Political Posts

[Parsad]

https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/28/world/live-news/iran-war-us-israel-trump

 

Cheers!

[ourkid8]

48 minutes ago, Parsad said:

https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/28/world/live-news/iran-war-us-israel-trump

 

Cheers!

Thanks - I called it earlier, Houthis seem to have finally joined the party!  Now let’s see if they start attacking ships via the Bab al-Mandela straight. The world has not seen pain yet, it’s coming! 

[John Hjorth]

14 hours ago, John Hjorth said:

That's not really the main point here,  Mike [ @cubsfan ],

 

The main point here is, that this move together with Israel is an agressive move, without consent from anyone, while the NATO pact is defensive, only.

 

But that doesen't bother your POTUS one whit. He just continues his *BS* talk, offending  allies further, whose heals just go deaper in the soil! 

 

This Iran / Strait of Hormuth turd is Israels and USAs in combined ownership. Now please own it!

 

It's really funny, that when the talk is about the war in Ukraine, some here still post Europe should really take ownership of that turd. 

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

Edit :

 

Changed address from @Red Lion to Mike [ @cubsfan ].

 

This post by me upstream was originally adressed at @Red Lion by my mistake. I hereby apologize to @Red Lion for any inconvenience experienced because of that error.

[NotSoWise]

Checked only the last two pages of this topic, so not sure if I am not repeating someone else. I think that one of the best frameworks for the situation with Iran is presented by prof. Robert Pape - link below. 

 

 

 

[NotSoWise]

If you analyze Iran only in the context of the region - than this was clearly a mistake to go in and start bombing. If you watched the above podcast, the outcome was predictable.

On the other hand if you increase the scope and include China in the picture, then it is not as obvious. If US wanted to clear the Iran situation before China confrontation (like clearing Cuba/ Venezuela) then it had some logic, BUT the chances of sucess were slim from the begining, you cant change regime by bombing - never happened in history. There was also no plan B if this bombing does not work out. POTUS hubris I think.

 

As for EU Nato allies - Iran thing was not consulted, it was purely US/ Israel initiative. Ormuz was open before the war... As for the Ukraine and US - well, US is defending its sphere of influence, from which it derives many benefits (US corps making money in EU and not paying taxes, selling weapons, etc). So I guess both US and EU are benefiting from this alliance, but it is not that US is only paying and not getting back anything.

 

With the US mighty Navy (best in the world), why POTUS needs EU ships? He needs them to get hits by Iranian rockets, to preserve US Navy and avoid own losses. Why would anyone with IQ > 1 agree to send EU navy to join now?

 

With my all sympathy to US/ West, US&Israel created this mess, so I think they should find a solution to this situation. Unfortunately there are no good exits from this. You either escalate or negotiate with Iran with your pants down. Both terrible choices.

Edited March 28 by NotSoWise

[John Hjorth]

Thank you for sharing, @NotSoWise,

 

What a frustrating interview to listen to. *sigh*

 

Deus Vult.

 

[Spekulatius]

16 hours ago, Viking said:

Here is a good (frightening) summary of the war in the Persian Gulf. Let’s hope this guy is wrong… and we wake up Monday morning to a deal. 
 

 

Mearsheimers predictions tend to age like warm milk. he is correct about Israel running the war essentially because every opening move was done by them. Same with the 12 day war by the way.

 

Example. Israel bombs South Park gas field. Trump seems upset - don’t so that - we don’t destroy energy infrastructure. Then 2 weeks later Trump threatens to bomb Irans South Para gas field. these things keep happening. Israel is clearly the brains in this operation and the US the bouncer doorman.

[dealraker]

I find it quite interesting that someone or some entity is front running (as to investing) all of Trump's dramatic attacks and retreats and there is a complete blocking of anyone finding about who this is.  This sort of thing is the power we've given to the Donald, it is what defines his path for the last 50 years.  None of the limits, laws, traditions...nothing held dear in the past is applicable to Trump.  It is precisely why he has survived.

 

What makes it so easy for Trump to run over everyone with corruption?  What's the psychology? is the question because the psychology is what defines this environment of circle the wagons to protect the President.  No one can get traction to un-do it...no one at all even gets close to stopping it.

[Spekulatius]

15 hours ago, John Hjorth said:

 

Yes, in seriousness, it was adressed towards you, @Red Lion,

 

To get the mindset of smaller states, I would refer you to Mark Carneys last speech at Davos :

 

TouTube - World Economic Forum [January 21 2026] :  Special Address by Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada | World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2026

 

 

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

If the three major thugs in the world : POTUS, Vladimir Putin & Xi Jinping don't obey and adher to international law and respect the independence, sovereignty and integrity of smaller countries, where does that bring the planet going forwards?

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

I especially note one CofB&F member talking about victories in the Middle East, after 'a fast victory' in Venezuela, likely 'next Cuba', another other time a CofB&F adressing Europeans in general 'f*ck'em' [- no CofB&F sanctions! - mind you!], and when seriously adressed the reaction is 'We're just having some fun here.' And even later that CofB&F member later on another subject posted : 

 

 

, all while POTUS has become a turncoat on the 'Ukraine thingy', now turning it opportuniscally into a business opportunity for the US military industrial complex, making USA an opportunistic arms dealer.

 

To that you can add the 'Greenland thingy' and POTUS' earlier talk about 'Canada being the next state in USA'.

 

Please also see and read Erics [ @cwericbs ] last post in this topic, upstream.

Trump/Hegseth have become a modern day crusaderS of sorts to fight the infidels wherever we can find them. Perhaps we can even convert them into capitalists.
Except Putin of course who is a brother who has been overdoing it a bit killing people and attacking other countries. He is not a concern for us except we need Greenland in case he is having a bad day and is  firing  nuclear ballistic missiles at the USA and we need to shoot them down in flight. 

 

  

[dealraker]

11 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

You have to look at this from an individual point of view not the national collective. There are Ayatollahs , IRGC,  Trump, Maga, Netanyahu . Each of these parties will do what is best for them,  not necessarily what best for the county, much less the rest of the world.

The Ayatollah and IRGC fight for their survival. Netanyahu needs war for his political survival (imo). 

Reading a historical fiction book by Sharonn Kay Penman titled Lionheart.  It is 1191...or is it 2026?

 

When did we say the war would end?

[John Hjorth]

19 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

Trump/Hegseth have become a modern day crusaderS of sorts to fight the infidels wherever we can find them. Perhaps we can even convert them into capitalists.
Except Putin of course who is a brother who has been overdoing it a bit killing people and attacking other countries. He is not a concern for us except we need Greenland in case he is having a bad day and is  firing  nuclear ballistic missiles at the USA and we need to shoot them down in flight.   

 

Please see my prior CofB&F public retraction of today upstream of this as adressed towards @Red Lion , and my CofB&F public apology for that  to @Red Lion here in this topic.

 

I hereby hope, that I'm now allowed to leave the corner of shame!

[cubsfan]

3 hours ago, NotSoWise said:

If you analyze Iran only in the context of the region - than this was clearly a mistake to go in and start bombing. If you watched the above podcast, the outcome was predictable.

On the other hand if you increase the scope and include China in the picture, then it is not as obvious. If US wanted to clear the Iran situation before China confrontation (like clearing Cuba/ Venezuela) then it had some logic, BUT the chances of sucess were slim from the begining, you cant change regime by bombing - never happened in history. There was also no plan B if this bombing does not work out. POTUS hubris I think.

 

As for EU Nato allies - Iran thing was not consulted, it was purely US/ Israel initiative. Ormuz was open before the war... As for the Ukraine and US - well, US is defending its sphere of influence, from which it derives many benefits (US corps making money in EU and not paying taxes, selling weapons, etc). So I guess both US and EU are benefiting from this alliance, but it is not that US is only paying and not getting back anything.

 

With the US mighty Navy (best in the world), why POTUS needs EU ships? He needs them to get hits by Iranian rockets, to preserve US Navy and avoid own losses. Why would anyone with IQ > 1 agree to send EU navy to join now?

 

With my all sympathy to US/ West, US&Israel created this mess, so I think they should find a solution to this situation. Unfortunately there are no good exits from this. You either escalate or negotiate with Iran with your pants down. Both terrible choices.

 

Now that it is known that Europe is within nuclear missile shot of Iran - the Europeans may feel differently.  These are the same European bozos that believed Iran was NOT producing nuclear weapons and stuck up for the regime as not having missiles capable of reaching Europe. 

 

Why?  Because Iran & Biden told them so.

 

So your real "terrible choices" are:

 

1-  Let a terrorist nation that despises Western Europe, Israel, and the US continue developing nukes capable of destroying you.

 

2- Or, do something about it.

 

No problem, as usual, the US and Israel will take care of the problem for the gutless Europeans.

[Spekulatius]

3 hours ago, NotSoWise said:

If you analyze Iran only in the context of the region - than this was clearly a mistake to go in and start bombing. If you watched the above podcast, the outcome was predictable.

On the other hand if you increase the scope and include China in the picture, then it is not as obvious. If US wanted to clear the Iran situation before China confrontation (like clearing Cuba/ Venezuela) then it had some logic, BUT the chances of sucess were slim from the begining, you cant change regime by bombing - never happened in history. There was also no plan B if this bombing does not work out. POTUS hubris I think.

 

As for EU Nato allies - Iran thing was not consulted, it was purely US/ Israel initiative. Ormuz was open before the war... As for the Ukraine and US - well, US is defending its sphere of influence, from which it derives many benefits (US corps making money in EU and not paying taxes, selling weapons, etc). So I guess both US and EU are benefiting from this alliance, but it is not that US is only paying and not getting back anything.

 

With the US mighty Navy (best in the world), why POTUS needs EU ships? He needs them to get hits by Iranian rockets, to preserve US Navy and avoid own losses. Why would anyone with IQ > 1 agree to send EU navy to join now?

 

With my all sympathy to US/ West, US&Israel created this mess, so I think they should find a solution to this situation. Unfortunately there are no good exits from this. You either escalate or negotiate with Iran with your pants down. Both terrible choices.

Note that US fleet is floating far away from the action and I think moved even further out (~1000km from the straight of Hormuz). They are afraid of taking fire from Iranian missiles or drones and  having to do evasive maneuvers lead to the loss of some expensive airplanes when they were operating closer to the action bombing the Houthis.

 

It’s a good indication that operating to straight of Hormuz with naval forces is quite dangerous. The US navy doesn’t do 2000km of extra flight distance (back and forth) for each sortie for nothing.

[Spekulatius]

28 minutes ago, cubsfan said:

 

Now that it is known that Europe is within nuclear missile shot of Iran - the Europeans may feel differently.  These are the same European bozos that believed Iran was NOT producing nuclear weapons and stuck up for the regime as not having missiles capable of reaching Europe. 

 

Why?  Because Iran & Biden told them so.

 

So your real "terrible choices" are:

 

1-  Let a terrorist nation that despises Western Europe, Israel, and the US continue developing nukes capable of destroying you.

 

2- Or, do something about it.

 

No problem, as usual, the US and Israel will take care of the problem for the gutless Europeans.

I thought the US took care of the nuclear part? I don’t recall anyone sticking up for the regime in Iran in Europe either except a few left wing nuts..

 

Anyway, Europe has already plenty of nuclear weapons pointed at them from Russia, a much bigger concern. Putin even has threatened to use them unlike Iran. I don’t think Europe can rely on article 5 for nuclear deterrence either.

 

To be frank, I think it would be better for Europe if the US leaves NATO. It forces Europe to fill gaps in defense (logistics are too depended on US) and get their own nuclear deterrence. The current ambiguity is not really helping Europe and leaves it unprotected, imo.

 

Both Trump and the Europeans so far have shied away from a divorce but I think it’s getting likelier by the day.

[NotSoWise]

Iran does not have nukes yet. Ali put on hold building nukes (fatva), but was killed by US/ Israel - so now they have no other choice than to build nukes - just like North Korea - so they are not bombed again. I am not supporter of Iran regime, just saying what the situation is.

 

North Korea when was developing nukes, was not stopped by US. Because NK has nukes, US is affraid to bomb it, unlike Iran. NK is even more dangerous than Iran, so why US didnt start there first?

 

Irans nukes (once they have it) will be targeted at Israel, not at Europe - why EU should bother? EU is already targeted by Russian nukes. Israel has own nukes, so they will be in equilibrium with Iran.

 

In general, being in EU, I dont care much if Iran has nukes or not, at least not a reason to start war on Iran by EU. EU is not bombing Iran, unlike US/ Israel. It is not our problem, just like N.Korea. Russia is bigger issue at the moment, as it wants to take control of Central Europe-Baltic region/ Central Asia/ Caucasian region. We cant solve all the problems in the world.

 

On a side note:

I think the real problems will start in 15-25 years from now, due to climate warming (once we move beyond 2 degrees C - less water, less food production, soil erosion, chemicals, mass migrations to EU/ US, etc, etc. Now we have minor problems compared to what will come. We should enjoy the present good times as long as we can (and compound) and not think about the future we most likely wont be able to change.

 

Pls note that I am not against fossil fuels, our civilisation is based on them - there is no other way and it cant be stoped (you need heat for cement and steel, then fossil fuels for fertilizers and plastics, etc). The issue is that we (rather our kids) will have to pay the price at some point for our comfortable life. But for now lets enjoy...

[NotSoWise]

2 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

I thought the US took care of the nuclear part? I don’t recall anyone sticking up for the regime in Iran in Europe either except a few left wing nuts..

 

Anyway, Europe has already plenty of nuclear weapons pointed at them from Russia, a much bigger concern. Putin even has threatened to use them unlike Iran. I don’t think Europe can rely on article 5 for nuclear deterrence either.

 

To be frank, I think it would be better for Europe if the US leaves NATO. It forces Europe to fill gaps in defense (logistics are too depended on US) and get their own nuclear deterrence. The current ambiguity is not really helping Europe and leaves it unprotected, imo.

 

Both Trump and the Europeans so far have shied away from a divorce but I think it’s getting likelier by the day.

Good assessment. One comment is that EU will not be able to defend itself without US for a minimum of another 10 years. It needs to develop technologies, build up defence industry, reform reserve system, build logistics networks (i.e. military fuel pipes extension to Poland, ports, bridges to support tanks, etc). The list is very long and on top EU countries are high in debt (UK, France, Italy, Spain). There is also asymetry of risk within EU, so it will not act as one block - eg. Spain vs Poland against Russia, etc.

[Spekulatius]

1 hour ago, dealraker said:

Reading a historical fiction book by Sharonn Kay Penman titled Lionheart.  It is 1191...or is it 2026?

 

When did we say the war would end?

The war will end when both parties agree to it.

 

If you want read up history of wars, try Barbara Tuchman’s books. Distant Mirror (medieval) and Guns of August (WW1) , March of Folly (Vietnam) are fantastic reads. She writes like a journalist day by day so you see the history unfolding page by page.

[Spekulatius]

15 minutes ago, NotSoWise said:

Good assessment. One comment is that EU will not be able to defend itself without US for a minimum of another 10 years. It needs to develop technologies, build up defence industry, reform reserve system, build logistics networks (i.e. military fuel pipes extension to Poland, ports, bridges to support tanks, etc). The list is very long and on top EU countries are high in debt (UK, France, Italy, Spain). There is also asymetry of risk within EU, so it will not act as one block - eg. Spain vs Poland against Russia, etc.

Yes, I agree but if the journey is long you better start going. I think nuclear deterrence is the biggest issue and could be plugged fairly quickly since France has already nuclear weapons and many countries have the basically tech to produce them quickly (Germany, UK etc). The other holes can be plugged later.

 

The problem with  relying on France alone for nuclear deterrence is that any country can flip into putinophile power when the right wing parties win out (Le Pen is actually better than the AFD on that end) so relying on one country isn’t going to do the job either.

Edited March 28 by Spekulatius

[cubsfan]

18 minutes ago, NotSoWise said:

North Korea when was developing nukes, was not stopped by US. Because NK has nukes, US is affraid to bomb it, unlike Iran. NK is even more dangerous than Iran, so why US didnt start there first?

 

 

You're kidding right?

 

North Korea and China have not been out killing Americans and Israelis for 50 years.

[Gregmal]

4 minutes ago, NotSoWise said:

One comment is that EU will not be able to defend itself without US for a minimum of another 10 years. It needs to develop technologies, build up defence industry, reform reserve system, build logistics networks (i.e. military fuel pipes extension to Poland, ports, bridges to support tanks, etc). The list is very long and on top EU countries are high in debt (UK, France, Italy, Spain).

Yea, so when folks object to the attitude of many in the US towards Europe...this summarizes a good deal why. You would think "big brother" Europe should be leading the way, ahead of, or at the least, on par with the US with respect to this stuff. Instead? What theyve done is become totally reliant on the US, but rather than be appreciative like one would expect, they've take the stance of entitled grifter, with respect to it. You wonder why, they are highly indebted, but then find nothing useful amongst their "Strengths", in the SWOT analysis. Theyve essentially funded their virtue signaling bullshit; their ideology, their climate experiments, their immigration free for alls, etc...under the assumption that the US will do the important things for them. Then, to make matters worse, their ruling class dolts never stop at the opportunity to lecture us, to wag fingers, to preach from their podiums, to write "papers" all signed by these same card carrying academic club members. I mean imagine that? Theyre gonna lecture us on fossil fuels while their citizens go broke trying to pay their energy bills? You reap what you sow...

[NotSoWise]

3 minutes ago, cubsfan said:

 

You're kidding right?

 

North Korea and China have not been out killing Americans and Israelis for 50 years.

No not kidding. 

In the past 75 years or so, North Korea and China killed more Americans than Iran since the begining of the world.

[cubsfan]

The idiots in Europe, much like our own Democratic Party here in the USA, endorsed and claimed Iran was in compliance with Obama's disastrous JCPOA deal.  But that's how Europe/Obama dealt with real threats - kick the can down the road for the next guy.

 

Just look at what these morons have done with energy/climate change policy and radical Islamic immigration.  No courage to confront real issues that threaten their economies and citizens.

Edited March 28 by cubsfan

[SharperDingaan]

1 hour ago, dealraker said:

I find it quite interesting that someone or some entity is front running (as to investing) all of Trump's dramatic attacks and retreats and there is a complete blocking of anyone finding about who this is.  This sort of thing is the power we've given to the Donald, it is what defines his path for the last 50 years.  None of the limits, laws, traditions...nothing held dear in the past is applicable to Trump.  It is precisely why he has survived.

 

Shuush ......    

Don't crowd out the trade, 'cause if they don't get done for front running ... you will not either! 

 

SD

 

[Parsad]

Trump or his team must have assigned him to Biden!    Hope the guy is ok, but only in America and under these conditions!  Cheers!

 

Jill Biden's Secret Service agent shoots himself while escorting former first lady through Philadelphia airport in freak accident

[cubsfan]

3 minutes ago, NotSoWise said:

No not kidding. 

In the past 75 years or so, North Korea and China killed more Americans than Iran since the begining of the world.

 

Why do you purposely ignore a cease fire that has been a success for 70 years?