# Speculation for and/or Consequences to the US and Elsewhere for Engaging in the Bombing of Iran and Other Targets **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Tags:** iran-strikes-2026\ **Created:** [March 4, 2026, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210 "2026-03-04T22:01:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 18
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2026, 10:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/341 "2026-03-31T10:53:29Z")
What if there is a catastrophic failure where dozens of Marines die at once. Remember the Jimmy Carter hostage rescue debacle, or the Reagan Marine barracks disaster? Would an unambiguous defeat move his needle away from further escalation? ---
**Author:** ![Ellecram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellecram/32/18948_2.png) [@Ellecram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellecram)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2026, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/342 "2026-03-31T11:20:56Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > Would an unambiguous defeat move his needle away from further escalation? I am not sure anything is predictable with this administration. Unpredictability is one of their defining characteristics. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2026, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/343 "2026-03-31T11:46:23Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > What if there is a catastrophic failure where dozens of Marines die at once. Remember the Jimmy Carter hostage rescue debacle, or the Reagan Marine barracks disaster? Would an unambiguous defeat move his needle away from further escalation? It might. _Or_ it might do the opposite and convince them to double down, or go all the way to dropping nukes. While one can predict in broad terms that everything Trump does will be motivated purely by selfishness and malice, not even he knows the details of what he’ll do. He’s too stupid and too deep in dementia for that. Trying to predict exactly what the Mad King will do is futile. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2026, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/344 "2026-03-31T15:04:22Z")
And here’s a predictable consequence; [Gas prices have now topped $4/gallon nationally.](https://gasprices.aaa.com/) ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/345 "2026-04-01T01:06:10Z")
> [@Speculation About Trump's Underlying Reasons for Bombing Iran and Other Targets](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-about-trumps-underlying-reasons-for-bombing-iran-and-other-targets/1028209/214): > > He’ll probably declare victory and pull out within a few weeks and let Iran control Hormuz…and pretty much guarantee Iran will secretly develop nukes as a deterrent for another stupid war. This increases the likelihood of a pre-emptive nuclear strike by Netanyahu. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/346 "2026-04-01T01:10:40Z")
Even supposing for a second anyone could use nukes and get away with it, what would he nuke, and why? Nuclear bunker-busters instead of the MOPs that failed to destroy Iran’s nuclear program? (Sorry, I mean they were “completely and totally obliterated”… next time they will be sent into nuclear, not merely conventional, oblivion!) ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/347 "2026-04-01T01:28:12Z")
Population centers. Civilian infrastructure. Industrial locations. Pretty much the same model they used in Gaza, just scaled up. Iran might be hiding nuclear sites anywhere. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/348 "2026-04-01T01:50:05Z")
And now that they’ve enshrined into law a [racially based judicial system](https://www.aol.com/entertainment/israel-passes-death-penalty-law-182000282.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuYmluZy5jb20v&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAIAD1MdMUvw_H6-dz-aQISm51-VJJw8EHSGaXtcZC2oS-XgqKtcxcqacwbln-eFTzO5ivl5QqzULh45422_Kb7SfeNLwywYcCssPW0zAZUFkW2soj7zRWVI1l5G5JtaxYcrizv2sTHoioCREGUN3Liyl85vglT0j6Q1-gC6hDgrL), they can just declare all Iranians to be “terrorists”, and this justifies the death penalty for all of them. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/349 "2026-04-01T01:57:36Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > Even supposing for a second anyone could use nukes and get away with it, what would he nuke, and why? Killing tens of millions of Muslims is a good enough reason to use nukes for people like this. A worthy goal in itself. I’ve listened to & read many people like that for decades. This _is_ a religious war, and always has been. > [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > Population centers. Civilian infrastructure. Industrial locations. Pretty much the same model they used in Gaza, just scaled up. Iran might be hiding nuclear sites anywhere. I think that Netanyahu would try to egg Trump on into using nukes himself, first. Trump has more, and letting him eat the international blow-back instead of himself obviously benefits Netanyahu. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/350 "2026-04-01T02:02:54Z")
Trump likely thinks that nuclear weapons are just a bigger Kaboom. And he’ll like that he made the biggest Kaboom ever in history. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/351 "2026-04-01T02:11:16Z")
And there’s been a number of accounts about how he’s been barely talked down from using them before. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 11:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/352 "2026-04-01T11:17:51Z")
Apparently Israel is going to use this as an excuse to try to permanently displace everyone in south Lebanon. [https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-destroy-all-houses-near-lebanon-border-defence-minister-says-2026-03-31/](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-destroy-all-houses-near-lebanon-border-defence-minister-says-2026-03-31/) ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/353 "2026-04-01T11:55:23Z")
No message. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2026, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/354 "2026-04-02T15:23:29Z")
Trump appears to be abandoning any hope of dislodging Iranian control over the Strait of Hormuz. > **[The Opening of Trump’s Box - The American Prospect](https://prospect.org/2026/04/02/opening-of-trumps-box-iran-war-strait-hormuz/)** > > Iran has put a tollgate across the Strait of Hormuz. This fundamentally changes the global economy. This basically means Iran has a “toll gate” over the Strait. That could literally double or more the Iranian government’s revenue. Tons and tons of money for new weapons and even nuclear weapons development. And all of this was foreseeable. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2026, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/355 "2026-04-02T15:27:00Z")
During the Yom Kippur war, whether Israel was considering using nukes, bluffing about their capability, or used the mention of nukes to spur a quicker ceasefire, one result was that the Soviet Union stationed tactical nukes in Egypt and the U.S. went to DEFCON 3. They could not have conceivably _launched_ nukes and hoped to survive the resulting nuclear war as a recognizable entity and government. You would hope that the same holds for Iran _and_ Israel today. Note that it is not a pure MAD scenario, as there are third-party ultimata involved (e.g., the US/Russia/China privately making it clear that nukes are off the table). ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2026, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/356 "2026-04-02T15:30:17Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > This basically means Iran has a “toll gate” over the Strait. $100 billion a year; not too shabby. Are American and Israeli ships still excluded? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2026, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/357 "2026-04-02T15:35:38Z")
What is the reporting like in Israel, @Alessan? Here (from what I’m seeing, anyway), it seems very clear that Iran is winning, will keep control of the Strait indefinitely, and Trump is a few days or weeks away from declaring an absurd victory and abandoning the war. How is Israeli media reporting this? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2026, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/358 "2026-04-02T15:41:30Z")
One lesson from this war - bad leaders (like Trump and Netanyahu) are very bad for their countries. But in ways everyone knows about. But bad leaders starting a war? That’s just catastrophic. Economically, militarily, morally… this war appears to have basically shattered the world’s geopolitical and financial order around the Persian Gulf. There will be ramifications, largely negative (except maybe for Iran, China, and a few others), for years and maybe decades. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2026, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/359 "2026-04-02T20:43:41Z")
From Josh Marshall: [https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/always-stuck-in-the-1950s-trump-courts-his-own-suez](https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/always-stuck-in-the-1950s-trump-courts-his-own-suez) > But it still looks like what no one is quite yet willing to call a massive, almost unimaginable strategic defeat. Taking Iran, which after the events of 2024 and 2025 was weaker than it had been in almost 50 years, and allowing it to emerge from a direct military confrontation with the United States as arbiter of a quarter of 20% of the global supply of oil and gas, simply beggars belief. We may have just made Iran a global trade power. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2026, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210/360 "2026-04-02T21:18:45Z")
Paul Krugman has been saying in his Substack that Iran has won for a couple of weeks now. He has good arguments in favour of this thesis. He repeated it today: > **[Trump Doesn't Even Have the Courage to Run Away](https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/trump-doesnt-even-have-the-courage?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=277517&post_id=192942938&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=203721&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email)** > > What the world learned from his big speech > One of the moments that really struck me in the speech was him declaring that the whole world was extremely impressed by what happened. He said, > > _the whole world is watching and they can’t believe the power, strength and brilliance. They just can’t believe what they’re seeing. The world can’t believe what it’s seeing._ > > What it’s seeing is that the world’s greatest military power took on a fourth-rate power. Again, as I said the other day, Iran’s military budget is a rounding error in our military budget. **And we lost.** For all practical purposes, we’ve left ourselves in a much weaker position and Iran in a stronger position than it was before. Bolding mine. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210.md?page=17) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculation-for-and-or-consequences-to-the-us-and-elsewhere-for-engaging-in-the-bombing-of-iran-and-other-targets/1028210.md?page=19)