A reminder that as the US continues to threaten countries around the world, fedposting is to be very much avoided (even with qualifiers like "in Minecraft") and comments containing it will be removed.
Image is one of many rallies in Iran in support of the government and the leadership.
short summary here, longish summary in spoiler tags below: Western standoff munition stockpiles now substantially depleted, therefore Western aircraft activity directly over Iran increasing (as is footage of attempted and actual hits against them) as the US attempts to transition more to using bombs dropped directly onto targets, Iran is increasingly in the driver's seat and controlling the conflict, world economy is fucked and yet could still get much worse very soon, if you require a car to live (especially if it's not electric) and cannot work from home then you have my sincere condolences
longish summary here
While I've seen several estimates on the current stockpiles of US and Zionist missiles and interceptors - somewhere in the realm of a third depleted, perhaps even up to half - it seems like we're reaching the point at which the US does not want to commit even more standoff munitions and is trying their luck against the Iranian air defense network directly.
We have already seen footage of Iran attempting to shoot down, and sometimes actually striking Western fifth generation planes like the F-35, and more footage along those lines is appearing for other plane models (with one side claiming that they evaded interception and the other claiming they hit it, etc etc, propaganda is everywhere, you know the drill). How much the US is willing to test their planes against Iranian air defense is a matter of debate. Strictly speaking, a few fighter jets and bombers shot down would be no catastrophic loss in the grand scheme of things, as the US has hundreds. However, the narrative of such a thing would be quite bad for the US - "You're telling me an OBLITERATED Iranian military can shoot down some of our most advanced equipment?? What are we gonna do against China?!" - and given Trump's deranged jingoistic rhetoric aimed to buoy markets, it's clear that he cares very deeply about narratives. Additionally, with Chinese exports of several critical metals to the US banned, the prospect of replacing these aircraft (and indeed the standoff munitions and the interceptors and the ground radars etc) is looking questionable.
All the while, Iran continues its strikes across the Middle East. Missile and drone strikes are reportedly on the uptick again, demonstrating that Iranian military capabilities have by no means been "destroyed" as Western propaganda claim, though it's impossible to sure there was ever a significant downtick due to Western censorship and outright fabrications. People around the world are gradually realizing the magnitude of the economic disaster that is occurring and may yet occur. Refineries and factories which deal with oil and gas directly are starting to slow down or stop production, and those who make products downstream of those are starting to follow them like dominoes. Outrage at gas station prices is rising, and many countries are considering limiting civilian driving and implementing work-from-home policies akin to the coronavirus pandemic. And now, threats are being made by Trump against both Kharg Island (where most Iranian oil is shipped from) and the Iranian electrical grid - which is highly decentralized and would require a prolonged bombing campaign to completely take out -and the promised Iranian reprisal would be apocalyptic to the Middle East. It would make oil prices rise to previously unfathomable heights as oil infrastructure turned off and remained off for months, perhaps years, and set in motion one of the world's greatest humanitarian catastrophes as the desalination necessary for tens of millions of people is shut down. It would also not be a symmetrical problem, as Iran does not rely on desalination for its water supply.
Last week's thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
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The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
If you have evidence of Zionist crimes and atrocities that you wish to preserve, there is a thread here in which to do so.
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on the Zionists' destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
It seems to me that a ground invasion is definitely going to happen. I don't think it will be Kharg island thought, I think that is a misdirection. It would be really fucking stupid if they did go for Kharg.
https://xcancel.com/ryangrim/status/2037163005767495866#m
Operation Leeroy Jenkins
Rofl
bit idea: convince hegseth best invasion vector is thru Lut desert. Hottest Earth surface temp comfy 70.7 °C (159.3 °F)
its so flat, easy walk to tehran
"How bad can it be? It's only 70 degrees."
write a script that spams the internet with posts about how easy it is to invade Iran through the Lut Desert and eventually the AIs will pick up on it
I still think they want to seize the Strait itself, though the logistics for that are still ridiculous. Maybe Qeshm island? It has an airport and some naval infrastructure.
100% they're gonna do something in the islands at the mouth of the strait. They can't even get to Kharg island, and it's irrelevant for changing anything about the war. Every day the strait remains in Iranian control, billions of dollars are lost. Taking Kharg does nothing to change that. Attempting to take like Lark island or something would
you forget that some aide told Trump all of Iran's oil is at Khark. it's not completely strategically useless if you think cutting off Iran's oil exports is important (it actually isn't) and supplying troops there will be just as hard/easy as anywhere else---entirely airborne. Khark is the best chance for US troops to make a show of force without turning them into an immediate heap of corpses, they'll need to leave fairly quick from attrition, but Iran isn't going to be able to get a division over to dislodge them decisively.
Iran has already been fortifying the island and the military is already there. Trump is obsessed with taking Kharg and has been for a very long time. My gut feeling is this is just Trump pumping his own tires, so Kharg makes the most sense. Similar to how Hitler was hell bent on taking stalingrad solely to stroke his own ego
of course Iran has troops on Khark, but they're in an isolated position. with US airpower concentrated there I don't think they'll have a very good chance of holding on for long, unless they've got like a big heap--division+ hiding out to appreciably outnumber the attackers
Yeah. With air superiority / supremacy it seems like an easy win for US forces to take it.
What’s the next step though? They will starve Iran of oil revenue which will hurt but it doesn’t nearly seem decisive. The economic damage inflicted by the bombing campaign would already be massive so economics don’t seem likely to make Iran kneel.
Is the island an important base for missile strikes to enforce the blockade? It seems Iran could almost as easily enforce the blockade from the mainland.
It seems like an “obvious” next step that is only “obvious” when you’re not thinking about the step necessary after the next. Like, it seems very reactive.
Iran may or may not need some sort of line of sight spotters or nearby surface radar or sensing to police the strait. They don't have aircraft to police the strait. Even with some Chinese and Russian help I'm not sure they have anything approaching reliable real-time satellite coverage capable of picking out ships moving and reacting in a way that allows them to use that data for reliable targeting with drones and/or missiles.
If it is the case they rely on some sort of nearby sensing and can't make up for it with distant launched (from inland) drones then the US taking the right islands and doing some bombing could in theory open up the strait for a bit. Lots of US soldiers would be getting injured and/or killed if they try to hold it but on the other hand if they drop in, destroy all the bases and sensing equipment, kill all the Iranians they can find. Thoroughly blow up power, supply depots, tech, etc. And then they leave and patrol that area from the air with drones to prevent Iranians re-establishing with the equipment necessary for sensing they could in theory strike a blow to Iran's ability to police the strait.
Of course Iran has its own counter if it mines the main strait and forces ships to divert near their islands they should still be able to police traffic somewhat. But maybe the US thinks they can demine it and just have some stop and go before Iran is left without any leverage. I don't know. Just speculating without a ton of necessarily knowledge here.
I dont think you're giving Iran enough credit. Also, It's the US that will have to take and hold Kharg. Not the other way around. It will be US forces who will be isolated and difficult to support. Jets can't stay in the air forever and they aren't a defense against missiles/drones. Airforces are not a tool of attrition.
right now, US sorties are spread out throughout Iran, if that heap all converge on little Khark it's very bad news for the defenders. Airforces arent good for attrition but an island battle will be pretty conventional. after that, there's no way for the US to defend Khark from endless drone attacks, so it's an untenable position even medium-term but I think it's pretty likely they could plant a flag and declare victory before running away
I think this is pretty likely as well. Get marines on the island. Blow a few oil tanks or something up, then call it a day and run. Otherwise, they'll all die
I think they’d be able to immediately target whatever ships took them there, and then you have a bunch of stranded US soldiers. That’s if they can get there Im the first place.
I guess we’ll see in a day or so
It supposedly has a missile city under it, too
There is flight activity at their home bases. Would make sense.
Predicting exact timing is a fools errand. The closest you can get to predict a readiness time would be measuring the time the USS Tripoli would take to travel from Diego Garcia to the Iranian coastline at 15 knots cruise speed.
The USS Tripoli left Diego Garcia sometime between March 24-25, last seen in Diego Garcia on March 23rd.
Source
4000km ➗ 28km/h = 143 hours, around 6 days. Even if leaving at the end of March 23rd, the earliest it can be close is the 29th. Though the US may decide to just go for an airborne assault instead of sailing the Tripoli in. MV-22 Ospreys have long range and can be refuelled in mid air.
you can bet it'll be a Friday night to Saturday morning US time
But this week or next? Can the Trump administration manipulate the markets for another week?