Utopia Talk / Politics / Jerguls intervention

Habebe Member	Sun Jan 12 05:12:53 Our fellow poster Jergul is believed to be on some serious drugs.. I Present exhibit A "You ( the US) cannot currently attack Iran conventionally. Because they have a conventional deterrent that would destroy gazillions in US military hardware and you do not have the production capacity to replace it in a timely manner." To put this statement into Context we were discussing conventional and proxy militants. Irans strength is in its proxy militants while the US military shines at conventional military. His argument for Iran's great conventional detterent is when they retaliated against the killing of Solemani by hitting some US military sheds with toy rockets and shooting down a civilian plane with mostly Iranians in it.... this is kind of like when a guy takea a swing at you and steps on a take knocking himself out. So agaun we are not discussing proxy fights, nor are we discussing long drawn oit nation building but strictly conventional warfare.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 05:24:28 lol, I was reviewing the 2020 US DoD budget. You need 9.8 billion dollars for base reconstruction after being attacked by two hurricanes. My point was that the US shines at not fighting conventional high intensity conflicts. They never end well and that is always predicable at the start. In the case of Iran, it does have a robust conventional deterrent that it successfully demonstrated kinetically recently. We are therefore not speaking of conventional warfare, but rather how the US is deterred from engaging in conventional warfare with Iran.
Habebe Member	Sun Jan 12 05:28:07 Tell me more about Iran's great conventional military and how it is a detterent?
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 05:32:29 There is no doubt at all that the US would flatten Iran in a long, drawn out conflict. I am merely suggesting that the price of engaging in such a conflict is too high. Iran is not Clinton's Iraq where ordering punitive raids have little to no costs attached. Iran has a robust deterrent. Significant costs are attached to attacking it conventionally. I do not think the US will ever be willing to pay those costs. I could be wrong. The US president has dictatorial powers abroad, so he could just decide to ignore the price and attack anyway. Such is the random factor when a single individual gets to make decisions like that all by himself.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 05:35:27 I am talking only about its ballistic missile programmes Habebe. You suggested at the start that you did not want to consider other, assymetrical deterrents. Do you really want a crash course on Iran's ballistic missile capabilities and how it might impact on US base operations in its proximity? You could ask the folk at Al Asad AB. I think they have finally crawled out of their blast shelters.
Habebe Member	Sun Jan 12 05:57:46 Long drawn out conflict? Of a conventional war? The US wouldn't and doesnt want war with Iran becaise we do not want another afghanistan or Iraq where we are keeping forces there and nation building indefinitely. But what you are suggesting is that the Iranian military has the fire power to take out " gazillions" of us military equipment and that we would run out of the equipment because lack supply chains. You have even used as an example.of their military might when they recently killed there own by friendly fire......
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 05:58:00 http://missilethreat.csis.org/country/iran/ 101 Preparatory studies.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 06:06:52 You have gazillions of unprotected military hardware in proximity to Iran Habebe. Iran has the capability to essentially mission-kill bases in its proximity (as demonstrated by the hours your folk spent in blast shelters at the Al Asad AB). The 9.8 billion in damage from two hurricane attack illustrates the dilemma nicely, though is nothing compared to the havoc precision munitions can wreak. It is well known that all imaginable high intensity conflicts are fight with what you have. Production run-ups are way too slow to keep up with the pace of losses, write-offs, and expenditures. You had to empty your pre-positioned stores in Northern Norway to sustain Iraq. I suggested punitive raids like Clinton did with much less reason to Iraq in the 1990s. Why are you not doing that? Could it be that you are deterred?
Seb Member	Sun Jan 12 07:51:02 Habebe, jergul is correct. Iran's BMs are proven accurate enough and with enough range to hit with precision most US bases in the region. Its similar to North Korea now prior to when NK got the bomb. You have way too many assets and men that would be vulnerable to BMs, so any conventional move on Iran would, like the North Korea contingency plans, first require a significant withdrawal from the region, a protracted airwar (which requires overflight rights etc to be secured). But even then you have a lot of vulnerable fixed assets (the naval base in Qatar etc.) which would suffer heavy damage. Ultimately the US would succeede in degrading sure defences sufficiently to hunt down and destroy Iranian BM launchers. But in the mean time you'd have had to substantially withdraw from Iraq. Worse, I think Diego Garcia is in range of some of Iran's longer range missiles, which has a significant NSA footprint and the sheds they keep the B2s in are unhardened. This no longer looks like a Desert Fox or Kosovo war style punitive action, it's a months long conflict which has the potential to dislodge the US completely from the region. Once you pull out of bases, will you be allowed back in, particularly when you'll be declaring Iran defeated? And like Kosovo, you'd run out of targets before the Iranians make concessions. Recall there it was only when Blair got Europe on side for a ground invasion that Milosovec backed down. All of this looks very very expensive just in operational costs, let alone the cost in political capital and impact on strategic grip. Russia and China would be the ultimate benefactors I think.
Forwyn Member	Sun Jan 12 08:44:32 "You can't touch Saddam, he has the fourth largest army in the world, hardened from a decade of war, and they have an abundance of conventional countermeasures, including an array of mobile BMs and SAMs" jergul, 1989
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 09:03:54 Gaslighting I see. Nice! I was sure Iraq would get steamrolled. Just for the record. I was vexed more by US double communications (The US ambassador basically telling Iraq it was ok for it to invade Kuwait).
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 09:06:21 I was positively surprised that Bush did not opt for regime change. Seems he understood that if he took Iraq, then he would have Iraq. Some things are their own deterrents.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 09:09:20 "Mommy, I did a poo-poo" Forwyn, 1989.
Forwyn Member	Sun Jan 12 09:18:04 Don't gaslight me, jergul!
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 10:01:47 There are advantages to being around when you were literally nothing Forwyn. Sorry that facts hurt :).
Habebe Member	Sun Jan 12 10:31:14 Seb, Literally the last time they attempted to use such conventional rockets they shot down a civilian plane killing 82 Iranians ( over 100 if you count dual citizenship) We can see how battle ready they are.
Habebe Member	Sun Jan 12 10:46:35 As for two damaged military bases by hurricanes 2 damaged military bases out of like 800 doesn't seem that bad. Iran has some outdated us and Russian planes, practically no Navy and an economy thats in the tubes.... Iraq had the 4th largest Army in the world with plenty of rockets, at the time the best in the region iirc.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 10:59:11 Hababe I am trying to make sense of your argument. Try to rephrase The US has absolutely no reason to be deterred by the precision stand-off weapons in Irans arsenal because?
Sam Adams Member	Sun Jan 12 11:09:57 Yes, jergul and seb do exhibit many questionable mental red flags.
Sam Adams Member	Sun Jan 12 11:18:22 I do love how jergul rants about the awesomeness of soviet bloc weapons just to watch them hit 0 americans and then shoot down their own airliner instead. And then seb spends days trying to convince everyone it wasnt shot down. Lol. Its the axis of wrong.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 11:22:44 They are not awesome Sammy. Awesome is a fixed wing aircraft dropping many gravity bombs with glide kits attached to secure precision targeting. That gives bang for buck. What Iran has are expensive, one-shot delivery systems with a significant logistic tail.
Sam Adams Member	Sun Jan 12 11:27:16 That wasnt what you said last week. You were so confident iran was going to come off well against the US. Lol.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 11:31:24 A single 5-52 with 500 pound JDAM guided gravity bombs could have achieved the same thing the Iranians did much, much, much more efficiently.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 11:36:57 Iran was far, far more elegant than I suspected it would be. You do not see it, but Iran made a powerful capability demonstration by clustering the strikes so tightly. It mission-killed the base for at least 3 hours. The damage? Well, we will see. I am thinking high 100ds of millions to low billions. The DoD will definitely ask for funding, so we will know for sure in a while. Not as high as the 9 billion you lost when 2 hurricanes attacked two bases, but still.
Rugian Member	Sun Jan 12 11:42:24 Habebe - The thing you have to understand about jergul is that he is first and foremost a fifth columnist at heart. His entire raison d'etre is to sow the seeds of doubt and make us question our belief in the inherent moral and military superiority of Western Civilization, with the goal of turning us into nihilists who don't mind seeing our countries slowly descend into oblivion and make way for the rise of Russia and the other authoritarian Eastern powers. If you manage to directly confront jergul and stay on point, he will eventually (and grudgingly) admit that yes, in fact, the US and Europe could of course easily crush the likes of Russia or Iran in a conventional war. To claim otherwise would result in an instant loss of all credibility, which he can't afford. Until you get him to that point though, he will incessantly insert snarky comments about how Western military capabilities are inherently compromised against Soviet/Russian military tech. "Soviet truck-mounted rocket launchers could easily force the US to evacuate its entire force from the ME." "Russian SA-400 missiles mean that the US can no longer move its hardware around without incuring staggering losses." "The latest Sukhoi tech means that the US no longer enjoys air superiority in any theater in the world." etc. etc. All of this is of course nonsense, and none of his claims of a new global renaissance for Russian tech have been borne out by actual real-world events. That won't stop him from trying to convince you to believe otherwise. Also, for GW1, I totally don't believe he thought the US would crush Iraq back then. Conveniently for him though, UP didn't exist back then, so I guess we'll never know.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 11:52:03 Ruggy Wow, taking gaslighting to a new level I see. None of those faux quote are even remotely close to any position I have ever held (all the s-400 does is increase stand-off distances. Air defences measure their value in access denial). Western military dominance is fine. What is lacking is the balls to accept significant losses. So it does not demand much in the way of sophistication to deter significan military action. And lol. The ghost-shadow of a Warsawa pact military set-up fighting a western coalition with air supremacy in the desert? How was that supposed to end? Iraq could not even beat Iran. I was only surprised Bush was not drawn into mission creep and regime change. I was impressed.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 11:56:35 I was quite fond of Rommel's small treatese on airpower back in the day. And he was talking about how fucked he was facing air supremacy by 1940s piston engines. That was Rommel. You think I gave Saddam a chance in hell?
Sam Adams Member	Sun Jan 12 12:56:13 Rugian is correct.
Seb Member	Sun Jan 12 13:04:58 Habebe: That's the most amazing nonsequitur. The plane was shot down by a second or third teir sit defence battery, the ballistics missiles are different units and hit and destroyed their targets. In 2003, the US patriot battery shot down a British jet landing (big, slow) at the airbase they were defending despite it broadcasting iff, having mistaken it for an Iraqi anti radiation missile (small and fast). Does this mean the US isn't battle ready and that the performance of its cruise missiles is at doubt?
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 13:09:50 Shrug, the problem is mostly that you guys are unable to adapt to information that does not fit your world views. So 5th column me here and treason me there. The Soviets had a similar understanding of dissent. Anyone not able to see the inherent superiority of Soviet Socialism was either a traitor, or mentally ill. Like nimi says. You have one job. Be the good guys. Problem is, you keep fucking up and refusing to take own your fuckups.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 13:22:26 Seb I think that example clearly shows there was something wrong with the US nuclear triad.
Rugian Member	Sun Jan 12 13:23:49 jergul I find it bizarre that you won't admit that you have a tendency to massively over-inflate the military capabilities of the enemies of the West and express glee when those same enemies exploit US fuckups that you consider will result in a reduction of our strategic domination. It's kind of your thing bro. I wouldn't argue that such a mentality alone makes you an anti-Western traitor, for the record. If you really wanted me to produce a name for it, defeatist would probably be more appropriate. It's when such defeatist rhetoric is combined with your tendency to dismiss the importance of Western culture and traditions - indeed, to argue that Westerners themselves should reduce themselves to near-extinction - that I feel enough revulsion to start throwing around the "T" word. Once you put all the pieces together, it's hard to escape that conclusion. The West, and the US in particular, has major flaws and does commit major errors in judgement (see: Iraq War). I would still easily take them, flaws and all, over having the world be ruled by the Russian oligarchs, Iranian mullahs, and Chinese automatons that you somehow always seem to side with.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 13:39:01 That is your idea of what my thing is. What I actually provide are sober assessements of status, actions, consequences, and emerging challenges. This thread is a case in point. Me: Iran has precision munitions and the US has lots of assets within reach. Habebe: OMG - Jergul thinks Iran can defeat the US in a conventional war. The cure to defeatism is growing balls and be willing to accept signficant losses. Its an easy fix. If people are convinced it is worth it. The idea that people have to be onboard with wars for democracies to thrive at wars is as old as the greek polis and the soldier-citizen. The whole idea that we need to breed like rabbits to keep democracy alive is to me ultimate defeatism. The Western, Liberal, Democratic Tradition (with capitals and in bold type) thrives because it seduces. Not because it can outbreed the alternatives.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 13:43:35 The mockery populism makes of the WLDT is a self-defeating poison. If our version of democracy no longer seduces, then it cannot prevail. Or like Nimi says: 1 job. Be the good guys.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 13:54:31 One or all of the pillars of US foreign relations do not qualify as being the good guys: 1. We may be bad, but the alternatives are worse. 2. If we can't have it, we will break it. 3. Now look what you made us do. An old classic.
Habebe Member	Sun Jan 12 18:56:27 Jergul, The US has a detterent. Thing is that it had nothing to do with Iran's military capabilities against the US. The US doesnt want war with Iran for several reasons. For starters the USA's goal would be a peaceful not threatening Iran. It would hurt our cause to forcefully exert regime change as we would not be greeted as liberators as much as the people dislike their government they would disloke a foreign power deciding it for them even more. Not to mention our poor track record of dealing with the aftermath of military based regime change and nation building....it takes a long time and is costly. However the US method of economic " warfare" coupled with political pressure and a little luck as of now though seems to be the best means to our end. Also the US is not nearly as proficient at fighting proxies and small militant groups....its a lot.more.drawn out playing a game.of whack a mole that makes things.long , drawn out and expensive.
Sam Adams Member	Sun Jan 12 23:03:18 "That is your idea of what my thing is. " No, that is actually your thing
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 23:14:06 Sammy Hush. Grow balls. Accept losses. Fight wars. Not hard to understand. Ruggy Not bad. But Western, Humanist, Democratic Tradition. Habebe The US has tons of deterrents.
Habebe Member	Sun Jan 12 23:25:32 Well I'll tell you what. Why not reframe the questions. What do you think is the best way to deal with Iran? Is it too much to assume that at the very least you would.not want to see a nuclear Iran or NK for that matter.
jergul large member	Sun Jan 12 23:44:37 Habebe Regain leverage by building up economic ties through the nuclear agreement. Iran does not want a nuclear arsenal. They have their equivalent of US Supreme Court rulings forbidding it. Its a non-issue and a scare tactic. What the US actually wants is for Iran to dismantle its deterrents permanently and block any attempt Iran might ever make at re-establishing its deterrents. That would only be possible in a framework were total nuclear disarmament in the ME was on the table. Something which is never going to happen because the US lacks the political will to see it happen.
jergul large member	Mon Jan 13 00:02:18 Ultimately, the US wants to turn back time to the good old days when policies could be enforced with effortless punitive raids if need be and at the discretion of the president. Its such a silly thing to wish for.
Habebe Member	Mon Jan 13 02:04:03 Actually, the US wants Iranians to bring upon there own regime change.
jergul large member	Mon Jan 13 02:16:11 So if Iran changes regimes, it can have nuclear weapons and continue to support terrorists? The US should formulate its goal better if regime change is all it wants. Or in other words. That the US also wants regime change does not change the fact that it wants Iran to permanently dismantle its deterrents and put itself in a position where it can never have deterrents again. Punitive raids are much easier if Iran complies you see.
jergul large member	Mon Jan 13 02:18:50 Ultimately though, it is probably best to ask Netanyahu what the US wants. I think he has the clearest and best understanding of US interests on this issue.
jergul large member	Mon Jan 13 08:19:19 "Near the airfield, shards of metal crack underfoot as two military personnel take measurements of the gaping crater left behind by one of the missiles. It is around 2 meters deep and roughly 3 meters in diameter -- a burned copy of "Beauty and the Beast" teeters on the edge of the hole. A flip-flop, an Uno card, and a military jacket stick out from the charred wreckage left in the wake of the missile. This was a housing unit for drone pilots and operators on the base. They evacuated the unit before the strike. Incidentally, the they had nicknamed the living quarters "chaos." Like most of the US section of the base, they had already been on lockdown at bunkers for over two hours when the first missiles landed. The strike was an Iranian response to the US drone attack, ordered by US President Donald Trump, that killed Iran's most powerful general, Qasem Soleimani, less than a week before. US troops knew Al-Asad air base would be attacked and sheltered in bunkers, exclusive tour reveals US troops knew Al-Asad air base would be attacked and sheltered in bunkers, exclusive tour reveals After days of anticipation, Tehran's zero-casualty retaliation came as a relief to many. At al-Asad camp, troops could rest easy after days of heightened alert. For countries across the region, it marked a welcome climbdown after the killing of Soleimani raised the specter of region-wide war. Ten of the 11 missiles struck US positions at the sprawling desert Iraqi airbase. One struck a remote location on the Iraqi military's side. Roughly one-third of the base is controlled by the US. The Iranian missiles, which used on-board guidance systems, managed to shred sensitive US military sites, damaging a special forces compound, and two hangars, in addition to the US drone operators' housing unit." CNN That was a pretty relevant target list given who had been involved in killing Suleimani.
Seb Member	Mon Jan 13 09:19:26 Jergul Difficult to tell - if everything on the base of relevant then it just means they can hit buildings they can see at near meter resolution from commercial satellites. If not, then indicates intelligence capability too.
jergul large member	Mon Jan 13 10:12:10 I considered a selection bias, but the base is simply too big for the targeting to be coincidental. We know they have intelligence capability. We know this is a joint base. (Iran also has its own satelllites)
jergul large member	Mon Jan 13 10:15:11 (for you dumbbells: Selection bias means I am looking for relevance: OMG Iran hit a mail box. I bet there was mail there for drone operators. What a precision strike! <- an example of selection bias)
Seb Member	Mon Jan 13 10:47:31 Jergul: If it's a drone base, surely any base element is going to involve drone related stuff?
jergul large member	Mon Jan 13 11:00:25 Its not a drone base in any way but coincidentally. It is a training and logstics hub for anti-ISIS activity and houses about 1000 non-iraqi coalition partners.
jergul large member	Mon Jan 13 16:01:15 Al Asad is still on a "strategic operational pause" waiting for the threat level to go down. In effect mission killed. So ISIS getting a nice break. Casualty aversion at this level is a cancer. Don't blame me that the military does not like fighting if there is a risk of anyone dying. Ruggy, that is the core example of defeatism you are looking for. France took a "strategic operational pause" in June 1940 too in order to avoid casualties. Just so you know where that road ends.
jergul large member	Tue Jan 14 01:29:09 So I guess we are done then. The challenge I indicated and the trigger for this thread: 1. Iran has a robust conventional deterrent. 2. The US is incredibly easy to deter once a country has a robust conventional deterrent. This is because the US has not set up for a conflict against an opponent with a conventional deterrent and is not willing to risk significant losses in a conflict. Significant? Well, US battalions on the front in wwii habitually suffered a 1% casualty rate PER DAY. So lets define significant as within an order of magnitude of that.
Habebe Member	Tue Jan 14 03:15:07 3.Jergul is delusional. If conventional weaponry of that caliber is such a great deterrent than why did Saddam's not deter us? Now as for the US not set up for an opponent with russian leftovers than what are we set up for? Again the deterrant is that we have no taste for 30 years of peace keeping and nation building.
jergul large member	Tue Jan 14 03:44:42 Habebe The Scuds lacked precision and were not particularly numerous. The core of my argument is that Iran has the precision to blow up stuff cost effectively. You are set up to fight ISIS. They do not have precision systems, so all you need to worry about is perimeter security. Perhaps with a headnod to the odd fragging here and there. Why would you think that punitive raids to compel Iran to comply to your will would involve invasion and occupation? You are simply not set up to avoid losses and have no stomach for losses, so are deterred. Try to make a better argument than "delusional", mkay? Or simply conceed the point you were trying to make. Whatever.
Habebe Member	Tue Jan 14 05:30:20 They have no more stomach for it than we do. I'll agree that we would have some issues with Iran, but the opposite of what your claiming. Our problems would come more from their non conventional warfare. They are tue regions kings at proxy non conventional warfare with the only conventional warfare tool being rockets which eouldnt be a threat for long. If conventional warfare reigned supreme in that area Saudia Arabia would be more of a power in the region. For defense really that is the best policy I suppose. Could Imagine a foriegn power trying to invade the US?hahaha that would make a great tv show.
jergul large member	Tue Jan 14 05:53:19 Habebe Assymetrical warfare is still conventional warfare. Thinking that militia groups armed with short ranged, non-precision rockets have a damage capacity and deterrent value better than what precision missiles give is simply irrational or ignorant, or both.
Seb Member	Tue Jan 14 06:19:47 Habebe: Accuracy, reliability and precision. The iraqi Scuds lack the range and reliability - the lover longer range ones were Jerry rigged and broke apart in flight so very inaccurate. Politically they were an issue as if they damaged Israel it might provoke an Israeli response, but Saddam didn't have enough to be able to gaurantee to got a military significant target. This is akin to saying that if the UK had 10 ton bombs and dropped millions of tonnes in WW2, how can 100 tonnes of explosives in 200 cruise missiles be a threat. The Iranians have no stomach for a fight, true, by the point of a deterrent is to get you not to attack them. It's you that need to decide whether or not you can look the other way sat their support for proxies in Syria or while they build nukes. So I'm not really sure what your point is.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Tue Jan 14 09:26:37 The point is simple, American ain't afraid of nobody and you guys are effectively saying that the US is afraid to bomb Iran.
jergul large member	Tue Jan 14 09:44:29 Its more than I am saying the USA is too lazy to bomb Iran. It could spend 500 billion and several years repositioning *stuff* and hardening vulnerable bases. But that seems like a lot of work, so they won't do it.
Habebe Member	Tue Jan 14 18:43:11 Seb, Even if the rockets themselves are more accurate, the Iranians using them are not....as in the case where they shot down their own fucking people from a civilian plane leaving from there own airport. Some may argue this was a fluke. I contend this speaks to a lack of organization and logistics skills.greatly neutering the threat of accurate missiles. Whats thenpoint of accuracy if you just shot down all targets?
Forwyn Member	Tue Jan 14 18:44:59 Target acquisition seems to be fine. Target identification, another story.
Habebe Member	Tue Jan 14 18:50:31 So for us its much wiser to attack the economy. We dont want them pursuit nukes. We don't want them supporting Hezbollah and others. We don't want them influencing Iraq. The best way to counter them is to attack the economy.
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 00:32:57 habebe Iran shot down the plane very accurately. But was the result of poor organization, and logistics. But you are confusing apples with oranges. Iranians do have similar issues with their missiles specifically because they hoard and only retire legacy systems through export agreements. You can think of it this way. An old system (it was dated when Iran imported it in 2007) shot down the plane, but newer stuff in the appropriate organization did not shoot down the plane. It was ultimately one operator throwing a switch in a high tenstion situation. You are countering Iran in a way that assures that it will support Hezbollah and others, it will influence Iraq, it will work towards nuclear threshold status. You have a funny definition of "best". The best way to counter Iran is by regaining leverage though economic dealings. Obama had paved the way for that. You should have aimed for giving it something to lose. Now all that is happening is you are turning the clock back to 2013, but with the loss of most, if not all, of the moral high ground. Iran has testbed I-8 centrifuges (so 8 steps beyond the legacy I-1 centrifuges it was bound to by the agreement). Lets see how they work when set up in a full cycle. But at least you see you are attacking Iran's economy. Progress!
Seb Member	Wed Jan 15 01:38:12 Habebe: Again, do you really believe that the failure of the battery commander in this instance to correctly distinguish between a plane and a cruise missile using fairly outdated analogue kit can be read across the entire Iranian armed forces any more than a US Patriot missile batteries failure to detect one of *it's own bases returning jet* as an Iraqi air launched anti radiation missile (a weapon with an entirely different speed and size, which the Iraqis didn't possess, and couldn't have launched because they didn't have any jets at the time either) tells us anything useful about American armed forces accuracy in general? I can't possibly believe that you actually believe this. The information we have about Iranian IRBMs, they are accurate, they have a reliability rate with a central estimate of around 90%, and an accuracy of around 20m by eyeballing the craters. They can hit individual buildings on enemy bases on the region and destroy them under war conditions. That's demonstrated now and it's silly to deny it.
Habebe Member	Wed Jan 15 02:34:50 Jergul, yeah because giving Iran billions of dollars wotked so well... Seb, As i said you can contend this a fluke, I see it as a military that has poor logistica and fucks up under pressure Information based on real worls results imo Trump tjeir potential. Perhaps im wrong.Is there a great deal of real world results that show otherwise?
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 02:42:36 By "giving", you mean unfreezing Iranian money, right? You have an odd way with words. The nuclear deal worked exactly as intended. The IR-9 centrifuges are reported to be 50 times faster than the IR-1 that Iran agreed to limit itself to under the deal. Iran does not have to leave an international inspection regime to reach nuclear threshold status you know. Nothing except the agreement is stopping it.
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 02:43:55 (for comparison. Japan has enough plutonium stored to make 5000 nuclear weapons. Its not a big deal from a profilation perspective).
Seb Member	Wed Jan 15 02:46:18 Habebe: No it's not a fluke, it's a deficiency in the capability (people, process, technology) but generalising that to an entirely different capability is unsustainable, particularly when that capability has just been demonstrated under combat conditions. Put it this way then: should the US decide to wage a punitive bombing mission like allied force or desert fox, Irans defensive measures may well shoot down civil flights in error, but such flights are unlikely to be operating. But short of turning off their second/third teir defences, there's not much else they can do about that. But there is zero reason to think that their ballistic missiles won't hit and destroy buildings in US bases throughout the region. Does the shoot down of a British jet by the patriot battery having identified it as a threat that literally could not exist evidence that the US military is generally poor at logistics and fucks up under pressure? If not, why not? It's a much bigger mistake on behalf of the operators. Despite claims to the contrary, the plane was broadcasting it's IFF, patriot batteries have network links in to all the air radars etc. Shit happens sometimes. But fine, you can engage in this illogical wishful thinking if you like. It's just a 21st century of "the Japs are no threat from the air, they can't fly because of their slitty eyes".
Seb Member	Wed Jan 15 02:47:44 Habebe: "Perhaps im wrong.Is there a great deal of real world results that show otherwise?" Yes, the blown up buildings in US bases in Iraq.
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 02:55:27 "But short of turning off their second/third teir defences" That is probably exactly what Iran will do (if by tier, you mean legacy equipment). Iran does have a hoarding problem and keeps things running that should be pulled out of service until upgraded. The Tors? Best thing it could do is slap on some new paint and give them to Hezbollah.
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 02:57:32 Alternatively, swap them with new Tors against the backdrop of otherwise exporting the systems :).
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 02:58:44 Iran has 64 days to enter new agreements with trading partners. The slapback is not retroactive to deals already made.
Habebe Member	Wed Jan 15 03:13:42 Seb,Oh that time, whrn they also shot down a civilian plane killing over 82 Iranians and 0 Americans....
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 03:25:42 For killing Americans, see Saudi Arabia?
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 03:26:33 What does the Saudi-US K/d ratio look like anyway? If that is how you want to measure winning.
Seb Member	Wed Jan 15 04:19:14 Habebe: Did that stop the bases getting blown up? Does the US not mind if it's billion dollar planes and or men come home in body bags provided a plane gets shot down? What happens when there are no civilian planes flying to get shot down?
Habebe Member	Wed Jan 15 04:32:40 Seb, I'm perhaps they will blow up there stores of rockets. We may never know things are looking bleaker by the day for the Ayatollahs regime....only time will tell. They have lasted longer than many im the west thought they would so far.
Habebe Member	Wed Jan 15 04:51:00 I'm =idk*
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Wed Jan 15 08:53:00 New developments "Iran's President Hassan Rouhani has said the country's military should elaborate more on how it shot down a passenger plane by mistake last week. Separately, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif acknowledged that Iranians "were lied to" for days afterwards. He insisted that he and the president were also kept in the dark." BBC
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 09:18:31 Nimi The military will probably be happy to elaborate since it was the Revolutionary Guard that shot it down.
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 10:45:01 Seb Realistically then it is only imaginable for satelittes that cross Iranian territory. A hunter-satelitte trailing in a very similar orbit within 100 km or so, with slow overtake capability. A lot of the math goes away if it simply is a question of hitting something moving at a relative speed of 20 km/hour. But definitely explosive, directed shrapnel, not kinetic impact. Just to be safe. A payload of 10 kg to MEO then. Seems doable.
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 10:47:13 (By math I meant the tolerances are simpliefied and eased).
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 10:50:48 habebe I am looking at the next deterrent capability Iran needs now that you are sharing space with it. Hitting things in MEO is trickier than in PE canvas hangars on the ground. But at least you always know where things in MEO are.
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 13:40:16 nm on Iran having 64 days to enter new agreements. Russia is changing its constitution to subordinate international law to its own legislation. Russia can now do whatever it wants.
Habebe Member	Wed Jan 15 16:17:07 Russia has kind of done whatever wants for a while now hasnt it? What's new about it? ( I'm seriously curious)
jergul large member	Wed Jan 15 16:46:08 It used to adhere to UNSC resolutions. It still will, but only after checking them against national interests. Its relevant to say Iran replacing the Tor system with something less prone to shooting down civilian aircraft. Sanctions in place prior to the 2015 deal are probably going to snap back. But that will no longer impact Iranian-Russian relations.
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