My weekly preamble is in spoiler tags below.
preamble
For the weekend of August 1-2, Trump had once again promised major strikes on Iran, which would have included crossing the critical red line of striking their energy infrastructure. In response, Iran once again essentially promised to end the possibility of modern civilization as we know it throughout much of the Gulf States and, to a certain extent, the Zionist entity, with the economic impacts radiating outwards around the world from there. The frustrating part about these threats from Trump is that while he's reneged on them before, the consequences of them actually occurring are so dire that it's difficult to ignore them; rolling a dice with even a 5% chance for complete catastrophe will always be nerve-wracking.
Anyway, as we all know, these strikes did not occur, with the excuse this time being much the same as the previous times: our regional allies begged us not to (potentially true) and Iran called us and said they were willing to negotiate/surrender (untrue). The point of these threat displays is at least twofold: first, to see if Iran is genuinely going to flinch, or, at least, if internal elements that may or may not exist will be spooked into action against the IRGC; and second, to manipulate oil prices downwards by creating constant cycles of "relief" out of an otherwise relatively constant downward trend as Hormuz stays closed and oil reserves continue to ebb. I do say "relatively", of course, given that Ansarallah now appears to be delivering a boot up the ass of Saudi Arabia by taking offline quite a lot of its refinery infrastructure.
It is into this situation that Ukraine seems to want in. For those out of the loop, the situation over in Ukraine has largely the same overall attritional dynamics as previous years, but with a few added wrinkles. Ukraine started striking Russian infrastructure a while ago, and while their effectiveness is hotly debated and I don't want to dismiss them as totally ineffectual, it's clear that the psychological effects - such as they are - are greater than the material effects. Russia's retaliation strikes have been considerably more impactful, including strikes on Ukrainian Black Sea ports and vessels, and a campaign explicitly against gas stations across Ukraine, as well as some rather impressive and disruptive explosions at Ukrainian military fairs and production sites. Zelensky has admitted publicly that they are now basically out of Patriot missiles and that Russian missiles are now landing entirely unopposed (beforehand, they were just landing largely unopposed, given the lackluster performance of Western air defences in general). He seems to have considered a possible way out: linking together the Ukraine and Iran Wars to a united front against Russia and Iran, which would then grant Ukraine more munitions to keep fighting on.
Now, for all the fear I've seen of this occurring (and, don't get me wrong, the US and Russia being in non-proxy, direct conflict is a genuinely frightening prospect for continued life on Earth) how linking together two wars which the West is quite decisively losing into a single war would help at all is beyond me. At this moment, at least, US military planners appear to agree with me. Ukraine hit a Caspian Sea vessel going to Iran a while ago, but then seems to have quickly apologised after being given a stern talking to by the US. This shows just how willing the US is to grant Ukraine more aid, as their own interceptor stockpile is running very low due to Iranian strikes. One would almost feel sympathy for Zelensky if is wasn't for... well, everything that's happened. The path of Ngô Đình Diệm is a tough one to walk.
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The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
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:
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.
The thing is the (atomic) bomb protects you from direct US military invasion and aggression which is what Iran is suffering.
It won't stop the US from using a (non-nuclear) proxy state like Ukraine that they arm to the teeth and use as a battering ram against you. In Iran's case there are no contenders who could do this at this time. The gulf states are greedy oil merchants locking down a region for the US against the desires of their own people and maybe they could be goaded into a land-war and invasion of Iran but I tend to doubt it given what Iranian missiles would do to their oil. Ukraine has no similar knock-out blow given the US and EU can keep it afloat relatively cheaply with foreign cash infusions. The same can't be said for global oil supplies if Iran knocks them all out or even for replacing lost profits to the gulf compradors for that matter over any reasonable time, certainly not for years.
So in Iran's case where hypothetically they'd gotten a number of atomic bombs and delivery methods to as far as the zionist entity and Europe (though maybe they might need direct to the US to really deter) the only real risk would be the mad dog zionist entity doing a run on Iran anyway using its own nukes to pave the way but there's no certainty that the zionists won't use nukes anyway as they're already rabid genocidal fascists whose mask has fallen and who are increasingly hated around the world with less and less to lose every day from doing it. At least having nukes in that situation would be some deterrence of mutual destruction.
I don't think right now is the right time to unveil nukes as at present their missiles are not interpreted as a potential nuclear attack demanding a nuclear response but after this war it wouldn't be the worst idea to get some because I don't think closing Hormuz will work a second time. I can bet the gulf states will be building massive pipeline and other capacity to negate most of the effect next time and bombing the production and refinery sites is a nuclear level step that may lead to the gulf states going for broke in an invasion of Iran which is why Iran hasn't done that so far (it leaves an escalation option to deter them).
Okay. Fair points, even if nukes don't help completely they are still a form of deterrent.
However, remember that Japan is economically the most dependent country on the strait of Hormuz. Larry Johnson put out a list right at the start of the war.
If Iran keeps up the pressure at a simmer, Japan and others may have to drop US bonds to stay afloat, and then the US currency starts to tank.
The strait of Hormuz has for decades been discussed like a nuclear option.
If Iran keeps this up, they can rid themselves of the western threat.
However, if Iran pursued a nuclear weapon that would have set off a wave of proliferation - including Saudi Arabia, UAE, Turkey, then Greece, and so on.
A lot of Iran's actions in this war wouldn't have been as viable in that case. Especially as any missile from Iran could have been considered as nuclear-capable.
Out of fears of an Iranian first-strike nuclear attack against adversarial nuclear weapons - the risks that someone would nuke Iran increase dramatically.
By maintaining highly enriched uranium, and an advanced and nuclear-strike-survivable missile program, Iran preserves the ability to potentially retaliate against a nuclear strike without setting off proliferation nor increasing the risks of conducting missile strikes.
Part of the incentive of nuclear powers to develop nuclear missiles was the historically poor CEP of missiles. But now that Iran has a massive arsenal of high-precision missiles - it can flatten Israel and others in the region conventionally.
Iran might be able to hit the US mainland, but they have not demonstrated nor claimed that capability. As such, the nuclear deterrent wouldn't be there. That being said, one of their missile designs seems like it has a missing second stage. So there's a good chance that they do have the ability to hit anywhere on the planet.
Usually nuclear states go for a triad: missile, submarine, plane.
Iran's subs are noisy and require shallow waters. Iran's air force is older than the country.
One could also take the nuclear briefcase as a fourth vector, but that's the trickiest one.
Declaring nuclear capability without a triad invites intervention to prevent the program from developing to a point where it actually becomes a threat.
Rumour had it that China told Iran not to bother with the more advanced planes without a SEAD-survivable air defense. That being said Iran has demonstrated that its unground plane facilities work well.
In anycase, Iran needs better and integrated air defense, then a better air force, then a better submarine program.
This is a country under half a century of attacks and sanctions from the west - including the Iran-Iraq war which killed so many people, including the threats from Al-Queda and ISIS.
It had to focus its energy in specialized forms of warfare that best captured its needs.
An openly declared and acknowledged nuclear program has four prerequisites that Iran has not met.
IMHO, Iran has long ago made the political decision not to nuke occupied Palestine, and once the Zionist entity is off the table, there isn't a whole lot of targets worth nuking. Iranian ICBMs can't reach the US, the UK, or France, so the only nukable target would be India, Pakistan, Russia, and China. Absent of ICBMs that can hit the US, hypothetical Iranian nukes are a BRICS deterrent if anything.
Exactly