My fellow Americans, over the past several hours, the United States Military pulled off one of the most daring Search and Rescue Operations in U.S. History, for one of our incredible Crew Member Officers, who also happens to be a highly respected Colonel, and who I am thrilled to let you know is now SAFE and SOUND! This brave Warrior was behind enemy lines in the treacherous mountains of Iran, being hunted down by our enemies, who were getting closer and closer by the hour, but was never truly alone because his Commander in Chief, Secretary of War, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and fellow Warfighters were monitoring his location 24 hours a day, and diligently planning for his rescue. At my direction, the U.S. Military sent dozens of aircraft, armed with the most lethal weapons in the World, to retrieve him. He sustained injuries, but he will be just fine. This miraculous Search and Rescue Operation comes in addition to a successful rescue of another brave Pilot, yesterday, which we did not confirm, because we did not want to jeopardize our second rescue operation. This is the first time in military memory that two U.S. Pilots have been rescued, separately, deep in Enemy Territory. WE WILL NEVER LEAVE AN AMERICAN WARFIGHTER BEHIND! The fact that we were able to pull off both of these operations, without a SINGLE American killed, or even wounded, just proves once again, that we have achieved overwhelming Air Dominance and Superiority over the Iranian skies. This is a moment that ALL Americans, Republican, Democrat, and everyone else, should be proud of and united around. We truly have the best, most professional, and lethal Military in the History of the World. GOD BLESS AMERICA, GOD BLESS OUR TROOPS, AND HAPPY EASTER TO ALL!
I’m reminds of that tweet about how America will bomb a country and then go back in 20 years and make a movie about how sad doing it made the soldiers.
Is there still a market for Zionist war propaganda parading as entertainment? I think when the boomer generation is gone, this won't be a viable movie to make.
And apparently they killed more during the mission to retrieve this guy
> striking Iranian military-aged males believed to be a threat who got within three kilometer” according to a correspondent with the US Air & Space Forces Magazine, who said he had been briefed on the operation.
How can we define what this even means? I don’t think any of the naive initial aims were ever attainable - and the entire impulsive and irresponsible adventure has spiraled down into what looks like impatient and petty spite: smashing the toys because the big baby didn’t get the present he wanted.
How twisted as it sounds, I do believe that the outcome is beneficial to the US. China and EU are weakened by this mess big time.
The US will bear costs in the future.
EU does not expect to be paid back for Ukraine, they are paying with their lives and by being a lab for testing weapons and strategies. I'm just flabbedgasted by pro russian europeans thinking it'll be great to live under Putin. It's not like it hasn't been the case already.
EU aid for Ukraine (yes this is a chatGPT overview):
Ukraine Facility (2024–2027): €33 billion of €50 billion is loans → 66%
MFA+ for 2023: €18 billion, all loans
Exceptional MFA backed by Russian-asset revenues (2024 package): €18.1 billion disbursed so far, loan
New EU package for 2026–2027: €90 billion, loan
Adding those together gives about €159.1 billion in loans out of €176.1 billion, or roughly 90% loans.
Oh, and before you ask, 2 out of 3 are not low-interest loans (only the one where the interest would go to Russia). If you're in France or Germany, your mortgage is cheaper than what Ukraine is paying the EU to defend itself from Russia "with EU help". And, yes, one might even point out that this means that Trump is correct when he says the US has given more to Ukraine than the EU. Given more, loaned (much) less. EU help consists 90% of allowing these loans in the first place.
An interesting perspective I see all over X and reddit is calling these people heroes, but only once the rescue happened. The more tame responses simply state that they are happy everyone was rescued and no military was harmed. Why? Those pilots were flying over Iran illegally, presumably to inflict fatal harm on whichever targets.
Is joining a military that has constantly been engaged in terror a "political view"? I'm not the one killing innocent people, it's just basic humanity to feel justice when murderers are stopped. I'm neither a Democrat nor Republican, this is not a partisan issue. I would vote for any politician that said they were closing down our bases all over the world and sanctioning Israel.
My political views are pretty simplistic: whoever initiates violence is the bad guy.
That's problematic here, because neither the US nor Iran are strangers to initiating violence. So a further refinement is necessary, based on a principle that I haven't had to fall back on very often: whoever initiates violence during negotiations is the bad guy.
The violence didn't start on February 28. Iran was providing weapons to Russia to use against Ukraine long before that. They were also sponsoring proxies to fight Israel, including Hamas. This battle is part of a much larger conflict.
What are those objectives? Can they be achieved by dropping bombs from the sky?
The US, and the rest of the world, are still waiting to know the answer to the first. Why was this war on a whim needed now? What was so imminent that the ongoing negotiations could not have continued?
The second answer is a definitive no, it's never been except for that one time that ended of WW2 when no one else had nukes.
As it turns out, "prevent a regime with the means and will to lockdown the straight from getting nuclear weapons" and "kill drug traffickers violating your country's sovereignty" is actually really easy to support!
Yes, when I go fishing in a 20 foot flat bottom I also put 6 outboard motors on it and weigh it down with hundreds of gallons of extra fuel, and then I go right past the actual fishing areas to head straight for US coastal waters. They don't tell you this, but this is actually the best way to catch fish in the gulf.
Perhaps the most interesting phenomenon I see, on X and elsewhere, is that there are many people who are actively rooting for Americans to die. It has been very revealing in a "see who your real friends are" kind of way. It's quite different from the GWOT, where a sort of cold indifference was common. This time there's europeans and even some Americans who are anxious to see Americans shot down and killed. This is probably the logical end state of believing that the other team is "literally hitler" for so long, amplified by the newsfeed algorithm.
The current US government (and the millions who voted them in power despite their clear fascistic tendencies) made perfectly clear to the rest of the world that the USA is friends with nobody: we are all supposed to be either enemies or vassals.
You can't have Vance come to Europe and insult all of them and expect us to be friends with you.
As an American rooting for Iran, I can offer my perspective. My country is occupied by Israel and used to commit the most heinous crimes against humanity that anyone could imagine. I am sick of it. Iran are fighting the very people occupying my government and the occupied government itself. They are on my side, hell they even offered to bomb Palantir! I'm rooting for the end of Zionism and Iran is really my only hope to make that happen.
This situation has been apparent for a long time, so I do not feel sorry for the people who signed up to fight in Israel's proxy military -- a military that was already guilty of mass war crimes prior to being occupied I might add.
It's crazy to watch this site go from 'we can't talk about the Russian/Ukraine conflict' to 'this is why I want American servicemen to die' being a community supported topic. There was literally more push back against being OK with Russian military losses in Ukraine than there is with supporting American deaths. To the point all discussion on that topic was stamped out by moderation here, but this cheering against America (and now pro-American deaths I guess) mixed with offhand usage of phrases like hasbara and other ZOG type dog whistles mixed in is one to two of the most active topics every day. And the majority of pushback just ends up flagged dead so it's not like people are looking for a discussion, just a pushing of propaganda/narrative/antisemitic dog whistles like low effort/low value posts with nothing more than calling someone hasbara (separating out 'evil' propaganda with a non-english term used to identify the jewishness and therefore enhanced evilness of the poster).
Personally the pervious moderation to the change in moderation stance for this topic makes it obvious that HN/YCombinators official position aligns with this and I think their official current position will start to have larger impacts for YCombinator. YCombinator, your position is now aligned with posts on your site justifying the deaths of American service members. Not really a good look.
Iran is occupied by a Shia apartheid government. They mandate Shia religious rules that they enforce with extreme violence and death, often against little girls for not wearing hats correctly. They staff the government and the majority of Iranian industry with Shia apartheid supporters. They recently murdered 3,000 (Apartheid regime number) to 30,000 protesters (broader Iranian civilian claim) in the span of 2 day. Iran is currently importing thugs from the Iraqi Shia PMF to be enforcers of the apartheid (showing this is a Shia occupation government forcing itself on the populace) on the streets of Iran along with inviting occupying enforcers from other surrounding Shia militant organizations. People who claim to be against religious apartheid oppressive states immediately turning positions to support such regimes show that they don't really hold that position for any reason but political expedience.
Okay. My response to this is that this does not reflect reality. There is ample evidence that, of the countries out there, Israel exercises outsized influence and is in many ways a very toxic partner. But occupying? We should be reasonable and precise in how these things are discussed. The IRGC is not on "your side". They would kill you without thinking twice about it, unless you are muslim, and even then they're probably just ask permission. Words on the internet are one thing, but be mindful that active support for Iran is treason.
IRGC is literally on my side, they are literally fighting my enemies. No money to Israel, no anti-BDS laws, no weapons to Israel, no political coverage for Israel, no media propaganda on behalf of Israel. If the IRGC wins decisively, these things will all become a reality.
I have many Muslim friends, they are some of the best people I've ever met in my life. I'm an atheist. Not one has ever had a problem with that.
You expressly stating IRGC is your side, not the Iranian people, is very telling.
IRGC caused more suffering/death, more starving of children, in the Yemeni civil war than Israel has in Gaza. If you care about military caused suffering/death, IRGC has to be on the top of your horrible people list.
IRGC is currently importing Iraqi Shia PMF to be enforcers of the Shia apartheid regime currently occupying Iran, because as a religious occupying apartheid regime they don't have enough organic internal support to draw from Iranians in Iran. If you are against occupation, you are against the unrepresentative Shia Theocratic regime (with many regime members born in Iraq) occupying Iran. Daring to dress like this (as a woman, men can dress as they want) will get you murdered by the Shia occupiers:
IRGC is currently recruiting 11-12 year old to man Shia apartheid enforcement checkpoints across Iran and to act as regime enforcers for future events like when the regime murdered 3000 (regime statistic) to 30,000 (civilian statistic) in two days because those people were tired of being ruled by Shia apartheid occupiers forcing Shia conformity (girls must wear hats or be punished, sometime via rape/murder). Again because as an theocratic apartheid occupying (not popular supported) regime they don't have enough manpower without resorting to children/foreign militia.
That is literally your side? Religious theocracies occupying nations without majority organic consent/support of the people? Segregation/lesser/modesty law treatment for women? Imported foreign militias on the streets to enforce unpopular theocratic oppression? Child soldiers? WTF is wrong with you if that is 'your side'.
Israel is an apartheid regime. Palestinian Israelis are constantly discriminated against and have laws apply differently to them. You could also argue that there’s a significant theocratic element in the Israeli government (resulting from the alliances the corrupt war criminal has had to make to retain power and avoid prosecution). Eretz Yisrael anyone?
I think what a lot of Americans fail to understand is just how galling the rest of the world finds your government’s rank hypocrisy. Your current president and his enablers are mostly considered to be literal madmen. Judging by words, deeds and outcomes it’s hard to defend an opposing view.
'but Israel' isn't a response on the points I raised other than to say you don't actually care about apartheid regimes/points, they are just convenient talking points for you to justify your position.
First of all, I fully reject Zionist propaganda. It's crystal clear that their mandate is to lie to Americans at all times. Secondly, yes the IRGC is on my side, they are attacking my enemies. The only state in the world to do so.
"Decisively" means something specific in warfare, but you are describing a basket of political objectives that are in many, many ways totally unrelated to what happens on a particular battlefield. This is probably a result of your nascent Palestinianism, which is definitely clouding your ability to coherently observe these global phenomena and adjust your priors accordingly. If the only tool you have is a hammer, then everything looks like zionist conspiracies to you.
Are you implying that it's the jews that are forcing my government to commit war crimes on behalf of Israel? That sounds like an antisemitic conspiracy theory.
> It has been very revealing in a "see who your real friends are" kind of way.
Nah, not really.
If I had 'friends' who went about kidnapping and assassinating leaders, mass murdering little girls, bombing literally hundreds of schools in a month, blowing up civilian bridges and power plants, etc etc etc... I wouldn't need to invoke "the newsfeed algorithm" to explain why people are genuinely happy to see the people committing those atrocities get a tiny taste of what they've been inflicting.
Friends don't let friends commit war crimes. And indeed, from that perspective, America might never have had any real friends. We've just been the biggest bully with the biggest stick, the kid whose parents owned the biggest local news channel and industry.
And frankly, friendship with America doesn't even come with the same perks as it used to. You want Europe to buy all their oil and weapons from the US at inflated prices? You want to stir shit up all over the world and then use the ensuing refugee crisis to bolster far right parties across Europe? You want to have a go at Greenland??
... And then complain that we don't have any "real friends" except Israel any more?! Well shit dude, I wonder why. Spoiler alert: It's not because Hitler comparisons are being amplified by the evil anti-genocide media.
> Without Israel, all Western civilisation is toast
Before Israel was established in 1948, was Western civilization toast? Or was it the power of the "western civilization" that conquered and ruled the world for centuries beforehand that allowed the creation of Israel?
This is barely an argument so I'm not going to bother engaging too much but two things, conflating Judaism and Israel is anti-semitic as hell, and ethno-states are bad.
The US and Israel have committed more terrorism than anyone else on the globe (combined), we also have the world's largest nuclear program and Israel has an illegal nuclear program. I welcome a nuclear armed Iran to keep these people (aka my country) in check.
I said nuclear program and I was correct by a very wide margin:
> The United States again spent more than all of the other nuclear armed states combined: $56.8 billion. China was the second largest spender at $12.5 billion, less than a quarter of U.S. spending. The third largest amount, $10.4 billion, or 10% of the total figure, was spent by the UK.
What is the purpose of a nuclear program? Having nuclear weapons. The fact that Russia can have a larger program with more warheads for less cost does not make you in fact correct. America also spends more on housing, do we have the largest housing program compared to China as well?
You're both moving the goalposts and ignoring my larger point. A nuclear armed Iran is good for the world. The US and Israel cannot be trusted with nuclear weapons unchecked.
Here's the problem with what you're saying. Mutual assured destruction (MAD) was insane, but it worked. We could trust it, because the Russians and Chinese didn't want to die any more than we did.
Iran is a regime with an ideology that embraces martyrdom. That invalidates all the assumptions of MAD, which is how people have had nuclear weapons and not used them for 80 years.
You seem to have confidence that that will work out well. (Or else you hold the US as being so evil that you don't care.) I disagree on both fronts.
I moved zero goalposts. You said largest nuclear program. I pointed out that when it comes to nuclear weapons, the largest program would be the one with the largest amount of nuclear weapons, which is Russia not the US. Proof:
I didn't ignore your largest point, I pointed out the flaws in the logic you presented to support your point, and that you might have other flaws if the facts you chose to use for support are so obviously wrong.
Wild to see HN/you support a nuclear armed Iran and new middle east nuclear arms race because 'america bad'.
Isn't that war illegal? Doesn't congress need to approve these things?
Speaking of terrorism, only one of the belligerents has been antagonizing both its allies and its enemies recently. Didn't they just snatch another country's head of state? Try a decapitation strike unprompted against Iran? Threaten to invade Canada, Greenland and Cuba? If one regime is using terror to achieve political aims these days...
Now imagine that: Russians recover a downed Su-34 pilot from Kremenchuk (distance is the same). A Su-34 can't even fly to anywhere close to the border/frontline - haven't since late April 2022 after several dozen attack aircraft of all sorts were downed in the first 2 months having achieved almost nothing.
The late of Russian air defence have fallen apart completely. One could argue that Venezuelans of Iraqi weren't good at operating them, but Iranians are certainly extremely competent using every piece of gear they get their hands onto.
They are free to disagree. America can withdraw anytime it wants. Let Israel fight whoever they want to fight and cry as much about America as they want.
FROM PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP
WE GOT HIM!
My fellow Americans, over the past several hours, the United States Military pulled off one of the most daring Search and Rescue Operations in U.S. History, for one of our incredible Crew Member Officers, who also happens to be a highly respected Colonel, and who I am thrilled to let you know is now SAFE and SOUND! This brave Warrior was behind enemy lines in the treacherous mountains of Iran, being hunted down by our enemies, who were getting closer and closer by the hour, but was never truly alone because his Commander in Chief, Secretary of War, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and fellow Warfighters were monitoring his location 24 hours a day, and diligently planning for his rescue. At my direction, the U.S. Military sent dozens of aircraft, armed with the most lethal weapons in the World, to retrieve him. He sustained injuries, but he will be just fine. This miraculous Search and Rescue Operation comes in addition to a successful rescue of another brave Pilot, yesterday, which we did not confirm, because we did not want to jeopardize our second rescue operation. This is the first time in military memory that two U.S. Pilots have been rescued, separately, deep in Enemy Territory. WE WILL NEVER LEAVE AN AMERICAN WARFIGHTER BEHIND! The fact that we were able to pull off both of these operations, without a SINGLE American killed, or even wounded, just proves once again, that we have achieved overwhelming Air Dominance and Superiority over the Iranian skies. This is a moment that ALL Americans, Republican, Democrat, and everyone else, should be proud of and united around. We truly have the best, most professional, and lethal Military in the History of the World. GOD BLESS AMERICA, GOD BLESS OUR TROOPS, AND HAPPY EASTER TO ALL!
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There are Hollywood studios knocking at their door for the story as we speak.
I’m reminds of that tweet about how America will bomb a country and then go back in 20 years and make a movie about how sad doing it made the soldiers.
This time round it might hard finding any Australians to play the lead roles.
Black Hawk Down but with a happy ending.
They already did this one in Behind Enemy Lines (2001)
Is there still a market for Zionist war propaganda parading as entertainment? I think when the boomer generation is gone, this won't be a viable movie to make.
The ridiculous amount of focus on this one individual vs the complete lack of attention for the thousands of Iranians already dead is very disturbing.
And apparently they killed more during the mission to retrieve this guy
> striking Iranian military-aged males believed to be a threat who got within three kilometer” according to a correspondent with the US Air & Space Forces Magazine, who said he had been briefed on the operation.
There was apparently a large multi hour firefight, which oh so conveniently no one is covering
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No, it does not show either. You completely fail at understanding my quite brief comment just jumped to delivering your talking point.
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> win this war ASAP
How can we define what this even means? I don’t think any of the naive initial aims were ever attainable - and the entire impulsive and irresponsible adventure has spiraled down into what looks like impatient and petty spite: smashing the toys because the big baby didn’t get the present he wanted.
We don't have to define it because we've won every day since the war started. Glorious leader said so
I know who my enemies are. They make it very clear.
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How twisted as it sounds, I do believe that the outcome is beneficial to the US. China and EU are weakened by this mess big time. The US will bear costs in the future.
EU does not expect to be paid back for Ukraine, they are paying with their lives and by being a lab for testing weapons and strategies. I'm just flabbedgasted by pro russian europeans thinking it'll be great to live under Putin. It's not like it hasn't been the case already.
EU aid for Ukraine (yes this is a chatGPT overview):
Ukraine Facility (2024–2027): €33 billion of €50 billion is loans → 66%
MFA+ for 2023: €18 billion, all loans
Exceptional MFA backed by Russian-asset revenues (2024 package): €18.1 billion disbursed so far, loan
New EU package for 2026–2027: €90 billion, loan
Adding those together gives about €159.1 billion in loans out of €176.1 billion, or roughly 90% loans.
Oh, and before you ask, 2 out of 3 are not low-interest loans (only the one where the interest would go to Russia). If you're in France or Germany, your mortgage is cheaper than what Ukraine is paying the EU to defend itself from Russia "with EU help". And, yes, one might even point out that this means that Trump is correct when he says the US has given more to Ukraine than the EU. Given more, loaned (much) less. EU help consists 90% of allowing these loans in the first place.
An interesting perspective I see all over X and reddit is calling these people heroes, but only once the rescue happened. The more tame responses simply state that they are happy everyone was rescued and no military was harmed. Why? Those pilots were flying over Iran illegally, presumably to inflict fatal harm on whichever targets.
Conversely I find it strange how many people seem to want US servicemen to come to harm because it would validate their political views.
Is joining a military that has constantly been engaged in terror a "political view"? I'm not the one killing innocent people, it's just basic humanity to feel justice when murderers are stopped. I'm neither a Democrat nor Republican, this is not a partisan issue. I would vote for any politician that said they were closing down our bases all over the world and sanctioning Israel.
My political views are pretty simplistic: whoever initiates violence is the bad guy.
That's problematic here, because neither the US nor Iran are strangers to initiating violence. So a further refinement is necessary, based on a principle that I haven't had to fall back on very often: whoever initiates violence during negotiations is the bad guy.
Four out of Five Eyes agree.
The violence didn't start on February 28. Iran was providing weapons to Russia to use against Ukraine long before that. They were also sponsoring proxies to fight Israel, including Hamas. This battle is part of a much larger conflict.
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not just negotiations, but also a ceasefire after the 12 day war
It's simple "us vs them". I see nothing wrong about it.
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The US/Israel lobs cluster munitions, YOLO fires missiles (and in facts targets schools and hospitals) and has long range nuclear missiles.
What are those objectives? Can they be achieved by dropping bombs from the sky?
The US, and the rest of the world, are still waiting to know the answer to the first. Why was this war on a whim needed now? What was so imminent that the ongoing negotiations could not have continued?
The second answer is a definitive no, it's never been except for that one time that ended of WW2 when no one else had nukes.
> a country that lobs cluster munitions
https://www.npr.org/2023/07/11/1186949348/us-cluster-munitio...
> and YOLO fires missiles at its neighbours
Perfidy in international waters? Double tap kill strikes on fishing boats?
So far, Pot meet Kettle.
I'm not claiming the US is "good"! I'm saying I would prefer a world where IRGC doesn't have long range nuclear weapons.
I'll go ahead and claim the US is "good" for you.
As it turns out, "prevent a regime with the means and will to lockdown the straight from getting nuclear weapons" and "kill drug traffickers violating your country's sovereignty" is actually really easy to support!
""""drug traffickers""""
We're killing random fishermen because Miller wants to see brown people die.
Yes, when I go fishing in a 20 foot flat bottom I also put 6 outboard motors on it and weigh it down with hundreds of gallons of extra fuel, and then I go right past the actual fishing areas to head straight for US coastal waters. They don't tell you this, but this is actually the best way to catch fish in the gulf.
And the evidence for this is where, exactly?
Oh, that's right, it's all extrajudicial "trust me bro" with no congressional oversight.
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Perhaps they are thinking "I Like People Who Weren't Captured".
Perhaps the most interesting phenomenon I see, on X and elsewhere, is that there are many people who are actively rooting for Americans to die. It has been very revealing in a "see who your real friends are" kind of way. It's quite different from the GWOT, where a sort of cold indifference was common. This time there's europeans and even some Americans who are anxious to see Americans shot down and killed. This is probably the logical end state of believing that the other team is "literally hitler" for so long, amplified by the newsfeed algorithm.
>"see who your real friends are"
The current US government (and the millions who voted them in power despite their clear fascistic tendencies) made perfectly clear to the rest of the world that the USA is friends with nobody: we are all supposed to be either enemies or vassals.
You can't have Vance come to Europe and insult all of them and expect us to be friends with you.
As an American rooting for Iran, I can offer my perspective. My country is occupied by Israel and used to commit the most heinous crimes against humanity that anyone could imagine. I am sick of it. Iran are fighting the very people occupying my government and the occupied government itself. They are on my side, hell they even offered to bomb Palantir! I'm rooting for the end of Zionism and Iran is really my only hope to make that happen.
This situation has been apparent for a long time, so I do not feel sorry for the people who signed up to fight in Israel's proxy military -- a military that was already guilty of mass war crimes prior to being occupied I might add.
It's crazy to watch this site go from 'we can't talk about the Russian/Ukraine conflict' to 'this is why I want American servicemen to die' being a community supported topic. There was literally more push back against being OK with Russian military losses in Ukraine than there is with supporting American deaths. To the point all discussion on that topic was stamped out by moderation here, but this cheering against America (and now pro-American deaths I guess) mixed with offhand usage of phrases like hasbara and other ZOG type dog whistles mixed in is one to two of the most active topics every day. And the majority of pushback just ends up flagged dead so it's not like people are looking for a discussion, just a pushing of propaganda/narrative/antisemitic dog whistles like low effort/low value posts with nothing more than calling someone hasbara (separating out 'evil' propaganda with a non-english term used to identify the jewishness and therefore enhanced evilness of the poster).
Personally the pervious moderation to the change in moderation stance for this topic makes it obvious that HN/YCombinators official position aligns with this and I think their official current position will start to have larger impacts for YCombinator. YCombinator, your position is now aligned with posts on your site justifying the deaths of American service members. Not really a good look.
Iran is occupied by a Shia apartheid government. They mandate Shia religious rules that they enforce with extreme violence and death, often against little girls for not wearing hats correctly. They staff the government and the majority of Iranian industry with Shia apartheid supporters. They recently murdered 3,000 (Apartheid regime number) to 30,000 protesters (broader Iranian civilian claim) in the span of 2 day. Iran is currently importing thugs from the Iraqi Shia PMF to be enforcers of the apartheid (showing this is a Shia occupation government forcing itself on the populace) on the streets of Iran along with inviting occupying enforcers from other surrounding Shia militant organizations. People who claim to be against religious apartheid oppressive states immediately turning positions to support such regimes show that they don't really hold that position for any reason but political expedience.
Okay. My response to this is that this does not reflect reality. There is ample evidence that, of the countries out there, Israel exercises outsized influence and is in many ways a very toxic partner. But occupying? We should be reasonable and precise in how these things are discussed. The IRGC is not on "your side". They would kill you without thinking twice about it, unless you are muslim, and even then they're probably just ask permission. Words on the internet are one thing, but be mindful that active support for Iran is treason.
IRGC is literally on my side, they are literally fighting my enemies. No money to Israel, no anti-BDS laws, no weapons to Israel, no political coverage for Israel, no media propaganda on behalf of Israel. If the IRGC wins decisively, these things will all become a reality.
I have many Muslim friends, they are some of the best people I've ever met in my life. I'm an atheist. Not one has ever had a problem with that.
You expressly stating IRGC is your side, not the Iranian people, is very telling.
IRGC caused more suffering/death, more starving of children, in the Yemeni civil war than Israel has in Gaza. If you care about military caused suffering/death, IRGC has to be on the top of your horrible people list.
IRGC is currently importing Iraqi Shia PMF to be enforcers of the Shia apartheid regime currently occupying Iran, because as a religious occupying apartheid regime they don't have enough organic internal support to draw from Iranians in Iran. If you are against occupation, you are against the unrepresentative Shia Theocratic regime (with many regime members born in Iraq) occupying Iran. Daring to dress like this (as a woman, men can dress as they want) will get you murdered by the Shia occupiers:
https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/09/16/woman-dies-custody-irans...
IRGC is currently recruiting 11-12 year old to man Shia apartheid enforcement checkpoints across Iran and to act as regime enforcers for future events like when the regime murdered 3000 (regime statistic) to 30,000 (civilian statistic) in two days because those people were tired of being ruled by Shia apartheid occupiers forcing Shia conformity (girls must wear hats or be punished, sometime via rape/murder). Again because as an theocratic apartheid occupying (not popular supported) regime they don't have enough manpower without resorting to children/foreign militia.
That is literally your side? Religious theocracies occupying nations without majority organic consent/support of the people? Segregation/lesser/modesty law treatment for women? Imported foreign militias on the streets to enforce unpopular theocratic oppression? Child soldiers? WTF is wrong with you if that is 'your side'.
Israel is an apartheid regime. Palestinian Israelis are constantly discriminated against and have laws apply differently to them. You could also argue that there’s a significant theocratic element in the Israeli government (resulting from the alliances the corrupt war criminal has had to make to retain power and avoid prosecution). Eretz Yisrael anyone?
I think what a lot of Americans fail to understand is just how galling the rest of the world finds your government’s rank hypocrisy. Your current president and his enablers are mostly considered to be literal madmen. Judging by words, deeds and outcomes it’s hard to defend an opposing view.
'but Israel' isn't a response on the points I raised other than to say you don't actually care about apartheid regimes/points, they are just convenient talking points for you to justify your position.
First of all, I fully reject Zionist propaganda. It's crystal clear that their mandate is to lie to Americans at all times. Secondly, yes the IRGC is on my side, they are attacking my enemies. The only state in the world to do so.
"Decisively" means something specific in warfare, but you are describing a basket of political objectives that are in many, many ways totally unrelated to what happens on a particular battlefield. This is probably a result of your nascent Palestinianism, which is definitely clouding your ability to coherently observe these global phenomena and adjust your priors accordingly. If the only tool you have is a hammer, then everything looks like zionist conspiracies to you.
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Are you implying that it's the jews that are forcing my government to commit war crimes on behalf of Israel? That sounds like an antisemitic conspiracy theory.
> It has been very revealing in a "see who your real friends are" kind of way.
Nah, not really.
If I had 'friends' who went about kidnapping and assassinating leaders, mass murdering little girls, bombing literally hundreds of schools in a month, blowing up civilian bridges and power plants, etc etc etc... I wouldn't need to invoke "the newsfeed algorithm" to explain why people are genuinely happy to see the people committing those atrocities get a tiny taste of what they've been inflicting.
Friends don't let friends commit war crimes. And indeed, from that perspective, America might never have had any real friends. We've just been the biggest bully with the biggest stick, the kid whose parents owned the biggest local news channel and industry.
And frankly, friendship with America doesn't even come with the same perks as it used to. You want Europe to buy all their oil and weapons from the US at inflated prices? You want to stir shit up all over the world and then use the ensuing refugee crisis to bolster far right parties across Europe? You want to have a go at Greenland??
... And then complain that we don't have any "real friends" except Israel any more?! Well shit dude, I wonder why. Spoiler alert: It's not because Hitler comparisons are being amplified by the evil anti-genocide media.
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> Without Israel, all Western civilisation is toast
Before Israel was established in 1948, was Western civilization toast? Or was it the power of the "western civilization" that conquered and ruled the world for centuries beforehand that allowed the creation of Israel?
>Without Israel, all Western civilisation is toast.
Why is that?
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This is barely an argument so I'm not going to bother engaging too much but two things, conflating Judaism and Israel is anti-semitic as hell, and ethno-states are bad.
Illegally? We're at war with Iran. They have consistently supported terrorism, they have an illegal nuclear program.
They're lucky it's still at this level.
What exactly is an "illegal" nuclear program?
The US and Israel have committed more terrorism than anyone else on the globe (combined), we also have the world's largest nuclear program and Israel has an illegal nuclear program. I welcome a nuclear armed Iran to keep these people (aka my country) in check.
Russia has more nuclear weapons than the USA. When you can't get basic facts straight, you might want to work on your justification for your premises.
I said nuclear program and I was correct by a very wide margin:
> The United States again spent more than all of the other nuclear armed states combined: $56.8 billion. China was the second largest spender at $12.5 billion, less than a quarter of U.S. spending. The third largest amount, $10.4 billion, or 10% of the total figure, was spent by the UK.
https://www.icanw.org/global_spending_on_nuclear_weapons_top...
What is the purpose of a nuclear program? Having nuclear weapons. The fact that Russia can have a larger program with more warheads for less cost does not make you in fact correct. America also spends more on housing, do we have the largest housing program compared to China as well?
You're both moving the goalposts and ignoring my larger point. A nuclear armed Iran is good for the world. The US and Israel cannot be trusted with nuclear weapons unchecked.
Here's the problem with what you're saying. Mutual assured destruction (MAD) was insane, but it worked. We could trust it, because the Russians and Chinese didn't want to die any more than we did.
Iran is a regime with an ideology that embraces martyrdom. That invalidates all the assumptions of MAD, which is how people have had nuclear weapons and not used them for 80 years.
You seem to have confidence that that will work out well. (Or else you hold the US as being so evil that you don't care.) I disagree on both fronts.
I moved zero goalposts. You said largest nuclear program. I pointed out that when it comes to nuclear weapons, the largest program would be the one with the largest amount of nuclear weapons, which is Russia not the US. Proof:
https://www.google.com/search?q=goole.com+what+nation+has+th...
I didn't ignore your largest point, I pointed out the flaws in the logic you presented to support your point, and that you might have other flaws if the facts you chose to use for support are so obviously wrong.
Wild to see HN/you support a nuclear armed Iran and new middle east nuclear arms race because 'america bad'.
I said the US had the largest nuclear program and I was right. I even provided a source.
You are also breaking site guidelines, badly.
Isn't that war illegal? Doesn't congress need to approve these things?
Speaking of terrorism, only one of the belligerents has been antagonizing both its allies and its enemies recently. Didn't they just snatch another country's head of state? Try a decapitation strike unprompted against Iran? Threaten to invade Canada, Greenland and Cuba? If one regime is using terror to achieve political aims these days...
No, Congress does not need to approve military action for it to be legal.
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Now imagine that: Russians recover a downed Su-34 pilot from Kremenchuk (distance is the same). A Su-34 can't even fly to anywhere close to the border/frontline - haven't since late April 2022 after several dozen attack aircraft of all sorts were downed in the first 2 months having achieved almost nothing.
The late of Russian air defence have fallen apart completely. One could argue that Venezuelans of Iraqi weren't good at operating them, but Iranians are certainly extremely competent using every piece of gear they get their hands onto.
The smartest thing Trump could do right now would be to take this as a "victory" and end the war.
I think he would have liked to end the war a while ago, but Iran and Israel disagree, so he's stuck.
Let them fight till death then. Not an American problem.
Israel disagrees.
They are free to disagree. America can withdraw anytime it wants. Let Israel fight whoever they want to fight and cry as much about America as they want.