranians and only serves to grow the regime stronger.
We wanted a regime change, but not at the hands of Israel and US.
Well the mass destruction and death in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya came with regime change but what followed was more death and chaos that none have fully recovered from. I'm sorry but that "we'll just bomb the country and hope that helps" attitude is utterly stupid and has been repeatedly proven to be deeply ineffective
I don't think we have a historical precedence to what is happening here. The closest would be Israel's attack on Hezbollah which literally collapsed and led to the collapse of the Syrian regime as well.
The Iranian regime is very centralized and with Israel and the USA having air superiority and having penetrated it completely from an intelligence perspective (see Israel's perfect knowledge of the whereabouts of the previous chief of staff and the newly appointed chief of staff) it's going to be very hard for it to survive if a decision is made to remove it. There are a handful of key people that once gone there is not going to be any continuity.
The current regime is allowed to continue because of fear of chaos if it is removed, not because there isn't a capability to remove it.
The troops on the ground were only able to act because the regime has been weakened. But yes, someone in Iran would need to somehow actively do something.
First footage from the area doesn't appear to show any extended damage, so maybe it was all a show.
Regardless, a sovereign country was bombed tonight just because they can. This, IMHO, can have very bad outcomes for the peace worldwide since it means that anybody who can bomb someone can just go ahead and do it. No more international order.
What's next then? Bomb Brussels because EU doesn't buy chicken from USA? This stuff isn't OK.
The regime change in Iran can be a silver lining if it changes with something more cooperative. But yes, I agree that this is unlikely.
> Regardless, a sovereign country was bombed tonight just because they can.
The dictatorial nature of Trump's order to attack a nation is far more concerning. Supposedly the US requires an act of Congress to authorize this sort of operation. Sidestepping congress underlines US's descent into totalitarianism and one of the very first acts crystalizing a dictatorship.
The way the world works these days m 60 Days is enough for the president to unilaterally get us into war with literally every country on the planet.
This president has clearly exposed the unarticulated parts of out laws which is supposed to make them work; The hope that the president will essentially act and interpret them in “good faith”
Congress and the US in general has had plenty of time to adjust the powers of the president as US naval, air, and communications capabilities have increased.
not doing so is approval of the change in the president's power to initiate and wage war unilaterally without congressional involvement
IRGC isn’t a sovereign country, it’s a designated terrorist organization
You forgot that IRGC already directly attacked Israel twice in 2024 [1,2], and that’s not including countless proxy attacks and terrorist acts, culminating in October 7th massacres & atrocities
You got it wrong: IRGC attacked and Israel retaliated
US is just helped a little bit their ally
> This stuff isn't OK.
UN, ICC, ICG, etc. all became a $hit show, they don’t work. For 40 years IRGC threatened with Genocide of Jews, and they did nothing. Now when Jews retaliated: * This stuff isn't OK.* ;)
Pedantic rule-based systems are easy to circumvent with loopholes and lacunas. That’s why we should look at the substance and not merely a [legal] form
Examples:
- form: a cryptocurrency, but substance: an unregistered security
- “medical alcohol” during dry laws / Prohibition
- “medical marijuana” & patients vs drug users
- etc.
—-
Was Third Reich[1] a “sovereign government” or a front for The National Socialist German Workers' Party?
Was USSR a “sovereign government” or a front for a Communist Party?
Is Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) a “sovereign government” or merely a front for IRGC[2]?
And wasn’t Iran/Persia already a “sovereign government” before IRGC staged a coup d'état (aka “revolution”)?
—-
> "De facto" and "de jure" are Latin terms used to distinguish between what exists in reality and what is legally recognized. "De facto" refers to something that exists in practice or reality, even if not officially established or legally recognized. "De jure" refers to something that is legally recognized or officially established
If any entity threatens u: u have 3 options: fight back, surrender, or self-destruct
In the first case, u have 2 more options: strike pre-emptively, or wait for them to strike & then retaliate
It doesn't matter what the entity is, it only matters whether they are enemy or not
——
> So China is not a sovereign state because it is a front for the CPP and can be bombed at will...?
I don't see the logical connection here. I never wrote that countries controlled by terrorist or authoritarian entities should be bombed at will. I wrote that some countries are highjacked by them, & if they attack or declare their intention to attack u, u may as well do it first
According to my Iranian friends (even the most hardline Ayatollah haters), most Iranians hate the regime, but they'll rally behind them if boots land on the ground.
Many of them still look at the Iran-Iraq war with a shade of Iranian patriotism (not sure there's a word to capture that actual feeling of sad memories of losing family members, coupled with a patriotic sense of duty).
The younger generation, not so much, since they didn't have to live through that hell.
> The few Iranians I know are against the regime, but I don't know how the wider picture looks.
my experience with Iranians I know are the same. the regime is not partitularly liked by the Iranians but they are no doubt united behind him now because (and for good reason) they likely believe whoever the israelis would appoint as the leader of Iran would be categorically worse.
I find it hard to believe foreign intervention can do anything other than rally support.
A lot of Americans deeply oppose Trump, but how many of them would support a Chinese invasion with the express objective of overthrowing him and installing a new regime? I suspect very few, and instead you'd probably get a backlash of support for Trump.
Japan was on the verge of being invaded by both the United States and the Soviet Union. The writing was on the wall and the choice to surrender very likely turned out better for Japan, both territorially and in the key priority of persevering the Imperial Dynasty.
Not necessarily but this is also not the end of the campaign. If Israel and US take out their ultimate bargaining chip and have air supremacy then the room to maneuver for the ayatollah is quite small. What happens next inside Iran is anyone’s guess. There have been multiple waves of very large protests in the past five years. What’s stopping mossad from delivering rifles to them from Syria or an airdrop at this point of escalation
Even if the regime doesn't survive, what's our track record in Iranian regime change like? What are the chances people there swallow their pride and roll over? If anything, Khomeini is probably a moderate compared to a lot of what we could end up with after 'regime change' (lol)
What are the chances that the peaceful, think it through, be reasonable crowd is ready to organize the next regime. Or maybe the hotheads with guns are ready to shoot first aim later.
Perhaps forcing regime changes on other countries shouldn't be a quick decision.
He is asking a valid question. Experts on the issue also warn that there is no guarantee that what replaces the current regime would be any more amenable.
Yes, but that name refers to a leader from decades ago. There is a similar-named leader today, but people who conflate the two tend not to be well-informed on the topic.
Yeah sorry for the typo - I obviously didn't mean the dude from the 80s. I'm not a scholar but have been paying attention for at least the last few years, so mea culpa.
I guess it’s all about how it’s handled afterwards. Germany and Japan have become huge US allies after some proper bombings.
Just recently Trump tried to troll the Germany’s leader for it and only got a “Thank you for defeating us”.
The truth is that Iran’s regime is indeed a very shitty one and a lot of people have grievances with it but the problem is, this is about Israel and they are not any better and didn’t stand at a higher moral ground with their illegal occupation and actions that many consider genocidal.
I think the post war political movement in America that produced the Martial Plan was exceptional. The situation now in terms of institutions, leadership and doctrine is nothing like that. It is difficult to believe that America of today could help a country in that way. Accountability is too fractured. Profiteering has become a way of life. And fundamentalism is too strong.
I get this a lot from a guy I do trust, and his old man is an Iranian immigrant, but I also recognize my sources are very biased against the regime.
Is there any good reporting out there or sentiment analysis that can show this? Or is it all word of mouth on the Internet? It's okay if there is nothing, but I'd feel a lot better if there was something substantial to back this up too.
1939, Nazi Germany starts fucking around and nobody does anything about it and then we have WWII on our hands.
You've totally missed the point. It's precisely because we didn't "properly" bomb Germany to stop that first invasion of Poland, that WWII happened and we lost 400,000 Americans, 6 million Jews etc.
The only thing this parent got wrong is the dates. Historians seem to generally think that Hitler's regime would have collapsed if the West had stood up to:
* The militarization of the Rhineland in 1936
* The Anschluss with Austria in March 1938
* The annexation of the Sudetenland (and the rest of Czechoslovakia) in October 1938
The German army was weak in the 1930s and his generals very hesitant. Hitler's "reckless" successes gave him credibility and power.
Apparently Hitler was genuinely surprised when the west declared war after the invasion of Poland. He expected the cowardly West to roll over again.
I recommend Childers' "World War II: A Military and Social History" if you're into this kind of thing.
There is alot of paralllels between the mindset of the populace then and today, especially in this thread that enabled Hitler's confidence. The famous Oxford Union "King and Country Debate" in 1933 declared with 275 for and 153 against that "This House under no circumstances would fight for King and Country". It was stated to have a tremendous impression of Hitler's decision-making when generals pushed back against his aggresive actions, and his bluff was rewarded well.
Well, skip forward in 2023 and here we are again...
Historians seem to generally think that Hitler's regime never would have existed if the West had not bent Germany over a barrel in 1918 and immediately after.
I mean, if we're going to ruminate over alternate timelines why fast forward to the 1930s..?
Not exactly, it was rather that the Treaty of Versailles was painful enough to cause resentment but wasn't harsh enough to cripple Germany. Even so, Weimar Germany managed to stabilize the situation for a decade or so, it's only with the Great Depression that finally broke the Republic's back (and even then, there were all sorts of political shenanigans that could have been manuvered better).
Furthermore, the foreign policy of the Nazis was informed more by their ideological myths than external events. After all, the Nazis admired the Great Imperialist Powers like the British Empire as part of the "Aryan Race". Their enmity was directed at Eastern Europe and the Communists, which had little to do with the enactment of post-war reparations on Germany.
The US has no desire or intent to occupy Iran. It would take a year just to move enough forces to even contemplate it. Iran is mountainous which makes this a lot harder than Iraq.
It is also completely unnecessary. There are two options. Either the current regime makes a "deal" or it's going to get crippled to the point of irrelevance or removed.
Iran and Iraq are very different. Different culture, people and history. It's also worth remembering Iran is not homogeneous, only 61% of the population are Persians. There are Azeri, there are Kurds and various other ethnic/region minorities.
Iran is extremely vulnerable. It has internal issues, constantly oppressing/suppressing its people. Its economy is in terrible shape. Most of its economic engine can be easily taken out (its main oil terminals). The bulk of its military can be destroyed from the air, it has little defensive or offensive capability. They know it.
I think what you are missing is how vulnerable the United States and its allies are in the region.
There are much much softer targets than Tel Aviv, many of which Iran has successfully attacked in the past.
The argument that the Iranian people hate their autocratic government might be correct. But a symmetric argument can be made about many of the regimes which work with the United States. No one in those countries is going to war with Iran to defend the US right to have military bases in the Middle East.
One way of looking at last week's ballistic missile attacks is that they were a way of demonstrating Iran's ability to retaliate in the wider region.
If Ramat Gan is not safe, then the UAE's resorts and airports, Saudi's oil processing facilities, the US installations in Iraq and in the Gulf, etc are not even remotely safe.
Israel reportedly took out >50% of the launchers. With complete control of the air space a launcher becomes a single use rather than its intended multiple use. The USA can defend its positions with Aegis/THAAD and its detection capabilities give early warning.
Israel has taken a lot of damage but relatively little loss of life.
Iran would be foolish to expand the war and they know it. They're not going to attack the UAE or Saudi. Iran's bluff has been called.
well israel would, because israel's existance depends on them.
from an israeli perspective, things cant be going better. if the US gets pulled into invading iran, then their only effective opponent in the world is vietnam'd. which is great if your soldiers arent the ones dying to IEDs.
without iranian funding/management, Hamas shrivels up and palestine is open to be ethnically cleansed. israel wins a 3000 year old war, and only has to deal with sternly worded letters from the UN for it.
against who? the persians beat the babylonian tyrants and enabled the rebuilding of the temple way back when. Cyrus is a messiah rather than ancient enemy
Then wouldn’t it be best to prop up groups on the inside? Start with providing restricted airspaces to groups who hate the regime, and let them be autonomous regions. That wouldn’t need any boots on the ground.
Say you give the Kurds their own part of Iran and help protect their area could weaken the rest. I think there is already such a deal in in Iraq afaik.
Can't compare Ukraine, which is a democracy where the government enjoys broad support, to Iran, which is a dictatorship where 80% of the population wants the government gone and rules by an iron fist and public executions.
> or it's going to get crippled to the point of irrelevance or removed.
how are you gonna do that without boots on the ground?
Trump talking about annexing canada made them go from being sick of the liberal party becuase of trudeau to swinging back around to supporting it to an upset victory because they were the only ones standing up to america. and thats america's closest ally, iran is their most bitter foe
this is either gonna end any chance of cooling things off with iran (and make them realize they need a nuclear deterrent yesterday), or turn into another vietnam/afghanistan
the regime was unpopular, the US could have collapsed them slowly like they did the soviets, but instead they let israel's "trust me bro" on nukes pull them into another quagmire.
Don’t think the current guy in the white house is much into nation building. Also after Iraq and 20 years wasted in Afghanistan - Americans are less likely to care about rebuilding a country.
The US occupied Japan and West Germany after WW2. Admittedly mostly with the support of local authorities. But that was the US with a pop of ~133m and Japan with a pop of ~70m. So yes, if the US had the political will it could occupy Iran.
Does it have the political will? No way!
Michael Shurkin-- a former rand analyst and I strongly recommend his podcast-- says that politicians say "there is no military solution" when they mean there is no military solution that people would politically support. The US could do all sorts of things in Iran but the US people would not accept the casualties or the human rights abuses.
No, it's damn near geographically impossible or would require cooperation from countries who would be absolutely be opposed to it, and the Pentagon knows it even the small brained people in fancy suits in Washington don't.
i doubt israel cares. if they can get the US to invade iran for them, then no matter what happens, their only effective opponent is dismantled. you can definitely hope to springboard that to regional dominance and guaranteeing your existance
This is true, no Americans have the desire to invade Iran after Iraq and Afghanistan. If Trump goes in then the next politician that runs on ending the invasion would win in a landslide. Further, there’s just nothing to justify an invasion. Regime change or not, Iran’s nuclear program and militias can now be destroyed from the air uncontested, why invade?
Well, its done now. All we can do is to hope for the better outcome and ever more powerful ideological regime is not the better outcome. Trump might just guaranteed that though. He isn’t good at this international relations and peacemakings stuff.
60%? Serious citation needed. The largest Christian population in Iran are Armenians. There are far fewer than 1 million Armenians in Iran. So unless you have evidence for the claim that there are 50+ million atheists in Iran, the number just defies belief.
I would be shocked if there were 50 million atheists in America. Maybe if you included people who are spiritual but do not believe directly in a god. Maybe I could accept it then, but at that point, you are stretching the definition of 'atheist' to its breaking point.
Not arguing your point. Just thought I’d share that of the emigres I know (big families that left starting in the late 60s) all are either Christian or Zoorastrian (to some degree). To them the Islamic conquest of Persia is not old news!
Trump thinks regime change will happen instantly and easily. Maybe he has secret source front NSA and CIA, who track private messages of Iranians! 60% of Iranians are secret christians. 38% are closeted gays!
A few bombs, everyone comes out of closet, unconditional surrender, democracy, live happily ever after... Sounds like American movie...
It's like there's an echo from every other stupid poll-raising middle east adventure we've ever gotten into.
This is a stupid war being waged by idiots against idiots . Unfortunately none of those idiots calling the shots will die, it'll be a bunch of kids who just made the mistake of not being rich and powerful enough.
America allies, Saudi head chop more than Iran. And there are 100K Jews in Iran and they get into parliament too. Show me that in Israel. You got confused with Saudi and Pakistan. Dont think 60% there Christian or atheist there. Westrrn media is always BS. They got so many wrongs since 2 deacdes ago, I read way less western stuff these days. Otherwise my whole world view looks like Marvel MCU and Tom Cruise with Arnie running around with guns.
Your numbers are way off: there are between 10k and 20k Jews in Iran. There are also 5 parliament seats in Iranian parliament (out of 290 members) that are reserved for religious minorities, of which two seats are for Armenians, one for Syrians, one for Jews and one for Zoroastrians.
It is ending a bit like Ming dynasty and Rome towards the end. Corruptions rife everywhere. Leaders try to be competent and yet ended making more mess. You can already see China is doing 5nm. Best camera phone is Huawei. Best EV in both variants models and quality and total volume sales, BYD. Tesla get decimated. Even AI China is on par. In terms of talents, you can see how well Americans read and count. In 30 years time, you need to learn Chinese and maybe Russian. I dont see America will be much viable pass the next 30 years. If you get a Dem prez, the country will be saturated with illegals. If you get JD, debrs will spiral out of control while opening a warfront in the middle east with Iran and China. This is basically empire ending scenario.
>If you get a Dem prez, the country will be saturated with illegals
Is this, in your mind, how empires end? I'm not sure if you've cracked a history book in a while, but immigrants built this country. We are a country of immigrants. We win when we get the hardest working, most entrepreneurial, boldest and smartest people to come here. Immigrants are no couch potatoes - on average they work harder than American born citizens do by an order of magnitude for way less pay.
In 30 years time there will be fewer Mandarin speakers than there are today, and far fewer Russian speakers. This has nothing to do with Americans; four out of five English speakers live in other countries. It's the consequence of Metcalf's Law in age of internet communication, combined with obvious demographic trends.
They don’t care about the regime, they only want it to be aligned with the US and Israel. The Saudi absolute monarchy regime (something that is way worst than the Iranian one) that is directly coming from middle ages, doesn’t get the same journalistic treatment in the US. Women rights in Iran are lightyears ahead of what is happening in Saudi Arabia. But who cares? Talking about Iran regime change only is pure hypocrisy when your best friend in the region can kill anyone by just deciding it.
Actually, Saudi Arabia doesn't beat woman to death for not wearing a hijab (although they're not great either). Saudi is ranked 56 on the Gender Inequality Index, whereas Iran is 113. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_Inequality_Index
3 years ago Saudi Arabia set into its law (on the international women’s day) that a male relative always have control on a woman. A few years ago only, women were allowed to drive but as of today they are very few female drivers. But that’s not the point, the point is the hypocrisy to point at a political regime because he his not aligned with your views while having as a best friend the worst absolute monarchy.
> A few years ago only, women were allowed to drive but as of today they are very few female drivers.
Maybe. But overall Saudi Arabia has been undergoing pretty dramatic changes in recent years: Women can now drive, are no longer required to wear a hijab, are allowed to work, can meet with male friends/non-relatives without the police stopping them, etc. Yes, it's still a far cry from what women are allowed to do in western countries, and absolute change is still slow, but relatively speaking it's still quite impressive and gives me (and apparently people there) hope.
Yes, quite a few actually. I do have to mention, though, that the women I talked to were from the cities, usually very well educated (studied abroad, spoke English / grew up with Netflix, etc.), and/or used to tourists. I didn't dare talking to women in the smaller, more rural towns as I wasn't sure about repercussions (for them). Plus there would have been the language barrier, anyway.
Overall, there seemed to be a rather pronounced divide between the cities and the country side:
In the cities you did see the occasional woman without hijab, some women working (particularly in the hospitality industry), and a few women driving (though still not many). Meanwhile, in more rural areas tradition strongly prevailed. So none of the things I mentioned are really commonplace yet (not even in the cities) – it's just that at the very least they're legal now and people (women) are making their first baby steps towards enjoying their newfound freedom.
You can find many videos of people walking around cities in Iran - not only are plenty of women not covering their hair, there's plenty of dyed hair too. Dress is a bit more conservative than western countries, but not by much, and women are obviously free - and feel safe - to leave the house unescorted. Iran has liberalized a lot compared to the post-revolutionary period.
Mahsa Amini was famously beaten to death by Iran's morality police in 2022 for the crime of not wearing a hijab. Even modern-day Iran is incredibly oppressive to women, and is currently ranked #113 on the Gender Inequality Index.
Israel hasn't really engaged in regime change. If anything the opposite. There was a single failed attempt to get the Christians into power in Lebanon. But mostly sort of the devil I know. We have Hussein in Jordan. We had Assad in Syria. Egypt had its own turmoils but not much Israeli involvement. The PA and Hamas were also viewed as a stabler alternative to chaos. Saudi and the emirates pretty stable. Turkey (not quite middle east but whatever) also have their internal turmoil. Iran has been stable as well.
This is true but that happened mostly after Hamas already took Gaza. Israel would have greatly preferred for the PA to control Gaza. The regime change in this case was done by the Palestinians themselves. The Israeli right wing did to some extent strengthen the division once it was in place. The Wikipedia article reads like a propaganda piece and I would not trust it at all. I've lived in Israel through this period so I have a pretty good first hand knowledge/experience of the events.
The PA didn't really come close to negotiating peace and given Hamas were not able to. See Hamas' suicide bombing campaign during the Oslo peace process. The PA, somewhat as a response to Israeli policy, decided to pursue trying to force Israel to yield via a combination of armed and political struggle and not negotiate with it. Strangely enough security cooperation did continue throughout (and the PA is basically supported by the IDF otherwise it would likely have been toppled). This all happened after the Oslo peace process collpased due to Hamas.
Bush pushed for an election as he wanted to have solved the middle east situation before his presidency was over, against both Israel and PAs wishes. Then Hamas won and Bush again pushed PA to do a coup which failed and PA was kicked out of Gaza.
No matter what. America getting them self into this, so fast is going to lead to a lot of worldwide drama distracting from the disastrous financial situation of the US.
My conclusion from the last 30 years of regime changes in ME is, be careful what you wish for. Iraq, Syria, Libya, Egypt - they all had their regimes "improved" by well-meaning (?) external powers, and they all went pretty badly.
That's not to endorse any of these regimes, including the current Iranian one, just saying the variance is enormous around these events.
How do you imagine Iran giving up? If anything, it will radicalize. This would happen even if you did anything remotely similar to your kid (i.e., attacked the kid violently because of an accusation they did something wrong), not to mention to a state that revolted against US political manipulation 45 years ago.
I'm wondering whether Trump knows that Iran won't give up and nevertheless pushes forward, or does he really believe that Iran can surrender? I think that's 99.99999% wrong belief. It feels like he is expressing it only to cover up his actions. He probably knows this will lead to a long-term escalation, but thinks that's the right thing to do for the interests of groups/countries he cares about.
Why there is regime change there? You are watching fake news projected by your own government for your bubble. The regime now is way stronger. Their economy now is also significantly bigger and stronger (hint: China). A fresh grad there can find job in less than 2 weeks. Try that in UK or NY...even 6mths would be atough endevour.
Iran has smaller gdp than israel and 12 times it's population. They are a delusional dwarf, and they beat and blind women that refuse to wear headscarf. So I wouldn't mind some dead and crippled clergy and IRGC as long as there are no boots on the ground. Just kill the elites until the population sorts the thing themselves.
Exactly. Libya is non threatening and doesn't sponsor terrorism as of late. That the Libyans decided to fuck things up internally doesn't change the fact that externally it was a success.
If the regime survives, it is also going to target (and murder) a whole hell of a lot of innocent civilians that it suspects aided Israel (and many/most will almost certainly be innocent). Due process is not a thing with IRGC.
If the regime survives, now Iranian people have a very good reasons to ignore its shortcomings and tyranny and Do a proper sacrifice. It’s a natural resources rich nation of 90 million people. If they want to get serious, they can get serious.