Donald! Trump!

He’s clearly unwell😂

https://twitter.com/Breaking911/status/1208946827875307520?s=08

What has he done now? Unreal.

Yes, that’s a fairly serious thing to do.

The consequences will be something hopefully be just observed rather than experienced.

I can’t say I’m against them taking direct action against Iran’s forces that are trying to destabilise the region, it’s the West’s, China’s and Russia’s job to screw around in other countries not Iran’s.

WTF…

He really is desperate to get re-elected isn’t he.

****

Well, that’s Gulf War 3 started.

This isn’t his doing. I’m sure he likes to get his gun off, but the reality surely is much military and political involvement in picking this fight up…?

I wonder if they are going to start on the little fat kid in North Korea next.

I wonder if they are going to start on the little fat kid in North Korea next.

I thought this was the distraction from the complete cock up in handling North Korea.

In order to get elected, @BarackObama will start a war with Iran.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 29, 2011

If Dumbojo wants to unite the country he has got to stay a million miles away f<span style=”font-size: 0.8rem;”>this.</span>

Of course we will invade Iran for a trade deal.

observed rather than experienced

Do you have any faith in Boris not doing a Tony?

Without passing comment on the wisdom of such a strike, it seems pretty brazen of Iran to have a figure like that flying into Baghdad and driving around. I thought the idea of proxy wars is you use the bare minimum of physical resources, not send your most senior officials?

it seems pretty brazen of Iran to have a figure like that flying into Baghdad and driving around.

It’s probably misleading to view Iraq as an independent self-contained state now. It is pretty much a vacuum. We hollowed it out with hundreds of thousands of troops, dismantled its military and government, then gave up and more or less pulled out, and left it for the other players in the region to tussle over. That’s how ISIS rolled over huge swathes of the country. It’s a mess.

History should tell the US that when it is having trouble guaranteeing the safety of its own embassy, then it has already without friends or influence in that place. Assassinating this top official is a desperate move which will not deter the Iranians. If anything it betrays the weakness of the Americans and will encourage the Iranians to continue.

Whilst I’m sure the Iranians are dangerous players in the region, this seems very ill-advised, to put it mildly. The only retaliation option the Iranians have would be offensive, it’s just a question of how and where.

Has deflected any attention from North Korea’s announcement yesterday that they will restart nuclear and missile testing.

The whole world is being run by dangerous idiots. I’m not sure the old Cold War deterrent of mutual destruction applies any more with all these small minor nut jobs.

Interesting piece on the BBC news site this morning discussing the implications of the world switching from oil to renewables in the next couple of decades. This could just be the appetiser!

Do you have any faith in Boris not doing a Tony?

Even with his Churchill fetish bozo isn’t that daft

Really hope not as my brother in law’s ship just started a 7 month tour of the gulf

The F-14s taking off will be a great advert for Top Gun 2

Whilst I’m sure the Iranians are dangerous players in the region, this seems very ill-advised, to put it mildly. The only retaliation option the Iranians have would be offensive, it’s just a question of how and where

They’re already conducting offensive operations though, and increasingly overtly. Whilst I can’t see the US assassinating a senior Iranian general is going to stop that or diffuse tensions (quite the opposite) I don’t think it’s suddenly going to spark a major conflict or have Iran firing rockets at Israel etc. The Iranians know they’ll get a kicking from the US without military support from Russia/China and I can’t see that happening in the same way NATO didn’t intervene militarily when the Crimea was annexed.

They’re already conducting offensive operations though, and increasingly overtly.

The US have been backing them against a wall since Trump took over, he has always had a hard on for another middle east war, and has been doing everything possible to provoke Iran into doing something they can sell as a reason for war.

The US see’s itself as the world policeman, and seems to base that role on a caricature of a racist bullying bigot of a policeman always happy to abuse the power it has.

The F-14s taking off will be a great advert for Top Gun 2

Only the Iranians still have the F14 in service.

Starting WW3 seems a bit of an excessive way for Trump to distract attention from the new impeachment revelations 🙁

Given that Tories want Brexit based on opening the doors to a trade relationship with the US, Bozo will go into a war with the US to cement this deal, if it turns into full scale hostilities in Iraq. It will be a stupid decision because we will be stuck cleaning up the mess afterward, and we’ll still get a poor trade deal regardless of any good favour because the UK is smaller than the US and we are poor at trade deals but Johnson doesn’t think strategically or critically.

FWIW the Iranian general was an awful person but I’m not celebrating, it’s a bad choice in a bad situation.
EDIT Kimbers I hope I’m wrong and you’re right, I hope you’re brother in law comes home safe.

Without passing comment on the wisdom of such a strike, it seems pretty brazen of Iran to have a figure like that flying into Baghdad and driving around. I thought the idea of proxy wars is you use the bare minimum of physical resources, not send your most senior officials?

Iran and US have had a de facto truce for some time, on the basis that they’ve both been fighting IS.

 he has always had a hard on for another middle east war, and has been doing everything possible to provoke Iran into doing something they can sell as a reason for war.

Not sure that’s true either, at least not his public position. He been very much for pulling US troops out of the ME, including his cluster-**** in northern Syria recently. Obviously he also realises playing the strongman panders well to his core supporters so I can certainly see him launching cruise missiles and drone strikes into Iran but not a full on war. I’d also be surprised if he initiated much of a manned air campaign in Iran – they have (or claim to have anyway) a pretty modern and sophisticated air defence capability (but I think it’s largely untested, unless the Israeli’s have probed it). Captured US pilots isn’t something he wants on his watch.

#TRUMP2020

The US see’s itself as the world policeman

This prediction was bang on the money. It's just the dates and names that were wrong. pic.twitter.com/1XJmuVMV5t

— Michael Moran (@TheMichaelMoran) January 3, 2020

Today’s top tweet:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ENXcMAQXYAUZUTN?format=jpg&name=900×900

You know how right wing govts on a shoogly peg at home traditionally like to have a foreign war to stiffen up patriotic resolve.

Wonder how good a trade deal we’ll get if we send our lads in?

And how long before there’s talk of conscription to suck up all those unemployed?

When Trump calls, let’s hope Boris has as much backbone as Harold Wilson had.

Should we be worried that Iran has been having joint naval exercises with China and Russia very recently? It may have some very big friends too.

Not sure China and Russia would directly involve themselves in a direct conflict but they will give tech support and the Russian S-400 air defence missile system is not to be sneezed at.  I’m sure the Russians would love to gather more radar intel on the F-35 and B2 aircraft.

In some respects the Iranians have been sniping at the Americans for a long time (since before Trump increased sanctions over the nuclear deal).  I wonder if Trump was still smarting from the loss of the expensive drone last year and this Terrorist General arriving in Iraq to plot the deaths of more Americans was too good an opportunity to resist.  Will giving Iran a bloody nose stop them? possibly, it may give them pause and make them realise that they have pushed the Americans (and especially their President) one too many times and that the gloves are off now.

Will it end well, NO.

I can see if there is any escalation from the Iranian side a joint Israeli and US missile and drone strike on the Iranian air defences followed by air strikes on the nuclear facilities using bunker destroyers for the under the mountain sites in conjunction with a massive cyber attack on them.

it may give them pause and make them realise that they have pushed the Americans (and especially their President) one too many times and that the gloves are off now.

I really dont see how it will give them any kind of pause

they literally have to respond in some kind of fashion now, the head of their army has just been assassinated, Iran has been biging itself up as a strongman for domestic audiences & this pushes their narrative that America & the west are out to get them, it will be destabilising for the Iranians immediately but they will have to respond in earnest, Trump must know all this so I do wonder if it is a deliberate provocation

meanwhile Korea were threateninga new round of nuclear missile tests any day

kimbers
…they literally have to respond in some kind of fashion now, the head of their army has just been assassinated..

Aye, it’s one thing to do in Osama Bin Laden, but it’s another to publicly assassinate the leader of a nation state’s defence.

It certainly has raised the stakes.

The obvious response is to return the favour on the most senior USA military commander that can they can access.

All the little tinpot populists get to a point where they can’t resist a little war to distract from the realities of life on the domestic front. In trying to erase Obama’s legacies, Trump can’t resist the temptation to go one better – even John Bolton must be spitting out his cornflakes at the sight of his former boss taking the hardest line possible with Iran.

It’ll be a test for Johnson given that the response from the EU is likely to be measured and sane. Johnson will know that Blair and Fatcha both won elections after committing Britain to regional conflicts that could have been avoided.

It’ll be a test an opportunity for Johnson

FTFY

the iranians will hit saudi/region oil again. (good for russia)

I wouldn’t want to work in a M.E. US embassy at the moment….

I foresee more deaths ahead … on both sides.

I suggest if you have no business in the middle east don’t go there coz you will be the target.

I just feel sorry for all those involved in the proxy wars.

Rump, putine, etc. Calling the shots from thier safe havens.

dragging all sorts in interesting genie to uncork… we only need the Germans unleashed now :/

You can’t beat a little government sponsored assassination in the name of peace to distract from the upcoming impeachment trial in the senate.

Clinton did the same thing