The second the first bomb hit, the Republican Guard went from a standing military force to a guerrilla army, similar in a lot of ways to what the US faced in Iraq, just vastly better-trained and better-equipped. The US couldn't subdue Iraq with hordes of troops on the ground for years, so why would anyone imagine an air-only campaign would have better results against a stronger and larger opponent?
Take China for an example. No one knows China's true military capabilities, because they're rapidly evolving and because they virtually never use them. If there's an element of surprise to be had, they have it. But that cut's both ways, because China itself doesn't have experience exercising those capabilities. The learning curve could be noticeable. Meanwhile, no one doubts the ability of the US military to execute.
China uses wars like these to test their equipment for example the s300 knockoffs. These were not effective in Iran nor in Pakistan. I am sure the Chinese have made a note of that and debugging the failure.
There's something funny about watching global markets react to Trump's every lazy lie as if Moses himself just passed down orders. Maybe funny is the wrong word. The kicker is that this isn't even Trump's war and he likely lacks the capacity to end it if he wanted to.
> and he likely lacks the capacity to end it if he wanted to.
Nah, he could end it any time he wants. Iran will stop bombing its neighbors in a week or so, and things will more or less return to the pre-war status quo.
He chooses to not end it, because the one thing that he cannot stand is losing face.
Iran will not stop harassing the region, and perhaps not even allow the strait to open, if Israel is still bombing them or fighting a proxy war in Lebanon. So Trump can pack up and head back to this side of the planet, having made our country a few trillion dollars poorer in the process, but the war doesn't ends until Iran and Israel decide it ends.
> Iran will not stop harassing the region, and perhaps not even allow the strait to open, if Israel is still bombing them or fighting a proxy war in Lebanon.
If Israel is still bombing them? Certainly.
This will put incredible international pressure on Israel to stop. It's one thing when the US wrecks the world's economy, and it's hard to push back on. It's an entirely different thing when a country of 10 million people is wrecking the world's economy. International opinion has been turning against it for years, already.
I do think it's very unlikely to continue the war if the bombing stopped, and only the proxy war continued.
People honestly forget that Iranians aren't stupid. Some of them are crazy, but not stupid. Iran has been doing things like saying you're safe in the Strait as long as you trade oil in Yuan, for example. They know exactly why they're doing that.
Now it's not very effective now, but if the US packs up and leaves they can keep doing it. "Trade in Yuan or we drone strike your ships" would lead to every company that operates there doing it provided it actually kept risk and insurance rates down.
They are taking money committed to a wind project and redirecting it towards burning fossil fuels - because what other lesson can we take from a global energy shock other than to increase our exposure to the next one? The company itself (France's Total) had already committed to the wind deal, so now the Trump admin is letting them off the hook, and using Trump's irrational refusal to issue licenses for wind power as the excuse for why the deal wasn't working out as originally planned.
Total is also committed to expanding LNG - Total [0] and Oil India [1] are collaborating on a $20 Billion LNG extraction megaproject in Mozambique which was paused due to an Islamist insurgency during which Total-and-Oil India-funded paramilitary allegedly committed massacres against civilians [2] while putting down an Islamic State insurgency in Cabo Delgado.
The US, France+India, and China have been competing over this project for decades.
These are businesses - no one cares about morals, only interests. And it is in France's interest to unlock these kinds of LNG projects.
7000 hours at 60 MPH (i.e. 100 kph) is ~700,000 km. That's assuming highway speeds, obviously, but if you're doing stop and go in a diesel truck you should probably sell it to someone who isn't and be among the first to get an electric one because the difference in fuel costs is so dramatic in that case.
I think you misread my comment. I'm asking why you wouldn't want other types of vehicles that can be electrified to be electrified, such that there is less demand for the diesel that yours requires.
For example I've got a tractor that burns diesel, for effectively homeowner use. I too am not going to be replacing this piece of capital equipment any time soon (even though electrical would actually be better in a lot of regards). But since trucking is reliant on diesel and quite demand-insensistive, the Epstein war recently made diesel prices jump 60%. Whereas the fewer economically-critical vehicles there are being powered by diesel (even just the short range ones), the less that price would have spiked.
We can have and use electricity even if that's not what you put in your tank. We can have both things. This is the US government actively trying to eliminate one of them.
This deal has zero to do with someone like you. This impacts our electrical grid. Now instead of harvesting renewable wind energy we will be burning LNG to power that portion of the grid.
I suppose there are still some diesel generators out there, so they might burn that instead. Of course, that only makes you worse off.
Because in every thread about EVs someone has to chime in with their niche gas only use case, as if that somehow matters to the overall needs of the vast majority of drivers. Cool, you area niche need. Don’t buy an ev for 10 years or so.
Trump wrecks the global energy economy and his next move is to increase our dependence on it? They don't make enough dimensions for the type of chess this brainiac is playing.
The ones with limited recourse are the flight crew who are trapped with you and a hundred other asshole for hours with no escape and very limited options in case of a serious disruption. If there is one space that has justification to act as temporary dictatorship, it's an aircraft in flight.
I've found that looking the person in the eye and giving a quick "hey, forget your headphones?" sometimes does the trick, and has yet to start a fight. Everyone has to act in ways they are comfortable with - but mass inaction is what creates space for this shitty behavior in the first place.
Yes exactly. If they are blasting ethnic music while in an ethnic hood it is usually because they are repping their hood, and sometimes in a way to intentionally bait someone to say something. If you ask them to stop they will pretend it is a challenge on their hood/race (no matter that they will play it so loud everyone's ears are splitting and all they want is not to get hearing damage). I watched a guy pull out a knife and start slashing as soon as he was asked to stop.
If you ask such person to stop it is implied they expect you to back that up with violence and you've already consented to a battle.
In Europe there's a maybe 0.1% chance that any random adult is carrying a firearm. And the vast majority of those are going to be rifles for hunting. In the US, it's more like a 3% chance. And firearms in the US tend to have higher capacity and higher rates of fire. Hence the default militaristic response from law enforcement. Or at least that's one of several reasons.
reply