[War] Trump surrenders to Iran in a humiliating defeat

Are we now in a situation where independent journalists and OSINT researchers have reduced access to high-resolution satellite imagery during wartime, while Iran (and Russia, etcs) still retain access through allied governments or non-U.S. commercial channels?

If so, the result is: weaker independent verification and public accountability without necessarily denying adversaries meaningful battlefield awareness.

In practice, that means the public sees less, while Iran, Russia, and their allies still see plenty.


Iran has hit far more US military assets than reported, satellite images show
5/6/2026

Iranian airstrikes have damaged or destroyed at least 228 structures or pieces of equipment at U.S. military sites across the Middle East since the war began, hitting hangars, barracks, fuel depots, aircraft and key radar, communications and air defense equipment, according to a Washington Post analysis of satellite imagery. The amount of destruction is far larger than what has been publicly acknowledged by the U.S. government or previously reported.

...

Satellite imagery of the Middle East is unusually difficult to acquire at present. Two of the largest commercial providers, Vantor and Planet, have complied with requests from the U.S. government — their biggest customer — to limit, delay or indefinitely withhold the publication of imagery of the region while the war is ongoing, making it difficult or impossible to assess Iran’s counterstrikes. Those restrictions began less than two weeks into the war.

Iranian state-affiliated news agencies, however, have from the start regularly published high-resolution satellite imagery on their social media accounts that claimed to document damage to U.S. sites.
For this examination — one of the first comprehensive public accounts of the damage to U.S. facilities in the region — The Post reviewed more than 100 high-resolution Iranian-released satellite images. The Post verified the authenticity of 109 of the those images by comparing them with lower-resolution imagery from the European Union’s satellite system, Copernicus, as well as high-resolution images from Planet where available. The Post excluded 19 Iranian images from the damage analysis because comparisons with the Copernicus imagery were inconclusive. No Iranian imagery was found to have been manipulated.
...


Experts who reviewed The Post’s analysis said the damage at the sites suggested that the U.S. military had underestimated Iran’s targeting abilities, not adapted sufficiently to modern drone warfare and left some bases under-protected.

“The Iranian attacks were precise. There are no random craters indicating misses,” said Mark Cancian, a senior adviser with the Center for Strategic and International Studies and a retired Marine Corps colonel, who reviewed the Iranian images at The Post’s request. The Post previously revealed how Russia provided Iran with intelligence to target U.S. forces.

Some of the damage may have occurred after U.S. troops already left the bases, making protection of the structures less vital. Cancian and other experts said they do not believe the attacks have significantly limited the U.S. military’s ability to conduct its bombing campaign in Iran.


U.S. Central Command, which has responsibility for the Middle East, declined to address a detailed summary of findings from The Post. A military spokesperson disputed the characterization of base damage by experts as extensive or evidence of failures, saying assessments of destruction are complex and can be misleading in some cases, but declined to provide specifics. Military leaders will be able to provide fuller context for the Iranian attacks after the conflict ends, the spokesperson said.

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you can just smell the desperation even through the fumes of the sh*t caked in his diaper

 

The rumor is that he keeps confusing the Pakistani intermediaries with the Iranians. That's why he keeps telling everyone the Iranians are eager to negotiate and saying good things.

 

He's a bit confused there. I think he meant incursion. But then.... someone made that chart for him ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

Rice, beans, and silly hats. Asian Mexicans the both of them.

 

Hahaha how hilarious to pretend that the only corruption that has ever taken place in the white house is the current corruption.

You keep waving that flag bro. I'm sure the next election will fix everything!! lol

 

He actually knows exactly what he's doing. When he lies, he expects the Iranian officials to come out and deny it. So he pre-empts this by pretending there's a fracture in the government and that he is speaking to the "good" side in the fracture. That way when the officials deny it, there's a reason to be doubtful of that denial.

He's actually playing on orientalist stereotypes, that middle easterns are by default doubt-worthy except the ones who act in western interests. It's something his mentor was very good at and he's continuing in that tradition.

 

Oh my god, you don't realize he's giving the award to the very Axios guy who is leading the stock trading corruption now.

You also don't know what Barak Ravid - the Axios guy - did in regards to Gaza for Biden.

You just found out about Ravid recently is what I'm guessing.

 

Dude I cannot do this bullshit with you. You want to cherry pick axios-related-insider-trading has never been proven with the Biden administration and then pretend that this is the whole discussion. Both sides are totally corrupt even if one more than the other by the laws of no-****-sherlock.

You believe that one party is so much less corrupt than the other and I do not. Can you f*cking leave it at that in peace without having to throw a b**** fit and ad hominem attacks? Are you capable of understanding people disagree with you and it's not because they are "braindead"?

Jesus ****ing christ.

 

Yes I think both parties are corrupt and I'm not in the business of cheerleading the less corrupt of the corrupt parties. I'm so crazy! I must love MAGA!

Dumbass.

 

I get why our Secretary of State is meeting with the Pope, but given everything else that is happening, why is our Secretary of State spending his time meeting with the Pope? You'd think he'd be working on the war, or trying to keep China triangulated, or any number of issues. Just the global economic fallout from war is a tremendous problem that needs focus. But no, we have to spend time meeting with the Pope because our President doesn't have any grace. This level of diplomatic dysfunction has not been seen in any other administration. These guys keep driving speeding semis into the rear of the miles-long pile-up they started.

 

Jeff Bezos' Washington Post: U.S. intelligence says Iran can outlast Trump’s Hormuz blockade for months

Weren't some of our resident Middle East experts telling us, just this week, that Iran was "desperate" for a deal?

 

Idk, they may have focus-grouped "incursion" and found it didn't test well. "Excursion" sounds more like Sunday leisure and less like doing evil.

 

Paywall

can you paste it here. Or is that a no-no

 

Here is a gift link: https://wapo.st/4u52grO

 

I’m going with the simpler explanation .

“incursion” was the talking point communicated to him (no more “war” please, cause legal stuff), but he mistakenly used “excursion” instead, and from then on, it became “excursion.”

 

Ugh. Still requires registering to use free link.

thx though. I can wait for news consolidator sites to report on it