UKH

http://news.sky.com/story/donald-trump-mulled-an-attack-on-iran-nuclear-sit...

Mulling over starting a war by the sounds of it now to distract from his defeat.

I wish I could say unbelievable.  

He probably considers these things all the time, only to be quashed by whoever else is in the room with him. I imagine whenever any country he can't pronounce the name of does something his doesn't like his first question has been 'can we bomb them' and someone like the Joint Chief says something like 'no sir because (insert long standing rational reason)" as they roll their eyes.

Despite the ebb and flow, US-Iran strategy has been well contained for four decades. There's animosity of course, but there's also been significant incidences of working together both above and below the radar. Iran is more competition rather than enemy from  a US perspective (though Iran doesn't see things that way). Yes they are ideological opposites, but Iran has also long been a useful buffer against ideologies they deplore even more like communism and terrorism.

A strike on mainland Iran would change the game instantly. There's good reason's they never done this before (though tolerated when Israel has). The US is struggling with what's happening in Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan and Pakistan - a fight with Iran would make those conflicts look like entertainment. 

add a couple of commas and the thread title would make a great route name.

Seeing how engaged Netanyahu now is with Biden could have some relevance on Trump's ideas about Iran. Hard to tell what it'd be though; trying to impress Benny with big talk, or sulking 'I'll show you then' now Benny has new friends.

It's fun to imagine Netanyahu and Biden discussing this. I can see them hacking away at serious policy, then having a coffee break where it gets mentioned and them brushing it off smug hand waves. Netanyahu's not a guy like like, but he lives next door to Iran and owns much of the process. A strike not on his terms would be against decades of strategic ground work.

I don't think you've been paying attention to how Trump does things. Precident, historical reasons, logical reasons.... These mean nothing to the man. And now that he is out, we all have to pray that he keeps his petty score settling on the domestic front and doesn't try to wreck US foreign policy for Biden.

On the flip side, there is and has been plenty of evidence that Trump is not partial to starting wars. I know not why but for whatever reason in the Trump psyche, he does seem to avoid armed conflict, it might be a part of his isolationist and capitalist bent - getting into a war is expensive after all. In the end I don't much care about the reason as long as it keeps him focussed on terminating his appointees, ranting about fixed elections and playing golf for the next 2 months.

I realize that - that's my point. He thinks out loud about the passing idea of strikes on Iran, then is simply distracted out of it when told it's bad for his re-election prospects or the economy or whatever. But, he's talked out of it by people who do have knowledge of policy, strategy and precedent. Even the most hawkish guys in the room don't have an appetite for hitting mainland Iran, you can be sure that if the idea would float there'd be grabbers as there has been for his other, rare, strikes. A strike on mainland Iran would have to be unilateral, even the Saudis and Israel don't seem to realistically be behind that, being more up for containment rather than a serious war in the neighborhood.

The militarist stuff he's gone with seems to have been either sure fire crowd pleasers like massive hits on ISIS, the hit on Soleimani and the raid that got al-Baghdadi, plus all the slow burn stuff that doesn't make news anymore like drone strikes, or 'deal' stuff like ditching allies and agreements he felt weren't paying their way, so the NATO stuff, the Kurds, Japan, Afghanistan.

I think the man is usually easily distracted into the agenda others set for him and keeping him playing in his basinet till January will be straightforward, I think the current f*ckery with votes is just that, he's being spoon fed bullshit from every direction, blocked on some things pretty important by no less than hand puppet McConnel himself, and told to minimize unsupervised media events. I agree, he loves nothing more than a good firing to brighten his mood and he's getting plenty of that.

My main hope is Sacha Baron Cohen is somewhere quietly writing the script of Trumps final days, to be made starring Trump as himself thinking it will be his version of events, when really it will be closer to The Death of Stalin than The Apprentice.

And beyond all that we have four years of total Democrat inadequacy to look forward to. Cool.

http://news.sky.com/story/us-election-results-trump-sacks-cyber-security-bo...

I'm surprised people are just letting him get away with all this now.  

.

I'm not surprised. How would they stop him? ---- The President even at this stage has huge powers

January 20 2021 can't come soon enough for me.... getting that evil man out of power and out of the White House

I get what you mean but what if the guy does want to start a war ?  Nobody seems capable of standing up to him right now.  It's insane.

Agreed.

I thought everyone had been calling Trump a Russian agent for the last 4+ years, so why would he now attack a strategic ally of the Russians (Iran)?

They'd stop him by slowing things down in the Senate and Congress till he's out of the executive position. As much power as he wields, he needs to get the resources allocated to do this and even in the most fluid of times like after 9/11 it takes weeks if not months. It would probably involve invoking the War Powers Resolution set up explicitly for this sort of situation.

A strike on mainland Iran isn't like a strike on somewhere in conflict the US already has a presence. Without a proportionate attack on the US, it's hard to see how it would initiate as it would require such a massive phase behind it to counter Iran's expected response. Not dissimilar to Syria, Iran is fortified by relations that would make things go regional fast. Turkey, Russia, Pakistan, China and Iraq may not act for Iran, but don't expect to see them side with the US. Unlike Syria, Iran is a consolidated nation, not a post-colonial mash-up only held together by a dictatorship, ready to collapse into sectarianism given the chance. They have a large middle class population, modern infrastructure, their own fuel supplies and know what peer-on-peer war is all about, something the US hasn't fought significantly since WW2. Iranian influence go well beyond it's borders and is intentionally set up to buffer this sort of provocation.

Trump wants a quick win and Iran isn't it. He'd be the guy that started Gulf War 3.

I'd imagine there have been conversations between the highest ranks of the military and cia, that if he over steps the mark in the next two months should 'something' be done about it. Or they ignore his orders. They'll put the USA first, not the wishes of a deluded outgoing president. 

Trump isn't a friend of Russia. It just suits Russia, China etc.. to have an idiot in charge of the USA. 

I'm surprised a comedian hasn't come up with a sketch with him arguing with worried advisors about  bombing Ikea as it sounds suspiciously like one of those biggly bad middle asian countries with short names that are hard to say.

It'll be fine, there's (more) sensible people around him still, the time to worry is if it happens.

North Ikea or South Ikea?

If only, if he were insane he could be replaced. He's just an isolated cnut nobody stands up to. The death of Stalin reference up thread nails it. 

Jk

Stooge not agent. 

Jk

I doubt such things get said until they absolutely can't be avoided, risks like that don't get people to the top. 

Jk

How can we be sure he's not insane ? He's only been checked by people he's in in charge of, and one of them has been dismissed due to alcoholism/drunkenness.

Mind you, if he was replaced right now, we'd get Pence - who talks to God (and whose wife teaches at a school that supports divine creation over evolution !).

I think when he's already been talked out of a missile strike on Iran since he lost the election then it's already at that point. 

The withdrawal of forces at short notice from Iraq and Afghanistan will also have huge implications that both the military and intelligence services will wish to avoid. 

Yes, but just how much damage could he cause in a couple of months?
youtube.com/watch?v=eTtLjRatfMI&

Yes. Bombing Iran is a perennial idea and not one Trump invented, if anything he's been tailing his predecessors as far as strikes on unsavory countries go. Apparently this incident was triggered by news of the Natanz facility now having much higher capacity than expected - due to Trumpf*ck himself chickening out of the JCPOA. It's a stupid scenario of his own making that only highlights how he never came up with that better deal, just like he never did on health care, immigration etc

I find this story to be more media sensationalism than anything - something we are seeing a lot of now that Trump isn't talking to the media and they need to stir shit up to keep viewership. It's not really short notice, he's talked about this for 4 years and it was on the agenda for years before that, and of those withdrawn it's mostly administrative and logistics personnel intended to be withdrawn, people involved with a planned removal of assistance in government as the country goes back to self-governing. Many of those people also are on short rotation, not long combat deployments, so yes the jobs are going but as far as enlisted people being stateside won't make much difference.

What is a far larger problem as I see it, and barely acknowledged in the press is how Trump did deals with the Taliban without including the national government and effectively gave half of Afghanistan back to the people the US has fought for 20 years under a 'we don't negotiate with terrorists' label. Stunning. 

Trump's not a Russian puppet, he's a Saudi one.

I can hear it now: 

Aye Kia. Aaaayyyeee kia

Think Chai-na!

Wait till he picks up on the threat from North Utsire!

I think his warmongering talk is pure electioneering - saying things that his fans will lap up then quietly abandoning them later on. Its all about marketing himself.

Well, if they are his marketing team, he needs to sack the grotesque line-up of pantomime villain lawyers led by Giuliani at today’s press conference.

While promising that he could prove massive voting fraud “eighteen different ways” he was sweating so much his hair dye was running down his face.

He need to be careful.  Sweating like that could be something serious.

Even Karl Rove thinks they need to pack it in.  He must have gone soft.

Laughing my ass off at Rudy Giuliani's press conference.  

Sweating hair dye down his face and telling us the voting machines are communist.

My cousin Vinny references for his legal arguments.  

Brilliant you couldn't make it up 

seems appropriate for this thread (its a cartoon)

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/nov/20/along-with-everything...

https://twitter.com/trifectablog/status/1329640880181964801?s=20

Very funny.  

Not just the hair dye (or mascara, or marker pen he used to touch up his sideburns), but the insanely smiling woman with the cleavage on his left and the very tall woman whose head you can't see on his right. They actually look like Muppets characters come to life.

And the "evidence" obviously has to be something to do with George Soros doesn't it? I mean... does Trump know that Rudy is going around telling everyone he's the president's personal lawyer? Giuliani, with all his bonkers shenanigans in Ukraine, is, arguably, the single biggest factor in tipping the election away from him.

The Borat humiliation when he was adjusting his dress in the expectation of a blow job should have been enough to see him disappear from public view but he keeps coming back for more and further ridicule.

If it weren't for the appalling and real threat to life on earth that they represent it would be a right old laugh. 

All I can think about when watching that conference is this scene from "The fifth  Element" 

youtube.com/watch?v=S-FVii-cRz4&

1 minute in 

That's exactly what I thought when I saw the clip last night.  

Great minds and all that .

:-D

I read the other day Rudy is charging $22,000 a day for his services.

So they say.

Comedy genius is worth that price .

;-D 

Actually I think Trump knows its over and is just making Jester dance .

The big woman, Sydney Powell, is telling the world that machines, sponsored by Cuba, Hugo Chavez et al, have been flipping millions of Trump votes over to Biden. Whilst she is delivering this earth shattering news (if it were true) Giuliani is fidgeting about behind her, pulling out a bottle of water and drinking most of its contents before walking out of shot. It would have been only slightly funnier if he'd pulled out a banana and started peeling and eating it. This is what the president gets for $22,000 a day.

By the way, I think somebody should tell Rudy that the Donald never, ever pays. 

Trump and the Republican party are monetising the dispute and keeping the base happy. Trump for the launch of his TV channel and to back-fill election debts and fund a possible rerun of trumpism in 2024;  the Republicans for donations to fight the January Senate seat reruns in Georgia..... from corporations terrified because Biden will win control of the Senate if those two seats go Democrat.

I'm not sure that this isn't getting beyond a joke; it's becoming serious. If he's surrounded by sycophants and fellow grifters telling him to keep going, where could it end? What would/will happen if the military are asked to physically evict Trump from the White House?

Does he still have a licence to practise?  In fact, I really wonder if any of the gargoyles* standing line at the press conference do.  Surely they risk being disbarred for such blatant dishonesty?  Even by the standards of Trump's madness this was really disturbing - truly paranoid raving. 

Chris Krebs (recently sacked as Trump's cybersecurity chief for unforgivable honesty) said it was the most dangerous 1h45m of television in American history and probably the craziest.  Given the polarisation and barely-suppressed violence simmering since the election it was also pretty close to incitement.  Irresponsible doesn't come close to describing it.   

* Pete Pozman is right that they looked like Muppets, but that makes them sound too cuddly.

Yes I noticed its reported that unless you donate more than 8,000 dollars none of that money goes to his lawsuits .

The attribute that underpins Trump's character is cowardice. This is the only reason he hasn't plunged the whole world into a final conflagration and it's why he'll skulk out of the White House when the time comes.

As we stand on the brink of the Inferno all we can do is laugh as Trump's clowns parade about in front of us. That being said I wake up each morning and check the news to make sure he hasn't gone and done it by accident. 

What's all this "nobody stands up to him" bullshit.
American conservatives won't stand up to him, mostly because a huge chunk of conservative voters actually support his actions.

Correction, this is what donors get for $22,000 a day. 

The American tabloid newspapers and TV channels (probably including Fox News) are currently arranging for this to happen, I believe.

Then, with full media attention, Trump will announce the New Order.

Power, Corruption & Lies?

Nope. Our insect overlords will arrive and Bill will join them and Trump on the podium, then they'll eat Trump head first, the resultant gastric explosion will kill them all off, and we'll all live pandemically ever after.

Evenin' all. Be safe out there.

And this scene

youtube.com/watch?v=deUVrtC5_So&

For a start, at Diluted Towers the comfy chair and popcorn maker will be dusted down and the broadband checked to allow undisrupted streaming.

Rudy will shake his head and Trump will accidentally get splashed with melting hair dye; he'll dissolve in a puff of orange smoke, his guards and the flying monkeys will be released from the spell and go down on their knees before Biden saying "Hail Joe", Biden will then fly back to Kansas in a balloon. We'll all wake up with the Obamas looking down at us and realise the past four years have all been a bad dream.