When a military force begins to decline, the first symptoms may be subtle.
On multiple occasions after President Trump launched a massive air campaign against Iran this past weekend, retaliatory attacks by simply constructed Iranian drones have penetrated American defenses with serious results. For example, at least six U.S. soldiers died, and others were wounded, in an Iranian strike Sunday on a command facility in Kuwait. CNN reported that the Americans received no warning of the incoming drone. According to CBS News, the fortifications around the facility protected it from car bombs but not from a direct overhead strike. “We basically had no drone defeat capability,” an unnamed military official told the network.
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When a complex system starts to decay, the first signs are usually subtle. In the third century, after the Roman empire had reached its geographic maximum, literacy began to decline across Roman society. Education levels fell not only among soldiers, but among officers, aristocrats, and even emperors. The Roman army still looked formidable for years afterward. It had good equipment and could march well. Yet it was no longer as advanced relative to Rome’s enemies as it had once been. It fought as hard as ever, but less effectively.
The capabilities of the U.S. military are still far superior to Iran’s. Yet certain developments in the American bombing campaign against Iran—a country seemingly rendered almost helpless after Israel destroyed most of its air defenses last year—are revealing what look like signs of strain.
For the current regime in Iran, a “win” will be simply surviving. It’s quite possible for them to do that, IMO. They’ve already taken the harshest hit that an autocracy can take, the leaders were killed. If they put new leaders in place then that will prove that this isn’t just a strong-man organization held together by personality and personal power - it consists of a whole sub-population who want it to continue existing.
At that point the only way you’re going to get rid of it is a very thorough boots-on-the-ground conquest. You can possibly do that through civil war instead of your own soldiers, but that depends on there being an opposition that’s at least somewhat organized and motivated by long-term intent. The US evidently hasn’t set one of those up, and I think Israel would have a hard time too. So yeah, this doesn’t look so great for the US.
And now the same regime is going to have a new generation of leadership with a thirst for vengeance.
America and Israel really screwed the pooch on this one, as if anyone’s surprised…
I would be incredibly naive to assume Khameini is just another tinpot dictator. There’s no way that, knowing this day would come, he hasn’t made a priority of building institutional resilience in the event of his demise. He was in his late 80s. We can be sure that the conversation around who would succeed him was happening even before this war started.
As terrible as he was, he was by no means politically unintelligent. Unfortunately we can’t say the same for America’s leadership at the moment.
You’re talking about substituting an adversarial government with a stable replacement. Trump and Hegseth are talking about bombing the shit out of Iran. There is no strategy required to achieve their goals. They’re already accomplishing them.
I’m not talking about America’s goals, I’m talking about Iran’s goals. The issue is what a “win” is for Iran.
It’s unclear what a “win” is for America since they don’t see to have much of a long-term plan or goal here. If it’s simply “bomb the shit out of everything” I guess they could claim a win. But that’s just the proverbial pigeon knocking over all the chess pieces and shitting on the board.