Iran

[ORAC]

Last night. No indication if air attacks - sabotage?

https://x.com/visegrad24/status/1843...506394185?s=61

Explosions heard near the Isfahan Nuclear Facility in Iran. Something is also on fire.

​​​​​​​https://x.com/tweet4anna_nafo/status...078716060?s=61
​​​​​​​

[fdr]

Originally Posted by Big Pistons Forever

Iraq was arguably the most successful military campaign anywhere, ever. The remit given to miliary commanders was regime change by military force and the resulting effort was a masterpiece of the effective use of precision military effects. The problem of course was the lack of a coherent executable plan for the day after. Defeating Iran militarily is the easy part, managing the fall out is a a whole different magnitude of hard. The region is at a tipping point and use of force decisions by Israel and the USA will have lasting consequences, but the status quo is not sustainable. A regional war is IMO inevitable and Iran will be decisively defeated, lets just hope there is a plan for a sustainable peace after the kinetic effects are over.

Which came down to one guy. W Paul Bremer. The next 17 years of sorrow are on his shoulders. he was given sound guidance by multiple agencies, and disregarded the lot.

[SWBKCB]

Originally Posted by Beamr

Iran’s Crown Prince releases important speech.
He’s ready to lead the transition to democracy in Iran

https://twitter.com/visegrad24/statu...15919537520790

There does seem to be an assumption that if you get rid of the current regime, something warmer and cuddlier will replace them. Have there been any recent examples?

[Asturias56]

"The problem of course was the lack of a coherent executable plan for the day after."

Amazing when you think about it - in WW2 the allies were planning from early 1944 as to what they'd do in Germany when they won

[Less Hair]

Originally Posted by fdr

Which came down to one guy. W Paul Bremer. The next 17 years of sorrow are on his shoulders. he was given sound guidance by multiple agencies, and disregarded the lot.

According to Wiki Bremer became a ski instructor later on?

[Lonewolf_50]

And he slunk away like a thief in the night.

With that said, the original campaign plan that General Eric Shinseki et al came up with called for about 240-260,000 troops including a substantial support for Phase 4 and Phase 5 (the "day after bits") and that got him fired.
Rumsfeld and the rest of the head shed scrapped it.

Spoiler

 

 

The Actual CENTCOM Op Plan put down for OIF was for substantially less than 200,000, massively underwhelming Phase 4 and Phase 5 portion, and of course it came a cropper in execution. Even if Bremer was a freaking genius (which he was not) there was a distinct lack of structural support for the plan as approved and resourced.
And of course, this led to Patreus asking for and getting The Surge ... how many years later?
OK, I better stop, I am getting grumpy just remembering all of this.

Whomever want to invade Iran is welcome to build an Op Plan that can do that, but how many Arab nations (neighbors who have issues with Iran) are willing to expend their blood and treasure in such an endeavor?
If they won't cross the LD, why should anyone else?

I see the current form of conflict sustaining itself for the mid term at the least.

[ORAC]

Video.

https://x.com/eyakoby/status/1843703446610018633?s=61

When asked whether he would support Israel striking the Islamic Republic of Iran’s nuclear facilities, Canadian opposition leader, Pierre Poilievre, responds:

“It would be a gift by the Jewish state to humanity.”

[Lonewolf_50]

Looks like someone (Pierre Poilievre) wanted to stir the pot, doesn't it, ORAC?

[SilsoeSid]

'Threads'

"One of the most terrifying programmes ever shown on British television, Threads is the nuclear apocalypse drama-documentary that continues to haunt people’s nightmares 40 years on. Ahead of a rare new showing on the BBC, here’s a look at how the drama still has the potential to terrify people.
First broadcast on 23 September 1984, anyone who tuned in to BBC Two on that Sunday evening would experience a bleak and unforgettable depiction of a massive nuclear bomb attack on a British city and its aftermath.

It was a nightmare scenario that was all too plausible in an era of heightened tension between the West and the then Soviet Union. Rarely seen on television since its first broadcast, it's being shown again on BBC Four and iPlayer on 9 October. Sheffield was chosen as the fictional nuclear target because its writer, Kes author Barry Hines, lived there.
(continues in link)
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02kgkkg
https://www.bbc.co.uk/articles/crl8nj3xxp7o
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threads_(1984_film)

PSB used in...
​​​​​​​

You Tube

[BEagle]

I bought the DVD of Threads 14 years ago. Still available, but about 3 times the price I paid!

Quite disturbing.....

[TURIN]

I'm watching Threads now. Scene outside a news agent. Headline... Iran crisis deepens!

Plus ca change! 😔

[fdr]

Originally Posted by Less Hair

According to Wiki Bremer became a ski instructor later on?

Did he instruct Sonny Bono?

[tdracer]

Originally Posted by fdr

Did he instruct Sonny Bono?

That's funny fdr. Sick, but funny

[Uberteknik]

Originally Posted by SilsoeSid

'Threads'

"One of the most terrifying programmes ever shown on British television, Threads is the nuclear apocalypse drama-documentary that continues to haunt people’s nightmares 40 years on. Ahead of a rare new showing on the BBC, here’s a look at how the drama still has the potential to terrify people.
First broadcast on 23 September 1984, anyone who tuned in to BBC Two on that Sunday evening would experience a bleak and unforgettable depiction of a massive nuclear bomb attack on a British city and its aftermath.

It was a nightmare scenario that was all too plausible in an era of heightened tension between the West and the then Soviet Union. Rarely seen on television since its first broadcast, it's being shown again on BBC Four and iPlayer on 9 October. Sheffield was chosen as the fictional nuclear target because its writer, Kes author Barry Hines, lived there.
(continues in link)
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02kgkkg
https://www.bbc.co.uk/articles/crl8nj3xxp7o
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threads_(1984_film)

PSB used in...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pO1HC8pHZw0

Watched it when it first went on air back in the early 1980's in the same year the US produced and broadcast a similar series 'The Day After'.
Threads, for me at least, is by far the more harrowing depicting the lead up to and immediate aftermath. It loses its way somewhat in the last third though and verges on surrealism at times.
As a child starting school mid 1960's and then a teen in the 1970's, the weekly test of the 4-minute warning siren (mounted on the local police station), sunk into the background becoming noise blended with traffic along with the local church bells on Sunday morning or our town clock tower bell chiming every hour. Secretly though, everyone welcomed the scheduled test as somewhat comforting opposed to the siren wailing at any other time. The public information films 'Protect and Survive', regularly broadcast on national TV at peak viewing times, are in hindsight almost laughable if they were not so chilling. Duck and cover under school desks was a bit of fun - the gravity of which was completely lost on all of us in 'juniors'.

Another programme well worth hunting down and aired in 1986, is based on Raymond Briggs book 'When the wind Blows'. Sublime to ridiculous, Briggs also wrote the childhood classic 'The Snowman'.

[fdr]

Politicians are quite happy to justify the cost of the war with rhetoric, and other children's blood. When it comes to paying for the peace (pieces) they don't see the same value in votes and that results in the next disaster unfolding.

You break it, you own it.

[Buster Hyman]

Originally Posted by BEagle

I bought the DVD of Threads 14 years ago. Still available, but about 3 times the price I paid!

Quite disturbing.....

The show or the price? 🤔

[Lonewolf_50]

Interesting related tidbit here:

DUBAI (Reuters) - Gulf states are lobbying Washington to stop Israel from attacking Iran's oil sites because they are concerned their own oil facilities could come under fire from Tehran's proxies if the conflict escalates, three Gulf sources told Reuters.

As part of their attempts to avoid being caught in the crossfire, Gulf states including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar are also refusing to let Israel fly over their airspace for any attack on Iran and have conveyed this to Washington, the three sources close to government circles said.

And the French did not let the USAF fly over France to bomb Lybia in 1986.

Iran's proxy the Houthis launched attacks on Saudi oil facilities a few years ago. You might say that they have previous form.

[ORAC]

Paranoia….

Esmail Qaani, Head of Iran's Quds Forces, had a heart attack while being interrogated for the suspicion of being an Israeli agent.

(Sky News Arabic)

[Less Hair]

Originally Posted by Lonewolf_50

Interesting related tidbit here: And the French did not let the USAF fly over France to bomb Lybia in 1986.

They still might have done it. For some reason France could use USAF C-5s to transport material to Tchad soon after.

[ORAC]

They still might have done it.

No. From first hand testimony of those involved. From the UK they had to fly down through the `Bay of Bidcay and past Portugal and then make a hard left through the `straits of Gibraltar. Same on the return leg.