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Simplicius: Israel Buckles as Iran War Shifts to New Drag-Out Phase

I have full access to this piece as it's free, and it's pretty long, so I will once again be summarizing.

• Iran just concluded talks in Geneva with Western representatives and failed to reach a deal as Iran will still not end enrichment, will not end its missile program, and will not negotiate until Israel stops attacking them. Simplicius points out the hypocrisy of the West vis-a-vis Russia ("Russia must end hostilities and withdraw from Ukraine entirely, THEN we can negotiate! Israel, of course, doesn't need to do the same thing with Iran").
• Iran keeping to its original aims is encouraging, indicating that they think an attritional war with Israel is likely to work. That they're bluffing is certainly possible but doesn't seem probable.
• Iran has been taking significant damage, though with Israel reusing the same videos a lot, it takes a while to properly analyse things. Radar sites have been hit, and there are about 80 verified hits on Iranian ballistic missile launchers.
• Simplicius doesn't know how many ballistic missiles Iran has (well, nobody except Iran really knows) but agrees it's somewhere in the low thousands (~3000, maybe more). Some sources claim 1500 have been fired already, while more precise graphs count 500 total launched.
• Iran can produce up to 300 ballistic missiles per month according to Western estimates. As long as Iran fires 10 or less missiles per day, they can keep firing basically indefinitely without wearing down stockpiles for when they're critically needed (e.g. the US joins the war).
• Israel's ability to intercept these missiles has been very degraded, so Iran could actually fire even less and achieve the same result. Iran could be thinking that they'll just fire ~5 per day and slowly build up stockpiles over the course of a long attritional war (months or years), even if they lose a couple missiles every day to Israeli bombing. We are seeing this in practice - that Iran is firing less missiles for the same overall result.
• Iranian senior official Mohsen Rezaee has publically stated that Iran has fired "over 400 missiles" and "over 600 drones" and that "dozens of missiles have hit Israel", which seems to match the graphs carefully counting up to about ~500 missile launches. On the face of it, this means a ~75% interception rate for Israel, and that's certainly a valid way of looking at it. Another way of looking at it is that many of these missiles were very old missiles that were used to waste interceptors so that more advanced missiles could get through later, and Israel itself is admitting that its interception rate is rapidly falling.
• Rezaee, back in March, stated that they knew that war with Israel is inevitable and was taking precautions. He says Iran's "missile capabilities" (a delightfully ambiguous word) were ramped up by 5 or 6 times. The most sensible way to interpret "capabilities" is probably "production". It's not clear whether this means production has been increased to the Western estimate of 300 per month, or if it's now substantially higher than that, but regardless, it's clear that Iran is following Russia's example, implementing a massive military-industrial campaign which dramatically outproduces the West.
• He also stated that Iran, as a precaution, already removed its most important nuclear program materials to safe locations, so what Israel is currently striking is achieving very little. There are flashy images of precise missile strikes by Israel, but these could very much be striking empty facilities. And even the West admits limited effectiveness overall despite the precision; e.g. at Natanz there's only damage to electrical components, which could be replaced in mere months.
• Trump delaying might point to a growing doubt that they could even destroy Fordow, but Simplicius admits that his words are hard to interpret given that he similarly lied about extending negotiations just before Israel struck.
• Simplicius regards Israel to be on what is essentially a genocidal ponzi scheme - you start a conflict, it goes badly, and so to distract from it you start a new conflict, which goes badly, and to distract from that you start a new conflict, which goes badly, and so on. This strange strategy matches the rhetoric of some Zionists which apparently want to go for Qatar, Pakistan, and/or Turkey "after Iran".
• This strategy is now causing very major economic damage to Israel. Some shipping companies, like Maersk, are refusing to go to Haifa, Israel's only operational deepwater/hub port (as Ashdod is too close to Gaza and Eliat under Red Sea blockade via Yemen). The airports are under lockdown, and Israelis are being forced to remain in the country.
• Notable Israeli strikes on Iran have similarly declined, particularly as Iran is ruthlessly hunting Mossad operatives in a dragnet across the nation and is striking Israeli intelligence sites within Israel itself. The shock phase appears like it may be over, and we may now be in the attritional phase. Only US intervention might save Israel, but given Iran's options to counter the US both militarily and economically, Trump is right to hesitate if he isn't merely bluffing.