Yikes, Israel might have just attacked Iran!

[SomeWomanSomewhere]

This is NOT GOOD news!

Israel has declared a state of emergency, at least six explosions in Tehran.

This is seriously unfunny!

Israel has ZERO strategic depth - Iran has plenty. Nukes: see above, reverse!

Where is this reported please?

Which is entirely normal strategy. Obviously they dont fear an imminent nuclear strike. Iran doesnt yet have nuclear weapons. Once they do it is much harder to contain them because because its harder to fight even a non nuclear war with a nuclear power, and, Iran remains the greatest sponsor of terrorism and active threat to Israel through its proxies and actively destabilising activity in the whole region.

Yup, and the way Israeli settlements are positioned also provide a type of shield to external attacks.

Also Russia cautioned Iran to have strategic patience due to the 1 million+ Israeli Russians.

I think Grok needs to update its information on Hezbollah. I can confidently say they won’t be attacking Israel in the current escalation nor do I believe Iran will either. My hunch is that Netanyahu believes the Iranian regime is vulnerable and could be toppled if the strikes are surgical and extensive enough to cut off the head of the snake. That's his calculation - and hey presto he kicks his trial can further down the road.

@SharonEllis Well do share any sensible analysis.

I’m reading through the international reactions this morning and it’s all condemnations, talking about de-escalation and talk of stopping a larger conflict in the ME.

So please stop saying people don’t want Israel to exist for being against this. That’s simply not true.

I didn't say that did I?

@sualipa

"The purpose of nuclear weapons isn't to use them, but to deter others from attacking you because possessing them means you could potentially use them."

Simply not true.

So did nuclear weapons deter India from recently retaliating against and attacking Pakistan? I don't think so...

Nuclear weapons might deter an all out invasion or occupation or possibly a regime change. But they certainly don't deter others from attacking you, as India / Pakistan has recently shown.

@PaxAeterna I agree that America likely cautioned against this action and said not right now for a multitude of reasons. Hence the restraint on announcing their actions.

1. The US military bases easily within reach of Iranian missiles. Also after Trump assassinated Soleimeni, Iran destroyed a US military location and killed the CIA guy in charge of the operation.

1. The economy. Debt servicing. Trump’s tariffs haven't brought in billions as promised. They can't talk up war too much as the markets would be spooked.

1. MAGA is split on Israel. A large part actively "hate" Israel and blame it for getting America involved in Middle Eastern wars. Even worse there is a larger contingent that are actively antisemitic and see Trump as owned by Jewish people.

.

Except Jews in Iran have less rights than muslims. Read this for example. https://www.iranhr.net/en/articles/7077/

Yourself and @Twiglets1

Would you really have expected anything different?
Glad I’m not on the side of Hamas & Iran.
**
Me too. A strange place to locate the moral high ground.

Clearly you think if your not with Israel your against it. When it is entirely possible that people favour diplomatic solutions over violence and get very worried when most governments in the world are condemning this action.

Have you heard of the stability/instability paradox? It's the idea that when two nuclear powers maintain strategic stability through mutual deterrence, they may feel emboldened to engage in lower-level conflicts, assuming they won’t escalate to full-scale nuclear war. This concept is relevant to Ukraine, which feels let down by the Budapest Memorandum an agreement under which it gave up its Soviet nuclear nukes in exchange for security assurances. In hindsight, many in Ukraine believe that retaining nuclear weapons might have deterred Russian aggression and "this effect can be seen in the India–Pakistan relationship and to some degree in Russia–NATO relations."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stability%E2%80%93instability_paradox

"posits that both parties to a conflict will rationally view strategic conflict and the attendant risk of a strategic nuclear exchange as untenable, and will thus avoid any escalation of sub-strategic conflicts to the strategic level. This effective “cap” on sub-strategic militarized conflict escalation emboldens states to engage in such conflict with the confidence that it would not spiral out of control and threaten their strategic interests. The causal force of this theory of increased sub-strategic conflict is the mutual recognition of the untenability of conflict at the level of strategic interests—a product of MAD [Mutually Assured Destruction]. With strategic interests forming the “red line” neither side would dare to cross, both sides are free to pursue sub-strategic political objectives through militarized conflict without the fear that the terms of such conflict will escalate beyond their control and jeopardize their strategic interests. Effectively, with the risk of uncontrolled escalation removed, the net costs to engage in conflict are reduced."[6]

@BelleHathor

"Oh and congratulations to Netanyahu he has just given Iran the final impetus to build a Nuclear bomb. That means Saudi would also pursue one too"

So are you suggesting that the Iranian nuclear program which has been running for decades was all just a peaceful science experiment and they didn't really intend to build a bomb. Equally the long standing Saudi threat that if Iran develops a nuclear bomb then they will quickly follow was just a bluff.

But because Israel has just bombed the Iranian nuclear program, then all of a sudden Iran will change its peaceful science experiment into a nuclear bomb program and the Saudis will say nah we weren't bluffing we actually meant what we said.

Or alternatively, we think that collectively Hamas, Iran leaders, Israeli leaders and Trump are all a bunch of cynical murderous bastards. See, no need to pick any of them.

All religious minorities in Iran have less rights. It’s a theocracy. It definitely expresses itself in antisemitism but it does seem to be more about power than religion when it comes down to it. Iran call the US Great Satan, the root of that isn’t about religion either.

Then there was the daring operation targeting Russias nuclear capable planes (which according to the Start Treaty must be visible on satellite to prevent a pre-emptive nuclear attack) which could only have been carried out with Western assistance.

FWIW there are commercial private entities out there such as Maxar that will sell anyone sat images of more than high enough resolution to allow Ukraine to target that bomber force and Ukraine has more enough technical capability to perform the strike.

Please pay attention !

His lack of knowledge of how to use capital letters is not reassuring.

This is the man we are all counting on now.

He gives me a headache.

That was put out 2 to 3 hours before the Israeli attack.

We have such great men and women around the globe, yet so many of our leaders are so incompetent.

As I said, I didn't say that. Ths is getting really boring.

All states with serious strategic capabilities feel the need to possess nuclear weapons as a precursor to ensuring their long-term survival. The more authoritarian the regime, the stronger this perceived necessity becomes. Unfortunately, this pressure is likely to increase rather than diminish in the future. When Gaddafi met his violent end - anally raped with an iron bar in a ditch - it sent a stark message to any god fearing despot globally. What would Isarel's response be if the House of Saud says it want nukes - which I'm sure they wil be exploring actively. Good for the oil price though OPEC and Russia will be raising a few glasses today as they see their coffers grtting strengthened.

THE FACT THAT HE HASNT GONE ALL CAPS PROBABLY MEANS IT'S NOT THAT IMPORTANT TO HIM.

I think it’s his way of not escalating the situation 🤣

Absolutely, but I'm looking at Lavrov explicitly blaming the "Anglo's" for planning the attack.

The action gave Russia the right to respond with nukes. Ironically it will also likely lead to Russia leaving the START Treaty, leaving the world less safe.