Iran/US conflict

[Skybird]

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/01/08/p...ors/index.html


Ha, I waited for it.

[ET2SN]

Originally Posted by Jeff-Groves

I'd sleep better at night if I didn't know someone actually believes that!


Here's the challenge now.
Try to post without ignorance of facts.

I'd say we get 3 responses with actual proven facts before it breaks down.
Tick Tok people! I ain't stay up all night to see nonsense.

Aw, geez. I'm sorry my conversation with someone else disappointed you.

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by August

But no Americans were injured and no American assets were damaged. Leveling their oil fields or cities would be a tad over reactive don't ya think?
Apparently he has instituted more economic sanctions. What else or instead should he have done in response?

I just believe if he's gonna talk tough, he should follow through.

[ET2SN]

Originally Posted by Aktungbby

besides, I never quibble with a skilled professional who can tell whale farts from cold war Soviet subs opening their outer torpedo ports

I wasn't a sonar tech, I ruined my hearing listening to radar.

I could also take a whizz without sitting down, thank you, so definitely not a sonar tech.

If the whales felt gassy, it wasn't my problem.

[ikalugin]

 

Originally Posted by Aktungbby

SO WAS MINE! HE INFORMED IN THE SIXTIES THAT I WOULDN'T BE HERE IF NOT FOR THE BOMB. HE FLEW B 29'S IN WWII AND WAS ON TINIAN WHEN THE ENOLA GAY TOOK OFF. SAVING AMERICAN LIVES CAME FIRST BUT O'L JOE STALIN FIGURED INTO THE EQUATION....https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Events/1945/potsdam_decision.htm THE REPERCUSSIONS OF THE STALIN LANDGRAB ARE STILL EVIDENT TODAY: JAPAN STILL DOES NOT HAVE BACK THE KURIL ISLANDS AS RUSSIA NEVER RETURNED THEM. AFTER ACQUIRING THEM DURING STALIN'S TOKEN ASSISTANCE TO AID THE ALLIES AGAINST JAPAN. IT IS WORTH NOTING THAT KIM JUNG UN'S TEST MISSILES AVOID NARROWLY GOING NEAR 'RUSSIAN TERRITORY' PREFERRING TO AGGRAVATE JAPANESE TERITORY: < Habomai, Shikotan, Kunashiri and Etorofu. ARE THE DISPUTED TERRITORIES HELD ILLEGALLY BY RUSSIA SINCE 1945. https://www.mofa.go.jp/region/europe/russia/territory/overview.html UNDER NEGOTIATION TO THIS DAY AND THE DPRK MAKES GOOD USE OF THE GEOGRAPHIC LOOPHOLE AS PUTIN "DOTH NOT PROTEST" HIS N. KOREAN ALLY'S NUKE MISSILE TESTS TOO MUCH. AMAZING HOW POTSDAM CONFERENCE 1945 STILL AFFECTS THE PACIFIC REGION MORE THAN HALF A CENTURY LATER....THE CHINESE IN THE SOUTH CHINA SEA ISLAND DISPUTES ARE JUST KEEPING UP WITH THEIR 'COMMIE' BUDDIES IN THE KURILS IMHO.

"Token assistance" that was a more significant factor in Japanese decision making than the two nuclear attacks as it broke the last major Japanese grouping in Manchuria and (through Soviet entry into the war with Japan) any chance of negotiated surrender (that they were hoping for - through Soviets)?

I see that the myth that US atomic bombings were the decisive factor is strong with you, but then the post was in capslock so I am uncertain if it was serious.

 

Note that Japanese actually released the islands during the original WW2 resolution negotiations but backtracked by the 1960s.

[ikalugin]

Originally Posted by August

Well kinda but the Soviets already knew the potential power of an atomic bomb and their spies had kept them informed as to our progress in making them so our use of a nuke against Japan might have had a proof in the pudding benefit to it but I think the edge that the writer you quoted was really talking about was just our possession of them.

Yes, when Truman informed Stalin about the Trinity test Stalin did not respond in any major way because he already new about the test and Truman, from what I recall, misinterpreted this lack of enthusiasm as ignorance of the nuclear capability.

[ikalugin]

Originally Posted by ET2SN

I've seen that argument and it supposes that the US leadership was omnipotent in terms of Russia while it was fighting a war in the Pacific.
If I had to guess, 99.999% of the US strategy was aimed at Japan and not at Russia.

The US had experience with Russia in terms of Lend/Lease so I think they had a good idea of who they were dealing with. The US didn't "want" Russia involved with the Japanese invasion in their over-all strategy. The US also understood why Germany failed to invade Russia (massive land mass where casualties weren't that important to the Russians) and that the Russian presence in the western Pacific was marginal, to say the least.

Also consider what happened to the USAAF/USAF between 1945 and 1950. If the US was concentrating on Russia that much, why did they "build down" the force?

I wonder why US demanded Soviet entry into the war with Japan after victory over Germany then and why while both parties were planning landing operations on the main Japanese islands (which for the Soviets would have been continuation of existing island hopping campaign - from Kurils and Sakhalin to Hokaido) US was assisting the Soviets in building up the relevant amphib capabilities.

Really makes you think, but then yes, US did get Japanese to the point where they were ready to tip over and go for negotiated surrender, with Soviet entry into the war pushing them from that position to unconditional surrender that Allies agreed upon.

As to the USAF build down - US assumed that it would have nuclear monopoly for longer and that the nuclear weapons could win wars by themselves, with nuclear weapons requiring fewer delivery systems than the conventional bombs.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Onkel Neal

I just believe if he's gonna talk tough, he should follow through.

One should act like that, yes, but what did you expect? He is
a.) a politician
b.) an opportunist
c.) a careless man
d.) sees himself as a "deal-maker"
e.) has blinked before, and repeatedly
f.) said he wants no more new wars, but get the US out of the existing ones.


I doubted before that he would be the tough basterd he poses to be if he raises a bluff and someobdy calls cards.


He won a small scoring, yes, the bad guy is dead, but not without the Us strategic weight paying a high price for it. The Iranian regime emerges stronger than before from this, Amwerican reputation suffers another blow and appears weaker from this.


In other words: he cooks his coffee with ordinary water, too, like everybody before him did as well. No messiah. No superman. Its all bluff, shine, and facade. And before somebody now says: "But look at the stocks values" - my reply is look at the parallel development of the "Bilanzsumme" (balance sheet totals?) of the ECB and FED - then you know were the stock "value" is coming from, and at what longterm cost. They are at record heights. And these records are a disaster and anything but positive. Its all shine and facade. Also, their standings are a trap from which there is no escape. Try to reduce them - and see what happens. Damned if you do, damned if you don 't. Its blown up. Its called a bubble.

[Mr Quatro]

Gentlemen this is not a WWII thread

Looks like I was right

https://endtimeheadlines.org/2020/01...K0r-zMyxOja5eQ

A plane that crashed killing 176 people hours after an Iranian missile strike on US bases was “likely” shot down and wreckage shows “obvious projectile holes”, experts say. The Kiev-bound Ukraine International Airlines jet came down shortly after taking off from Tehran Airport in Iran this morning, killing everyone on board.

[Jimbuna]

The US says it is "ready to engage without preconditions in serious negotiations" with Iran following the countries' exchange of hostilities.

In a letter to the UN, the US justified the killing of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani as an act of self-defence.

Iran retaliated by firing missiles at airbases housing US forces in Iraq, causing no casualties. It also told the UN it was an act of self-defence.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-51043559

No doubt this article, if true, will be a little contentious depending on which side your viewpoint/opinion is on.

[mapuc]

True strength is not the ability to crush your enemy, but the ability to forgive his aggression.

Markus

[Aktungbby]

Originally Posted by mr quatro

Looks like I was right

Well if they can do that so can we; in which case the shoot down by the USS VINCENNES of Iran Air 655 in 1988, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655 is now a forgiveable offence!!?? I wonder if the Iranian Postal Service will create a stamp out of it this time? Oh wait when they do it it's the Will of Allah; when we do it it's Infidel Evil ??!!

The event sparked an intense international controversy, with Iran condemning the attack. In mid-July 1988, Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati asked the United Nations Security Council to condemn the United States saying the attack "could not have been a mistake" and was a "criminal act", a "massacre", and an "atrocity". George H. W. Bush, at the time vice president of the United States in the Reagan administration, defended his country at the United Nations by arguing that the U.S. attack had been a wartime incident and that the crew of Vincennes had acted appropriately to the situation.

@ mr. quarto: apologies! I know this is not an Iran-Iraq War thread either! but the Iranians are still pissed about it:

 

Nine months after the downing of Iran Air Flight 655, on the morning of March 10, 1989, Rogers' wife Sharon escaped uninjured when a pipe bomb exploded and set fire to her minivan as she sat stopped at a red light across the street from the University Towne Center shopping mall in San Diego. The van was registered in the name of Will Rogers III, and many people at the time of the bombing suspected that terrorism was involved. Five months later, the Associated Press reported that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had shifted focus away from terrorism towards the possibility of someone with a personal vendetta against Captain Rogers. As of 2003, the bombing of Rogers' van remains an unsolved case, despite a major investigation involving at some time up to 300 police and FBI agents. On February 17, 1993, the case was featured on the TV show Unsolved Mysteries, but no additional information was uncovered. 31 years after the incident, in July 2019, the Iranian English-language newspaper Tehran Times published a letter addressing Rogers personally, asking him, eighty years old at the time, to confess to willfully shooting down the airliner.

[Skybird]

Oooops! US claims Iran shot down Ukrainian airplane with a missile, by mistake.


P.S., Sorry Mr. quattro. I lost track of what is going on due to all that WW2 reference here.

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by mapuc

True strength is not the ability to crush your enemy, but the ability to forgive his aggression.

Markus

Uh, disagree

[ikalugin]

Originally Posted by Onkel Neal

Uh, disagree

If I may:

Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting. The best victory is when the opponent surrenders of its own accord before there are any actual hostilities... It is best to win without fighting.