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This is a great article and an excellent breakdown of how what we hear on the news can be so off base. Just to nitpick, this part stuck out to me: >Fast forwa

by aprilthird2021 3y ago

This is a great article and an excellent breakdown of how what we hear on the news can be so off base. Just to nitpick, this part stuck out to me: >Fast forward two decades, and this outlook looks dangerously naive. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Iran’s attacks on Israel, and a possible Chinese attack on Taiwan or the Philippines show the importance of ballistic missile defense as a way of blocking attacks by invading states. In 2006, in the middle of the War on Terror, it might have seemed inconceivable that just 18 years later, the world would see multiple authoritarian empires waging aggressive, expansionist wars, and that the U.S. and its allies would be playing a beleaguered defense. But here we are. Hmm, one of those countries' actions is not like the others no? Iran's missle launch was not an invasion of Israel. It was definitely Israel who violated Iranian sovereignty first here, no? With the killing of IRGC commanders in a Syrian consulate. Neither country has attacked Israel recently. The US and Israel have assassinated targets in the country of Iran recently, while the reverse has not been true. Who is really invading who here? And in that sense, Yglesias' point that missile defense is only important if you want to meddle in and invade sovereign nations seems to be correct for the one conflict of these which existed back then (Israel v Middle East) (whatever you may believe about the value of such moves)

deleted 3y ago
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edanm 3y ago
> It was definitely Israel who violated Iranian sovereignty first here, no? With the killing of IRGC commanders in a Syrian consulate. Neither country has attacked Israel recently. Iran funds Hamas, which attacked Israel on October 7th (and has attacked it many other times). It funds Hezbollah, which has been attacking Israel since October 7th, partially from Syria.
- aprilthird2021 3y ago
  And the US funds Israel who has extrajudicially assassinated Iranian civilians in Iran in the past few years. So can Iran then blow up an American embassy with justification?
  - edanm 3y ago
    The US itself has assassinated Iranian generals. > So can Iran then blow up an American embassy with justification? Well, that's a tough question. If you're asking legally or something, idk, I have no real knowledge of this. If you're asking practically, yes, the US is powerful and is able to do things that other countries can't. If you're asking morally - there's no question in my mind that the US should do whatever is possible to weaken the Iranian regime. For all its faults, the US are the "good guys" on the world stage right now. The Iranian regime is a dictatorship that has taken a wonderful people hostage and is forcing them to live by religious laws that many (most?) would be happy to live without. It is evil, pure and simple. It is also incredibly dangerous, has funded terrorism for years, has destabilized the entire Middle East for years, and is likely to wipe out Israel if given the chance. I'm not shedding any tears over the US trying to stop the Iranian regime. (And note - this only goes for the Iranian leadership, the Iranian people are wonderful and should be protected at all costs!)
    - enterprise_cog 3y ago
      [dead]
    - aprilthird2021 3y ago
      I'm not talking about generals, I'm talking about civilians. Israel famously assassinated an Iranian civilian in Iran with a machine gun deployed remotely. >If you're asking morally - there's no question in my mind that the US should do whatever is possible to weaken the Iranian regime My original point was that Iran has not invaded Israel or even prematurely attacked or postured against it, the way Russia and China have done to the territories they wish to invade. It's quite the opposite. You even agree here that the US should essentially have carte blanche to destroy Iran because... it's a religious dictatorship (seriously that's all)??? Some of the closest US allies are religious dictatorships who have the exact same religious rules as Iran??? In fact, the US and Israel heavily court religious dictatorships who force their populations to live by the exact same religious laws! A very outlandish take, to be honest, but it serves my point well. Iran's actions against Israel are defensive ones against a bloodthirsty enemy who seems to have a very poor reason to want to destroy it.
AnimalMuppet 3y ago
> The US and Israel have assassinated targets in the country of Iran recently, while the reverse has not been true. I presume you are referring to the US killing of Soleimani, and the embassy bombing, though neither of those were in Iran. But you're missing the point. Why did those killings happen? Iran keeps arming proxies (Hamas, Hezbollah, militias in Iraq, the Houthis, and maybe some others), and having those proxies attack Israel and the US. (In the case of Soleimani, he was meeting with militias in Iraq who were literally killing US military personnel.) Iran thinks this is a fun game of "we get to kill your people, and you don't get to kill us". Eventually the US and Israel got tired of the game. The US killed Soleimani at a time and place that made it explicitly clear what he was doing and why the US wasn't going to keep putting up with it. Israel lost patience with Iran's game after the Hamas attack; they are in no mood to allow Iran to be stirring up trouble with Hezbollah on their northern border. So I think it's rather unfair to point fingers at Israel and the US for killing Iranians, when the individual Iranians in question are deliberately trying to kill US and Israeli soldiers and citizens, and have been for quite some time.
- aprilthird2021 3y ago
  You presume wrong. I mean the killing of Iranian civilians such as Mohsen Fakhrizadeh. The US arms Israel who conducts such extrajudicial assassinations. By your logic, this makes all American military personnel and proxy civilians fair targets for Iran
  - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
    So, you mean like the Iranian attempt to assassinate John Bolton? (I mean, they didn't succeed, but does that make a real moral difference?)
    - enterprise_cog 3y ago
      [dead]
    - aprilthird2021 3y ago
      Wasn't this a retaliation to the killings Israel and the US did of it's people? Also, I am keeping military leaders aside. I think most would agree that they sign up for a level of targeting civilians should be exempt from.

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edanm 3y ago

> It was definitely Israel who violated Iranian sovereignty first here, no? With the killing of IRGC commanders in a Syrian consulate. Neither country has attacked Israel recently. Iran funds Hamas, which attacked Israel on October 7th (and has attacked it many other times). It funds Hezbollah, which has been attacking Israel since October 7th, partially from Syria.

aprilthird2021 3y ago
And the US funds Israel who has extrajudicially assassinated Iranian civilians in Iran in the past few years. So can Iran then blow up an American embassy with justification?
- edanm 3y ago
  The US itself has assassinated Iranian generals. > So can Iran then blow up an American embassy with justification? Well, that's a tough question. If you're asking legally or something, idk, I have no real knowledge of this. If you're asking practically, yes, the US is powerful and is able to do things that other countries can't. If you're asking morally - there's no question in my mind that the US should do whatever is possible to weaken the Iranian regime. For all its faults, the US are the "good guys" on the world stage right now. The Iranian regime is a dictatorship that has taken a wonderful people hostage and is forcing them to live by religious laws that many (most?) would be happy to live without. It is evil, pure and simple. It is also incredibly dangerous, has funded terrorism for years, has destabilized the entire Middle East for years, and is likely to wipe out Israel if given the chance. I'm not shedding any tears over the US trying to stop the Iranian regime. (And note - this only goes for the Iranian leadership, the Iranian people are wonderful and should be protected at all costs!)
  - enterprise_cog 3y ago
    [dead]
  - aprilthird2021 3y ago
    I'm not talking about generals, I'm talking about civilians. Israel famously assassinated an Iranian civilian in Iran with a machine gun deployed remotely. >If you're asking morally - there's no question in my mind that the US should do whatever is possible to weaken the Iranian regime My original point was that Iran has not invaded Israel or even prematurely attacked or postured against it, the way Russia and China have done to the territories they wish to invade. It's quite the opposite. You even agree here that the US should essentially have carte blanche to destroy Iran because... it's a religious dictatorship (seriously that's all)??? Some of the closest US allies are religious dictatorships who have the exact same religious rules as Iran??? In fact, the US and Israel heavily court religious dictatorships who force their populations to live by the exact same religious laws! A very outlandish take, to be honest, but it serves my point well. Iran's actions against Israel are defensive ones against a bloodthirsty enemy who seems to have a very poor reason to want to destroy it.

AnimalMuppet 3y ago

> The US and Israel have assassinated targets in the country of Iran recently, while the reverse has not been true. I presume you are referring to the US killing of Soleimani, and the embassy bombing, though neither of those were in Iran. But you're missing the point. Why did those killings happen? Iran keeps arming proxies (Hamas, Hezbollah, militias in Iraq, the Houthis, and maybe some others), and having those proxies attack Israel and the US. (In the case of Soleimani, he was meeting with militias in Iraq who were literally killing US military personnel.) Iran thinks this is a fun game of "we get to kill your people, and you don't get to kill us". Eventually the US and Israel got tired of the game. The US killed Soleimani at a time and place that made it explicitly clear what he was doing and why the US wasn't going to keep putting up with it. Israel lost patience with Iran's game after the Hamas attack; they are in no mood to allow Iran to be stirring up trouble with Hezbollah on their northern border. So I think it's rather unfair to point fingers at Israel and the US for killing Iranians, when the individual Iranians in question are deliberately trying to kill US and Israeli soldiers and citizens, and have been for quite some time.

aprilthird2021 3y ago
You presume wrong. I mean the killing of Iranian civilians such as Mohsen Fakhrizadeh. The US arms Israel who conducts such extrajudicial assassinations. By your logic, this makes all American military personnel and proxy civilians fair targets for Iran
- AnimalMuppet 3y ago
  So, you mean like the Iranian attempt to assassinate John Bolton? (I mean, they didn't succeed, but does that make a real moral difference?)
  - enterprise_cog 3y ago
    [dead]
  - aprilthird2021 3y ago
    Wasn't this a retaliation to the killings Israel and the US did of it's people? Also, I am keeping military leaders aside. I think most would agree that they sign up for a level of targeting civilians should be exempt from.