Iran declines invitation to call Trump about Trump's concerns: Trump the statesman, part 2?

[Horatius]

@Ravenman

I said the cause should be investigated. I’m not in favor of throwing out conspiracy theories in the absence of facts, as you have done.

You do realize that at this point, any speculation about who did it could be considered a “conspiracy theory”, right? No matter who did it, they would have had to conspire in some way to pull it off, and that includes the “Iran did it” theory.

Planing minor sabotage against a small number of civilian vessels is well within the capabilities of any state-level actor, and quite a few non-state actors. Calling one supposition that State A did it a “conspiracy theory” while accepting the supposition that State B did it as being a reasonable speculation is just plain bias.

[iiandyiiii]

Skeptical U.S. Allies Resist Trump’s New Claims of Threats From Iran...

One American official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss confidential internal planning, said the new intelligence of an increased Iranian threat was “small stuff” and did not merit the military planning being driven by Mr. Bolton. The official also said the ultimate goal of the yearlong economic sanctions campaign by the Trump administration was to draw Iran into an armed conflict with the United States.

Uggh. And not a little uggh – this is stomach churning stuff. War with Iran would be the dumbest of all the dumb decisions Trump has made, and likely result in hundreds or even thousands of dead Americans for no good reason at all.

[Ravenman]

@Horatius

You do realize that at this point, any speculation about who did it could be considered a “conspiracy theory”, right? No matter who did it, they would have had to conspire in some way to pull it off, and that includes the “Iran did it” theory.

Planing minor sabotage against a small number of civilian vessels is well within the capabilities of any state-level actor, and quite a few non-state actors. Calling one supposition that State A did it a “conspiracy theory” while accepting the supposition that State B did it as being a reasonable speculation is just plain bias.

Oh no, I don’t have a bias. If Norway finds out that Saudi Arabia bombed its tanker, I’d fully support a Norwegian airstrike on Saudi Arabia.

[Snowboarder_Bo]

Prep work continues:

The U.S. on Wednesday ordered all nonessential government staff to leave Iraq, and Germany and the Netherlands both suspended their military assistance programs in the country in the latest sign of tensions sweeping the Persian Gulf region over still-unspecified threats that the Trump administration says are linked to Iran.

The movement of diplomatic personnel is often done in times of conflict, but what is driving the decisions from the White House remains unclear. A high-ranking British general said there was no new threat from Iran or its regional proxies, something immediately rebutted by the U.S. military’s Central Command, which said its troops were on high alert, without elaborating.

Last week, U.S. officials said they had detected signs of Iranian preparations for potential attacks on U.S. forces and interests in the Middle East, but Washington has not spelled out that threat, and an alert on the website of the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad said that all nonessential, nonemergency U.S. government staff were ordered to leave Iraq right away under State Department orders.

The U.S. in recent days has ordered the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group to the Gulf region, plus four B-52 bombers.

[HurricaneDitka]

@Ravenman

Oh no, I don’t have a bias. If Norway finds out that Saudi Arabia bombed its tanker, I’d fully support a Norwegian airstrike on Saudi Arabia.

This piqued my curiousity: Is Norway capable of launching airstrikes on Saudi Arabia by themselves? Wikipedia says the Royal Norwegian Air Force operates a few dozen F-16s, 16 F-35s, 6 P-3s, and 4 C-130s. I don’t think any of those have the range to hit Saudi Arabia, at least if they’re flying from Norway.

[septimus]

A big danger now was foreseen in the parable about the shepherd boy brat named Donald who cried ‘Wolf.’ I, for one, won’t believe anything the oaf says — and he’s surrounded himself with sycophants who are all also liars.

This doesn’t just go for me and a majority of rational Americans. Our traditional allies have no faith in the veracity of tweets and farts from this Administration. (Our new “ally,” Russia, is of course delighted with most disinformation.)

European foreign ministers did not offer Pompeo a group meeting during his sudden visit to Brussels this week, perhaps fearing a photo-op would be seen as an endorsement of the US approach.

This was always the big danger of a Trump Presidency: the possibility of a foreign crisis requiring an adult leader. With Trump and Bolton in charge, the correct default assumption is that everything they think or say is stupid, mistaken or a deliberate lie (despite that even broken clocks can show the correct time by chance).

[Snowboarder_Bo]

Saudi Arabia eggs us on now too:

Saudi Arabia on Thursday blamed Tehran for a drone attack by Yemen’s rebels that knocked out a key oil pipeline and a newspaper close to the palace called for the U.S. to carry out “surgical” strikes on Iran, adding a new layer of tension to the standoff in the Persian Gulf.

Saudi Arabia’s deputy defense minister, Prince Khalid bin Salman, tweeted that the drone attack on two Saudi Aramco pumping stations “proves that these militias are merely a tool that Iran’s regime uses to implement its expansionist agenda in the region.”

A state-aligned Saudi newspaper went further, running an editorial calling for “surgical” U.S. strikes on Iran in retaliation. Iran has been accused by the U.S. and the U.N. of supplying ballistic missile technology and arms to the Houthis, which Tehran denies.

The Arab News editorial, published in English, said it’s “clear that (U.S.) sanctions are not sending the right message” and that “they must be hit hard,” without elaborating on what specific targets should be struck.

ETA: Hey, how’s Kushner’s Middle East Peace plan working out?

[septimus]

Saudi Arabia’s deputy defense minister, Prince Khalid bin Salman, tweeted that the drone attack on two Saudi Aramco pumping stations “proves that these militias are merely a tool that Iran’s regime uses to implement its expansionist agenda in the region.”

How much are those pumping stations worth? A pittance for the House of Saud, right?

I won’t rule out that Saudi might be the False Flag operator. They’re certainly evil enough. I think they may be watching Putin and feeling jealous: “Hey, we saw Trump the Chump first. Let us have some of that!”

[Snowboarder_Bo]

I just realized that i have not read or heard of even one Republican saying that “we shouldn’t be the world’s policeman” about this. In fact, I can’t find anyone saying it, from either side of the aisle.

[HurricaneDitka]

@Snowboarder_Bo

I just realized that i have not read or heard of even one Republican saying that “we shouldn’t be the world’s policeman” about this. In fact, I can’t find anyone saying it, from either side of the aisle.

President Trump said it last year. That wasn’t “about this” Iranian escalation, but it does serve to highlight his generally non-interventionist / isolationist / anti-globalist attitude.

This opinion piece by James Carafano is now ten days old, but said (about Iran):

The U.S. is not the world’s policeman or its babysitter, but it doesn’t want to be blindsided by bad actors who think Washington is so preoccupied elsewhere that they can take advantage of the situation. Thus, the U.S. has to demonstrate it is present and capable of acting where it needs to.

Tucker Carlson didn’t use the “world policeman” phrase, but he was forcefully advocating against a military intervention against Iran. The Young Turks host tweeted:

In the bizarro world we live in @TuckerCarlson is the only anchor on cable forcefully advocating for peace. While @MSNBC dutifully beats the drums of war, Carlson is pointing out the obvious - war with Iran would be an epic disaster. When Tucker is more progressive than you …

[KarlGauss]

@Hurricane Ditka

The U.S. is not the world’s policeman or its babysitter, but it doesn’t want to be blindsided by bad actors who think Washington is so preoccupied elsewhere that they can take advantage of the situation. Thus, the U.S. has to demonstrate it is present and capable of acting where it needs to.

Great idea.

Next step is to be sure to leave enough of your troops in harm’s way around the world so that the US can demonstrate its might anywhere, for any reason, just by claiming its soldiers are threatened.

And if claims of threats aren’t enough, well, false-flags can be waved and not just by the bad guys.

[KidCharlemagne]

@iiandyiiii

Abandoning the Iran nuclear deal was IMO the most catastrophic foreign policy blunder since the invasion of Iraq, and with the potential to be even worse. Just incredibly stupid policy.

I think it was a bigger blunder if you weight it for obviousness. At least there was a possibility of a gain from the Iraq war. Leaving the Iran deal was a pretty obvious net loss to the US.

[Snowboarder_Bo]

This should relieve everyone: Trump tries to tamp down talk of war with Iran.

President Donald Trump said Thursday that he hopes the U.S. is not on a path to war with Iran amid fears that his two most hawkish advisers could be angling for such a conflict with the Islamic Republic.

Asked if the U.S. was going to war with Iran, the president replied, “I hope not” — a day after he repeated a desire for dialogue, tweeting, “I’m sure that Iran will want to talk soon.”

The tone contrasted with a series of moves by the U.S. and Iran that have sharply escalated tensions in the Middle East in recent days. For the past year, national security adviser John Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have been the public face of the administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran.

“We’re squeezing really hard right now and we hope they cry “uncle” before we start dropping bombs” is how I read that.

[bobot]

I read it more like: “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing, do I sound tough?”

[Walken_After_Midnight]

It’s good cop, bad cop. Things are so fucked up that Donald Trump is the “good cop”.

On top of that, there’s Madman theory going on. Plus general craziness etc.

[Gray_Ghost]

Trump’s a bunch of things. Rude on Twitter, opens mouth and inserts both feet, grabs 'em by the pussy, etc… But running for office, he was fairly alone among Republicans (other than Rand and Ron Paul) by asking what the point of OIF was, why do we still have troops there, why are we in NATO and where are they going to start paying us for the privilege, etc… Contra Mr “Bring em on!”, I don’t see Trump spinning up a conflict for shits and giggles. He has other things to occupy his time, like the ever skyrocketing federal debt, and whether we’re headed to another recession.

I do see all of this as a reaction to increased sanctions against Iran, and those were inspired by the perception the Iranians were cheating their asses off on how much nuclear weaponizeable material they could generate. A deal isn’t any good if only one side is following it. I guess your opinion about this depends on whether you think the Iranians were cheating, and if so, does it matter if the Iranian government gains possession of nuclear weapons. If you don’t really care about either point, then it’s not worth starting sanctions, and having to fade the temper tantrum of the Straits of Hormuz being interdicted.

If you do care, then what’s the exit strategy? Iran isn’t going to stop enrichment unless they’re forced to. Sanctions don’t look like they’re enough force, as troubling as they threaten to the Iranian regime… The Sunni nations won’t be satisfied, or defer their own special weapons programs, unless the Iranians stop. And clearly these sanctions are enough of a PITA, that Iran is allegedly engaging in overt military action Understandably so: what else have they to sell besides oil/gas, really?

The tanker strikes were a warning. If caused by limpet mines, they were small ones, estimated to not be able to crack a double hulled VLCC. They could easily be larger ones. No one saw the little ones being placed; odds are people won’t notice big ones being applied either. The Houthi drone strikes against the cross Arabia pipelines are another attempt to demonstrate that an attempt to bypass a Hormuz blockade will be costly.

Costs are the point. How much is it worth, to continue sanctions, suffer an Iranian oil interdiction campaign, and maybe have Shia sympathizers commit terrorist acts in one’s country?

[KarlGauss]

@Gray_Ghost

Trump’s a bunch of things. Rude on Twitter, opens mouth and inserts both feet, grabs 'em by the pussy, etc… But running for office, he was fairly alone among Republicans (other than Rand and Ron Paul) by asking what the point of OIF was, why do we still have troops there, why are we in NATO and where are they going to start paying us for the privilege, etc… Contra Mr “Bring em on!”, I don’t see Trump spinning up a conflict for shits and giggles. He has other things to occupy his time, like the ever skyrocketing federal debt, and whether we’re headed to another recession.
. . .

How about as a distraction, plain and simple? Whether it comes to military action is just a secondary concern, if it all, to Trump. He just needs to ‘rally the nation’ except in his case the nation is red.

[Snowboarder_Bo]

@Gray_Ghost

Costs are the point. How much is it worth, to continue sanctions, suffer an Iranian oil interdiction campaign, and maybe have Shia sympathizers commit terrorist acts in one’s country?

Aye: costs are a point. Another is goals. And the value placed on those goals.

[Horatius]

@Gray_Ghost

I do see all of this as a reaction to increased sanctions against Iran, and those were inspired by the perception the Iranians were cheating their asses off on how much nuclear weaponizeable material they could generate. A deal isn’t any good if only one side is following it. I guess your opinion about this depends on whether you think the Iranians were cheating, and if so, does it matter if the Iranian government gains possession of nuclear weapons. If you don’t really care about either point, then it’s not worth starting sanctions, and having to fade the temper tantrum of the Straits of Hormuz being interdicted.

If you do care, then what’s the exit strategy? Iran isn’t going to stop enrichment unless they’re forced to. Sanctions don’t look like they’re enough force, as troubling as they threaten to the Iranian regime… The Sunni nations won’t be satisfied, or defer their own special weapons programs, unless the Iranians stop. And clearly these sanctions are enough of a PITA, that Iran is allegedly engaging in overt military action Understandably so: what else have they to sell besides oil/gas, really?

It should be noted that essentially nothing you’ve said here about Iran’s nuclear program in anywhere close to accurate. Essentially everyone but Trump and his supporters are of the opinion that Iran is, even now, abiding by the terms of the deal that Trump trashed.

The Next U.S. President Should Rejoin the Iran Nuclear Deal

Two Years on, the Iran Deal is Working

Iran still holding up its end of nuclear deal, IAEA report shows

[Snowboarder_Bo]

Trump, ever the statesman…

If Iran wants to fight, that will be the official end of Iran. Never threaten the United States again!

“Again?” :dubious: