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There's no insurance scheme the IRGC can concoct that protects against the US navy hitting your rudder with a 20mm gun.
by int32_64 5mo ago
There's no insurance scheme the IRGC can concoct that protects against the US navy hitting your rudder with a 20mm gun.
- bdangubic 5mo agoUS Navy has shown particular strength in this conflict against Iran, sitting in the international waters many (many, many) miles away and chillin :)
- Jensson 5mo agoWhats weak about doing the smart thing?
- nerfbatplz 5mo agoAmerican destroyers and aircraft carriers have been chased away from the Strait multiple times now. Hilariously the USS George HW Bush had to go the long way around Africa rather than risk transiting the Bab El Mandeb after the Houthis defeated the US Navy last year.
- Jensson 5mo agoIn what way were they chased away? Iran tried to sink them and didn't hit any shots, and many on Iran's side died trying. Many IRGC soldiers dying and not even scratching the paint on US vessels doesn't show US to be weak. > Hilariously the USS George HW Bush had to go the long way around Africa rather than risk transiting the Bab El Mandeb after the Houthis defeated the US Navy last year. Valuing the lives of your crewmen and avoid terrorists is bad how? USA not wanting their soldiers to die is weak? Would you want more deaths on US side to show strength? USA can win this war with barely any casualties, why would you not do that? And USA being able to do this with barely any losses shows tremendous strength to me, Iran was more powerful than Ukraine but USA could establish aerial superiority immediately with no losses, this is so much stronger than what Russia displayed.
- srean 5mo agoGiven how expensive they are they were presumably supposed to do more than primarily stay out of range. There are less expensive ways of doing that.
- Jensson 5mo agoThey block Iranian ports so Iran can no longer export oil, that is doing a lot.
- srean 5mo agoAnd Iran has blocked the strait too. It's at best a stalemate.
- Jensson 5mo agoBut this stalemate benefits US corporations by raising the price for oil, so its not really hurting the attacker. In order to hurt a plutocracy like USA you need to hurt the American stock market but American stocks are doing great.
- srean 5mo agoThat's true. Both USA and Russia should be quite happy with the current state of affairs. China not so much. Rest of the world is quite pissed with USA. But that's just emotion. Unless it gets realised into something concrete it matters little.
- yongjik 5mo agoTrump is at -20% net approval and it's steadily getting worse even now. Seems like most Americans don't decide whether things are going great by looking at S&P 500.
- bdangubic 5mo agoneither he nor people that will decide 2026 election give a hoot about his net approval rating. they should not even poll this. the only thing worth polling is few states that could swing the election one way or another (and this is even smaller number than normal for upcoming midterms). what americans think on the whole has stopped mattering awhile ago…
- ericmay 5mo ago> Hilariously the USS George HW Bush had to go the long way around Africa rather than risk transiting the Bab El Mandeb after the Houthis defeated the US Navy last year. The ship went the long way around because why risk being attacked by missiles? It's less that the US Navy "was defeated", which itself is a plainly asinine comment which only serves a purpose of trying to incite others, and more so a practical safety concern. But if you really want to argue that the US Navy was defeated, I would submit our next step should be to utilize nuclear weapons on Yemen and destroy the Houthis. That way you can't make these claims and we'll see who really is defeating who :)
- etdznots 5mo ago[dead]
- chrisco255 5mo agoNot one U.S. ship was damaged by the Houthis. Meanwhile airstrikes took out a ton of Houthi assets.
- TitaRusell 5mo agoAmericans always say they are winning. Nobody believes it.
- chrisco255 5mo agoI guess, you know nowadays it seems like if an enemy scratches one of our ships it is called a total loss for the U.S. meanwhile other nations have their entire air force taken out along with all of their targeting systems and most of their missile supplies and even their heads of state are taken out by F35s or arrested by special forces and somehow that is called "losing" by armchair internet dwellers.
- theonething 5mo ago[flagged]
- samrus 5mo agoStarting a war and then not fighting in it is pretty stupid honestly. Either fight or dont start a pointless war
- overfeed 5mo agoEveryone has a plan until they get punched on the mouth. The plan was a quick decapitation strike, perhaps followed by a Venezuela-like arrangement.
- 4gotunameagain 5mo agoThere was no plan. The plan of Israel was to trick the incompetent leadership of the US into a war with Iran, which they did.
- khriss 5mo agoYou mean smart things like going into a war with zero plans beyond the first day, bombing girl's schools, then being forced to run away by a country whose entire GDP is less than your military budget?
- srean 5mo agoI would have never realised that things would have taken such an Onion worthy scatological turn. s/n/d/6
- blitzar 5mo agoThats untrue, they sank the unarmed Iranian vessel Dena after it attended the International Fleet Review 2026 naval exercise hosted by India. It goes without saying that many are saying it was one of the greatest naval battles of all time.
- baq 5mo agoJust wait for CENTCOM bulletin with their USDC blockade insurance address
- spwa4 5mo agoYou mean that these mafia style insurances are a joke, but free (as in safe and not taxed) access to the seas is something many wars have been fought over. "Insurance" selling by navies was the norm until WW1 at least.
- outside2344 5mo agobc1qxy2kgdytzdonaldjlostiranwartrump
- FireBeyond 5mo agoHah, far more likely that it would be $TRUMP or $PATRIOT shitcoins. Gotta skim somehow.
- tehjoker 5mo agoYou realize that America "in theory" wants ships to transit the strait right? The US blockade is self-defeating. You can't block the strait if we block the strait! lmao
- IncreasePosts 5mo agoThe reason the US is blockading is because Iran is only partially blockading it. If Iran wasn't blockading at all then America wouldn't either. But it's pretty clear that "only shops whose countries pay a lot of money to Iran" would help Iran.
- Pay08 5mo agoThe US is blockading the Iranian coast, not the entirety of the Strait.
- etdznots 5mo ago[dead]
- SubiculumCode 5mo agoI think this is incorrect. The point is to show that if Iran does this, then they will not be the only ones that can do it. The last thing that should happen is to reward Iran for rent seeking on the Strait. Others can also seek rent then, and the whole strait gets shut down..which encompassed around 90% of all Iranian oil exports, which in turn was about 90% of their economic exports.
- tehjoker 5mo agoThere is truth to this but it's basically we'll hurt ourselves to hurt you more. This is a lose-lose strategy.
- SubiculumCode 5mo agoI am not sure if in the long term it is our interest to allow Iran to extract rent from this trade route, which would only strengthen China. It seems to me that the hurt is spread around the world quite widely, with inordinate impacts on Iran and China, not the U.S. or Europe [1]. [1] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-oil-trade-through-the-strait-of-hormuz-by-country/ https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-oil-trade-through-t...
- outside2344 5mo agoA Iran drone then bombing UAE's oil infrastructure as payback?
- Jensson 5mo agoThey are already doing that so it wouldn't change anything.
- kakacik 5mo agoNo they are not right now, otherwise we would have full news every day of it. Defense rockets for stuff like Patriot ran out, those systems are trivial to overwhelm and deplete in the age of cheap drones and become useless quickly. Same for the major airports, they keep working, people keep flying to the asia, albeit in less numbers.
- _DeadFred_ 5mo ago>No they are not right now, otherwise we would have full news every day of it. Yesterday Iran stuck a nuclear plant with a drone, and launched them at other targets as well. And there is news on it even... https://apnews.com/article/iran-us-uae-nuclear-drones-71e7e58f45193b7dee3df28740532a7b https://apnews.com/article/iran-us-uae-nuclear-drones-71e7e5...
- Helloworldboy 5mo ago[dead]
- wang_li 5mo agoExactly. The US just announces that they will take any vessel that pays for transit. So, what happens then? Any vessel that goes through and the IRGC doesn't shoot them, the US seizes. So, no one pays since they can't pay for successful transit. The fun game is that all the vessels just go at once. Any that the IRGC doesn't shoot the US takes. Any that it does shoot sink. So, no transit. Unless IRGC doesn't shoot at all, in which case everyone gets out of there with just one vessel paying the ransom. Ultimately this doesn't work for the IRGC as the US is far more capable of closing the strait than Iran is. The US can also fuck with Iran by getting slight cooperation from ships in the Gulf of Oman by getting some small inflatable boats with remote control and AIS transmitters on them. Put the boat in the water next to a ship, turn of the ship's AIS, turn on the boats AIS, and send the boat through. Send hundreds of them. IRGC won't know what to shoot at or will expose their positions by firing at a rubber raft.
- lefra 5mo agoOr they'll use a pair of binoculars (or a drone with a camera) to ignore the decoys and shoot at the actual ship...
- wang_li 5mo agoThe horizon at sea level is about 3 miles. The strait of Hormuz is 35+ miles wide. Any mechanism used to get around this would be detectable and could be attacked with relatively inexpensive ordinance.
- cyberax 5mo agoAbout 20 meter elevation would be needed to cover the navigable part of the strait. So, a couple of tall ladders?
- don_esteban 5mo agoLook at the map. They have mountains. Not much rain/fog in that area to block the sight lines. Maybe haze.
- mothballed 5mo agoA combination of enough insurance to make it worth the time of the owner + offer the workers a generous amount to their next of kin could make it worth it. Being turned into minced meat might be worth it for some people if it means their families become rich.
- jltsiren 5mo agoMilitary history is full of quotes like "war is too important to be left to the generals". When you put people who focus on technical matters in charge, they often make poor decisions, as they are not looking at the big picture. The question is not about whether the US can blockade the Hormuz Strait but who gets blamed for the blockade. Iran is messaging that it is making serious attempts to reopen the strait, while China and Russia are probably reinforcing the message. When people around the world suffer from the consequences of the blockade, they are more likely to blame America for their troubles. Or at least that's what Iran is trying to achieve.
- Jensson 5mo agoNo government have accepted Iranian tolls so far, that is just not going to fly ever. If every country controlling a strait started taking out such tolls that would cause much worse issues than we are seeing currently, nobody will have that.
- telchior 5mo agoNo government has accepted Iranian tolls so far, but some shippers sure have; ships have been passing through the strait. Those shipments go on to countries with governments. I don't think you can actually know that there wasn't government support for any of those payments so far. And cryptocurrency should be even better for deniability. In reality it would be a really good idea for certain governments that rely heavily on Middle Eastern oil (e.g. Philippines) to pay fees in the short term. More than a month ago the Philippines was already claiming to have "safe and preferential access", if that involves money they'll pay it. (https://www.rappler.com/business/philippine-flagged-ships-safe-passage-iran-impact/ https://www.rappler.com/business/philippine-flagged-ships-sa...)
- freathinker102 5mo ago[dead]
- markdown 5mo agoYou think people care? The average guy on the street doesn't even think about the fact that part of the price they paid for their lunch went to Panama for the use of a canal.
- yongjik 5mo agoSure, but when it happens it's no longer Iran's problem - it's your problem. (And maybe America's problem, unless America gains anything from the global trade burning down.)
- jchook 5mo agoThe US fundamentally wants the oil to flow globally. Its secondary blockade of the Strait seems to be driven by optics and PR rather than strategic value.
- dmix 5mo agoIt's a pressure campaign to get a nuclear deal. NYT reported Iran already offered to open the strait, end hostilities, and negotiate a nuclear deal later, but the US rejected that offer as they want to pressure them into giving up their uranium. Now Iran is demanding money in exchange for the uranium which is the primary roadblock.
- esalman 5mo agoIt's a pressure campaign to get the Iranian leadership in one place so that Israel can bomb them again. There was a deal, the president cancelled it in his previous term.
- deleted 5mo ago[deleted]
- antman 5mo agoNobody credible said or believed Iran was making nuclear weapons. Iran had made it a fatwa against the Islamic law to develop such weapons and Obama had referenced that. They also dont believe bolivian fishermen could reach the US with stocks of drugs, they dont believe venezuela’s president was a hidden drug kingpin, and they also dont believe that Cuba is a credible threat that needs to be blockaded to the stone age. These are power plays to signal that world dominance is not decaying but in case of Iran it has backfired and pushes China’s narrative as a pillar of stability.
- dmix 5mo agoThere is still lots of evidence that Iran started enriching uranium towards weapons grade over the past decade. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-64810145 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-64810145 Largely a legacy of Trump's sanctions failing to get a nuclear deal the first term and back firing. You'd have to be naive to think they don't want a bomb in the first place before that though. Saddam played the same game where they pretended they just wanted nuclear for energy, even though they were a petrol state... which is why in 1981 Iran helped bomb Iraq's reactors (where Iran teamed up with Israel to do so) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Opera https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Opera If Iran didn't believe Iraq's peaceful nuclear intentions, I'm not sure why anyone would believe Iran then buying tons of uranium from Russia was any different. Not to mention building underground lairs to enrich it while also building ICBMs.
- throwaway27448 5mo agoWhy would the US navy be attacking ships in the strait of hormuz
- theptip 5mo agoThey are doing this because they blockaded Iran.
- iririririr 5mo agobecause Baron trump has a bet on polymarket paying 100:1?
- victorbjorklund 5mo agoBecause Trump said they would. Because he is insane.
- 21asdffdsa12 5mo agoKnuckling under to the imperial ambitions of others is always the more sane solution for the slaveminded man.
- solumunus 5mo agoTo prevent Iran from controlling it. Of course it’s dumb but this is why.
- themafia 5mo agoYea there is. It's called "nuclear weapons." Why you'd want to play this 'tough guy' game in the era of the Internet is wholly beyond me. You have a fantastically well outfitted military that in the absence of diplomacy stands a really good chance at getting us all killed. Jingoism is a mind poison.
- futune 5mo agoIf you phrase it as an "insurance scheme", then sure they can? All insurance schemes work by giving you money if bad stuff you don't control happens. I'm sure they could. They probably won't.
- blitzar 5mo agoThe US begged, like a dog.
- dlev_pika 5mo agoThere’s no assurance the US army can concoct that protects against the IRGC mines. Guess who lost more?
- adjejmxbdjdn 5mo agoTell all those ships sailing to China that. And sadly, $6 gas will collapse the U.S. Navy’s will and effort in weeks.
- sschueller 5mo agoChina can and not with its military.