01-03-2020, 10:43 AM
** 03-Jan-2020 World View: Iran's threat of retaliation
There's been a lot of hysterical bluster coming out of Iran for the
last 12 hours, calling Americans monsters, and promising retaliation
leading to destruction to America and Israel. Blah, blah, blah.
There's no doubt that Iran's geezers want to retaliate, and it will be
interesting to see how they do that. They're almost completely
boxed in. Their military playbook for years has been covert attacks
on Americans and on Saudi assets, and in funding terrorist groups in
the region. Then they always step back back and blame it all on
America and Israel.
I listened to one Tehran pundit last night list one event after
another in the last 40 years, and it was amazing how he blamed every
on America. He even blamed the 1979 Islamic Revolution on America.
It was an amazing tour de force.
The point is that Iran always maintains deniability. If Iran
attacks an oil tanker in the Gulf of Hormuz, they deny having anything
to do with it, no matter what the evidence.
So what kind of retaliation are they going to try now? Will they maintain
deniability, or will they make an overt attack on American assets?
And if they do, where will they do that? In Iraq?
And that brings us to Iraq. Soleimani was an Iranian hero of the
Iran/Iraq war. Soleimani may be beloved in Iran, but he's hated
in Iraq, because he killed lots of Iraqis, and continued to kill
Iraqis in terror attacks since then.
The Iranians are saying that America has violate Iraqi sovereignty.
In fact, America is there at the invitation of Iraq, at least to
help remaining ISIS cells. Iraq got burned when America left
Iraq in 2011, in that ISIS was in control of 2/3 of the country
by 2014, so the Iraqis don't want to go through that again.
But the Iraqis are also telling Iran not to violate Iraqi sovereignty
by attacking America on Iraqi soil.
So we know that Iran is going to retaliate, but they have very few
choices. Maybe cyber. Maybe fund Hezbollah to do a terrorist act
somewhere in South America. Maybe an IRGC attack on American assets
in Syria. So Iran has plenty of choices, but few of them are more
than symbolic. We'll just have to wait and see.
Once again, it's important to remember that Iran and Iraq are in
generational Awakening eras, and both countries ae facing large
anti-government and anti-Iran protests. It's not America, but it's
these protests that are frightening the hell out of Iran's hardline
geezers, and they will be more worried about how any retaliatory step
against Americans will affect those protests.
Soleimani was a war hero in Iran, so the streets of Tehran are filled
with anti-American protesters, but that's only temporary. When that
fervor ends, the Iranian people will still be living in poverty, and
will still hate the hardline geezers that they've been protesting
against for years.
There will NOT be a war between American and Iran. But as Ive said
many times, a war between Iran and Saudi Arabia at some point is
certain.
(01-02-2020, 11:48 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: > Any thoughts on where this will go? If Iran is in an awakening
> period, the country won't support prolonged fighting against the
> US. Will the IRGC and the various militias formerly managed by
> Soleimani try to extract revenge with attacks on US forces, or
> will they not even attempt that?
> I can see it accelerating the generational turnover in Iran, so
> it's looking like your prediction of Iran becoming a US ally has
> some hope.
There's been a lot of hysterical bluster coming out of Iran for the
last 12 hours, calling Americans monsters, and promising retaliation
leading to destruction to America and Israel. Blah, blah, blah.
There's no doubt that Iran's geezers want to retaliate, and it will be
interesting to see how they do that. They're almost completely
boxed in. Their military playbook for years has been covert attacks
on Americans and on Saudi assets, and in funding terrorist groups in
the region. Then they always step back back and blame it all on
America and Israel.
I listened to one Tehran pundit last night list one event after
another in the last 40 years, and it was amazing how he blamed every
on America. He even blamed the 1979 Islamic Revolution on America.
It was an amazing tour de force.
The point is that Iran always maintains deniability. If Iran
attacks an oil tanker in the Gulf of Hormuz, they deny having anything
to do with it, no matter what the evidence.
So what kind of retaliation are they going to try now? Will they maintain
deniability, or will they make an overt attack on American assets?
And if they do, where will they do that? In Iraq?
And that brings us to Iraq. Soleimani was an Iranian hero of the
Iran/Iraq war. Soleimani may be beloved in Iran, but he's hated
in Iraq, because he killed lots of Iraqis, and continued to kill
Iraqis in terror attacks since then.
The Iranians are saying that America has violate Iraqi sovereignty.
In fact, America is there at the invitation of Iraq, at least to
help remaining ISIS cells. Iraq got burned when America left
Iraq in 2011, in that ISIS was in control of 2/3 of the country
by 2014, so the Iraqis don't want to go through that again.
But the Iraqis are also telling Iran not to violate Iraqi sovereignty
by attacking America on Iraqi soil.
So we know that Iran is going to retaliate, but they have very few
choices. Maybe cyber. Maybe fund Hezbollah to do a terrorist act
somewhere in South America. Maybe an IRGC attack on American assets
in Syria. So Iran has plenty of choices, but few of them are more
than symbolic. We'll just have to wait and see.
Once again, it's important to remember that Iran and Iraq are in
generational Awakening eras, and both countries ae facing large
anti-government and anti-Iran protests. It's not America, but it's
these protests that are frightening the hell out of Iran's hardline
geezers, and they will be more worried about how any retaliatory step
against Americans will affect those protests.
Soleimani was a war hero in Iran, so the streets of Tehran are filled
with anti-American protesters, but that's only temporary. When that
fervor ends, the Iranian people will still be living in poverty, and
will still hate the hardline geezers that they've been protesting
against for years.
There will NOT be a war between American and Iran. But as Ive said
many times, a war between Iran and Saudi Arabia at some point is
certain.
