We Were "This Close" Says Iran

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/worl...if-tells-nbc-news/ar-BB100VbS?ocid=spartandhp

In others words, The US and Trump tested us and came out on top.

That country is pathetic from how they treat their own people to their continue blustering on the world stage.

But I'm biased, I've been hating them since the 70s.

 

What would they have done? If someone killed our top general I'd hope wed smash them.

 

They came closer than did we.

 

If our top general was like Iran’s we should smash him.

 

Also agreed but he was serving iran and iran didnt have much of a problem

 

What an incredibly whiny guy. I guess that if all your government can do is posture then whiny tends to be where you end up. Iran has spent years acting tough. I guess that is easy when most of the people you are facing are civilians, lightly armed militias or disorganised remnants of second rate militaries. The moment they are faced with a foe who can hit hard they wet their pants and retreat. Much as I dislike the guy, Trump got this one right.

 

And they been hating you since you installed a dictator you wanted so you could own their oil and profit from their resources.

But you are entitled to their oil and have the right to choose who rules over the Iranians .

They should hate you whereas you have no reason to hate them except for shits and giggles .

Of course we should be able to run over other nations and pick their rulers anytime our corporations want to profit from the resources of other nations . Clearly that is what you and other criminals believe .

Some Americans dont want to operate like *******ned ccriminals . And we think criminals should be in jail.

 

They were really not as close to war with the U.S. as they seem to think they were.

Iran cannot afford a war with the U.S., and, luckily for them, Trump doesn't want a war with them.

The Soleimani killing was just sending a message, not an escalation to war.

 

And what a message it was! Well planned, well timed and well executed.

 

While Iran's foreign minister, and the track he is following on behalf of an administration (Rouhani and company) which has lost all of its mandate, can be characterized in any fashion you wish and I am not going to quibble with it much, the facts cannot be buried under spin and delusional propaganda.

The US assassination of General Soleimani was followed by an overt, acknowledged, and direct retaliation by Iran -- this despite public and official threats (including in the message sent to Iran through the Swiss) of "massive retaliation" in case Iran responded to the assassination by doing exactly what it did. While Iran did not start an all out war against the US, it hit back at the US with sufficient force and its attack (regardless of casualties) cause substantial damage to the Al Asad air base. In this context, it was the US that backed down, not Iran, which had prepared to take the issue further if the US had retaliated. These are facts regardless of the spin by the anti-Iran crowd who have been itching for a fight with Iran, but have never shown the stomach to go through with it.

This is not the first time Iran has shown US threats to be empty bluster nor will it be the last. While there is no denying that the US did engage in a direct act of war against Iran by assassinating General Soleimani while on an official visit in Iraq, and even admitting that action by the US will require a lot more than Iran's attack against the Al Asad air base to fully avenge, the actual contest between Iran and the US and its outcome will be decided based on who ends up prevailing across the many theaters which see Iran and the US pitted against one another. In Iraq, in Lebanon, in Syria, in Yemen, in the Persian Gulf and in Iran itself. In all these theaters, Iran has been able to thwart the US designs. While Iran's victory in none of these theaters is complete, in all of them, the prospects of a US victory look dim. And they look even worse now after General Soleimani's assassination than before.

 

If the USAs top general was anything like qasem soleimani, the very well armed US civilians would have taken him out for the murder and torture of his own citizens.

Remember just a few months before he was killed the Republican Guard slaughtered 900 civilians and imprisoned who knows how many others.

if an American General did that and got away with it, then we can compare USA and Iran.

 

The only 'official visit' your dead terrorist leader got was one by a hellfire missile straight up his ass.



'Thwarting designs'....AKA terrorism against American servicemen.

You can talk all big......and then go shoot down another airliner full of Iranians. Yeah, you guys are super competent. We are literally shaking in our boots over here.

 

I appreciate your message and I wish more Americans were, indeed, interested in making sure there country would not be acting like it has been acting for too long. But I like to be clear: the 1953 coup, and US support for the Shah, was not remotely among America's greatest sins against Iran. In fact, while the 1953 coup was significant in understanding certain historical issues relevant to the Iranian revolution and the so-called 'hostage crisis', the real issues between Iran and the US are about things of a much more recent vintage.

The majority of the people in Iran, tired of decades of overt and covert war against the US, were willing to trust those who told them that a reconciliation between the two sides was possible only if Iran accepted not to build nukes and entered into the fraud called the JCPOA. In fact, the entire reason d'etre and mandate from the Rouhani administration, flowed from and stemmed from that sentiment. And once the Trump administration did what even a Hillary administration would have done (albeit, in the case of the latter, in less obvious, less unilaterial fashion, focusing instead on ways to impose sanctions based on other pretexts while keeping the "JCPOA" alive on paper but not in deed), the people in Iran realized that the only real options they have are either to submit to US imperialist design or to resist. Today, the overwhelming majority in Iran have chosen the path of resistance. Of course, there are those (including even in the government of president Rouhabi) which want to follow the course of appeasement, but they represent the 5th column within Iran. The Rouhani administration itself has lost all of its mandate and even Zarif, who was once a popular figure in Iran, is increasingly viewed with contempt by the Iranian people.

 

Iran knows USA can take out any military asset larger than a jeep in about a week. The US would have no desire to put boots on the ground so it would be a great big turkey shoot that would render Iran unable to do the meddling they love to do.

Sometimes I wonder why USA doesn't just do exactly that.

 

Exactly. There is NO comparison nor will there ever be except in the minds of the dazed and confused.

 

Yeah yeah yeah, the JCPOA....you guys violated it like one month after it was signed.

Your people and your country celebrate a national holiday on November 4th...."Death to America Day".

We you quit acting like barbarians, Americans might be inclined to show a little trust. But for now, your leaders are ****.

 

And they got two for the price of one.

 

Yup LOL

 

I am not here to give people who are interested in chest thumping and empty bluster, history lessons, but here is a quick review of how things stand between Iran and the US in the theaters which have pitted the two sides against one another.

Lebanon: the president of Lebanon is an ally of Hezbollah and the latter is more powerful, better armed, with a lot more missiles and means to destroy Israel, than when Israel (with US support) tried to disarm it in 2006. In the meantime, the delusions of setting up a philangist minority government in Lebanon under US/Israel thumb came crashing, with the US leaving Lebanon after its marine compounds were leveled. And with Israel itself pushed out of southern Lebanon by Hezbollah.

Iraq: once the regime used as a tool against Iran got too big for its britches, and the hundreds of billions and all the arms and armaments sent to Saddam got into his head, the US took out Iran's enemy in an attempt to install a friendly regime in that country. And as part of a larger agenda which saw Iraq as a base to be used to destabilize and use against Iran. Through many twists and turns, and events which I can describe in greater detail for those who might be interested in the facts and not propaganda, the ultimate situation right now can be best described as a 'stalemate' with a trajectory that favors Iran. Even if Iran has not yet 'won' the Iraq war, as the Pentagon itself claimed in its official history of the Iraq war, Iran is even closer to that victory today than it was before General Soleimani's assassination. Of course, the seeds of that victory, and Iran's ability to thwart the US and its designs, owe a lot gratitude to General Soleimani. And the US might have felt itself as having exacted revenge to feel better for its loss by assassinating him.

Syria: despite the "Assad must go mantra", it was ultimately Iran that saved Assad when no one else was doing anything but to undercut his regime. Nonetheless, after Iran decided that Russia's help would assist the effort to defeat the full range of forces being set up against Assad, with practically all the powers in the world having their hands in trying to take Assad and his regime out of the 'axis of resistance', the increasing role of Russia in Syria (most recently, with US and Israeli backing essentially) has been at Iran's expense. Right now, while the US/Israel did not win their fight in Syria, neither did Iran. Iran limited the loss and the land bridge to Hezbollah is still operating and open. In some ways, in fact, Iran's position in Syria is even stronger today than it was before the Syrian civil war. Assad is still in power and there are many allied Iranian forces and bases in that country. But Iran's own position in Syria is admittedly less than stable. Russia has been the main victor from the Syrian civil war waged against Iran, even if the real losers have been the coalition against Assad (led by the US) and not Iran.

Yemen: the dozen or so countries, backed by the US and Britain, and led by the Saudis, which had predicted to defeat the Houthis in a few weeks, have been stuck in a war which has resembled (for the Saudis and their 'coaltion') America's experience in Vietnam. Everyone realizes that war has been pretty much lost, even if there are efforts to find a face saving ways for the Saudis to accept that defeat.

In Iran itself, the constant propaganda trying to highlight the activities of a small group within the country notwithstanding, it is quite obvious that the assassination of General Soleimani has simply made any serious hope of causing an implosion from within look like a distant and foolish dream. Tens of millions of Iranians have become committed to the ideology of resistance, even if many of them were previously willing to find reconciliation with the US.

Anyway, I am not here to declare any side the 'winner' prematurely. This fight is still going and its outcome is yet to be told. But this is not going to be a war which the Americans are going to win by spin and propaganda. The latter only works for their own base within America. In the region, the facts speak clearly and those facts aren't what some people like to claim.

 

Thanks for the propaganda IR. I'm sure you'll find plenty of folks here just ready to lap it up. Those among us who are adults unencumbered by ideology know exactly what happened. America killed a senior figure in Iran's regime and Iran gave a few US soldiers concussion, then blew up a Ukrainian plane. The regime humiliated itself and looked weak. If characterising that as some sort of US backdown helps Iranians deal with the massive loss of face & exposure of their weakness then few of us who have been paying attention will be surprised.

Iran's economy is in tatters; protesters are shot down in the streets; Iraqis from across their religious & ethnic communities protest about Iranian influence (and get murdered for it by Iran's puppets); and if Iran wins 'victories' in the region it will be in broken nations it could not repair even if it wanted to. Again, if this somehow pumps up your tyres then good for you.

Can't wait for the day oil is no longer an important commodity. Then the rest of us will no longer have to care what happens in your part of the world.

 

Iran—a government that practices stonings and beheadings for dating, holding hands, kissing, for choosing to live one’s own life according to one’s own wishes—is lecturing America on morality? What’s next, Weinstein lecturing women about respect?

The world is upside down backwards.

 

Exactly. The U.S. wouldn't put a single boot on their soil, but we would do a lot of damage. We could put them out of the oil business. We could hit every nuclear facility they've got. We could destroy every military aircraft they've got. Etc, etc, etc.

So no ... We weren't all that close to war with Iran. Killing Soliemani was a sending a message. We let them fire some missiles back at our base in Iraq, and then we ended it. We ended it because our President and our people do not want a war with Iran. But the message was clear. "Stop poking the grizzly."

 

No person who has any claim to any type of "morality", needs to engage in lies to make their point.

As for the US being able to do damage to Iran, that is understood. What is less understood, and what many people would like to hide, is the fact that the US would not be able to avoid significant damage to itself in any war with Iran. Indeed, if the US had taken any action against Iran directly in response to Iran's missile attack against the Al Asad air base, the entire region, tens of thousands of US forces, dozens of US bases, US vessels, and a lot more, would have been in flames. That is the reality and the rest is propaganda.

 

They could stop engaging in terrorism which is the problem they bring upon themselves.

 

Because as a constitutional republic the United States is not really set up to be a traditional sort of empire. Politically and fiscally we have become one, yes; but not via sustained military means . . . the length of our various engagement notwithstanding. We are great at getting bogged down, but our actual military effectiveness always depends on which political party and president has got effective control over our nation at what time. One president can initiate a war venture -- with a cooperative legislative branch -- and then the next president can scuttle it just on the brink of actually winning and do so even with an uncooperative legislative branch. That's just the nature of the United States.