Iran Opinions

[The Man From G.O.P.]

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[The Man From G.O.P.]

Of all these options, option 1 seems the least evil of them. If we did not have troops in Iraq and Afghanistan that would be vulnerable to any Iranian retaliation for a military strike I would be more open to using military measures.  And as for a conventional invasion -as long as we have no draft, we have not the manpower for an invasion of Iran at the same time we are occupying and fighting insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan.

So you vote you're willing to do nothing to stop Iran? Brilliant

[The Man From G.O.P.]

Of all these options, option 1 seems the least evil of them. If we did not have troops in Iraq and Afghanistan that would be vulnerable to any Iranian retaliation for a military strike I would be more open to using military measures.  And as for a conventional invasion -as long as we have no draft, we have not the manpower for an invasion of Iran at the same time we are occupying and fighting insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan.

So you vote you're willing to do nothing to stop Iran?

Considering the other options, yes.  There are no other feasible alternatives.  We could, however, try to contain a nuclear-armed Iran. The fact that it will attain nuclear weapons is pretty much a foregone conclusion -and we cannot wipe out their nuclear capabilities in one fell swoop the way Israel did to Iraq in 1982.

Don't be daft, between American, British, Isreali, and pro-west Iranian Intelligence we can find the sites they currently have and wipe them all out without ever putting anyone in danger, you can't build these things in closets.

[The Man From G.O.P.]

as for the draft, it is impractical.  where would we train the new draftees? 

  Any military strike we make on Iran will invite retaliatory attacks that could have the potential of destroying our scattered units throughout Iraq in detail -and then we would be honor-bound to avenge them by scraping together another army to retake the lost territory.  And where would that extra manpower come from then? 

 

First off, American units are never scattered, It would be impossible for Iranian units to do anything but piss us off in a case where they attack us in Iraq, thier military quality is that of the Iraqis, Second, we would never be engaged in DETAIL one after another, we have these communication devices called PHONES that allow things to be a little more organized than the dark ages. Also to assume that we dont have many satillites focused on Iran is crazy, we would know about any mobilization they made, and have the capability to wipe it out long before it could reach us in Iraq. Your mis-understanding of modern military tactics and status is too great for you to be talking like this.

[The Man From G.O.P.]

We'd have to deal with a new Shiite insurgency in Iraq.

Frodo Is suggesting that the Iranians would have even a chance at beating a US force in battle in the Middle East, that is nonsense.

[The Man From G.O.P.]

We'd have to deal with a new Shiite insurgency in Iraq.

Frodo Is suggesting that the Iranians would have even a chance at beating a US force in battle in the Middle East, that is nonsense.

No it's not. Do you research on the Iranian military, Iran's terrain, and how spread thinly the US is now.

Remember, a bunch of Afghan tribalists with unimpressive weaponry beat the Soviet Union.

Read again, Frodo suggests that the Iranians could attack and defeat an American army on an equal field in Iraq because America is "scattered" and could be defeated piecemeal

[The Man From G.O.P.]

as for the draft, it is impractical.  where would we train the new draftees? 

  Any military strike we make on Iran will invite retaliatory attacks that could have the potential of destroying our scattered units throughout Iraq in detail -and then we would be honor-bound to avenge them by scraping together another army to retake the lost territory.  And where would that extra manpower come from then? 

 

First off, American units are never scattered, It would be impossible for Iranian units to do anything but piss us off in a case where they attack us in Iraq, thier military quality is that of the Iraqis, Second, we would never be engaged in DETAIL one after another, we have these communication devices called PHONES that allow things to be a little more organized than the dark ages. Also to assume that we dont have many satillites focused on Iran is crazy, we would know about any mobilization they made, and have the capability to wipe it out long before it could reach us in Iraq. Your mis-understanding of modern military tactics and status is too great for you to be talking like this.

You know what? I know what you are implying, and you're absolutely right -we are invincible!  Let's take on Syria and Sudan too while we're at it. 

No, not at all, it's just your thinking couldn't be farther from the truth

[The Man From G.O.P.]

Fu** this...I'll change my vote -not only should we do a conventional airstrike, but also launch a full-scale military invasion and occupation of Iran.  And that should also involve reinstating the draft so we could have a deep reserve of readily-deployable manpower that we can throw at them.  If we are going to wipe out Iran's capability to develop nuclear weapons, it makes no sense to stop short with only an airstrike while the Iranian populace is clamoring for vengeance in its aftermath with terrorist cells being readied to wreak hell on the American homeland.  Let's fight the terrorists there rather than here.   

What do you suggest be done about the Iranian situation, Frodo?

It's easy to dismiss all the available options, but doing nothing will have a cost too, at some time in the future.

This is clearly a dangerous regime with great potential to bring destructive war to the region, and to the United States.  The countries around it are weak and will probably be intimidated enough to buckle to a nuclear-armed Iran.

Iran could use its nuclear weapons to intimidate the region into declaring economic warfare on the west by curtailing oil production and driving the price through the roof.

There are no easy answers to this problem, but I think we should be mindful of the potential costs of doing nothing.

Dazzleman -I see no reason why we can't simply contain Iran as we did the Soviet Union for over a half-century.  It is the least dangerous option out there, and though it is a dangerous regime, it nonetheless is a regime that values its own self-preservation.  They are rational beings.  Iran is not the equivalent of Al Qaeda which cannot be contained like any other nation-state and therefore must be hunted down with whatever means are at our disposal. 

Frodo, your point is valid and your mind is in the right place, but the reality of the situation doesn't allow for us to do the same thing this time. You have to remember we had the fact of MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction) to hold against the Soviets, they knew that America, if attacked, had the willpower and guts to wipe Communism off the map. This situation is completely different. Given the opportunity, the far right wing Islamic facists (that indeed exist) would take any uranium enriched or bought by the government and use it in such a way where it could do damage to this country. Imagine Los Angeles dissapearing one day? Now yes, it would be difficult for hardliners to come by this material, but surely not impossible. Knowing full well thier country would suffer nothing more than an American invasion, and with the whole-hearted view of martyrdom in thier minds, they would have no problem deploying such a weapon.

Meaning, do something about it now.