Atrios thinks it's weird that there isn't more discourse over the possibility of war with Iran. I get that, although since the discourse would be dominated by hawks (it always is) the ongoing silence might not be such a bad thing.
Part of the reason, I think, is that "war with Iran," if it comes, would be a strange creature indeed. Neither Israel nor the US can invade Iran even if they wanted to. Nor can Iran invade Israel. It's 600 miles through Jordan and Iraq to get to Israel from the border of Iran.
The only thing left is an air war, and that wouldn't be easy. Most of Iran is only barely in range of either Israeli fighters or American carriers in the Med. Carriers in the Persian Gulf could do better, but fighters don't carry big payloads in any case and can inflict only limited damage. Heavy bombers can fly from the mainland US, but it's not easy and we couldn't support very many missions.
Plus it's risky. Iran has legit air defenses and can shoot stuff down.
That leaves two things. First, we could wreak hell on Iran's Persian Gulf oil facilities. However, that risks both serious retaliation and damage to shipping channels that would cut off world oil supplies. Purely for reasons of our own national security, it's pretty unlikely.
Second, both sides have missiles. And missile defenses. How much damage could the US and Israel do with a serious commitment to a missile war with Iran? I don't know, but that would be one weird war if it were just two sides launching waves of missiles at each other. We could obviously keep this up longer than Iran, but it's unclear how much it could accomplish.
Right now, Israel's war with Iran is limited to proxies (mainly Hezbollah), cyberattacks, sabotage, and so forth. A real live hot war with Iran would increase that intensity, but mostly via missile attacks unless both sides decided to risk turning the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz into wastelands.
In other words, my best amateur guess is that a full-scale war with Iran isn't really possible short of a provocation that provoked a truly massive commitment from the US—something on the order of the Gulf War or Vietnam. That's hugely unlikely, and short of that Israel and Iran are just too far apart to do much damage to each other. So there's really no prospective war for the discourse to obsess about.
POSTSCRIPT: This is all unrelated to the possibility of a sustained American campaign to knock out Iran's nuclear facilities. That would be hard but probably doable if we put our minds to it. Israel, on the other hand, doesn't have the military resources to pull this off. It's the US or nobody.
There was an estimate of the costs of the last Iranian attack. Some info here:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/02/west-defend-israel-iranian-attack
The US and Israel spent ca. $1billion defending against the missile attacks. Iran spent tens of millions. (The article above lists costs of interceptors, $10 to $28 million, much more expensive than ballistic missiles--but doesn't have cost of the missiles listed--though I vaguely remember coming across an estimate cost of those to be less than $100K)
1 billion is 0.003930817% of US GDP, 10 million is 0.002418379% of Iran's.
As you can see, the number of zeros the same. And if 'tens of millions' was 2 tens, they've spent more than we have.
Both economies grow at ab average of 2% per year. This is peanuts.
+1
Good comment.
I want to say up front that I am strongly against this. However, the US has a long history of using small foreign wars to test new weapons and tactics (Ukraine is just the latest example, even if we didn't start it). I see Iran as a possible practice ground for an eventual war with China over Taiwan. The US could launch bombers from Diego Garcia (a little over 3000 miles) and they in turn could quite effectively attack Iran with over-the-horizon tactical missiles, which likely are good candidates for testing. I strongly doubt that Iran is "out of reach", especially when that "reach" is one of our most active areas of military development.
Those over the horizon missiles likely cost more than the damage they would do.
I also think war with Iran is unlikely and will go further and say the US has been damn stupid in making Iran into a bogeyman. Admittedly this is a low bar, but Iran is better in many respects than Saudi Arabia. Anyway, Netanyahu has always been obsessed with Iran, the sole Muslim country with a thriving, protected Jewish minority, and that's problem No. 1 because he wants the US to do the fighting and dying for Israel and until now he's been leading Biden by the nose. Also the oil lobby would love $200/barrel prices.
So I'm hoping it won't happen before Jan. 20th and that Kamala Harris will get rid of Sullivan and Blinken. A new ME policy is desperately needed and though I trust she wants one, I'm not sure she'll dare. But if she does, she'll be a shoo-in for a Nobel Peace Prize.
Agree with all of this. If the U.S. goes to war with Iran it will be because Netanyahu wanted war with Iran and Biden didn't have the balls to say "No."
That said, I am also really interested to see what Harris does after 20 Jan. Harris is not the president and will not become the president unless she wins this election. The smart play is to have Biden on side for the campaign but Harris is clearly alienating the majority of under-50 U.S. citizens who are sick of the U.S. providing all the bombs for the Gaza genocide. Assuming Harris wins, it will be up to her how much weaponry the U.S. should send to Israel, assuming the war with Iran isn't already in full swing by then.
My guess is Biden sees the brewing Mideast conflict as connected with Ukraine. Iran is an active participant in the Ukraine invasion.
Forcing Iran to deal with Israel will take some heat off Ukraine.
" Iran is an active participant in the Ukraine invasion." You're delusional. For all the reasons Kevin gave, there isn't going to be a US Iran war unless Trump wins. Obviously, normal logic is irrelevant to someone as stupid as Trump.
"the sole Muslim country with a thriving, protected Jewish minority"
In 1979 there were about 100,000 Jews in Iran. This has dropped steadily since then. Today there are between 8,000 and 10,000 Jews living there, about 0.01% of the Iranian population. I wouldn't call that thriving. About 97% of Iranian Jews now live in Israel and the US.
Jews in Iran are formally to be treated equally and free to practice their religion. There is even a seat in the Iranian parliament reserved for the representative of the Iranian Jews. However, de facto discrimination is common. For example, the Islamic government appoints the officials who run Jewish schools, most of these being Muslims. And if you are a Jew in Iran, you better not be spouting Zionist opinions. Khomeini said, "We recognize our Jews as separate from those godless, bloodsucking Zionists."
Zionist opinions have become apparently open genocide. So why would that be acceptable anywhere?
You don't have to be anti-Semitic to support the current Iranian government, but for some strange reason everyone who supports the current Iranian government just turns out to be an anti-Semite.
If "Zionist opinions" means a person supports the right of Israel to continue to exist, that is a very mainstream view in the free world. If a Jewish person loudly expressed this view in Iran, I bet they would quickly be arrested.
Here is a story from the Israeli press. A 12-year-old Arab-Israeli girl said "Uh, people are starving in Gaza." Nanoseconds later her classmates said her village should burn and attacked her after class, after which the school suspended her. The Israel Education Ministry then accused her of inciting against the army. But, yeah, only Iran is eeeeevil.
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-09-24/ty-article/.premium/israeli-arab-girl-12-suspended-from-school-after-empathizing-with-gazan-children/00000192-206a-dc44-affb-39fb8a800000?fbclid=IwY2xjawF6WDRleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHT-b-hyxYY-LHIuXHUtHXH2syCLwrE74ZydFCiAdt-FbeQ46ZhOPUycmfA_aem_BfJf_W_u4g24rIlBBLDeNA
The US made them what how?
My two cents is that it was a fine thing for American pundits and observers to talk about when it was merely hypothetical. The problem right now is that Netanyahu has successfully remade himself into the Richard Nixon of the region circa Christmas 1972, ie the unpredictable madman on the block, and that's making things a little too real for punditry and idle game-spinning.
ADM's very good point granted, the Biden administration does not want or need to be dragged along as Netanyahu's henchman this close to the election. Yes, the Iranians are due another counterstroke; also yes, the Israelis have pretty well neutered Hezbollah, the near projection of Iranian power. So what's next?
The last time this kind of standoff-missile retaliation happened, the Israeli response was, as I recall, a demonstration that they could basically destroy Iran's air defenses at will. That might be something they'd carry out this time-- it would be chastening to the Iranians but not fatal because no one else in the region would follow up on it, plus it would give them a chance to rebuild bigger and better and incidentally give Israelis a chance to get inside whatever Iran rebuilds.
OTOH, I believe confining that first response to a demonstration took a lot of foot-stomping and arm-twisting and threatening on our part. The fact that Biden can't afford to let us get drawn into an active role and doesn't want anything dramatic to happen might actually be a big temptation for Netanyahu to do exactly what Biden doesn't want-- it would fit right in with his pattern of shitting all over Biden for having the temerity to act as an ally.
So I really don't have a clue what Netanyahu will do and how that will affect us, and I think that for the usual talkative suspects, the prospects for the region, for Israel, for the US, for the election, are just too dire for the usual bloviating. Not Bolton, but for most of them I think it's an abyss they don't want to look into.
And Biden sends US troops to Israel for air defense. Good grief, he’s a jackass. I don’t care if the lunatics in that part of the world kill each other. Sending US military to fight there is a bad idea.
Hezbullshit got some revenge today.
Yes, we know, you're okay with death and strife and bigotry.
Did you cry yourself to sleep last night over this tragedy? Grow up.
The amount of money, materiel, time, sweat, and blood* already expended in that part of the world leads me to believe we have been at war already just not in the way the hawks want. A boiling pot watched...
* Yes, the wonderful lines of geography say we haven't but we all know that's just a technicality and recent history and that of the last century torture that technicality.
If the USA spends so much on military defense and still can't feasibly take on Iran, what's all that spending for?
the pork barrel, obviously
Why should our defense budget be an appropriate offensive war budget? Then it wouldn't be defense, now would it?
LOL! Well, the "Department of Defense" used to be called the War Department.
That was primarily during the time it's reason for existence was the genocide of native americans. So its name was entirely appropriate.
This. The one thing that our colossal military spending sorta kinda does buy is it keeps potential adversaries on their side of the line. This sort of timid, minor nibbling at the borders of the US sphere of influence by Iran is exactly the situation we want.
We don't have to spend the needless tens of trillions to have a military that can readily invade and conquer anyplace on the planet to ensure that nobody dares look at us funny; Iran occasionally throwing some missiles at a minor ally but then immediately backing down when we growl at them is tolerable, as it keeps real wars from breaking out at a fraction of the cost actually global policemanning would cost.
Iran has only thrown missiles at our allies when our allies directly attacked them first.
Even more unhinged are the constant Trump Republican claims that Biden and Harris will "start World War 3", a claim which I've never seen justified with any rational explanation of who the parties would be in such a world war, or what the casus belli or war aims of either side would be.
By “start WW3” they mean our adversaries will sense our weakness and attack. If Trump is President they will know we are tuff and quake in their boots at the mere thought of attacking.
Hopefully you are being sarcastic. Otherwise you are trying to win stupidest person on the planet award.
Can someone explain how Iran is an existential threat to Murika? It sure as hell it can do a lot of damage to Israel with long range missiles but no way they will put boots on the ground.
Anyone know when Israel has come to the aid of the US??? Seems like a one way street.
Iran is a colony which won independence. An existential threat to a capitalist empire which informs its over forty years of hostility.
"It sure as hell it can do a lot of damage to Israel with long range missiles " No it can't. With the aid of the US, Britain and France, Iran's missiles can easily be shot down.
Hmm. Speaking of Iran, that kill list of Americans tied to the assassination of Qasem Soleimani suggests they're willing to test America's red lines.
Y'all realize this instability in the Middle East is a culmination of Trump's actions, right?
- Moved the US Embassy to contested land.
- Assassinated a central Iranian official.
- Ended the Iran nuclear deal and reimposed sanctions.
- Produced the Abraham Accord in order to isolate Iran.
- Proposed the "Peace to Prosperity" that nixed an independent Palestinian state.
I'm not saying Trump should have appeased Iran. Rather, he provoked Iran and dared them to respond. He never sat down with Iran even though he was constantly sitting down with Putin and Kim. Dude even talked to Taliban. Abdul was his name, I believe he said.
He hates Muslims, right?
Hates Muslims, but loves him some Saudis. Who know how to speak his language-- money and flattery.
Your list reminds me of the W days, when the watchword among the neocon and some administration types was "everybody talks Baghdad, *real* men go through Tehran." Some of these birds have been spoiling for an OK Corral showdown for 45 years.
And some of that group have figured out how to push trump's buttons. And so have the Saudis, who will resolutely fight the Iranians down to the last American. The Israelis have bedfellows when it comes to Iran.
And everybody in the world who isn't MAGA knows that trump is, shall we say, supremely and easily biddable.
You missed mentioning Trump's advocacy of an "Arab NATO", which would obviously have been intended to contain Iran. Presumably the Gulf States weren't willing to get into a formal alliance with the USA, because the idea died.
A real war with Iran will require a draft. Liberals will accept a draft as a means to prevent war. If conscription is resumed, war will have gone beyond the planing stage.
You can tell that Israel has been doing its homework. For a long while, it was fighting an amorphous enemy. Over the last five years or so, there have been a series of highly targeted attacks against various leaders including at least one high level technical leader of Iran's nuclear program. There are parallels to the US war in Mexico in the early 20th century which was fought against various paramilitaries. It wasn't until Pershing started doing old fashioned police work that the US started making progress. I get the impression from the targeted attacks that Israel has been doing old fashioned police work. (Think about it. If the enemy could plant explosives in that many portable radios, just how secure were those communications?)
This isn't our war and we don't want it. Leave us out of any calculations other than direct defense of Israeli homeland, which they really don't need and is more just posturing by us to keep other countries out of it.
Israel isn't shooting down the Iranian missiles and drones. It is the US, UK and France shooting down 90% of them.
Aside from that, I get the sense we're enabling Israel into thinking they can get away with war crimes and further annexation of Palestine and Lebanon, which we should absolutely NOT be doing.
It's time for all this to wind down and stopping the flow of missiles from us to Israel as the primary lever.