Monday 13 January 2020

Who’s Going To Stop Him?

Blank And Pitiless: Having ordered the assassination of the Iranian General, Qasem Soleimani, President Donald Trump promised to reduce the cultural monuments of Iran’s 3,000 year-old civilisation to rubble if a revenge attack was mounted. A breach of international law? Certainly. A war crime? Indisputably. Who’s going to stop him? Nobody.

WHAT WERE THEY thinking? Allowing angry crowds to storm the US Embassy in Baghdad? If such scenes were authorised by General Qasem Soleimani, then he was not the master strategist and tactician his countrymen are proclaiming him to have been. Believing an American president – any American president – could look upon such scenes with equanimity betrayed the most astonishing ignorance of recent US history.

The storming and capture of the American embassy in Tehran in 1979 set off 444 days of diplomatic and military humiliation that not only destroyed the presidency of Jimmy Carter, but also created a thirst for vengeance that not even the passage of 40 years has diminished. It matters little that Soleimani was instrumental in clearing the Baghdad embassy compound of demonstrators, simply by allowing such images to imprint themselves upon Donald Trump’s retinas, the General was guilty of the most enormous, and ultimately fatal, error of judgement.

Nor will the American President be in the slightest measure intimidated by the size of General Soleimani’s funeral procession, or by the promises of vengeance offered to his widow by Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Iran’s capacity to inflict harm on the American Empire is considerably less than Queen Boudica’s ability to make the Roman Empire pay for its outrages. The Roman Empire did not have an air force.

In some part of the Iranian Islamic Republic, the unanswerable character of American air power must, surely, be weighing heavily upon the judgements of its public servants and soldiers. A retaliatory strike against the United States that even remotely resembled the assassination of General Soleimani in terms of scale and significance would provoke the USA to, in the memorable quip of the late US Senator from Arizona, John McCain, “Bomb, bomb, bomb-bomb, Iran”.

The armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran have nothing with which to stop an American air attack. Its fighters are too old and its pilots insufficiently trained to take on the state-of-the-art aircraft, air-crews and missile technology of the United States. Everything the Iranians could throw at them would be effortlessly brushed aside by their American attackers. Not only that, but the very instruments of Iran’s self-defence would themselves be among the Americans’ first targets. They would not, however, be the last.

Having rendered Iran defenceless to American (and, almost certainly, Israeli and Saudi) attack, the list of targets would include (in no particular order) the country’s weapons factories, transportation systems, manufacturing enterprises, cement plants, water purification facilities, media networks, state ministries and scientific research centres – especially Iran’s nuclear research programme – pharmaceutical production plants and fertiliser factories. All of the above would be attacked even as Iran’s military and civilian command-and-control centres and all of its major cities were being pounded into dust.

President Donald Trump has further promised to reduce the cultural monuments of Iran’s 3,000 year-old civilisation to rubble if a revenge attack is mounted. A breach of international law? Certainly. A war crime? Indisputably. Who’s going to stop him? Nobody.

There are some who insist that Iran is not entirely helpless. That its little navy has developed weapons and tactics capable of sinking a US aircraft carrier with all hands. But, what then? The snuffing-out of 3,000 American lives in a single attack would, almost certainly, provoke the current American president into ordering a tactical nuclear response. Tehran, or if he was feeling particularly vindictive, the holy Shia city of Qom, would, in a split second, be transformed into a radioactive wasteland.

Impossible? No, sadly, it’s not. The rest of the world would certainly be shocked and horrified by such an act of disproportionate savagery. But, once again, who would/could stop an American president determined to demonstrate to the rest of humanity that America has been made great again – and will not be constrained by any power upon the face of the planet?

Still not convinced? Well, consider this. When 60 Minutes journalist, Lesley Stahl, put the following question to American Secretary of State, Madeline Albright in 1996: “We have heard that a half million [Iraqi] children have died. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?” Albright replied:  “I think this is a very hard choice, but the price – we think the price is worth it.”

And she was a Democrat!

POSTSCRIPT: When assessing the actions and options of the Iranians it is always wise to recall that it was in their part of the world that the game of Chess was invented. To have avenged the death of General Soleimani without killing a single American (or any other human-being) has to be adjudged a truly inspired move. Forced into a duel by President Trump, Ayatollah Khamenei elected to fire his pistol harmlessly into the air. Honour is satisfied – and the world breathes again.

This essay was originally published in The Otago Daily Times and The Greymouth Star of Friday, 10 January 2020.

35 comments:

David Stone said...

Don't forget the spy drone they took out a few months ago; leaving the military personnel plane alongside unharmed. That showed a defence capability that shocked the US establishment. And the accuracy of the retaliatory missile strikes, none of which the US stopped has demonstrated that all US bases in the middle east are vulnerable . And all the shipping in the Med.
No doubt the US would win a war even if they did have to resort to nukes, but that would likely bring in Russia and then from what we read there is the gear available to stop him. But what a mess ! But it seems that America can't bear the faintest doubt of their dominance of world capitalism and ability to deliver death misery and destruction. The doubt must be extinguished at any cost to other nations and to the poor classes of Americans that can find employment only in the US military.
I think they will have to find out if Putin's hypersonic nukes are as good as he claims. The testosterone levels can't leave the question open.
But I think it is way more complex than to blame it all on Trump. It would only differ in style with any other likely incumbent of the White House. The US is a very complex organism. And it's central nervous system is not all controlled from one centre in the head. The foreign policy decisions as referred here have a continuity that belies any serious interference from the current WH incumbent . And it is not controlled entirely by some grey men forming a deep state, though no doubt there are plenty who would like to have that power. It is the whole organism that is set on a path of perceived exceptionalism and imagined destiny to rule the world, and the decisions that matter are never made by any identifiable individual or group, but rather are the result of a morass of seperate little decisions that add up to what the organism does as a whole. This is what makes it so dangerous because it also means that no individual or group has to feel personally responsible for the organism's actions, or the result. They are all just doing what they have to in the circumstances.
And indeed who can stop it? No one. And that includes the president of the United States of America.
D J S

Wayne Mapp said...

If the Iran did sink a US aircraft carrier I am pretty sure the US would not respond with a nuclear attack. Even President Trump would not do that. However, I imagine the entire Iranian Airforce and Navy would be pulverised by massive B 52 strikes. Basically precision weapons would destroy the entire technological aspects of Iran's defence system.

Would that end the Iranian government? No it wouldn't, not by itself. But it would think twice about attacking the US again.

As for the current situation, maybe the Iranians were not so displeased to see the end of General Suleiman. He might have been conducting a much too aggressive independent foreign policy, that was at odds with what the "official" government wanted. Hence the limited and rather symbolic retaliation.

Bonzo said...

The Islamic Republic of Iran has killed hundreds in revenge for the killing of Soleimani. At least 56 at his funeral and 176 on the Ulkrainian plane that they shot down shortly after it took off from their own airport. They then spent three days lying about it transparently before a humiliating backdown. Things have been busy!

The Iranian people must be praying the regime calms down before more of them die. Chess masters my arse.

Odysseus said...

I never expected to see you Chris sympathizing with one of the most evil and repressive regimes on the planet, but that's where the Left seems headed these days. Soleimani orchestrated the death and oppression of thousands in the region, including Iranian protesters, on behalf of the cruel theocracy in Tehran. Trump's aim in dispatching him was to protect the lives of US diplomats and service personnel in Iraq. "No more Benghazis" he declared, recalling the infamous episode when Obama and Clinton had abandoned their defenseless diplomats to be slaughtered by jihadists in Libya. Do you think Soleimani had arrived at Baghdad airport in the middle of the night fresh from putting down protests in Lebanon simply for some R&R? We can all be grateful the Iranian retaliation failed to kill anyone. However they managed to end the lives of 176 innocent people on a Ukrainian 737, a fact they tried to hide for 3 days. We should all applaud and support those brave Iranians, mainly young people, who have now taken to the streets to protest against that vile regime.

Chris Trotter said...

To: "Odysseus".

In your endless wanderings, Odysseus, it is regrettable that you never seem to have steered anywhere near the Isle of Truth. What you have ventured too close to, seemingly, are those sirens of the American far-right, who have, as is their habit, torn your critical faculties apart.

Soleimani was in Baghdad at the invitation of the Iraqi Government - ostensibly an ally of the USA. His meetings were intended to calm the situation in the Iraqi capital - especially in relation to the US Embassy Compound.

Perhaps, you are recoverable by Reason, perhaps not. A good starting-point would be to let the historical fact of US aggression in the Middle East, and its malign consequences, become the master-frame for future judgement.

The hundreds of thousands killed, the billions-of-dollars-worth of infrastructure destroyed, the homicidal fanaticism unleashed, was not the work of General Soleimani (he merely responded to it in defence of his nation) it was the work of the United States. Once you grasp this core reality of contemporary geopolitics, making sense of what happens in the Islamic world will become a lot easier.

Shane McDowall said...

So it was McCain.

I remember an Auckland radio station broadcasting a ditty that went to the tune of The Beach Boys tune "Barbara Anne".
(Ahem) " Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran / Bomb Iran, Just like Japan ".

Cruel, but funny.

David Stone said...

Wayne Mapp
B52s ? I think the world of war technology has moved on a few decades since they were the critical factor, and if you noticed how the Iranians took out that spy drone a few months ago; clinically, and how all their missiles precisely struck their targets without interference from US celebrated defence systems it should be apparent that Iran is right up there with the technology.. And it is this tech that will decide the outcome of the next all out war, not firepower that can't be delivered.
My fear is that the US will be humiliated (I think they have been) and will react by doing what they must as a quickly developing last resort to prove their superiority in the only way remaining to them.
They may not even prove able to deliver that.
I think the deescalation since the missile strikes in Iraq in defiance of Trump's promises of what would happen if they retaliated is based not on a sudden attack of diplomacy but on the message that demonstration conveyed. Yes you can probably destroy our country , but it will not come cheaply. A lot of beautiful war equipment will be smashed and a lot of US servicemen and women will come home in bags.
The only way those lumbering old B52s will get through is if there are more of them than Iran has missiles.
That's not to say the Iranian regime is sweetness and light, but there would be a chance for it to mellow if the US would pull their bloody head in and leave the rest of the world to run it's own affairs.

D J S

Odysseus said...

Nothing to do with the "American far right" Chris, plenty to do with having observed the Iranian regime for many years including while resident there.

Nick J said...

Chris and Wayne, I think that you are missing the latest iteration of the leap frog game of military technology. That is the latest hypersonic missile technology developed by Russia.

This development seriously challenges the manner in which the US can project power. It means in effect that the cost in aircraft and pilots could now be prohibitive, and the ability of the opponent to strike back is magnified. An analogy is the development of the modern torpedo that made the dreadnought battleships a liability from the day they were launched.

This time the dominant power has a monopoly on conventional power projection, and as always happens somebody counters with the unconventional. Fun times.

sumsuch said...

The lesser of 2 evils, Odysseus. Iran has a democracy broiling in it but the price , given our experience the last 40 years here in the modernist realms, must be looking after the least. They're trying to sort that out in America, where rudeness seems a main point of objection to Trump.

sumsuch said...

Have you ever thought of becoming a licensed lay-reader like my pa, Chris? You're lyrical -- which I personally think the tops. Fun language spoken -- obviously not much here in agricultural Gisborne. Pa came out in an Akld private school in the 70s for 'kindness'. I canna fault him, even as a more passionate/destructive Calvinist.

sumsuch said...

Strange, ideas about reality are thought/fought out in Left blogs. Or not. Talkback 4 to 1 'it's commonsense!' comments are expressed in the Right blogs. They don't care about reality, just their comfort. They look up in their 30s over their stomachs and wonder at those who dispute their stomach.

Tom Hunter said...

And now there are protests erupting in Iran over the shootdown of the airliner over Tehran.

Some Twitter feeds and video...

F
arnaz Fassihi


What a spectacular turn of events, Islamic Republic.
Crowds chant, "Our enemy is right here, they are lying that it's America


More video here

And here

While some people outside of Iran are beating their chests over Suleimani, here are Iranians tearing down a poster of Suleimani & Khamenei last night in Iran.

The right side of history showing up - again.

Geoff Fischer said...

Kia ora Chris
"Who will stop him?".
Not Jacinda Ardern or Winston Peters. Their reaction to the assassination of Qassem Soleimani was to say that they "understood the US concerns about Iran": diplomatic code for "we endorse President Trump's decision to assassinate a senior official of a sovereign state with whom the United States is not at war".
So the Realm of New Zealand contends that murder can to be used as a legitimate instrument of politics. That comes as no surprise to those who know the full history of the New Zealand state, but the people of New Zealand have a very different view to Ms Ardern and Mr Peters. Unlike the colonial government, they believe in the rule of law and so far as it may be possible, the maintenance of world peace.
A privileged, cowardly, narcissistic billionaire politician murders a man who grew up in a poor farming family, left home at 13 to work to help pay off the farm debts, fought for his country with great courage in a long and brutal war, and went on to become a military leader noted for his bravery, chivalry and compassion.
The overwhelming majority of New Zealanders are appalled by this iniquitous and reckless act of murder, but the colonial government finds nothing to criticize. On the contrary, it condones the act and offers comfort to the murderers.
So who is going to stop President Trump if not the "compassionate, empathic" Prime Minister of New Zealand?
God will stop President Trump. And along with President Trump, He will stop Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern. He will bring all to the seat of justice.
Politics is not just like a game of chess, Chris. It is a contest which rests on the most profound philosophical beliefs and moral values and it is the elect of God who prevail in the end. Whatever the United States does, however many their drones and bombers kill, there will be more such as Qassem Soleimani.
The colonial regime to which you still offer equivocal support will fall along with Trump and for the same reasons. Because of its dishonesty, brutality, cowardice, arrogance and selfishness. Because it has decided to make war on God, and because not even the greatest of Grand Masters can succeed in such an adventure.

Tom Hunter said...

murders a man who grew up in a poor farming family, left home at 13 to work to help pay off the farm debts, fought for his country with great courage in a long and brutal war, and went on to become a military leader noted for his bravery, chivalry and compassion.

The New Statesman addressed this sort of nonsense directly, while also being strongly anti-Trump and pro-Left (but admittedly not Corbyn Left, let alone Geoff Fischer Left):

It is a preposterous and grotesque revisionism of history to suggest that the man who harboured al-Qaeda in Iran was some sort of counter-terrorist. The brutality of Soleimani’s policies in Iraq was as responsible for creating the material conditions ISIS needed to flourish as Bush’s disastrous invasion of Iraq did (Obama doesn’t get off lightly here, either), and his forces carried out acts of unimaginable cruelty against civilians in IS-occupied territory in the process.
...
Soleimani made his mark through his unrestrained barbarity towards civilians in Syria and Iraq, and he was personally responsible for the deaths of thousands of people. These include the hundreds of Iraqi civilians who were shot dead by Iraqi security forces within the last three months, acting directly under his orders.

Soleimani was brutal, merciless, and ruthlessly efficient at his trade, slaughtering his way across the Middle East in the pursuit of regional hegemony. If he could not bulldoze his way through civilian infrastructure, he had a near endless supply of impoverished, forcibly recruited Shia conscripts from Afghanistan and Pakistan that he could send over the trenches in World War One-like human wave attacks until all resistance was broken, their lives apparently as cheap to him as the lives of the civilian protest movements he crushed.


Which was why so many Iraqis and Syrians were literally dancing in the streets upon hearing that the Americans had killed him.

Tom Hunter said...

There's also a lot of confusion here re military matters.

Don't forget the spy drone they took out a few months ago; leaving the military personnel plane alongside unharmed.
Alongside? The P8 Orion was miles away conducting it's own surveillance of Iran. The Iranians merely claimed they could have also shot it down - saying that it had also entered Iranian airspace like the drone - but chose not to. Even Trump noted that fact and said they'd made a wise choice to avoid killing Americans.

That showed a defence capability that shocked the US establishment
Rubbish. Drones are slow-flying vehicles that have always been understood to be vulnerable to SAMs, and this one was not even a stealth drone.

Besides that, the recent shootdown of that passenger plane shows that the Iranians are actually pretty sloppy if we assume they're finally telling the truth that they thought it was a US cruise missile. Those weapons are a few metres long and wide and presents a vastly smaller radar signature than a Boeing 737. What sort of poorly trained SAM crew would mistake one for the other?

And the accuracy of the retaliatory missile strikes, none of which the US stopped has demonstrated that all US bases in the middle east are vulnerable
According to numerous reports the Iranians actually informed Iraq about what they were going to do, implying that they deliberately avoided casualties or even infrastructure damage at these bases. Smart move on their part but it says nothing about their accuracy.

Ten hit the Ayn al-Asad airbase, one hit the Erbil base, and four missiles failed.[22] The U.S. defense secretary, Mark Esper, later said 16 short-range ballistic missiles had been launched from three locations within Iran; 11 hit the Ayn al-Asad air base, one hit the base near Erbil, and four failed to reach their target.[25] Other sources confirmed that two ballistic missiles targeted Erbil: one hit Erbil International Airport and did not explode, the other landed about 20 miles west of Erbil.

Pretty typical for ballstic missiles, which have have inherent accuracy and reliability problems, which is why claiming that they "hit bases" is about as good as it gets. The best the USSR and USA could do with all their science, technology and industry, was get ballistic missile accuracy down to a few metres, which is fine for an atomic warhead. That's actually a tell that the Iranians still want nuclear weapons.

As these strikes have demonstrated such missiles are largely useless for delivering conventional explosives - especially compared to the accuracy of GPS and laser-guided weapons, which is why the only others who have tried using them this way were the Nazis in WWII with their V2 attacks and Saddam Hussein in the 1980's against Iran and during the 1991 Gulf War. They were strategically useless then as well.

Tom Hunter said...

And one last military thing....
The only way those lumbering old B52s will get through is if there are more of them than Iran has missiles.

Again, the USA is not exactly ignorant about modern SAMs, which is why they've developed stealth planes like the B-2, F-117, F-22 and F-35.

But the B-52's are still effective, given that they don't have to "get through" at all. Even three decades ago they were being equipped with so-called "stand-off" missiles that could be launched long before the got in range of SAMs. An effective solution to keep the old machines useful, and those missles are increasingly stealth themselves. The tactics that have been developed by the US envision the use of many such old planes as simple missile carriers, to be directed by stealth planes opearating inside a place like Iran, which brings me to your next point...
Iran is right up there with the technology
Not really, which is why they fired one of their top generals last year for hiding the fact that Israeli F-35 stealth fighters had been flying around Iran and he'd hidden that fact from his superiors.

Even then it was only because of a report about the flights in the Kuwaiti daily newspaper Al Jarida. Up until then the Iranians had not a clue.

...the latest iteration of the leap frog game of military technology. That is the latest hypersonic missile technology developed by Russia.
...It means in effect that the cost in aircraft and pilots could now be prohibitive....

The technology is about AGM (Air-To-Ground) and GGM missiles for offensive use. Nothing to do with anti-aircraft missiles.

... and the ability of the opponent to strike back is magnified.
True, but the Russians are not likely to sell such attack technology to Iran as it would be too destablising.
More likely something like their famous S-400 SAM system, which is defensive and supposedly effective against stealth planes.

In any case the trick is not the technology but the deployment and we've heard a lot of boasting from the Russians about such weapons over the years without actually seeing them deployed, let alone deployed in numbers that would scare anybody. The reason for that is that basic one that Russia has an economy smaller than that of Italy with a larger population.

VPP has no intention of repeating the mistake of the USSR, which is why he regularly announces such wonder weapon tech and then goes quiet about it later on. They're still trying to deploy their latest high-tech tank that they announced a decade ago.

Yes you can probably destroy our country , but it will not come cheaply. A lot of beautiful war equipment will be smashed and a lot of US servicemen and women will come home in bags.
I recall hearing the same things three decades ago when the US went up against the Iraqi Army, the fourth largest in the world, fresh off a war they'd fought to a standstill against Iran and loaded to the hilt with the best weapons the USSR could provide.

The Yanks destroyed it out in about a hundred hours.

Jays said...

Why do you and others post this bullocks Chris?
Trump has been hesitant (for a US president) to go to war.
Compared to Obama, Clinton (him and her) and Bush Junior he has practically peaceful.
I get that Trump is an appalling human being Chris, I really do.
But we can point that out whilst still sticking to the facts.

Tom Hunter said...

One last point.

Two thirds of Iran's electricity comes from about a dozen power plants, just eight refineries produce 80% of its oil products and 90% of those are exported through just one place, the Port of Kharg.

One night of cruise missile and stealth bomber attacks would destroy all of them. No need for the USA to do anything else.

Tom Hunter said...

So you're not going to permit my arguments to see the light of day here then? Too "far right" or whatever the excuse is.

Ok - let's see what you think of this series of Tweets from Yashar Ali, an Iranian who writes for the Huffington Post and New York Magazine, hardly bastions of the "Far Right".

No. 12 really does finish off his point about Western Leftists using the Iranian situation to go after the West in general and Trump in particular:

This happens often with people living in authoritarian states & with certain religious/ethnic groups. We're used as tools to push domestic political agendas. We're told what to feel & think by people with no connection to our country & have no idea what they're talking about

Chris Trotter said...

To: Tom Hunter.

Reasonable commentary I can live with, Tom, but defamation and crude abuse will not see the light of day.

Tom Hunter said...

One last bit of criticism of your article.

There is an discrepancy here between your update that finds ...

To have avenged the death of General Soleimani without killing a single American (or any other human-being) has to be adjudged a truly inspired move. Forced into a duel by President Trump, Ayatollah Khamenei elected to fire his pistol harmlessly into the air. Honour is satisfied

... and the rest of your article making it clear how insane it would be for the Iranians to escalate further. There can be nothing "inspired" about an entirely predictable move, as I wrote here on the NoMinister blog several days ago:

USA v Iran: What WON'T Happen After Soleimani's Killing

Charles E said...

I think some are being a bit harsh on our host, in that he did not say the dead general was a saint or hero.
But Chris I do think you have got the wrong end of the stick entirely about the current US Administration, & Trump. It and he are more like the Reagan WH. He sank half the Iranian navy, after a lot of provocation, causing a long quiet period. It was first rate deterrence. A good policy change. He like Trump was no warmonger at all. But he hugely boosted the US military capability and pointed it at the USSR and said: “Beat that”. They could not. And collapsed (for that and other reasons).

It is exactly what a responsible great power should do. Talk tough, carry a big stick and only after a lot of provocation, whack the enemy and ‘invite’ them to pull their head in. That is not to start or risk full blown war. It is the opposite. To prevent war.
So Trump and Co (He is not at all a one man band) have pulled off the biggest FP coup for a generation I believe. We shall see. It is not failsafe, but the best option. All other states will be taking note.

Re reference to ‘assassination’ or even more falsely, ‘murder’. It was not. Those are illegal of course. Whereas killing an enemy combatant leader in a war zone, or even at home is entirely legitimate. Iraq is a war zone and the US is at war with Iran. Call it the 40 year war. Obama gave them money but that was an idiotic attempt to end it. A fool only blessed with fine words. The opposite of Trump. No fool but almost illiterate.

That the Iranians in the street are openly calling the regimes dead 'hero' a murderer speaks volumes. There are pictures of them refusing to stand on US & Israeli flags. The foul old bearded men may at last be on the way out? A military coup perhaps?

I wrote this in The Press today, which they cut a little, without spoiling:
The world is substantially better now one Iranian military commander has been killed in action. Yes, he died on the job, killed by his chief foe’s, technically and morally superior war machine.
But oh what alarmist, and Trump deranged angst it has caused among the chattering classes of the left, who not only have no true knowledge of the evil man now extinguished, but no time even for looking at his disgusting record.
Soleimani had the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians on his hands, including countless children. In Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Gaza and his own country, plus others.
It’s as though Himmler, crossed with Goebbels and Eichmann had been taken out of the picture in early WW2. That war may have been cut short, and the Holocaust prevented. Now we are not heading for another war. The opposite.
The US at last is back under leadership not equalled since Reagan demolished the Soviet tyranny, merely by showing power to evil.
Proper deterrence is back, backing a free world that wants rid of such horrendous, oppressive regimes as the Islamist State of Iran.

David Stone said...

@ Tom H

Here is an Idea you might be interested in...re
"Besides that, the recent shootdown of that passenger plane shows that the Iranians are actually pretty sloppy if we assume they're finally telling the truth that they thought it was a US cruise missile. Those weapons are a few metres long and wide and presents a vastly smaller radar signature than a Boeing 737. What sort of poorly trained SAM crew would mistake one for the other?"
Another take on that...

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52851.htm

What the author on ICH does not suggest though it occurred to me immediately if it were not an aircraft malfunction is that it was the real retaliation for killing the general and the missiles , (which were placed extremely accurately and deliberately killed no one) and there was someone on that plane. or several people on it that were American assets. And both Iran and the US knew from the start that was the case.
I which case the announcement by the US that Iran had "accidentally" she it down, was a white flag. Calling a truce; allowing the Iran govt to agree it was an accident , much more acceptable to their public than having to admit they had deliberately killed dozens of their own citizens in order to take out one or two Yank assets , and simultaneously letting them off the hook for the tit for tat.
The US , as in attacking Iraq once they were sure they did not have weapons of mass destruction, does not attack countries that can defend themselves . There won't be a war with Iran.
D J S

Geoff Fischer said...

Kia ora Chris
People's judgements on the character of public personalities will differ.
I judge Qassem Soleimani to be a better man than Donald Trump who gave the order for Soleimani to be assassinated.
Donald Trump would appear to disagree with me on that, as would Tom Hunter.
I say "appear to disagree" advisedly, because in order to come anywhere near a justification for the killing Trump must create the impression that Soleimani was deserving of death. Trump need not actually believe that himself. He just needs to create the impression in the mind of others.
This is the way of all murders and all murderers.
So while ordinarily we may say that "One person's opinion is as good as another's", when judging the character of a murder victim, that is not the case.
The opinion of the murderer, or of an accomplice who is trying to justify the murder, has no credibility.
Therefore Tom Hunter's judgement on Qassem Soleimani requires no response. In fact it should not be dignified by a response.
Tom Hunter's views on the ability of Iran to win a war against the United States while not so morally objectionable are in fact irrelevant.
President Trump is determined to destroy Iran. He has made that clear by the economic blockade, followed by the assassination of Iran's leading military commander.
Iran has no choice but to fight. The cost to the Iranian people will be high, but if God wills they will survive, as the people of Vietnam survived every instrument of death and destruction that the United States government could apply against them.
Arohanui ki te tangata Irani.

Chris Trotter said...

To: Tom Hunter.

Don't challenge the Referee's rulings, Tom, if you want to keep playing the game.

Tom Hunter said...

Don't challenge the Referee's rulings, Tom, if you want to keep playing the game.

Fair enough and I did get a chuckle about that one, plus you did publish almost all of what I wrote. We will simply have to agree to disagree on the other stuff.

Patricia said...

Think about David and Goliath.

Think about American incursions everywhere. Asymmetric warfare has kept them very very busy everywhere they go.

What if Iran destroyed the Straits of Humuz, the Saudi pipeline to the Suez canal and the Suez canal itself. They don’t need to kill one person. But the world would stop running economically.

Geoff Fischer said...

Kia ora David:
If Iran accidentally downed the Ukrainian passenger aircraft, that was a grievous failure of system and judgement.
If the shooting down was deliberate, it would have been a war crime regardless of whether US agents were on the passenger list.
But I have seen no evidence that it was anything but accidental.

Charles E writes:" killing an enemy combatant leader in a war zone, or even at home is entirely legitimate. Iraq is a war zone and the US is at war with Iran.".
Nations are not at war until there is a declaration of war. Even then, they are not permitted to launch attacks upon the territory of non-belligerent states. The United States would have to declare war on both Iran and Iraq before it could legally attack Iranian military personnel within Iraq.
If the fact that one nation bullies, obstructs, intimidates and harasses another means that they are at war, then for forty years the United States has been at war with every nation on earth with the exception of the State of Israel, and is legally entitled to kill any person in any place if they have a connection to the military forces of their nation state. President Trump and Charles E clearly consider that to be the case. The decent, honorable and God fearing people of this world do not.
The assassination of Qassem Soleimani was an arrogant, reckless act of murder.

petes new write said...

Interesting post Chris.

David Stone said...

Kai ora Geoff
The ideas just that. One of a multitude of possibilities , we will be very unlikely ever to know and an unfortunate accident remains the most likely one.

"If the fact that one nation bullies, obstructs, intimidates and harasses another means that they are at war, then for forty years the United States has been at war with every nation on earth with the exception of the State of Israel, and is legally entitled to kill any person in any place if they have a connection to the military forces of their nation state. President Trump and Charles E clearly consider that to be the case. The decent, honorable and God fearing people of this world do not."
I'm quite sure this is indeed the clear belief of the CIA at least; and the drone kill programme establishes that it is the assumption of any US administration. As long as they can't strike back. That the most arrogantly psychopathic of them also consider themselves the most God fearing deserves thinking about.
Cheers D J S

David Stone said...

And what are we doing in Iraq now? Winston says the troops are safe and the situation is being carefully watched. But the situation is that all foreign troops have been asked to leave by the Iraqi government. Have we no independent morality at all ?
When referring / criticising US democracy we might as well use "we" rather than "they". We have no more autonomy than Iraq.
D J S

Nick J said...

Tom you are quite correct on a technical level. And I'm not arguing would win. You are however missing the crucial point. The new technology is a quantum leap so the Pentagon is in catch up mode. The implication is that any attack by the Empire, whilst likely to succeed through sheer weight of numbers will become prohibitively costly.

Empires die when the cost of extracting tribute exceeds returns. Or when the facade of absolute strength is shattered. Imagine the world's reaction if a super aircraft carrier got sunk. Now that's now become dead easy.

Geoff Fischer said...

"That the most arrogantly psychopathic of them also consider themselves the most God fearing deserves thinking about"
It certainly does, although not all who portray themselves as such are genuinely God-fearing.
"Ma o ratou hua ka mohiotia ai ratou e koutou". The label attached to a tree may not reveal its true nature, but the fruit always will.

Geoff Fischer said...

International law determines the relations between civilized states. If in ordering the assassination of Qassem Soleimani Donald Trump had acted in his personal capacity he would have been guilty of terrorism. But because he acted as President of the United States his actions are subject to the rules which govern relationships between states.
One of these rules is that acts of war should be preceded by a declaration of war. This rule assures that nations are definitively either at peace or at war with each other. It allays fears of surprise attack, and reduces the temptation to launch a preemptive strike. Thereby it provides a sense of security and reduces the risk of war. If the rule was not in effect, then nations would never be sure whether they were at peace or at war, and would therefore be more likely to take hostile measures against one another.
This is the kind of unsafe world that the United States has made for us as it overturns the conventions that kept a degree of peace in the world for centuries past.
The colonial regime in New Zealand has also all but abandoned its previous commitment to the principles of "collective security" and international law. It now tacitly endorses the right of the United States to engage in acts of war without declaration of war in any corner of the globe, without the approval of the United Nations and with little regard to consequence. New Zealand came to this position by degrees over the past two decades, first allowing the United States a free hand with respect to Afghanistan and then effectively placing the Islamic Republic of Iran, a state of 40 years standing with jurisdiction over more than 80 million citizens, beyond the pale of international law.
So why has New Zealand reneged on its previous commitment to the United Nations, collective security and the rule of law?
To answer that question one needs to ask why New Zealand adopted those principles in the first place. The standard rhetoric goes that "New Zealand is a small country and the best protection for small nations is an international system of collective security based on the institutions of the United Nations".
However New Zealand only came to this view at the end of the second world war. Prior to that it looked to the British empire for its defence and for the formulation of its foreign policy. The change came not because New Zealand suddenly became small (it always had been small) but because Great Britain had become "small": no longer large enough to rule the world, and in particular New Zealand's part of it. "Collective security" was New Zealand's response to the collapse of empire.
The new policy was a pragmatic one which did not reflect any genuine commitment to the rule of law in relations between states, and that is why New Zealand has been able to walk away from the United Nations and rule of law principles with hardly a backward glance.
In 1939 a Labour Prime Minister declared of Britain "Where she goes, we go. Where she stands, we stand". In 2020 another Labour Prime Minister is sending a message to the world "Where Trump goes, we go. Where he stands, we stand".
On the whole this is not a regime that loves Donald Trump (although many within the deep state are willing him on to ever more rash actions), but it fears him and that fear dictates its responses to his most reckless and iniquitous acts.
In 1939 New Zealand was ranged alongside a fading empire against an ethno-nationalist megalomaniac. Now it is in league with the tyrant ruler of a empire gone rogue. That does not augur well for the future of the Realm.