Iran

[ORAC]

Jordan won't let them overfly - not clear on how they'd get in.

By a strange coincidence the IAF took out the southern half of the Syrian ADGE system in the last 48 hours - and Iraq doesn’t have one these days. So a pretty much direct route avoiding Saudi and Gulf states airspace…..

​​​​​​​Israel & Palestine

[tartare]

Originally Posted by ORAC

By a strange coincidence the USS Georgia arrived in the region a couple of weeks ago….

https://www.al-monitor.com/originals...es-middle-east

And the B-2 wing practiced hot-pit refuelling at Diego Garcia during the past month…

https://youtu.be/TJGnONgkk_M?si=Laa8s6XpAYk062D7

Don't understand the B2 reference sorry... obviously I'm missing something..

[Uberteknik]

Originally Posted by tartare

Don't understand the B2 reference sorry... obviously I'm missing something..

Assuming US regional bases or assets are attacked, the B2 is a long range stealth strike capability and can round trip to Iran from the nearest deployment at Diego. This base is also out of reach of the longest range Iranian ballistic missiles. MADL comms can receive real-time situational and targeting data from forward F35 Israeli aircraft. Hot-pit is refuelling with the engines running for increased sortie rate. Weapons load out is formidable and includes GBU-57 deep penetration presumably putting Natanz at risk.
Even if they are not used, sends a message of credible preparation and surprise attack.

PS soz if you already know the B2 capability or have a mil background - not meant to patronise in any way.

[fdr]

This has been coming for some time, since April 24, when the Iranian embassy in Damascus was attacked by Israel. We are approaching the anniversary of the Re'im music festival on 7th October 2023, which set off the fuse on this latest sad round. The pager attack was not going to occur without upsetting those with a vested interest in Hezbollah. The latest attack on Hezbollah resulting in the demise of Hassan Nasrallah added additional weight to the less restrained Iranian response to their embassy attack.

Israel was aware an attack was likely, and Irans comments in the last week to Vlad the diminutive would have given Israel a heads up that things were going to get rowdy in the near future. The video of the attack on Israel resulted in a fair number of leakers, air defence appears to have been around 30% effective which will make for some uncomfortable times in the debrief in Israel. Hard to see that Benjamin Netanyahu will show any restraint in respect to a response against military targets in Iran, or oil/shipping infrastructure, assuming that Israel retains a large number of the F-15's and F-35's.

The intractability of the problem in the region without the desire for good will to prevail is not going away anytime soon. The decisions on the settlement expansions in the West Bank may not look to have been so helpful when this page of history gets a review in the cold light of day many years hence. In the absence of a will to discuss the issues that separate the 7 tribes, there will be more tears and little in the way of solutions, just the delight of radicals tearing down the tent and renting the fabric of civilisation, again.

We will get an idea how a true gen-5 aircraft goes against an early gen-4 air superiority aircraft with little updating. Not dull, but depressing.

[tartare]

No offence taken - was aware of all those things, but puzzled as the US has confined role so far to Iranian missile shoot downs from the Arleigh Burkes - whereas the B2 is a strategic bomber...

[fdr]

Originally Posted by tartare

Hmm - well that makes things even more challenging...

Might make for an extended life on the KC-10s which are bowing out at present. If the DoD wants immediate extended range, they can always contact www.delta-burn.com they have demonstrated their technology on the CFM56 recently, and that gives a non trivial range extension to high bypass fans. They are happy to demo that on their jets or on the DoDs, so long as the bypass is above 2.3.

Oddly, their work was mainly done on IAI Westwind II's and on Merlin IIIA's.

[Uberteknik]

Originally Posted by tartare

No offence taken - was aware of all those things, but puzzled as the US has confined role so far to Iranian missile shoot downs from the Arleigh Burkes - whereas the B2 is a strategic bomber...

Yeah, get that. I guess it would be prudent preparation and posture signalling for Iran not to directly attack US assets - or else....

[ORAC]

No offence taken - was aware of all those things, but puzzled as the US has confined role so far to Iranian missile shoot downs from the Arleigh Burkes - whereas the B2 is a strategic bomber...

It is in response to 1358/1360/1361 and the refusal of the Gulf states to allow the US to use their bases in those countries for any attack on Iran.

I’m simply pointing out that, even ignoring the carrier based FJ in the area - which still might not have the legs to reach targets inland without putting their carriers in harms way - the US has ample weapons platforms able to reach targets in Iran. Two of which that are already in the area or can reach it within hours are the Georgia with 150+ Tomahawk and the B-2 which can carry multiple bunker busters up to and including the GBU-57 MOP.

[Lonewolf_50]

I'll go out on a limb, ORAC, and suggest that the US isn't going to start lobbing Tomahawks into Iran any time soon.

Originally Posted by tartare

Noting Biden's calls for de-escalation, would the US allow staging of an attack from Al Udeid, Ali Al Salem or the like?

No. The Host Nation would probably exercise its veto.
Based on what I learned at Al Udeid a couple of decades ago, the chance of launching strikes from there at Iran are likely zero (in the near term) and specifically as regards support to Israel as long as the Gaza thing keeps going.
The Host Nation has some sensitivities that must be respected. I doubt that this has changed, since I was there, and I'd point out that Al Udeid is a joint use base.

It houses the Qatar Emiri Air Force, United States Air Force, Royal Air Force, and other foreign forces. It is host to a forward headquarters of United States Central Command, headquarters of the United States Air Forces Central Command, No. 83 Expeditionary Air Group RAF, and the 379th Air Expeditionary Wing of the USAF.\

In other words, it's a base that when all is said and done belongs to the Host Nation: Qatar.

Originally Posted by fdr

The intractability of the problem in the region without the desire for good will to prevail is not going away anytime soon.

Understatement of the week.

Originally Posted by fdr

We will get an idea how a true gen-5 aircraft goes against an early gen-4 air superiority aircraft with little updating. Not dull, but depressing.

Since the air war over Syria in the early 80's, when the F-16 and F-15 had lop sided results over various Migs, it seems to me that the Israelis do quite a bit of live Op Testing of American machines of war, with the usual result being dead Arabs.

[tartare]

OK, I am still finding this puzzling.
Why would Biden support Israel's right to defend itself, but not support Israel striking Iran's nuclear weapons development facilities?
Is the US concerned that such an Israeli strike alone might not be completely successful, and aggravate the Iranians to the point that they accelerate towards breakout.
At which point, the only power with the reach and mass (TLAMs and Bunker Busters) to rapidly stop Iran would be the United States.... thereby dragging it into direct conflict?

[ORAC]

Interesting body suits….

Video

https://x.com/visegrad24/status/1841...539208490?s=61

3 Swedish citizens aged 15-20 arrested for throwing hand grenades at the Israeli Embassy in Copenhagen this morning.

https://archive.ph/R1Dtq

Explosions and gunshot at Israeli embassies in Sweden and Denmark


A gunman opened fire on the Israeli embassy in Stockholm and two bombs were set off near its counterpart in Copenhagen, in what one prominent terrorism expert described as an apparent escalation of Iran’s “shadow war” against Jewish targets in Europe.

At least one gunshot was aimed at the embassy in Stockholm at about 6pm on Tuesday. At 3.20am on Wednesday, two hand grenades were detonated about 100m away from the embassy in the Danish capital.

No one was hurt in the incidents but they have exacerbated concerns that the war in the Middle East is spilling over on to European soil as Israel and Iran engage in direct and proxy conflicts.

Danish police arrested three Swedish nationals between the ages of 15 and 20, said to be gang members, in connection with the bombings in Copenhagen. Two of the suspects were detained on a train in Copenhagen central station, which was also inspected by a bomb disposal squad…..

There have not yet been any arrests in Sweden, and the Swedish and the Danish authorities have not made any public statements about a possible motive or a direct link between the shooting in Sweden and the bombings in Denmark.

However, SVT, the national public broadcaster, reported that Swedish police believe both attacks were carried out by criminals associated with Foxtrot, the country’s most powerful gang, and that they were ultimately ordered to do so by Iran.….

Earlier this year Swedish and Israeli security services both accused Foxtrot of recruiting freelance criminals, who are often teenagers, on Iran’s behalf.

Peter R Neumann, professor of security studies at King’s College London, said the character of the incidents strongly suggested that they were part of a series of attacks commissioned by Tehran, although they could also conceivably have been the work of a separate terror group such as Islamic State.

There have already been three previous attacks on Israeli embassies in Europe since the start of the year: two in Stockholm and one in Brussels.

Neumann said that in all three cases, evidence had pointed to the involvement of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), an elite branch of Iran’s armed forces, using local criminal networks to create a thin veil of plausible deniability.

“These would be the fourth and fifth attacks on Israeli embassies in Europe this year,” he said. “They fit with the modus operandi. What also fits is that the Iranians have typically hired local criminals to carry out these attacks previously in order to not be directly connected with them.”…..
​​​​​​​

[Uberteknik]

Originally Posted by tartare

OK, I am still finding this puzzling.
Why would Biden support Israel's right to defend itself, but not support Israel striking Iran's nuclear weapons development facilities?
Is the US concerned that such an Israeli strike alone might not be completely successful, and aggravate the Iranians to the point that they accelerate towards breakout.
At which point, the only power with the reach and mass (TLAMs and Bunker Busters) to rapidly stop Iran would be the United States.... thereby dragging it into direct conflict?

Damned if he does and damned if he doesn't. Hence Biden has ruled out US involvement on this front - for now.

Upcoming election is a bit of a giveaway. No sense in giving Agent Orange more political ammunition if you pardon the pun.
Attacking the nuclear facilities is likely to dramatically precipitate escalation potentially dragging in the US and also Russia. Wig-man can blame it all on the Biden admin' and gives another argument to remove support to Ukraine to end the SMO and become Putin's new bff (for a nice mutually assured backhander) and sojourns together at each others holiday pads.

Yes, the only weapons that could hold the deep nuclear facilities at risk would be the GBU-57's but at nearly 14 metric tonnes each only the US has the strategic heavy bomber reach to accomplish that from Diego Garcia. (Good job they just signed a new 100 year lease).

[ORAC]

Russia is in discussions with the Houthis, via Iran, to transfer long-range Onyx anti-ship missiles for use against Western ships.

The Houthis have already been targeting military and commercial vessels in the Red Sea.

In June, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that if the West continues to allow Ukraine to strike Russia, Moscow could supply long-range weapons to forces willing to retaliate against Western nations.

Source: Reuters

[ORAC]

https://x.com/tankertrackers/status/...434732660?s=61

BREAKING: The National Iranian Tanker Company (NITC) appears to be fearing an imminent attack by Israel. Their empty VLCC supertankers vacated the country's largest oil terminal, Kharg Island, yesterday.

Clients: We have located & tagged all of them in satellite imagery.

Please note that crude oil loadings continue, but all of the extra vacant shipping capacity has been removed from the anchorage of Kharg Island.

This is the first time we see anything like this since the 2018 sanctions round.

​​​​​​​

[tartare]

Despite their extraordinary technical and operational capabilities - too big a job for the IAF alone - even to knock out a handful of the most critical sites:

[fdr]

Originally Posted by tartare

Despite their extraordinary technical and operational capabilities - too big a job for the IAF alone - even to knock out a handful of the most critical sites:

but dang, that would be a frag order for the history books.

Good news is, whatever Israel does, it will be a surprise to Teheran and to us, Israel has a bit of message to send downtown.

[Asturias56]

I'm sure the Iranian leadership, when they met, knew that Israel probably had the room bugged, and that they could almost certainly be wiped out at a flick of a switch.

My bet is that they'll wait until after the US Election - if Trump gets in they'll go for N weapons ASAP. If it's Harris they'll try and get back to where they were with Obama.

[SASless]

A military strike does not have to hit every single site....just look for the pinch points that if removed....stop the production of any nuclear weapons.

Then, Combine that with strikes that put the Iranian Oil Production facilities into ruin, destroy their offshore facilities that load Tankers, sink every Iranian flagged/owned tanker throughout the world's oceans.

Turn out the lights by hitting every electrical generation and transmission sites....all by air or sea forces....and you bottle up the Genie.

Re-impose all of the sanctions as were in effect that almost saw the Iranian government go bankrupt and impose sufficient new sanctions to achieve that end.

Follow up by a major effort to support unrest amongst the Iranian people and perhaps we shall see the end of the current regime.

Appeasement and calling for cease fires has never worked....the other side has to understand it has lost and must make the best deal possible... but must accept they cannot prevail and must accept the terms being offered.

Negotiation can only succeed if you are in a "winning" position and the opponent knows and accepts that it is not and is in a clear losing situation.

What one experienced negotiator had to say....

The worst thing you can possibly do in a deal is seem desperate to make it. That makes the other guy smell blood, and then you're dead... Leverage is having something the other guy wants. Or better yet, needs. Or best of all, simply can't do without.

Unfortunately, that isn't always the case, which is why leverage often requires imagination, and salesmanship. In other words, you have to convince the other guy it's in his interest to make the deal.

Commonsense tells us that you negotiate from a position of strength....not weakness. (For you Brits....think back to Chamberlin v. Hitler prior to WWII). All Chamberlin obtained was some time to delay what was coming.

Hitler was intent upon War....was way ahead of Great Britain in its preparing for that War and thus felt to be in a superior position and in the end that Agreement was not worth the paper it was written upon.

Does anyone think the Mullahs in control of the Iranian Government are much different than the Germans in that regard beyond using proxies for the majority of their military aims as their record of war making did not turn out all that well back when they took on the Iraqi's under Saddam Hussein.

[Chugalug2]

SASless:-

Commonsense tells us that you negotiate from a position of strength....not weakness. (For you Brits....think back to Chamberlin v. Hitler prior to WWII). All Chamberlin obtained was some time to delay what was coming.

Hitler was intent upon War....was way ahead of Great Britain in its preparing for that War and thus felt to be in a superior position and in the end that Agreement was not worth the paper it was written upon.

That delay was what was needed to stop Hitler at the Channel. It meant that you Yanks had a base from which (with a certain amount of help from others) to attack Germany, with which you were at war (thanks to AH's inspired non negotiable declaration), to invade and liberate occupied Western Europe (with a certain amount of help from others), and then to occupy NAZI Germany (ditto preceding, yet again).

Are you saying that Chamberlain was wrong? What should he have done instead?
​​​​​​​

[West Coast]

Are you saying that Chamberlain was wrong? What should he have done instead?

Wrong? Guess the answer depends on where you live. UK, perhaps. Sudetenland, perhaps not.