West Asia News and Discussions

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 08 Jan 2020 08:13

^ UBCN points to our earlier analysis. The POTUS was set up by Deep State entities. Initial rocket attack on US base was false-flag. POTUS reacted to report of US contractor killed, and basically asked for a swift retaliation to stop the attacks. DeepState did a heavy-handed response, hitting Iraqi bases run by Iranian forces that were hindering the oil stealing trade. Demonstrations occurred, Suleimani was seen. POTUS was flat-out conned into permitting a hit on the commander of the Hezbollah in Iraq, and the Deep State used that authorization to kill Suleimani when he was with the approved target. POTUS came out with ill-informed tweets.
Putin made a visit to Damascus yesterday in the middle of all this and spent the day at the Russian command center. May have been a few phone calls between Putin and Trump, or Lavrov and Pompeio. NATO, France and Germany also may have been explaining the birds and bees to DT.
By now, sensible counsel have got to the POTUS, and trying to ramp down the tensions. Understood that Iran had to fire off a few missiles. Casualties being downplayed. Hope that's it.
Otherwise tomorrow morning Teheran will be smoking. OTOH, it's a bit different from Iraq 1990 or 2003. In Iraq and Syria small numbers of Americans are scattered among a lot of other forces. May be hard to get them all out if all-out hostilities break out. Losses may be significant.

John · Post by **John** » 08 Jan 2020 08:22

By now, sensible counsel have got to the POTUS, and trying to ramp down the tensions. Understood that Iran had to fire off a few missiles. Casualties being downplayed.

Trump is not going to downplay casualties he was ready to go on air but as damage seems to less than expected it was called off.

brar_w wrote:Fox reporting that CENTCOM now states that 15 TBM's were launched, 10 hit Al Asad, 1 hit Erbil, and 4 failed. Historically, this would constitute one of the larger TBM barrages in quite a while. I wonder what the record is for TBM attacks on an Air Base per wave.

Saddam fired 86 Scuds during GW and I recall there was day when they got fired a dozen or so of them.

brar_w · Post by **brar_w** » 08 Jan 2020 08:22

^ Yeah I know..but were more than 10 launched at a single target in a single wave?

ArjunPandit · Post by **ArjunPandit** » 08 Jan 2020 08:25

lets assume for a second if there are US casualties, in terms of endgame is it possible for iran to have nukes? even a dirty bomb?

John · Post by **John** » 08 Jan 2020 08:25

brar_w wrote:^ Yeah I know..but were more than 10 launched at a single target in a single wave?

About 7 against Israel.

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm ... story.html

Vayutuvan · Post by **Vayutuvan** » 08 Jan 2020 08:26

Santosh wrote:
habal wrote:Gen Wesley Clarke mentioned in an old interview...
Wouldn't this be classified information that he is not supposed to leak?

This guy almost started WW III back when he ordered US troops to prevent the Roosky forces entering the city of <whatdchammacallit> leading to a tense stand-off for a couple of days.

ArjunPandit · Post by **ArjunPandit** » 08 Jan 2020 08:27

UBji how about US choosing a time, place and method of their convenience like cyber attack next month..does iran have internet? If not democracy iran certainly needs facebook, twitter and tinder..

bhavani · Post by **bhavani** » 08 Jan 2020 08:27

Both the bases that have been hit host US forces and fighter planes. US will probably retaliate soon. I think we are looking at the opening salvos of a US-Iran conflict.

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 08 Jan 2020 08:28

Saddam SCUDs had concrete warheads per reports of the time. Reported to be wildly inaccurate as well. I find it hard to believe that Iranian missiles in 2020 are that bad.

Vayutuvan · Post by **Vayutuvan** » 08 Jan 2020 08:29

brar_w wrote:^ Yeah I know..but were more than 10 launched at a single target in a single wave?

Scuds have a very large CEP. Moreover, they were tipped with some puny 1000 KG of TNT/explosive.

PS: UB ji beat me to it as expected.

John · Post by **John** » 08 Jan 2020 08:32

UlanBatori wrote:Saddam SCUDs had concrete warheads per reports of the time. Reported to be wildly inaccurate as well. I find it hard to believe that Iranian missiles in 2020 are that bad.

They were inaccurate because of their legacy guidance system and the ones used in GW all had warheads (articles talks about how one exploded after intercept destroying roofing in Israel). But Saddams Al-Hussein missile were even more inaccurate because they poorly cobbled together and they had flew modified trajectory to maximize range which resulted in them in breaking apart during terminal phase.

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 08 Jan 2020 08:32

I think DT has more to gain from a dramatic peace with Iran today, than the totally unoriginal template of SLCM/ALCM/F22/B52 stuff that nearly everyone expects. Stock market will zoom.

brar_w · Post by **brar_w** » 08 Jan 2020 08:34

bhavani wrote:Both the bases that have been hit host US forces and fighter planes. US will probably retaliate soon. I think we are looking at the opening salvos of a US-Iran conflict.

Iran picked one of the softest targets and a barrage of nearly 15 ballistic missiles appears to have claimed no US lives. It could have picked any one of the large US bases in the region, some that are quite close to Iran. If there was ever an offramp here for Trump then Iran carefully chose to hand that to him on a platter. Only alternative theory is that those US troops were using CEW measures to muck around with those TBM's. If not then the Iranians had to have orchestrated an attack that was loud but really did minimal damage relatively speaking and was strategically mostly inconsequential..

Who thought that one carefully guided JAGM could do more strategic damage than more than a dozen ballistic missiles

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 08 Jan 2020 08:36

Then the whole thing is like people drawing swords and then deciding to cut their own musharrafs slightly to satisfy H&D.

habal · Post by **habal** » 08 Jan 2020 08:52

UlanBatori wrote:^ Otherwise tomorrow morning Teheran will be smoking. OTOH, it's a bit different from Iraq 1990 or 2003. In Iraq and Syria small numbers of Americans are scattered among a lot of other forces. May be hard to get them all out if all-out hostilities break out. Losses may be significant.

Iran has made rapid advances in missile tech with help of china & north korea. It is also a civilizational power unlike Iraq under saddam. It has the power to set the entire region afire, 52 targets or 324 targets being targeted do not matter when there are fires all around. Hezbollah in Lebanon is armed with around 60,000 missiles of various types. Americans well know Israel is toast if they retaliate beyond a point. And if uae and saudi are attacked, and US cannot do much to prevent these then the entire region slips out of US hands, bases or no bases in region. After a couple of volleys putin or xi will enter the fray on pretext to 'control the situation' and that will be the end of usa leverage in region.

Trump was supported by deep state with the promise that he would break the strategic logjam that obama and killary had got into in syria when they couldn't push any more isis or nusra to commanding positions and russia and iran had blocked all routes for expansion in syria and were retaking lost territory one-by-one.

Trumps mission was to reverse this strategic logjam by taking on russia (russiagate) and Iran seperately and removing Syrias two pillars of support and attempt to break the syrian logjam from a different direction. And that is where we are at right now.

tandav · Post by **tandav** » 08 Jan 2020 09:03

This could be the end of US military bases in the ME should China and Russia decide to step in to support Iran. The grip of US supported military dictators in ME is tenuous as of now and Iran has the heft and the influence to upend all regional satraps. Pakistan may use this to accelerate its own dependence on US influence and get even more firmly in bed with China and Russia.

tandav · Post by **tandav** » 08 Jan 2020 09:16

As of date: the Iraqi parliament has asked American Forces to leave Iraq pronto and American presence in Iraq despite this resolution is an act of occupation. Any American forces that stay or retaliate against any action that attempts to evict them are fighting the will of the Iraqi people. Trump with a single stroke of stupidity handed over Iraq to Iran.

In a wild flight of imagination I think it is in the realm of possibility that Iraq and Iran may merge into a single Shia dominant country.
The Iraqi parliament only has to invite Iran to come stabilize the situation. This outsome I believe was the end game Soleimani and others in Iran were working towards and the Arab Sunni block is working against. Assassinating Soleimani has the potential of actually accelerating this outcome.

John · Post by **John** » 08 Jan 2020 09:20

habal wrote:Iran has made rapid advances in missile tech with help of china & north korea. It is also a civilizational power unlike Iraq under saddam. It has the power to set the entire region afire, 52 targets or 324 targets being targeted do not matter when there are fires all around.

China just sent over 90s tech even the drones are no better than what you can get from Amazon. Trade deal reportedly might have China handing over some intel on Iran so it’s double edged sword. China will definitely abandon Iran if it is in their interest.

Most of Iranian long range missiles hizb fired at Israel showed wielding and craftsmanship quite poor so let’s stop this hype and this same country that put together that amateur stealth fighter couple years ago. Let’s wait for daybreak but looks like some of missiles fired missed so much for 10m RCS.

Saddam was far bigger threat in 90 than Iran is now. However Saddam and his generals were highly incompetent and also Russia fed lot of misinformation which he believed.

CalvinH · Post by **CalvinH** » 08 Jan 2020 09:23

tandav wrote:
In a wild flight of imagination I think it is in the realm of possibility that Iraq and Iran may merge into a single Shia dominant country.
The Iraqi parliament only has to invite Iran to come stabilize the situation.

Arab and Persians coming together to form a single state....can a religious sect become a glue for that. What happens to Kurdish region of Iran/Iraq and Arab sunni regions of Iraq. Too complicated.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 08 Jan 2020 09:32

Unless you have better things to do. Watch it at 6:00. New terminology for all those in MLU.

tandav · Post by **tandav** » 08 Jan 2020 09:35

UlanBatori wrote:I cannot understand why the Iranians would attack an Iraqi base when the Iraqi govt has been going out on a limb for them. The report about Iraqi casualties may be fake news. As Donald Rumsfeld said as the US strikes in Afghanistan started:
This is the last time I tell you the truth.
If there were ambulances swarming the place, I would put out a news item to say that the enemy only hit their own friends, not my people.

Iraqis in those bases have probably moved out and stayed at home. It is my understanding that most Iraqis support Iran. That leaves the base mostly full of American soldiers. Trump did not count on Iraqi parliament asking America to get out. Americans are now scrambling to evacuate/secure their Soldiers. Many of these soldiers face a repeat of Mogadishu if they are not evacuated.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 08 Jan 2020 09:35

U.S. forces likely had warning before Iranian missile strikes

You bet. Those F-35s must have had a great evening.

John · Post by **John** » 08 Jan 2020 09:39

Ukrainian passenger plane to Kiev has crashed during takeoff in Tehran reports say it is a technical glitch so to early to say they shot down their own plane.

Western news have confirmed it, fact that Iran state media is saying its technical issue this early is suspicious.

brar_w · Post by **brar_w** » 08 Jan 2020 09:42

tandav wrote:
Iraqis in those bases have probably moved out and stayed at home. It is my understanding that most Iraqis support Iran. That leaves the base mostly full of American soldiers. Trump did not count on Iraqi parliament asking America to get out. Americans are now scrambling to evacuate/secure their Soldiers. Many of these soldiers face a repeat of Mogadishu if they are not evacuated.

Please take a look at the Iraqi presence at Al Asad. Not only do they have an Army division housed there, they have several other SOF and other military units based there. The thing is supposed to be the size of a small city (20+ km base perimeter). Iraq evacuated all those soldiers, other hundreds if not thousands of citizens who support operations there without anyone noticing?...just days after they said they were reinforcing base security there?

habal · Post by **habal** » 08 Jan 2020 09:43

John wrote:China just sent over 90s tech even the drones are no better than what you can get from Amazon.

90s tech means it don't kill ?? the ak47 is 1940s tech and it can kill just fine. Chinese drones on the other hand are debatable, there are china watchers on the forum who could weigh in. But as far as weapon tech is concerned, age doesnt matter it is effectiveness that is moot.

Trade deal reportedly might have China handing over some intel on Iran so it’s double edged sword. China will definitely abandon Iran if it is in their interest.

this could well be nato psy-ops. If China definitely abandons Iran what credibility do they have in eyes of potential collaborators. How is this in theie interest ?

Most of Iranian long range missiles hizb fired at Israel showed wielding and craftsmanship quite poor

then how come they landed in Israel ? No offence if something lands at target even with poor welding, should we concern with weld quality ?

so let’s stop this hype and this same country that put together that amateur stealth fighter couple years ago.

yes they made a fool of themselves, but they tried to do something. Better than doing nothing. But airforce and aircraft are not Iranian strengths, and that is why they put all their eggs in the missile basket.

Let’s wait for daybreak but looks like some of missiles fired missed so much for 10m RCS.

what if these missiles missed on purpose. Iran made a statement and gave trump wriggle room.

Saddam was far bigger threat in 90 than Iran is now. However Saddam and his generals were highly incompetent and also Russia fed lot of misinformation which he believed.

Saddam's army officer ranks was trained mainly by Indian army at NDA, they were not incompetent but some sunni generals were bought over. Also as US launched the attack from basra in southern most Iraq, Soleimani was leading a parallel assault from East in understanding with Shia collaborators from Iraq. Also Saddam was a pawn that was installed by CIA and his handler was Rumsfeld back in the day. His handler had a good measure of his pawn and decided to dispose him after use.

brar_w · Post by **brar_w** » 08 Jan 2020 09:59

John wrote:Ukrainian passenger plane to Kiev has crashed during takeoff in Tehran reports say it is a technical glitch so to early to say they shot down their own plane.

Western news have confirmed it, fact that Iran state media is saying its technical issue this early is suspicious.

Highly suspicious timing though we may never be able to confirm for sure.

anmol · Post by **anmol** » 08 Jan 2020 10:02

Tweet in the 4chan post: https://twitter.com/salehalbaydani/stat ... 5220787200

Tehran has informed Washington through mediators that it will bomb a base #عين_الاسد In Anbar, Iraq, to save face, and announce that this is the response that I have vowed to kill #سليماني Therefore, America evacuated the base hours before the bombing, and therefore also the American human losses will be zero as a result of this theater bombing!

anmol · Post by **anmol** » 08 Jan 2020 10:06

A 4.9 magnitude earthquake struck near #Iran's #Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant. The depth and epicenter indicate it was a natural event and unrelated to this evenings events. A similar earthquake struck in late December. USGS report enclosed. https://twitter.com/StratSentinel/statu ... 8141024256

John · Post by **John** » 08 Jan 2020 10:08

what if these missiles missed on purpose. Iran made a statement and gave trump wriggle room.

If so why waste the missiles and ballistic missile have such large damage footprint unless you firing them off at empty fields they will do damage if launched at bases. Even precision strike have casualties.. Plus original tweets after launch by Iranian military talk about 100s killed I think Iranians are trying save face and descalate.

Sticking to topic looks like there is videos of Ukrainian jet on fire in the sky prior to crashing looks like it got hit IMO. Sad for passengers caught up in this. Some reports state it was a SAM hit.

brar_w · Post by **brar_w** » 08 Jan 2020 10:15

There are three possibilities of why the TBM attack was a flop based on current assessment of it based on what we know. 1) Iran missed on purpose because it wanted to de-escalate quickly and not have it go out of hand, 2 ) Iran intended to hit but those missiles were not very precise (US reports that 10 hit Al Asad but 4 failed to hit, while 1 hit Erbil), and 3) There was CEW capability deployed (US has been referring to "Left of Launch" for well over a decade now in both Iranian and NoKo context). All three are possible..though 1 seems to be risky because if they intended this to be just "for TV" then why risk actual escalation (if they actually hit something) with 15 missiles? why not 5? (also, its not like Iran hasnt killed Americans before)..2 ) is possible but we would have to wait for Sat imagery which will come in the morning and will eventually find its way into open source analysis..Impact within base perimeter or potentially inhabitable structures would point to this. Same with Iraqi casualties, if any, though EW allowed them to sound the sirens and bunker down. We would never know about 3.

Prem Kumar · Post by **Prem Kumar** » 08 Jan 2020 10:22

CNN is reporting that the U.S troops in the airbase received adequate early warning and had time to get into their bunkers. So, the U.S must have missile launch warning radars, planes, satellites watching Iran on a 24x7 basis. Plus "getting into bunker" drills.

Iran just looked like Scud-Saddam idiots. Their tech is poor. Hope they can sell some sort of victory to their domestic frenzied mullahs & assorted Islamic gangs

Sachin · Post by **Sachin** » 08 Jan 2020 10:28

The Indian Main Stream Media would tom-tom that this attack was a major success and Donald Trump is now scurrying for cover. There were reports that CPI(M) had already condemned the Trump administration in the US over the killing of Suleimani. Trump was said to be so nervous after that he offered to resign

.

anmol · Post by **anmol** » 08 Jan 2020 10:31

Y. Kanan · Post by **Y. Kanan** » 08 Jan 2020 10:44

Well if it was the deep state's intention to turn the world against America, it's working. Things are about to get much worse because Iranians are both proud and relatively competent; they are constitutionally incapable of wimping out the way everyone here seems convinced they will. BR'ites are expecting Iranians to wimp out as we would in their place, because it's logical.

They won't. They'll strike back any way they can.

habal · Post by **habal** » 08 Jan 2020 10:54

Everyone here said Russia couldnt afford to intervene in Syria and Russia didnt have the cash, its economy was shambles and weapons were inaffective, it's army was obsolete technology and Russia couldn't handle if mighty USA stuck back. Also Russian aircraft had poor uptimes as western aircraft and there was no way they could handle the western air advantage. The Russian base in Khmeimim was a sitting duck and would be overrun in hours if nato so felt like it. Russia navy was a joke and would run at sight of US aircraft carrier.

to benefit of Syria, Russia agreed with none of the above.

Similarly there are authoritative predictions on Iran and its ayatollahs and it's military that will shake in fear while taking on might of USA. That this is the end of Iranian bravado. But again Iranians were not aware of such doubts and they struck a US base.

williams · Post by **williams** » 08 Jan 2020 11:14

You don't hit a superpower and expect them to be quite. Uncle will predictably respond in force it is as simple as that.

brar_w · Post by **brar_w** » 08 Jan 2020 11:17

williams wrote:You don't hit a superpower and expect them to be quite. Uncle will predictably respond in force it is as simple as that.

Don't be so sure. How has the US been materially affected here? Trump ordered airstrike to take out QS and his Iraqi associate. That was a success. Iran retaliated with a missile barrage that, based on what we currently know, only destroyed some infrastructure without any US or perhaps even Iraqi life. Iran's FM has said that this concludes their retaliation. There is very little to be gained from escalating that further. Had the missile attack even been partially successful or aimed at a major US base in the region then it would have been one thing. This provides plenty of room to dial down the heat. I could be wrong but I feel that DT would not go down another round of escalatory tit for tat. He may give the combatant commander on the ground more freedom to take preemtive action if they sense some sort of Iranian movement but I doubt they'd plan a strike inside Iran. As far as the US is concerned a complete failure of a missile attack probably does not warrant an escalatory response. But with DT who knows.

John wrote:Plus original tweets after launch by Iranian military talk about 100s killed I think Iranians are trying save face and descalate.

I think Iranians are still claiming dozens of causalities.

habal · Post by **habal** » 08 Jan 2020 11:26

williams wrote:You don't hit a superpower and expect them to be quite. Uncle will predictably respond in force it is as simple as that.

superpower lost syrian war. Superpower decided to battle by proxies but resupplied isis and moderate rebels on a fairly regular basis. If your premise then is that superpower will use nukes, then there are others with nukes too. No point in being a superpower if it is surrounded by radiation all across.

So net net it is not that simple.

But again there will be some USA response since they have their H&D to defend in front of it's own population and immigrants. But then what the response to that will be is not in US control. What if China or North Korea decide to strike at USA through some Iranian proxies then hey lo behold Trump is on twitter and at war again.

What if China has shipped over it's Long March missile to Iran and it lands up in US. Will Trump go to war with both China & Iran at same time ?

amitverma · Post by **amitverma** » 08 Jan 2020 11:29

IRANIAN TV: PRELIMINARY INFORMATION ON THE DEATH OF AT LEAST 80 U.S. SOLDIERS AFTER THE REVOLUTIONARY GUARD BOMBED THE BASE

Mort Walker · Post by **Mort Walker** » 08 Jan 2020 11:31

^^^Let's wait and see. Sounds more like the bluff of the DG ISPR better suited for twitter responses.