Just Say NO To World War 3!

It has come to our attention that there is a faction in the USA and elsewhere of largely neoconservatives who are incessantly itching for a hot war with Iran more than ever.  The casus belli this time (as though the warmongers really needed a new one) is 1) that Iran has long supported and funded both Hamas and Hezbollah, which is true, and 2) that Iran's fingerprints are (allegedly) all over Hamas's brutal and barbaric terrorist attack against Israel, which is debatable.  That is in addition to Iran's alleged nuclear weapons ambitions, of course, which was the previous justification, as well as their proxy attacks against American troops in Iraq and Syria.

(For the record, we thoroughly condemn Hamas's brutal and barbaric terrorist attack against Israel, without qualification.)

That said, going to war with Iran directly would be a major strategic blunder for a number of reasons.  First, a ground war and occupation there would be an even worse quagmire than the ill-fated ground wars and occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Secondly, even a predominantly air war, which could set Iran back centuries if we really wanted to, would ultimately create a "failed state" which would be a magnet for extremists in the future.  The inevitable blowback sooner or later would be horrendous to say the least.  As the saying goes, "you break it, you own it".  At the same time, a half-assed war would in fact be the worst of all options in the long run, and any forcible "regime change" will inevitably create a dangerous power vacuum sooner or later.  And finally, a war with Iran would be very likely to draw in Iran's staunchest allies:  Russia, China, and North Korea, three nuclear-armed countries that any sane person does NOT want to get into a hot war with!  That would be World War 3, essentially, and even if it somehow doesn't go nuclear (which is far from guaranteed), it would still be truly horrendous and extremely costly in both lives and resources.  Any "victory" would be a Pyrrhic victory at best.

(Nuclear war is simply too horrible to even contemplate, something no sane person could ever support, period.  But just one miscommunication and it can happen.)

In other words, the USA attacking Iran would not be like cutting of the head off of the proverbial snake, but rather more like a Hydra whose heads will keep multiplying each time one is severed.  OOPS!

At the very least, a three-front war like that (without going nuclear) would NOT be even remotely possible to win with an all-volunteer military for very long.  The Reserves and National Guard can only buy us so much time for what will likely be a very long and bloody war of attrition that would likely dwarf World Wars 1 and 2 and the American Civil War combined.  That's the biggest elephant in the room.  So for all the people who want to go to war with Iran (or any the other aforementioned countries), let's put it up to a vote.  Those who vote "yes", well, greetings, you have just been drafted!  Those who abstained will be next if needed.  Those who vote "no" shall be exempt.  And the vote should be repeated annually to decide whether or not to renew the war effort for yet another year.  And if that is still somehow not enough for a truly existential war that already began and where withdrawal is truly not an option, and a more comprehensive draft is still somehow needed, then draft the billionaires first, then the millionaires, and so on.  It's only fair.

With absolutely NO apologies to the modern-day Ayn Rand disciples who are itching to fight Iran, and yet paradoxically quail at the very thought of personally having any sort of skin in the game themselves.

(Normally I would agree that a country that needs a draft to defend itself deserves to lose, and that in any case they could easily have enough recruits for an all-volunteer military if they simply paid them enough.  And in principle that still remains true.  But a World War 3, due to its inherently massive scale and duration, would kinda be the exception that proves the rule.)

So seriously, warmongers.  KNOCK IT OFF.  Yesterday.  Do everything you possibly can to defuse any impulse to start such a war.  Yesterday.  The life that you save may very well be your own.

QED

Did Trump Just Start A War With Iran?

On January 2, 2020, Trump apparently ordered a drone airstrike near Baghdad, Iraq, that killed Iran's top general, Qassim Soleimani.  This assassination was of very, very questionable legality given that Trump did not notify Congress (or really anyone else, for that matter) before giving the orders.  And now Iran is openly threatening (unspecified) revenge and retaliation for this foolish and reckless act of bravado and hubris by the Manchild Who Would Be King.

We are well aware that General Soleimani was not a good person by any stretch of the imagination, nor is his own Revolutionary Guard Quds Force particularly cuddly either.  They have in fact been officially designated as a terrorist organization by the United States Department of State years ago due to their notoriously rogue activities in the region, including their support for violent militias in Iraq.  But when the "leader" of the USA decides to go rogue himself and arbitrarily assassinate a leader of a sovereign nation that we are NOT actually at war with, that is a dangerous and irresponsible escalation that threatens to unleash a conflagration across the whole region, if not even further.  At the very least, it will delay any hope for peace in the region by at least a generation, and at worst can perhaps even trigger World War III.

And of course we can kiss goodbye practically forever any chance of reviving the Iran nuclear deal that, while imperfect, was in fact working to keep Iran from getting their hands on The Bomb for the foreseeable future--before Trump pulled out of it of course.  If Iran didn't have a reason to want nukes in the past, well they sure do now!  This latest stunt thus clearly does FAR more harm than good, and we at the TSAP condemn his reckless and irresponsible actions.

(As for motives, can you say, "Wag the Dog"?)

No War With Iran!

After the recent attacks on oil tankers in the Sea of Oman and Strait of Hormuz by an unknown attacker, Trump and his warmongering cronies are now hastily blaming Iran for these attacks.  But there is plenty of reason to believe they are being, shall we say, "economical with the truth".

The timing alone is suspicious, as Trump has every reason to "wag the dog" to deflect from his ever-mounting scandals including, but not limited to, Russiagate.  Also, the evidence is lacking and what little there is, just doesn't really seem to add up.  And we know that Trump has been hell-bent on provoking Iran ever since pulling out of the nuclear deal last year.  Time will tell, of course, but this really has "false flag" written all over it.

Besides, going to war with Iran would most likely be a disaster of epic proportions, and certainly not something to take lightly.   And even if Iran does somehow turn out to be the culprit, the fact remains that the ships attacked were not even American tankers (they were Norwegian and Japanese), and fully zero Americans were harmed in the process.  In fact, this was apparently a "property damage only" (PDO) incident.  So let's NOT fall for this would-be modern-day Gulf of Tonkin incident and get sucked into yet another decades-long quagmire again.

The best foreign policy can be summed up in four words:  "first, do no harm".  Seriously, this is not a game, and the stakes have never been higher now.

UPDATE:  Just a few days later on June 20, Iran confirmed that they shot down an unmanned American spy drone (again, PDO) that they claim was flying in their airspace, while the Trump administration claims it was over international waters.  Time will tell who is telling the truth, perhaps even both if, for example, it turns out that the drone entered Iranian airspace first but was subsequently shot down over international waters.  Maritime borders can be tricky and nuanced.  Regardless, this is still not a good reason to go to war with Iran.

It is exceeding unlikely that the Orange Cheeto in Chief actually wants a shooting war with Iran.  He himself has said as much.  He would rather just bluff to make himself look tough while distracting from his myriad scandals closing in on him in the late stage of his failed presidency.   And his puppetmaster Putin apparently doesn't want him to go to war with his buddy Iran, either.  But now that Iran apparently called his bluff, and Bolton and Pompeo are still itching for war, the United States is now in a very precarious situation thanks to Trump's stupid bear-poking saber-rattling routines, and a war may still happen inadvertently in spite of him canceling it at the last minute.  He is clearly like a crackhead playing with matches and gasoline, and every day he seems more and more unfit for the office of dogcatcher, let alone for the office of the Presidency.

We Need a War Like We Need a Hole in the Head

With the US government weighing what to do about Iran's defiance over their growing nuclear program, a top American general appears rather pessimistic about what a military strike on Iran would accomplish.  General James Cartwright notes that the US would be unlikely to permanently stop Iran's nuclear program unless we fully occupy the country.  Simply striking them would, at best, merely delay the inevitable.  At worst, it would likely inflame an already volatile Iran even more in the long run, and galvanize support for the current regime. Thus, the US military has wisely been rather averse to any such attacks on Iran, and remains as such. 

All things considered, invading and occupying Iran would most likely be a disaster, one we simply cannot afford to risk.  The magnitude (read: number of troops required, and thus the cost in both lives and money) would necessarily be much greater than for the Iraq invasion and ongoing occupation.  Unlike Iraq, their military has not been softened by twelve years of draconian sanctions and periodic bombings.  It may even spiral into WWIII for all we know.  The occupation would need to last for at least a decade, perhaps even two.  With two other ongoing wars, a massive budget deficit, and numerous other problems in our country, the question remains:  where will we get the troops, not to mention the money, to commit to such a massive long-term endeavor?

One wildcard in the whole issue is Israel, currently led by the right-wing hardliner Binyamin "Bibi" Netanyahu.  Their government has been saber-rattling for many years now.  If they were to launch a strike on Iran's nuclear facilities (very difficult since most are underground), that would be just as bad (for the region at least) as the US doing it.  And if we are foolish enough to be dragged into it, either by tacitly (or explicitly) authorizing or joining in after the fact, that may very well be the end of America as we know it.  Did you know that Israel currently has about 200 nukes already prepared?  Let's not encourage anything of the sort, tacitly or otherwise.

What Iran will do with their nuclear technology remains a mystery. They claim it is for peaceful purposes only, but we can't be too sure about that. That said, it appears that going to war with them would do more harm than good. Thus, the TSAP does not support any sort of strike (or invasion) of Iran unless they attack us first. This is consistent with the party's general foreign policy.

Fortunately, for the near term at least, the government has ruled out any sort of military attack on Iran.  However, they are continuing to pursue more sanctions on Iran through the UN Security Council until they agree to stop uranium enrichment.