The United States shot down more drones and missiles than Israel did on Saturday night during Iran’s attack, The Intercept can report.
More than half of Iran’s weapons were destroyed by U.S. aircraft and missiles before they ever reached Israel. In fact, by commanding a multinational air defense operation and scrambling American fighter jets, this was a U.S. military triumph.
The extent of the U.S. military operation is unbeknownst to the American public, but the Pentagon coordinated a multination, regionwide defense extending from northern Iraq to the southern Persian Gulf on Saturday. During the operation, the U.S., U.K., France, and Jordan all shot down the majority of Iranian drones and missiles. In fact, where U.S. aircraft originated from has not been officially announced, an omission that has been repeated by the mainstream media. Additionally, the role of Saudi Arabia is unclear, both as a base for the United States and in terms of any actions by the Saudi military.
“U.S. intelligence estimates that half of the weapons fired by Iran failed upon launch or in flight due to technical issues,” a U.S. Air Force senior officer told The Intercept. Of the remaining 160 or so, the U.S. shot down the majority, the officer said. The officer was granted anonymity to speak about sensitive operational matters.
I don’t know if this ventures into conspiracy theory territory or not but in real time, I thought the Iranians had essentially told the U.S. what was coming and to prepare for it because Iran wanted a show and to test Israel’s air defense systems without provoking a war.
When it happened, one of my friends was like, “Great. World War III.” And I said I didn’t think so because Iran announced that they had launched it all as they launched it all. You don’t announce, “Here come some bombs!” to the media when your goal is having them actually land.
That’s not conspiratorial thinking at all, that’s just geopolitical literacy. Your assessment is correct: Iran planned this carefully to avoid causing any major damage. This was pro wrestling.
Which honestly makes it sad to consider that Iran has become the more restrained, rational actor here. The US needs to put Netanyahu on a short leash. He is not worth this.
I suspect Netanyahu wants a Trump presidency. I don’t expect him to do Biden any favors - quite the opposite, really.
This. The “Genocide Joe” cohort doesn’t realize they are falling right into Netanyahu and Trump’s plan. I mean, at least the small number of them who aren’t propagandists in the first place.
I would hold my nose to vote for Biden if my vote really counted, but I will still call him genocide Joe. If he continues down this path, I hope he is forever known as Genocide Joe. Let history know it.
Netanyahu and Trump
And the Kremlin, and the CCP.
They don’t give a shit because the genocide is already in progress. Also these people are very real, real enough to make an impact on the primaries. You liberals really just can’t help but constantly condescend to anyone who doesn’t do what you want them to.
It’s hilarious watching liberals try to blame their campaign failures on “Russian bots”. It’s always someone else’s fault
Yet they’re funding the democrats more than the republicans.
They get everything they want with Biden and the Dems, no one has stopped them.
With Trump they get a man who cohorts with neonazis, and they may get literal WW3 or a flakey ally.
Trump pushed US policy much closer to Israel. Biden has been mostly status quo, though leaning away from them which the US has never done before. I need a citation on funding to believe that claim, but regardless they already have republicans in their pocket. They don’t need to spend any more to purchase them.
Is the US really leaning away from Israel though. They’re still actively funding and aiding them.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68173904.amp - “US sanctions Israeli settlers over West Bank violence”
https://time.com/6591139/biden-israel-executive-order-sanctions/ - “What to Make of Biden’s Historic Sanctions on Israeli Settlers”
https://www.voanews.com/amp/calls-increase-for-israeli-accounting-for-gaza-airstrike/7556362.html
https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2024/4/10/biden-israels-netanyahu-making-mistake-on-gaza
Man, thanks for listing the sources. I didn’t want to do the work. Yet, you got downvoted for it because they don’t actually want to know the truth. They want to spread a lie.
Leaning away as in away from our usual stance? Hell yeah. We historically wouldn’t even criticize them.
The first time ever? Why do liberals constantly lie and exaggerate? No one with a brain believes you. Obama leaned away from Israel by actually blowing them off, Biden scolding Netanyahu a couple times while proceeding to give him billions in aid isn’t leaning away from shit.
Obama I think criticized them, but I don’t think there was ever any action behind it. I could be wrong about this but I think that’s the case. That said, Obama never faced a situation like this. He would probably handle it I a way I more agree with, but he’s not president so it doesn’t really matter.
There weren’t any major wars when Trump was in office.
It was a small 4 year period where most of the world was battling Covid and increasing death rates at home.
U right.
The best part of the “Genocide Joe” cohort is they call him that - despite the fact that he hasn’t committed a genocide - while simultaneously virulently denying the very real and well-documented genocides committed by communist Russia and China.
Pretty sure I’ve called them out multiple times.
Ah so despite the fact that you seem to be aware of what an actual genocide is you decide to call Biden that…why, exactly? Because it sounds clever? Because you along with 90% of the rest of the world allowed Donald Trump to lead you down to the level of grown ass adults referring to literally fucking everybody by childish, idiotic nicknames?
Ah so you deny there is a genocide in Palestine.
Disgusting.
This was millions and millions of tax payer dollars spent for “pro wrestling”. Damn that’s sad. 😆
I wouldn’t call it a wrestling show, but an attempt to prevent two smoking drunks from a bar fight by enabling them to save face. Also the bar is covered in burnable liquor and we are all standing in it while the doors are shut.
1 billion for defence, not that much for offence.
The main point to announce it was so they would get shot down. If they had reached their targets that would be a war they would lose very quickly. This way no harm was done. But now the people in charge in Iran can tell everyone in the country look how we attacked the bad people. Kind of like when north Korea talks a bunch of shit to everyone then launches a missile to no where. They can brag about it in country how they almost fucked up Japan and no one is the wiser because the only news coming in is things they ban see internally. Iranians saw the missles and drones leave their airspace then get told lies about what happened.
They did the same thing back when you guys turned Qassem “Kotlett” Soleimani into a fine paste. Announcing an air strike, notifying the target in advance and declare victory. Noone was killed in their retaliatory attack.
While the Mullahs have fucked up Iran beyond recognition, their handling of crises like this is pretty good.
That’s a lot of money we’re spending because of Netanyahu’s crazed bloodlust.
You could be spending it in Ukraine.
Hell, we may even be able to make Americans life better at home. Would be an easy way to get votes, but both parties know only a small handful of swing states decide the election, so why bother making things better when we can just spend billions in ads in five states.
Lmfao. I didn’t expect to get a full laugh outta the comments today. Thanks.
…aight so fuck Israel in a “your genocide is abhorrent and you don’t deserve any support from anyone” kind of way, but if we’re going to support a genocidal ethnostate anyway, at least we’re doing it in a way that stops civilians from betting blown up, as opposed to handing them half a military’s worth of bombs for them to drop on other civilians.
Now that that’s taken care of, could we maybe take the we’re planning on sending over to Israel for them to do even more genocide with, and send them to Ukraine or something so they can fight against genocide instead?
Jordan shot down a lot. Jordan has roughly as many Palestinians as Gaza.
Jordan directly not really. The American bases in Jordan shot down the drones.
The Jordanian monarchy is heavily corrupt and bribed by America. They receive billions in weapons and bribes to suppress their population and turn the country into an American outpost near Syria and Iraq. Last year they got $1,619,118,868
A prime example was the Tower22 base that got bombed in the beginning of this year
Currently there are massive protests in Jordan against their regime.
Apparently the drones were aimed at military targets only, unlike Israel’s attack on the embassy.
Slava Ukraini indeed. Israeli citizens do, however have some valid problems with how they’re treated by the Islamic nations :| killing a bunch of people where the population demographics is half children is indeed a bit ermh, uh questionable. Feel like having a war criminals trial would be suitable for Hamas and the IDF. What was the name of that unit? 8 something something 👁️👁️👁️📿📿📿🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Israeli citizens do, however have some valid problems with how they’re treated by the Islamic nations
Largely as a reaction to the previous actions of the government of Israel towards Muslims.
Most of the citizen-to-citizen issues (in both directions) stem back to decades of government-to-government mistreatment and abuse. All the way back to the creation of Isreal and resulting displacement of Arab/Muslim people who were already there.
And, actually, it ultimately goes back centuries before that, but 1947 was a signifigant increase in hostility and mistrust.
I would suggest that the Christian Europeans have been much worse to Jewish people over the years. the Palestinians have a valid reason to be annoyed that they have to be displaced.
Of course, but that’s a separate set of conflicts.
Yeah, Israel existing in any capacity really rubbed the surrounding Arab countries the wrong way. Hence they tried wiping it off the map several times.
Israel: bombs a diplomatic target without warning
Iran: bombs 2 military targets with warning
USA: shoots down most of the assets that made it even close to Israel
Biden: Biden reportedly told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that “Israel really came out far ahead in this exchange”
I wonder what game they’re playing.
Netanyahu is trying to stay out of prison, like Trump, so he needs conflict but not too much (losing support from his right wing coalition wounds end him) to seem strong and as a distraction and for political points. Iran doesn’t want war but doesn’t want to look weak and want to make a point to not let Israel think there won’t be consequences, they can’t just do nothing at all. Biden doesn’t want war in the region and he’s focused on negotiations to calm everybody down, preventing escalation. If Iran had hit something important it almost certainly would’ve escalated to war.
Not happy paying taxes to support this.
Shooting down Iranian dron3s and misses should not be your breaking point lol. This was the most justifiable action that has taken place since this shitshow started shitting.
It’s not the breaking point (that was long ago), but it’s not justifiable either. Protecting Israel no matter what crimes they commit has led us into a genocide. This merely demonstrates that the US could have protected Gazans from Israeli bombs but chose not to.
They were firing at military targets because Israel assassinated one of their generals. If Israel wants to start a war with Iran while they have their hands full with Gaza and Lebanon that’s their perogative but the US shouldn’t be enabling this insanity.
Agreed. I poorly implied with the “mostly” that I don’t think any of the actions are justifiable in their own merit and only meant to compare it to the other shit we’ve been backing and how this action was atleast responding to militant aggression. I tried to say it as tho we won 1st for being the fastest speed walker when really we won because the only people who speed walk in a mall are 70-80 years old lol.
Thanks for the clarification!
Tax dollars hard at work.
Saving lives is one of the few things I support our tax dollars being used for.
Healthcare, here, for our people please
Best I can do is protect the military assets of a genocidal ethnostate.
Agreed
Gotta defend those genociders!
Saying this is equivalent to saying all Palestinians are Hamas.
Considering Iran specifically targeted Israeli military assets, not really.
Your tax dollars are shielding nazi military targets from retaliation, whilst arming them to commit genocide.
This wasnt saving lives, it was saving Israeli soldiers.
If Israel and Iran ended up in a real fight (which is the result of this attack succeeding) Palestine would have been hit really hard really fast. There’s no way they end up risking leaving Palestine in a position to fight back while they send resources elsewhere.
Sure, it was retaliation, but the result would have been horrible for so many innocent people.
Israel has committed to responding anyway so what was acomplished other then enriching weappns manufacturers?
Sure, they said they’ll respond. We’ll see if it means anything… Words are cheap.
You think the nation committing genocide is bluffing about striking a target whos embassy they already struck?
“If you stand up to the nazis you’re actually helping the holocaust”. Who the fuck upvotes this stupid shit? But sure it’s everyone else who’s the real propagandist 🙄
Yeah… not even remotely a reasonable argument. We didn’t know the holocaust was ongoing (at least, not the form of it) when we went to war with Germany. Also, Germany did kill a lot more of their prisoners as the war took it’s toll and they became a liability which, if anything, supports my point. Not to say we shouldn’t have fought the nazis, but that’s not why we fought them anyway.
Also, Iran didn’t do this to help Palestinians. They did I’d because Israel attack their embassy. It wouldn’t have stopped the genocide no matter what and only could have made it worse. They wouldn’t be fighting them because they’re Nazis. They’d be fighting them because they want revenge.
Who upvotes your zero-thought comments? (I guess no one luckily.)
Avoid those freedom potholes with pride, citizen.
The Iron Dome is looking pretty rusty… I wonder how much Likud diverted to private accounts in the Caymans.
That’s the real story at the bottom of this mess.
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Israel was warned about the attack a month before it happened.
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4 billion dollars in US funding that was supposed to go to Israeli defense somehow didn’t work.
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US is having to privately ship weapons to Israel behind congress and senate approval.
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The Iron Dome only protects against short-range rockets. Israel’s Arrow and Arrow II Endospheric and Exospheric anti-missile defense systems are what most of the missiles that were intercepted by Israel were shot down with.
Iron dome was conceived before small drones were really a thing like they are now.
It was built starting in 2011 - we knew small drones were a thing long before then. You’re thinking of consumer drones but drones have been a real military concept since at least the mid nineties.
1917 actually. The concept is really old. Basically, why use a human to do something dangerous if it can be made smaller and not require a person in harm’s way?
Yeah but military drones are huge as luck. Reapers are massive.
How so? Most targets were either ballistic missiles that iron dome doesn’t intercept (David’s sling and Arrow intercept missiles and ICBMs) or shot down long before reaching Israel.
What do you think ICBM stands for?
They fired smaller missiles as well.
Most targets were either ballistic missiles that iron dome doesn’t intercept (David’s sling and Arrow intercept missiles and ICBMs)
What do you think ICBM stands for again?
Inter continent ballistic missiles. A specific class of missiles, which were not the only ones used in the attack.
Inter continent ballistic missiles. A specific class of missiles, which were not the only ones used in the attack.
Here, I replied twice so you can ignore one of them like you did my reply. You can even be more pandentic about one of them, then ignore that and read the second one.
mfw Israel is so well situated with the USA that they had an entire coalition force come to their aid for a tit for tat return strike
What is more likely?
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UK, France and Jordan want to protect Israel (who has the most capable air defense systems in the region)
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UK, France and Jordan hate Iran and want to counter an Iranian military operation that could destabilize the region further; and also gain momentum for pressuring Israel for concessions
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I guess if they didn’t do that, Israel would have needed to counter with 90000 missles considering the 300x response from Iran?
Damn half failed? That’s crazy.
That is what I was thinking, but also wonder if it was part of their show of power. They telegraphed their intentions fairly clearly. If they intentionally disabled half of the drones after take off, then it might simply be an additional warning. If this attack was shot down, could double the drones also be shot down? Just speculation, but I do have a feeling that there is more to it than just half malfunctioned.
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Take an estimate of how many you think they can stop, let’s say 100.
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Set up 500 in incrementally increasing waves, give them a weeks notice it’s coming, then a short warning before you launch.
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When some start to make it thru, flip a switch to drop some out of the next wave
You now have an accurate number for how many drones/missiles can be shot out of the sky by Israel and the US over a range of time.
This wasn’t an “attack” it was pushing up and finding out exactly how much Israel can handle.
The implied threat being if Iran wanted to, they could overwhelm Israel’s defense, and they now know exactly how much that would take. Along with what out of a huge range of options gets thru best.
Say they launch an actual attack, they could include a bunch of dummy ordnances delivered by the payloads most likely to be shot down, and prioritize the heaviest payloads in what’s less likely to be shot down.
This was also a great leaning experience for the US and the other participants. With Ukraine’s experience against the Russian invasion, we’re seeing how drones are completely changing military strategy. Strategists all over the world are probably reviewing this “battle” to learn as much as they can to later apply it to both offensive and defensive weapons.
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Yeah, I have a feeling disabling ordinances might have been actively done in communication with the US to get to the 99% number.
It would he curious to see what the failure rate in Ukraine is for Iranian drones and missiles.
Do Houthi missiles count as Yemen or Iranian?
Yemeni. Else we could extrapolate into America bombing the Iranian consulate or directly committing the Genocide in Gaza.
I was making a joke, but you absolutely could blame the Gaza Situation on the USA in the same vein as Iran is to be blamed for the Houthi problem. Iran didn’t just fund Houthi’s in Yemen, that’s where they came from.
Netanyahu also personally ensured Hamas got funding and that the other parties who wanted peace was suppressed, so you can blame him too
I blame Netanyahu for 90% of the conflict in that region, I expect his funeral will rival that of Mussolini’s.
The implication is that without US assistance, Israel wouldn’t have been able to knock out all these missiles. That is unfounded, especially considering that Israel has one of the most advanced high-altitude SAM systems in the world, the Arrow and the Arrow II missile systems.
All defence systems can be saturated. Drones allow unprecedented swarm attacks that the old maxim “the bombers will always come through” have become relevant again.
Biden won’t put US military members in the way to deter an actual fucking genocide…
But he’s scrambling jets to protect uninhabited areas in Israel?
This isn’t just him supporting a genocide anymore, he’s not making logical decisions. He’s said for literal decades that nothing will ever make him lower his complete support of Israel, and he keeps showing us that’s true
Someone with that kind of loyalty to any foreign government for any reason should disqualify them from holding at least the presidential office.
It was bad when Trump was like this with Russia, and the whole Dem party agreed.
Then Biden does the same shit and suddenly it’s ok?
Fuck that noise.
Iran hurting almost nobody is in everyone’s best interests.
We don’t need Israel vs Iran lobbing missiles at each other or marching to attack each other. Shooting down every single Iranian rocket was the fastest and simplest way to peace.
Shooting down every single Iranian rocket was the fastest and simplest way to peace.
Not really. This wasn’t America acting with a strategic strike. They simply shot down a few missiles to “support” Israel … because to do otherwise could have opened the door to other Arab nations lobbing bombs at Israel where over 1 million Palestinians are still living.
Peace wasn’t any part of this strategy.
Grade A geopolitical analysis lol
Iran hurting almost nobody is in everyone’s best interests.
The only mention of any injury from this was something that was shot down landed on someone…
If all the “attack” hit the target, there would have been zero injury.
I don’t like that Biden is supporting Israel, but I’m not going to put him and Trump on the same level. Trump moved our embassy to Jerusalem. Biden has allowed a lot of shit I hate and don’t want us to be a part of, but acting like they’re one and the same is not helpful. Especially when we would have had boots on the ground helping Israel if Trump was in office.
If someone kicked you in the balls, would it be ok for everyone you meet after that to punch you in the face?
Or do you keep the same social standards regardless of meeting one exceptionality shitty person?
Would you get mad at the guy who just punched you? It was as bad as the kick in the nuts, so you can’t complain right?
Logically speaking, you’re saying you’d accept the punch with a smile because it was worse before.
I’d rather take a hit to the face.
You’re trying to summarize a situation into something small and easy for people, but it’s complex and shitty.
I understand the plight of the people in Gaza and the absolutely abhorrent behavior my country has had towards them. I understand how the futuristic and advanced weapons made by my country have negatively impacted the world.
I also now live in a world that deals with the results of Donald Trump in office. My mom, sister, niece and wife don’t have access to the same healthcare they once did that was a right to them. I have a court system now that’s so skewed compared to American politics that it dictates policy to us rather than democratically enables the people. I live under a system of moved goal posts because Trump made the wall into a whole thing, and now everyone looks to shut the border down constantly rather than dealing with the reasons people flood across it. Every day people in my country die from gun violence and expanded police powers both of which rapidly increased under Trump and who changed the laws making it easier to purchase weapons and who made police more resistant to citizen committees.
And before you switch to the “why don’t you then change it” we’re working on. The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first steps. Fascists don’t just go away when they lose. They fester. Trying to throw it all away means potentially creating one of the bloodiest conflicts the world has ever seen because we’re upset temporarily. I get that people are needlessly dying, but more will die no matter what we do. Staying the course, correcting the effects of Donald Trump, changing the tides of American politics and shifting the left actually left is the best course of action right now. We’re getting there. Not as fast as I or others like, but I see it every day.
You’re trying to summarize a situation into something small and easy for people, but it’s complex and shitty
It’s definitely shitty, but the choice to support a genocide or not is surprisingly easy…
Like, you act like what good Biden has done inexplicably comes with the evil Biden does.
We could have someone that helps.more and does less evil.
To take it back to my “small and easy” analogy, someone that shakes your hand, or at least just gives one of those barely noticable head nods without a change in facial expression even.
You’ve let the guy who kicked you in the nuts lower the bar too much, youve forgotten what acceptable behavior looks like.
We could have someone that helps more and does less evil.
Really? Who?
You “genocide joe” folks keep saying there’s a better choice, but nobody will give me a name, a website, a campaign address I can send money to, anything. Show the candidate that can literally win in 7 months. Otherwise, you’re asking me to put my family at additional risk for the payoff of helping exactly 0 people in Gaza… unless you define helping as Israel “finishing the job.”
You want one name?
Elizabeth Warren.
But that’s not the only name.
Hell, the major reason for voting Biden is literally that he’s not trump, a qualification everyone eligible to run for president shares, except trump.
Do you honestly think 7 months isn’t enough time to run a general campaign? Why is the primary not scheduled to end for two more months if that’s true?
Seriously, how can you rationalize the primary not being scheduled to end for two more months if that’s not enough time for a general campaign?
I’m dying to hear your answer.
I actually voted for Warren in the primaries last cycle. As far as I know, she isn’t running this cycle and isn’t on the ballot in any states that have already passed the8r registration deadlines.
I know for a fact that 7 months isn’t long enough to run a presidential campaign because, again, you have to have filed to run usually a year in advance. Unless you’re suggesting that Warren is running the best write-in campaign in American history. I’m happy to help her, but I’m a little worried I haven’t heard a word about it from her or any PACs.
You’re right, we should bring back the guy who kicked me in the nuts, but now has threatened to kill me too. Genius level.
If it’s too late to change candidates, why hasn’t the DNC convention taken place?
Why did they schedule it so late in the summer that they missed multiple state deadlines to be on general election ballots?
And if your answer is going to have anything to do with the DNC being completely incompetent: why are you insisting we keep letting them be the only thing that stands between America and trump?
Who, exactly, would be an ideal candidate at this point to replace Biden that has a hope in hell of winning? Who, exactly, has the national recognition to pull that off in the Democrat party, or really any other party, in November of this year?
Removed by mod
Removed, civility.
Why is it the Biden supporters that sound most like trump supporters always have a post history making pro genocide comments too?
I’ve noticed it a lot, so I’m genuinely curious.
Removed by mod
2nd removal for implying another user is mentally deficient. 1st one was a removal, this one is a removal and a temp ban. Don’t insult other users.
If someone kicked you in the balls, would it be ok for everyone you meet after that to punch you in the face?
But that isn’t the situation. The situation is that you can choose to let someone kick you in the balls, or you can choose to let a whole gang mug you. There isn’t a third choice, no matter how much you want there to be. Third party candidates are a great ideal, but until we have a different voting system, it will continue being an ideal instead of reality.
There isn’t a third choice,
The primary still isn’t over, but people have been saying that for years…
We get two poor decisions every four years, and shit ain’t going to change as long as two private organizations are the only two options.
It’s easy for the DNC to match what it’s voters want, but they’ve become out right antagonistic towards their voting base, and voters can’t really do anything because at the end of the day our political parties are private groups with no responsibility to voters.
So you can keep blindly supporting them, but in case you haven’t noticed, it loses the party voters every election. If you really just care about beating republicans, then you should be putting you’re energy to pulling the party left.
Not telling people to give up an accept this as best possible.
This is a dumb take - I definitely want us to cut off military aide to Isreal that’s used for offensive purposes… but there’s no reason to let Iran bomb Isreal just because we’re pissed off about Palestine. Isreal being forced into a defensive war is only likely to accelerate deaths in Gaza.
but there’s no reason to let Iran bomb Isreal just because we’re pissed off about Palestine
So why aren’t we shooting down Israel’s attacks on Gaza?
You can’t claim we shot these down just to avoid casualties out of respect for life when we’re actively helping commit a genocide.
At least not if you want to convince anyone of anything logically.
Well, for one, we don’t have bases positioned in the vast expanse between……checks….Israel and Gaza.
I believe most of these shootdowns came from the Red Sea, Iraq, and Syria’s.
The u.s. could easily enforce a no-fly zone over gaza and implement an iron dome to intercept missiles going either way instead of just protecting israel.
If the u.s wanted this to stop they could, it’s not a matter of ability, it’s a matter of will.
What bases do we have between Iran and Israel?
There’s one “base” in Israel…
https://apnews.com/general-news-2ccf317f293d4be59b92cec5554c3db4
Which exists inside of what was already an Israeli air base, is under control of Israel, and was only put there in name by trump so the US would have an excuse to attack anyone that attacks Israel.
Like, this shit isn’t ancient history, but I’m constantly surprised on here that I’m the only one who remembers stuff from the last decade.
Wikipedia indicates there are currently 12 bases in iraq
The US is a puppet state of Isreal. Our entire Congress and presodent is AIPAC-approved.
Iran’s government with its tail between its legs. I hope the people of Iran one day get better leadership.
Good job on the USA and its partners in making sure there isn’t any more victims.
To those of you doing that Whataboutisms, fuck off.
How could the leadership have handled this better? Actually hitting Israel hard and escalating the war? Do nothing and set a precedent that Iranian embassies can be bombed with impunity?
Iranian leadership sucks in a lot of other ways but they played this about as well as they could. They had to ride a fine line between a response tough enough to match the aggression of Israel and save face, but not enough that the u.s. would give Israel a blank check in escalation.
Maybe not backing Hamas, a terrorist organization, to begin with.
