Harry Shea

Exposing the Machine.

" Be a citizen journalist!" Elon Musk

Ask not what your government can do for you, find out what your government plans to do to you.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

America First means Congress has the sole power to declare war. If you believe in the Constitution ( Article 1, Section 8) you believe in the America our Founders designed to prevent the executive from unilaterally committing the U.S. to war.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@CurtisHouck Have you watched Fox?

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

I disagree. The outcome wasn't a matter of a better decision making process, it was baked into the conflict from the very beginning. The predictable closure of the SOH, America's unwillingness to put boots on the ground and the limited effectiveness of air campaigns doomed the campaign from the outset.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@pati_marins64 Initiative seized: https://t.co/DJDQN1YGzK

[Trita Parsi @tparsi]

Over the past eight or so days, the US has targeted Iranian vessels as well as targets on the Iranian mainland. This included non-Iranian oil vessels. In essence, this was the US seeking to escalate the blockade of the blockade.

At first, Iran's response was proportional. The US could tolerate that response.

In fact, it was beneficial to the US to continue the exchange of blows but keep them relatively limited, as it would slowly but surely erode Iran's deterrence without imposing intolerable costs on the US.

But yesterday, Iran moved to change that equation.

After the US struck a Botswana-flagged tanker as part of Trump's blockade, the Iranians counter-escalated disproportionally.

Tehran struck Kuwait International Airport as well as a US base in Kuwait, Ali Al-Salem.

It struck the 5th Fleet facilities in Bahrain. (Full extent of damage unknown.)

It struck Jordan. (Full extent of damage unknown.)

It struck northern Iraq. (Full extent of damage unknown.)

It struck the UAE. (Full extent of damage unknown.)

It struck the Al-Udeid Air Base in Qatar. (Full extent of damage unknown.)

It was a demonstration - and reminder - that Tehran retains escalation dominance.

Whereas the US is comfortable with either a possible deal or a low-level exchange of fire, but not a return to full-scale war, Tehran is comfortable with a possible deal or a full-scale war, but not with a low-level exchange of fire that erodes Iran's deterrence and allows for Trump's "blockade of the blockade" to become effective.

The area where both can actually be comfortable is some sort of a deal. Reaching it, however, is a different story.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

This.
https://t.co/xuQyxn3ZQx

[Open Source Intel @Osint613]

Saudi Arabia is concerned Iran will target its water desalination plants, if U.S. chooses to go back to war.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@jakluge He'd have to go back to Epstein, Epstein, Epstein.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@grok @marcthiessen @grok How much has it cost American consumers at the pump and for food?

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@grok @marcthiessen @grok How much did the Trump Iran war cost the U.S. in munitions spent and because it disrupted the world economy?

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@joekent16jan19 History teaches us that President's who don't do their homework, who are unprepared, who are overconfident, who underestimate their rivals don't fare well in foreign affairs.

If Trump capitulates and signs an agreement, we at least avoid an un-winnable, forever war.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@Tyler_Van_Acker @grok if 10% of back pain cases required surgery in the U.S., as Tyler Van Acker states, how many back surgeries would there be in the U.S. each year and how many back surgeries are performed in reality?

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

Pro-Israeli, Ari Fleischer, supporter of the Iraq War is wrong again. If striking Iran repeatedly was the answer, we would have already bombed them back to the stone ages.

Too many chicken hawks and neoconservatives like Ari, don't grasp that America's military prowess is limited by multiple factors including the regime's alliance with the Royal Guard, Iran's capabilities around asymmetric warfare, their ability to bomb regional oil infrastructure and desalination stations of their neighbors (goodbye potable water) and ignores the threat of warfare spreading in the mideast.

Ari discounts the worst-case scenario: a systemic supply-chain shock affecting food, energy, shipping, semiconductors, telecommunications, finance, and defense manufacturing — there would be cascading second-order effects across the global economy that would take years to unwind.

If bombing, bombing, bombing was the answer we would have won in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Considering our limitations and the potential consequences of our foreign policy would save us bi

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@AriFleischer "Mamdani is actually one of the least consequential mayors NYC has ever had."

I wish. There will be consequences.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

The inevitable outcome isn't due to a failure of planning and execution - it very clearly wasn't the right move the right move in the first place.

The reason is plain and simple: It's stupid to prosecute an unwinnable war. Donald Trump et al. failed to exercise due diligence.

Now he's either got to overcome his giant ego and take the "L" and move on, or double-down.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

Not sure of your logic there.

If we declare victory and leave the Strait will magically open and we can save billions and keep the armaments that would otherwise be destroyed in an unwinnable war - and then there's the issue of casualties and Iranian blowback against other gulf nations, their infrastructure, including their oil processing capabilities.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

Iran War: And now for the rollback of expectations.

Sad.

https://t.co/8Iwzg5MPkq

[Brit Hume @brithume]

The US mission in Iran is being judged by a standard in which only complete capitulation is victory for the US but mere survival is victory for Iran. This is nonsense as the post below makes clear.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@BarakRavid People with Ravid's views are going to awfully disappointed with the GREAT deal Trump will eventually have to make.

Unbeknownst to those parroting Trump talking points is that our President got us involved in an intractable situation in the mideast.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

@Noirchick1

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

Chicken hawks think that bombing Iran " back to the stone ages" will be successful.
Unfortunately, it won't. Here are but 2 reasons.

Iran will continue to bomb or drone its neighbors' oil infrastructure and the SOH. They can do this from hundreds of miles away hidden in the mountains of Iran.

Secondly, they will take out the desalination plants of other gulf countries who are mostly or wholly reliant upon them for potable water.

From ChatGPT: Many of the major plants are coastal, fixed, and within range of Iranian missiles, drones, sabotage operations, or cyberattacks. Analysts have long viewed them as a strategic vulnerability.

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

Another US pundit that doesn't compute that might-doesn't-make-right in this conflict.

Bombing them into the stone ages ain't gonna work.

If it would the US wouldn't be pressing so hard to negotiate.

https://t.co/iRA6U3kGDF

[Marc Thiessen @marcthiessen]

If you were in Iran’s shoes, you would perceive weakness, conclude that Trump’s threats were bluster and that he is unwilling to resume the bombing campaign, that Trump is feeling political pressure from high gas prices, that the U.S. blockade of Iran in the strait is backfiring on him and that it is only a matter of time before he is forced to end that too. You would think that your ability to threaten the oil infrastructure of America’s Persian Gulf allies is not only successfully deterring Trump from striking you again but also preventing him from taking away your control of the strait. You would think that you, not Trump, have the cards.

https://t.co/c5XnrIHZNO

[Harry Shea @HarryShea5]

Another guy who doesn't realize that we are not in control of the SOH - we do not hold the trump card Mark.

https://t.co/geDEtreOAa

[Mark Penn @Mark_Penn]

Negotiations nearing end?

They are torturing young people to get confessions and then hanging them. They have seized the Strait of Hormuz to paralyze the world oil market.They are sending missiles to civilian areas of countries like the UAE and even tried attacking our ships. And keeping the internet shut so their people cannot communicate.

And we are negotiating with them? I am always open minded to see what happens but these don’t seem like promising negotiating partners.