But none of it is a surprise, is it? Iran was on the list for a while now and last time I mentioned it on this forum, I was laughed, because "it didn't happen yet" either missing the concerted effort to make it happen or being part of the deflection campaign.
That is a clear abuse of power, which like most of the abuses revealed by Wikileaks, Snowden, etc., get solid bipartisan support.
Also, I'd expect that everything Iran wants to see Russia also wants to see.
So they could probably just check themselves how it was going, unless they wanted rapid feedback I suppose.
[1]: https://www.reuters.com/world/china/iran-used-chinese-spy-sa...
[2]: https://thedefensewatch.com/product/tee-01b-earth-observatio...
The full truth of the situation going public is probably one of few ways to pull back on this unchecked government behaviour, given Congress seems all but dead.
It's not "government behaviour", it's unchecked dictator's behaviour. It's not democratic, and the former service personnel who are doing it know they're contravening the constitution, committing war crimes, and so breaking their vows and promises. And all seemingly to just be a lever for Trump and his cronies to pull on to steal multi-generational wealth from everyone invested in USA markets; to add to the multi-generational wealth they're stealing via contracts and just taking as bribes, clear as day, right under the noses of congress.
USAians who support Trump seemed to tolerate his militia and the former USA army being used against your own citizens, and tolerate war-crimes that are written as the definition of the types of orders that soldiers must refuse to carry out.
I wonder how long it took the provinces of Rome to realise Rome had fallen.
So why continue listening to the order to punch the brick wall and break their knuckles? There's some deeper cultural issue at play here, likely that's been there since Vietnam and only grown over the last sixty years, where refusal of orders even if clearly detrimental is a betrayal of your country and fellow servicemen rather than an exercise in judgement and consideration of consequences.
Americans. Please avoid this childish demonym unless you're going to commit to calling people from South African "SAians" too.
Sure, "this is fine."
The delay on commercial imagery purchase isn't to hinder Iran, it's to hinder our understanding of the conflict.
> Everyone has to rely on Iran's satellite images to find out what's happening
No one - not even Iran - is relying on Iran’s satellite images.
[0] https://www.reuters.com/world/china/iran-used-chinese-spy-sa...
[1] https://thedefensewatch.com/product/tee-01b-earth-observatio...
Among Trumpistan, Israel and Iran there is no good guy in this war.
I doubt. Israel is a racist project and zionism is just apartheid with better PR.
The whole conspiracy around the downed airman https://www.afr.com/world/middle-east/a-ruse-to-snatch-urani... only adds to it.
They were trying to take Uranium out?
the narrative exists for Iranian propaganda purposes because if you look at what happened (US forces set up a forward-operating-base deep within Iranian territory, held it for hours, found the airman, then left without casualties) it's very embarrassing for the Iranians.
Iran could have easily scattered the material over multiple locations well before the US/Israel hit the site.
Having said that, I find it incomprehensible that if Iran had the material, they didn't finish the task of building a working weapon. If you have resources the US wants to steal, and you have no nukes, you get attacked.
I agree that Iran had ample time to disperse and hide any material. Any operation with just 2 C130s with of equipment (about 6 humvees worth) is far to inadequate to find and remove it.
My SUV can easily carry 500kgs, and it's not even a big vehicle.
It's speculated this material is buried under a mountain, but we have satellite evidence of Iran digging and transporting something out, so nobody knows for sure. Iran also has nuclear facilities that were never inspected by the IAEA. It's possible there's undocumented nuclear material there.
And only removing the 60% grade material without removing the rest is completely silly. Iran has enough centrifuges to convert its 20% grade material into weapons grade in 1-2 months. And has enough 5% material to convert into weapons grade in 8 months to a year. Removing only the 500kgs of 60% grade material would not solve the issue, Iran would be back to where it was in a few months, and doing so would only kick the can down the road.
That's why all (several tons) of the nuclear material needs to be found and removed.
Realtime updates of this quantity did not exist for any of the Gulf war, Kosovo War, Iraq war.
I guess it is a combination of established media not doing well financially and lacking in quality and expertise and the general rise of authoritarianism and death of (mainstream) critical journalism. Free press has been severely limited these days.
1. Drones are a relatively recent evolution but are really a continuation of asymmetric warfare that has been wildly successful post-1945. The US has been woefully unprepared for cheap, mass-produced drones that, as evidenced by these satellite images, are equivalent to high-precision missiles in terms of effectiveness but are substantially cheaper;
2. Censoring these images serves no military purpose. Iran, China and Russia (among others) have access to accurate satellite imagery so censoring these images really just belies a fear of public opinion. Any cost estimates of this war given by the administration (which tend to be $1-2B/day) don't seem to include repairing and replacing lost weapons, radars, facilities, aircraft and other base infrastructure. That's going to be billions more;
3. It seems clear that this war so ill-considered and the US was so unprepared that (IMHO) will go down as the biggest strategic blunder in US history as the US military and Gulf security guarantees have shown to be a paper tiger and there is no military out of this conflict short of the use of nuclear weapons;
4. Despite claims to the contrary, the US does not appear to have air superiority over Iran. The evidence for this is the continued use of missiles and other so-called "stand off" weapons (ie fired at range to avoid SAMs and anti-aircraft batteries);
5. Despite administration claims to the contrary, there are now desperate shortages of munitions for missile defences, Tomahawk missiles and various other missiles. Some of these had already been dseriously depleted in the 12 day War. This has made things substantially worse and it will likely take years to replenish supplies;
6. The future of Gulf bases and secruity guarantees is now unclear given it's now been demonstrated that the US can't protect them; and
7. I'm not sure the UAE (and Duabi in particular) ever recovers from this. The image that Dubai is some stable center for business and finance in the MIddle East has been shattered. Will the wealthy come back knowing the US can't protect Dubai? I honestly don't know. Dubai is a "wretched hive of scum and villainy" (to quote Star Wars). It's key in Iran evading sanctions, Russia evading sanctions and instrumental in the South Sudan genocide (ie there's a trade between UAE arms from the US and stolen South Sudanese gold from the RSF). The UAE has left OPEC. I honestly don't know if this will be a good or bad decision long-term.
There are 3 players in this war and they all have very different goals. Israel wants to wreck Iran. The US wants out. Iran simply needs to survive. I'm not sure where we go from here. To back down, the US would need to split with Israel and that's a pill likely too difficult to swallow given that Israel is the only reason we're in this war at all.
Looming over all this is the upcoming summit between the US and China, currently set for next week. It's already been delayed once because of this war. Having this situation unresolved is going to greatly weaken the American negotiating position. The US may well want to delay it again. If so, (IMHO) China may well cancel it entirely.
First, I agree with you on the drones. They're a new entrant to the battlefield and the US has had to learn to adapt.
You're viewing Iran as a simple country vs. country war. This war is not about just Iran, this war is about energy, technology, and dominance against Russia and China.
Iran is a destabilizing power in the middle east. Not only does it control a bunch of oil itself, but it controls the Strait of Hormuz. This chokepoint means that Iran has had the oppprtunity to disrupt the world's energy supply. If you think you think this isn't a global risk then you don't understand the global economy. Instability in the global economy is a risk to US dominance.
The US has a very strong partner in Israel not only as an outpost, but as a technological partner and a strong intelligence partner. You might read articles about Israel making trouble in the region, but most of this has no true basis. In fact the Arab countries around Israel have enjoyed peace with Israel for quite some time. Further, the other Arab nations (especially the ones that aren't Russia/China aligned) want stability like the UAE, Bahrain, and even SA and they are sick of proxies in the region being used to create instability. They want to sell their oil and they want US and Israeli technology.
There's no question that Iran is/was a threat to Israel - that's well documented. There's no question that Iran is/was a threat to US forces in the middle east, that's documented too.
So, who's the biggest winner if Iran ceases to be a destabilizing force in the middle east and no longer has a chokehold on global energy supply - the US. This truly reenforces US dominance.
Somehow you see this as making China stronger - it doesn't do that. At best it drives Russia closer to China but that has already happened.
Right now the US is energy dominant in almost all categories. Having a strong foothold in the Gulf especially loosely controlling the SoH would solidify this.
Quick side note - air superiority means that you can fly planes around the country without major risks of being shot down. The US maintains complete air superiority since essentially this started. Until the ceasefire they were able to bomb targets at will.
So this is a war to prevent Iran from closing the Strait of Hormuz, which made Iran close the Strait of Hormuz for the very first time ever, did I get this right.
They always could close the Strait and they eventually did. In this case the US is already energy independent and could absorb the shock.
Trump is an idiot and thought starting a war would help his odds in the midterm elections, and he needed a bigger distraction from the Epstein files. That’s the beginning and end of it. Any claims that this was some strategic move to assert US dominance is a poor attempt grasping at straws.
Your argument is that Israel started a war that Trump is finishing to divert from Epstein ties but that's tying together a bunch of conspiracy theories.
Uh, no. Europe gets a tiny fraction of their oil from the middle eastern countries currently being affected and none of their natural gas.
> Your argument is that Israel started a war that Trump is finishing to divert from Epstein ties but that's tying together a bunch of conspiracy theories.
If you think the Epstein files are a “conspiracy theory” I guess we can end the discussion now because much like your claims Europe is dependent on the Middle East for energy, you have no idea what you’re talking about.
And do you really think Israel starts this without US backing? The war they’ve asked every president since Bush about starting but were told no by every predecessor to Trump, including Trump himself when he didn’t need a distraction his first term.
And, while that's true of crude itself, more refined oil products are heavily imported from the ME to Europe - I'm sure you've seen the news on jet fuel.
I do think that saying "oh, Trump did this so we stopped looking at the Epstein files" is a conspiracy theory. Doesn't mean it can't be right - just means that it's just conjecture.
All I did above was provide a different perspective - don't like it? Feel free to move along.
So maybe US got taught a lesson, but saying it will take years to replenish seems extreme. If that's what it takes, then maybe US was never a superpower and then the 2028 war (hypothetical) would have been a shock. If it got taught lessons, it should use these lessons to improve its capabilities - building drones, resupplying weapons, and fix whatever else is needed. And I am not sure I understand the meaning of phrase "air superiority". It does not mean bombing everything below and taking un-necessary risks. The fact that 7-20 soldiers got killed (and similarly low numbers on Iranian side compared to the Iraq war), is a testament to their ability to reduce risk. Any war will have deaths, but this provided US a stress test like the bankers should have received in 2008.
The question is whether the military and political leadership can learn those lessons or will they pass it on to the next administration. If what is being said is true, this requires a Covid level mobilization effort.
The first problem is that China simply doesn't have that military capability. Water is an incredible barrier, even in modern warfare. There are roughly 100 miles of open ocean between mainland China and Taiwan. China would need to transport somewhere between 500,000 and 1 million troops at a minimum with all th elogistics, air support, etc that that entails. They don't have that Navy. They're not building that Navy. Do you have any idea how badly Taiwan or the US could disrupt supply lines over 100 miles of ocean?
At its height, Nazi Germany's army was something like 8 to 10 million soldiers IIRC. You can see the white cliffs of Dover from Calais on a clear day. It's a distance of 17 miles. And that was completely impassable in an era without radar where the Germans essentially had air superiority. Now nobody has that military, not the US, not China, for a large-scale amphibious landing.
Second, China has no need to invade Taiwan. China thinks very long term. They believe this issue will be resolved in the future, possibly far in the futrure. And all but 10 countries agree with them. This is the so-called "One China" policy. It's the official policy of some ~180 countries including the US and all of Europe.
If they had the military and they chose to use it, it would do untold damage to them diplomatically and economically when the world already agrees with them. Think of it like Russia invading Ukraine. Suddenly formerly neutral countries like Finland and Sweden and lining up to join NATO. Do you think that helped Russia's security situation, economy or diplomatic relations?
Lastly, and this is the point where people really get in their feelings for some reason, China has no modern history of imperialism and military intervention. The standard rejoined is "But Tibet!!!". Yeah, that was 1950. There were some other minor border disputes with Vietnam and I think the USSR. This is all projection because the US loves doing imperialism and military intervention. China doesn't have that history.
So, for a country that can't invade, has no need to and has no history of doing similar, one really should question where this idea is coming from.
China is engaged in a major border conflict in the South China Sea. So far it's just water canons and ramming boats, but there are reports of deaths.
I sincerely hope you are right, but - as we've seen with Russia - once they get rid of all the people who can say no, dictators make incredibly poor decisions. Better to prepare for war.
First, they're in China's backyard. China doesn't want a hostile imperial power on their border any more than Russia or the US does. Just look at the Monroe Doctrine, which now apparently includes kidnapping Venezuela's president.
Second, in those cases China was helping defend a nation from an invader, The Korean peninsula is a little more complicated. The Western version of this conflict is that the North Korea just upped and invaded one day for literally no reason. A more accurate history would have to include the military dictatorship the US installed on the peninsula when it was freed from Japanese occupation post-WW2.
As for the islands, which are in the South China Sea I might add, I'm more sympathetic to China's position here. That position is that the US is engaging in a deliberate strategy of maritime containment through a ring of islands and military bases, called the Island Chain Strategy [1]. It's not a secret. I personally think this is a pointless and unjustifiable strategy, built on a false premise (of containing Chinese imperialism).
The Phillipines are a US client state. So is Japan. So is Taiwan. So is it any wonder than China is grabbing these islands before the US or one of its clients occupies and militarizes them? I mean really... what business does the US have interfering with islands off the coast of China?
That thing you just did there - "they're in China's backyard" - that's imperialism. You're trying to justify the imposing China's will on a population that does not want them.
With this kind of bias, I can't trust a thing you say. It's a shame, because I really like the view of China as a peaceful beheamoth. Unfortunately it's all lies.
This didn't happen. The only thing that was sent from Korea was interceptors, which there is a global shortage of.
Korea-based THAAD system was not dispatched to Middle East, says USFK commander https://www.stripes.com/theaters/asia_pacific/2026-04-22/tha...
> In previous moves, radars were taken off the peninsula, Brunson said, without specifying their types. “This was in advance of Midnight Hammer,” he said of strikes on Iranian nuclear sites in June. Some of those have not yet returned to South Korea, but the THAAD systems remain on the peninsula, Brunson said.
And I’m not sure taking the word of the US military in the comment section of an article about how the US Military has been lying about the war is super convincing..
> an article about how the US Military has been lying
That's a gross mischaracterization of the submitted article. FTA:
"The amount of destruction is far larger than what has been publicly acknowledged by the U.S. government or previously reported."
There is no "lying". The US government is not making false statements, they are declining to fully state losses. Every single military on earth does this. The US nor its military is under no obligation fully report combat losses.
> I’m not sure taking the word of the US military in the comment section of an article [...] is super convincing
So you'd rate an unsourced claim by an anonymous internet commentator as more credible than a statement from the commander of USFK?
Random commenters à la Bellingcat are far more trustworthy with their specific claims than Hegseth or CENTCOM. And I believe the THAAD was being relocated because The South Korean press had pictures of the radar system being dismantled. It now seems like they decided to only ship the interceptors to the ME, but to pretend like the reporting at the time wasn’t accurate is just silly.
This didn't happen, give a source. You're probably confused about the F-15 that was struck but not shot down near Qeshm Island. That happened a day before a different F-15 was actually shot down near the city of Lali, in Iran’s Khuzestan Province.
> lied about the THAAD being struck in the first place
Neither did this, give a source. The US military refusing to comment, or claiming some (but not all) missiles were intercepted, is not lying.
> Saudi Embassy strike (“minor material damage”)
Source, I'd love to see the false statements the US military made.
> they continue to lie about the number of casualties
Source? I'd love to see this too, from what I understand the US stopped reporting the number of casualties, which is drastically different from "lying".
Minab I'll admit the military tried to deny, but that was an issue with AI targeting using outdated data (Iranian naval base converted some military buildings on-base into a school, and the US targeted these buildings with outdated maps). Aljazeera has some good maps of what happened: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/3/3/questions-over-minab...
> South Korean press had pictures of the radar system being dismantled
No, look again at those photos. They do not show radar systems being dismantled, only interceptors being moved.
You are describing "lying by omission" which is a very well known form of lying. Specifically, they stopped reporting the number of casualties to intentionally misrepresent what was happening in the war.
All this to bury the Epstein files.