Why Can’t the USA Bring Iran to Its Knees?
Let’s be honest about what’s happening here. The most expensive military in human history has been dropping very expensive bombs on a country with a medieval theocracy running it, and the theocracy is still standing. That’s a very loud way of achieving nothing.
Bombing from 35,000 feet looks magnificent on television. It really does. The footage is extraordinary. The problem is that footage doesn’t topple regimes. Regimes fall when their people stop believing in them, when their economy collapses so completely that the ruling class can no longer buy loyalty. You don’t get that from a B-2 Spirit at altitude. You get craters. Expensive craters.
The Iranian regime will not lose face. Full stop. These are men who have spent forty years telling their population that America is the Great Satan. Being bombed by America isn’t embarrassing to them. It’s their entire argument, handed to them on a silver platter, gift-wrapped with a bow.
Meanwhile, Trump is on Truth Social describing a campaign of absolute dominance, while the reality on the ground is quietly, comprehensively different.
The allies Washington relied on across the Middle East were not protected. The allies in Europe looked at the situation, then looked at each other, and told Washington exactly where to go. Politely at first. Then rather less politely. They are not coming back. You can empty every American base on the continent and they still won’t come back. That bridge isn’t burned. It’s a smoking hole in the ground.
Then there’s the Strait of Hormuz. A narrow waterway. Roughly 33 kilometres at its tightest point. And Iran sits on one side of it with the ability to make the global energy market absolutely hysterical at a moment’s notice. That is the regime’s ace card and everyone knows it. Blocking that strait doesn’t require a sophisticated military operation. It requires a decision. And the moment oil prices go vertical, the political cost to America becomes almost impossible to absorb.
The blockade itself is bleeding the United States dry. Maintaining that kind of sustained pressure across that kind of distance, in that kind of maritime environment, costs an extraordinary amount of money and an extraordinary amount of political capital. Every week that passes without a decisive outcome is a week in which the bill gets larger and the story gets worse.
And that’s the real damage. Not the bombs that didn’t work. Not the allies who walked away. The real damage is the image. For decades, American power was assumed to be unchallengeable. You didn’t have to fight it. The mere suggestion of it was usually enough. Iran has now demonstrated, in front of the entire world, that you can absorb American military pressure and remain standing. That lesson will not be forgotten in Tehran. It will not be forgotten in Beijing. It will not be forgotten anywhere.
The superpower that couldn’t finish the job. That is what the world is watching.
No amount of Truth Social posts changes that.
Gandalv / @Microinteracti1
Israel, if everyone is lying, open Gaza.
If the ICC, the UN, international human rights organisations, Israeli rights groups, journalists, doctors, humanitarian workers, aid agencies, witnesses, and survivors are all lying, then open Gaza.
Let independent investigators, forensic experts, journalists, and UN monitors in.
A state confident in the truth does not fear investigation. A state afraid of the truth blocks access.
Open Gaza.
Of course Trump, the narcissist in chief, doesn't think about the financial situation of Americans.
To Trump, it doesn't matter that the working class is struggling economically.
What matters to Trump is that his family got $4 billion richer since he was elected. That's it.
Aspiranti giudici federali rifiutano dati oggettivi, come la vittoria elettorale di Joe Biden alle presidenziali del 2020, in nome alla fedeltà al presidente Trump.
Sempre meno “Land of the Freedom”, sempre più dittatura Trumpiana. Non restiamo in silenzio.
La UE no puede seguir paralizada por el veto de un solo gobierno frente a los imperios. Necesitamos una “Unión dentro de la Unión”: una vanguardia de Estados dispuestos a avanzar en defensa, política exterior y soberanía europea: https://t.co/QYavm7E9mD @guyverhofstadt@DomenecD
Of the 170,000 injured in Gaza since Oct. 23, 43,000 sustained life-changing injuries, reports @WHO. More than a quarter are children.
"The people of Gaza deserve the sustained support needed to recover and reclaim their lives."
Breaking News: U.S. intelligence reports show that Iran retains substantial missile capacity, despite President Trump’s claims otherwise. https://t.co/gHLM1oA9yh
Canada is building big — new ports, mines, and power plants that will transform our economy for all.
With the Canada Strong Fund, all Canadians can share in the returns of those nation-building projects.
It's crazy that a pedophile adjudicated rapist felon is coming after activists like us who call out his crimes, and the crimes of Israel. We'll never shut up about their crimes. We'll always speak out. And if they kill us, others will step up and continue where we left off.
trump calls the White House a “shithouse.” Calls a reporter a “bitch.” Screams at Iran: “Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards.” And not a peep from the media. Do not become numb to this. None of this is acceptable. How far we have fallen as a nation
Israel killed this Lebanese father and his 7-year-old son, who were known for caring for birds.
Israel has killed at least 575 people in Lebanon since agreeing to a ceasefire with Hezbollah on April 16.
In not rescinding its association agreement with Israel, the EU is violating both INT'L LAW, leading all its members to commit wrongful acts and be complicit with apparent int'l crimes, and its own EU Law.
Let’s be honest about what we’re watching here.
🇺🇸 330 million people, the country that put men on the moon, defeated the Nazis is now sitting on its sofa watching its president post crayon drawings of Venezuela with an American flag on it.
At least the Russians who oppose Putin have a reasonable excuse not to speak up. Siberia is cold and windows are tall. At least North Koreans can point to the very real possibility of their entire extended family being relocated to a concrete box with no heating. These are legitimate barriers to civic engagement.
What’s America’s excuse?
You can vote. You can protest. You can run for office. Nobody is sending you to a gulag. The worst thing that happens is someone calls you a name on Truth Social. And yet, there you all sit, 330 million of you, watching a man who cannot spell “Venezuela” claim it as American territory, while nodding along like this is a completely normal thing for a head of state to do.
No dictator in modern history has done more damage to the prestige of a country’s highest office than this man, and he’s done it entirely voluntarily, with access to the full resources of the American government, and a communications team that apparently just lets him post whatever falls out of his head before breakfast.
Kim Jong-un, for all his considerable faults, has never once posted a map with a flag on it and called it foreign policy.
Think about that.
Gandalv / @Microinteracti1
This government has participated in genocide.
Here is a simple test for any would-be successor to Keir Starmer:
Would you establish a full, independent, public inquiry into the government’s complicity in the greatest crime of our time?