[War] Trump surrenders to Iran in a humiliating defeat

People who benefitted from this:
Russia
China
New Ayatollah
Defense industry

 

Trump told a reporter this morning that the US is looking into partnering with Iran on the tolls and it’s a beautiful thing. Said we had to secure the straight from other people.

 

Hegseth in less than 1 minute:
- this is a new regime that we can work with
- if they hadn’t made a deal we had to hit all the targets because they are a terrorist regime

 

But, it was open and free before the war. This sucks.

 

Hegseth is such an a hole

 

The chairman just said he believes that Iran controls the straight

 

My god the jizzhadist Baghdad Bob aka astro123 is back. I need something stronger than RoundUp to get rid of this MF bug. I’m thinking sonic wave might do it.

 

This was before the war crime and cease fire. Link for full article. Worth the read.
The Strategic Defeat of the United States

...

The New York Times’ Edward Wong recently looked at how the United States was doing in achieving Trump’s five articulated goals from February 28th:

1. Destroy Iran’s missile-industrial complex. “The U.S. and Israeli militaries have destroyed many of Iran’s ballistic missiles and launchers in airstrikes. But a large number are undamaged, and Iran continues to fire missiles in the region.” A follow-on NYT report says that U.S. intelligence has concluded, “Iranian operatives have been digging out underground missile bunkers and silos struck by American and Israeli bombs, returning them to operation hours after an attack.” So clearly, this goal has not been achieved yet.
   
   
2. Destroy Iran’s navy. “The two militaries have destroyed much of Iran’s navy.” Let’s stipulate this one, although it hasn’t stopped Iran from closing the Strait of Hormuz. But this goal, narrowly defined, has been achieved.
   
   
3. Sever Iran from its terror proxies: “Mr. Trump was referring here to militias in the region that receive financial support and other types of backing from Iran. The militias are still active.” Indeed, particularly the Houthis. This goal has not been achieved yet.
   
   
4. Ensure Iran does not obtain a nuclear weapon. “U.S. officials say they think some highly enriched uranium remains in tunnels buried under rubble. Sending ground troops into Iran to seize the material would be risky.” Sure, Trump no longer cares about the uranium, but this counts as a goal that has not been achieved yet.
   
   
5. Create the conditions for regime change. “The newly appointed supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of the deceased cleric, is a hard-liner aligned with a powerful arm of the Iranian military. The current government remains theocratic, authoritarian and anti-American, and continues to wage a war of resistance.” Beyond the fact that the Trump administration doesn’t understand the concept of "regime change,” this goal has not been achieved yet.

Look, call me crazy, but a military campaign against an adversary that has failed to achieve four out of five objectives does not seem like a successful operation.

If anything, however, this understates the depths of Trump’s strategic cluster****.

Despite a lot of chatter about negotiations possibly taking place, the administration has eliminated any chance at a coercive bargaining strategy working, as the New York Times’ Wong and Julian Barnes reported earlier this week:

So where does this leave the Trump administration? Nowhere good. Trump can try to sell the idea that the current difficulties are just a short-term hitch and a prolonged war is worth fighting, but he’s poorly positioned to sell that narrative. Plus, the longer this fight drags out, the more he alienates NATO allies, including the United Kingdom. And as much as he doesn’t like it, such estrangement carries strategic costs.

Time’s Eric Cortellessa reports that “[Trump] is searching for a way to declare victory, halt the fighting, and hope that economic conditions stabilize before the political damage hardens.” Trump certainly wants to try that gambit — but this strategy isn’t likely to work either. Multiple reports that suggest Iran thinks it is winning the conflict. Even if Trump declares victory, Iran will continue to exert a chokehold over the Strait of Hormuz, pocketing a lot of resources to rebuild itself.

At best, Trump seems to have locked the United States into a regional version of Benjamin Netanyahu’s “mowing the grass” strategy with Hamas: periodically launching attacks whenever the antagonist builds up its capacities. But as the Financial Times’ Neri Zibler reports, this is not working out quite as Netanyahu had hoped:

...


The longer this war drags on, the greater the costs for the United States. Absent a full-scale ground invasion, Iran can hold out. But Trump can’t simply declare victory and tap out either. Which means he is stuck trying to sell a strategic defeat as a tactical victory. But inconvenient facts mean that not even Republicans are buying that pitch.

Trump has lost this war. The only question now is how bigly he loses it.

 

Yeah, to put it mildly. The guy has no business doing anything other than going back to his old Fox commentator job. At least that takes his power away from putting our troops in harms way, and spending billions a day doing it. We don't need that warrior wannabe putting visions of heroic and overwhelming victories in Iran into the head of that demented and crazy old orange man's head.

 

Trump's a clown, and his MAGA administration is the crowd at the circus cheering the crazy man on. His 2 weeks answer for everything is nothing but BS. It's like this phrase he just spews out over anything and everything, from his healthcare plan to tariffs to everything else.

 

Are you sure, we could have @Clutch do a lookup for comparisons.


but ATWis a douche, so….
Would not be surprised.
DD

 

Certain traders in the Administration.

 

So far, the Iranian people are by far the biggest loser in this war. The US and the rest of the world (outside of China and Russia) come in a close 2nd.

 

I don't think people really realize how much power Trump just gave Iran through this process that now they are the US recognized controllers of the Strait of Hormuz. Before the war this was internationally recognized waters. However this shakes out long term it certainly looks like from now to the foreseeable future they will be able to essentially own this waterway, and it will give them a HUGE windfall of revenue.

You are right though to put Russia at the top of the list. They backed Iran through all of this. They are their big brother, and not only will Russia's partnership with Iran strengthen, but Russia also got sanctions lifted. Just a huge win for Putin.

You really just couldn't dream of a worse scenario for the United States, and the free world. Of course Trump could have nuked Tehran which would have been bad, but long term what Trump has done here is one of the biggest blunders in foreign policy THE LIKES OF WHICH HAVE NEVER BEEN SEEN.

My advice to Trump about a week ago was to just get out. Declare victory, and leave. But making a deal like this is both doing that, AND actually making terrible foreign policy official at the same time. He would have been better off not doing any deal, and just getting the F out, and just move onto another scandal. This is just an epic disaster.

 

He could sell a total victory b/c our countrymen are gulliable and lowered gas prices will appeased them. Hell we have dummies on here thinking we won this war.

Aftermath of the war
Regime, still there. No nukes before or after, no change. Strait now has $2M toll per boat, was open before. Lots of death and destruction. Billions of dollars incinerated. This is a win as much as the desert is wet.

Not to even mention the impact US losing has to other parts of the world like Taiwan and our allies.

Such a stupid war.

 

My guess is they will find a way to bypass the strait with pipelines and a new harbor south of it.

DD

 

In his press conference Hegseth said that if Iran had not negotiated to end the war and open the Strait of Hormuz, the US would have obliterated their ability to fund their terrorist regime. The implication in that statement is that by making the deal we are allowing them to continue to fund their terrorist regime.

WTF was the point of this adventure?

 

You know ATW’s posting style quite well. As do I. They aren’t the same.

 

Well, I know that he would try to mask it, but he is banned for being a douche, no harm in looking him up and running an ip comparison….

DD