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Iran Strikes: Day 18

Tuesday, March 17th, 2026

More regime honchos dead, America and Irseal are (try to contain your shock) winning, a bad weekend for the KC-135, a Dem uber-lawyer backs Trump on Iran, and Israel is hunting Basij in the streets of Tehran. It’s your Iraq war update, incorporating news from late Friday until now.

Also, I keep getting the occasional 429 errors that require Bluehost support to snip long-running processes that they won’t give me access fix without handing them more money (which isn’t happening). An optimization scan brought up suggestions for improving performance, some highly impractical (no, I’m going to hand-optimize WordPress generated JavaScript), but one of the things spinning up long threads is Twitter embeds, so I’m going to try to do less of that and just link and summarize rather than embed. I’ve also updated and turned the caching plugin back on (turned off in a previous Bluehost troubleshooting session), so I’m hoping that will speed things up as well.

Now on to the update!

  • “Israel Eliminates Iranian Regime Security Chief and De Facto Leader Ali Larijani.”

    Israeli forces killed the Iranian regime’s security chief and de facto leader, Ali Larijani, in a Tuesday morning airstrike that has the potential to foment greater chaos within the Islamic Republic’s remaining leadership.

    The IDF announced that Larijani was killed through “a precise strike” on his location near Tehran.

    “His elimination adds to the elimination of dozens of senior commanders and leaders of the Iranian terror regime, who were eliminated by the IDF during Operation Roaring Lion, and constitutes a further blow to the Iranian regime’s abilities to manage and coordinate hostile activity against the State of Israel,” the IDF wrote in its statement.

    After Ali Khamenei’s death, Larijani emerged as the country’s de facto leader, consolidating his power and overseeing combat operations against Israel and other Arab nations in the region. Along with his brother, Sadeq, Larijani waged outsized influence in the Iranian leadership and positioned himself as a successor after Khamenei’s death. He also served as secretary of the Iranian Supreme National Security Council, the body that orchestrated attacks on Israel and led efforts to violently suppress the Iranian people.

    “During the most recent wave of protests against the Iranian terror regime, Larijani advanced violent enforcement measures and repression operations, and personally oversaw the massacre that was carried out against Iranian protestors,” the IDF said. “Larijani led the regime’s national-security coordination and directed its international activity, including engagement with members of the axis.”

    (Hat tip: Ed Driscoll at Instapundit.)

  • “Israeli army confirms it killed the head of the Basij in a strike in Tehran, Gholam Reza Soleimani.” Definitely good news for the Iranian people.
  • Hilarious if true: “Missile hit Sepah Bank digital security center in Tehran.”

    A missile strike hit the digital security center of Sepah Bank in Tehran early on Wednesday, according to information received by Iran International.

    The building, located on Haghani Street, was destroyed in the attack while the bank was processing salary payments for military personnel.

    The services at Sepah Bank and Melli Bank Iran remained widely disrupted for a second day, with online banking unavailable and only card-based services operating.

    (Hat tip: Regular commenter Malthus.)

  • DataRepublican scrapes the publicly available information and comes to some conclusions.

    FACT 1: Iran’s missile capability has been functionally destroyed.

    As of Day 6, Adm. Brad Cooper (CENTCOM) confirmed Iranian missile attacks declined roughly 90 percent since strikes began [ISW, March 5, 2026]. Per joint intelligence assessment (IDF/CENTCOM briefing), approximately 75% of all launchers destroyed; 100–200 remain. The IRGC Aerospace Force — Iran’s primary instrument of long-range conventional power projection — has been catastrophically degraded in nine days. “Hundreds” of warheads destroyed (conventional missile warheads — Iran has no deployed nuclear warheads). Defense industrial base under systematic attack. This is not a setback. This is the functional end of Iran’s power projection capability.

    Fact 2 has been edited back from Iran’s nuclear program being 8-15 years to reconstitute, to being substantially destroyed for the the immediate future.

    FACT 3: The Strait of Hormuz is closed — not by mines, but by insurance actuaries.

    Seven of twelve International Group P&I Clubs cancelled war risk coverage on March 1–2, 2026. These seven clubs insure approximately 90% of the world’s ocean-going commercial tonnage. War risk premiums surged over 1,000%. The result: tanker traffic through Hormuz collapsed from a pre-conflict baseline of approximately 138–153+ vessels per day (figures vary by data provider: Lloyd’s List/Kpler cite ~138; CSIS/Starboard cite 153+) to as few as 3 commercial transits recorded by Windward.ai AIS tracking on March 7; a near-total shutdown. Iran achieved a de facto blockade by making the risk-reward calculation of commercial transit economically irrational, without firing a single mine.

    FACT 4: The US is the primary economic beneficiary of this crisis.

    Brent crude has risen from $72/barrel (pre-conflict) to $106.81/barrel on March 8, 2026 (Day 9), with an intraday spike to $110 when Asian markets opened Sunday evening — the first time Brent has exceeded $100 in nearly four years, and up 50%+ from the $60/barrel that started 2026. WTI (US crude futures) hit $106.57 (+17.2% on the day). A new cascade has begun: Gulf producers are being forced to cut output as storage fills — Iraq’s production has collapsed 60%, UAE and Kuwait have begun cuts. Goldman Sachs warned Friday night that the Hormuz shock is now “17 times larger” than the peak Russia disruption of April 2022 and projects Brent could reach $150/barrel by end of March if Hormuz flows remain depressed. The US is a net petroleum exporter. Every $10/barrel increase in oil costs China and Japan hundreds of millions per day while benefiting US shale producers and LNG exporters (Cheniere, Shell, ExxonMobil). Qatar suspended LNG production. CSIS senior fellow Clayton Seigle: “A deficit of 20 million barrels per day is hitting global oil market balances with no sign of relief.” The Washington Post confirmed explicitly: “The conflict has hit Europe and Asia harder than the United States.”

    FACT 5: Ali Khamenei is dead. His son is not a legitimate successor.

    Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was assassinated February 28, 2026, in a joint US-Israeli airstrike on his Tehran compound — Israeli jets dropped 30 bombs in daylight with zero effective Iranian air defense response. Mojtaba Khamenei, his son, was named Supreme Leader by the Assembly of Experts on March 8. Mojtaba is a Hojjatoleslam (mid-ranking cleric), not an Ayatollah — his theological credentials are below what the constitution’s spirit requires. He has never held a formal government position. The regime has chosen dynastic succession in a self-described revolutionary republic. This legitimacy deficit is the long-term vulnerability. [CONFIRMED — NYT, Reuters, P1B]

    DataRepublican assume there will be no land war. But she’s working from the assumption that such a land war will require occupying all of Iran, rather than, say, Tehran and various oil exporting ports.

    FACT 7: China is losing 1.7 million barrels per day of discounted Iranian oil and faces secondary sanctions.

    China bought approximately 90% of Iran’s oil exports at sanction-discount prices. That supply is gone. Higher global oil prices hit China’s economy directly. The February 2026 Executive Order imposes tariffs on any country purchasing Iranian oil — aimed directly at Chinese “teapot” refineries in Shandong Province. The US simultaneously disrupted both of China’s discounted petro-state suppliers (Iran and Venezuela). China is watching US military capabilities through its satellites and reading the Taiwan signal.

    FACT 8: The Mosaic Defense kept Iran fighting but cannot project offensive power.

    Iran’s 31 autonomous provincial IRGC commands, each with pre-delegated launch authority, are firing pre-authorized strike packages without central coordination. This means the regime cannot be decapitated; missiles keep flying. But the same decentralization that enables survival prevents the complex multi-axis offensive operations that would actually threaten US interests at scale. The 90% launch decline is the empirical proof: what remains is dispersed residue, not a coherent military campaign. [ASSESSED — CEPA, P1B, P2A mosaic paradox]

    FACT 9: The Iranian economy was already at collapse threshold before the war began.

    Pre-war data: rial at 1.45 million per US dollar (December 2025 peak); 49% inflation; negative GDP growth; government budget deficit at 6%+ of GDP. The January 2026 protests — the largest in Iranian history, with 3,000–30,000 killed by the regime — were triggered directly by rial collapse. The war adds destroyed infrastructure, disrupted trade, severed oil revenue, and accelerating secondary sanctions. The economic collapse is not a future risk; it is an ongoing reality that predates Operation Epic Fury.

    FACT 10: The Axis of Resistance has been substantially degraded.

    Syria land bridge severed (Assad fell December 8, 2024). Hezbollah “dramatically weakened” by 2024 Israeli offensive; Nasrallah killed September 2024; Iran-Hezbollah land corridor gone. Hamas catastrophically degraded after 18+ months of Israeli ground operations; IRGC’s Hamas portfolio manager Saeed Izadi killed June 2025. Houthis’ stockpiles reduced by Operation Rough Rider (2025); Houthis “staying out of the Iran-US fight for now” (Al Jazeera, March 7, 2026). Iraqi PMF taking active US strikes. Iran’s 40-year investment in regional proxy power has been substantially degraded — not dismantled. Hezbollah retains organizational structure, partial rocket inventory, and political control of southern Lebanon. Hamas retains organizational elements outside Gaza.

    I feel that most of this is probably correct. And that’s just the topline analysis; there’s a lot more in-depth data and analysis at the link. (Hat tip: Borepatch.)

  • You know who likes the chances of America and Israel winning the war? Al Jazeera.

    When you look at what has actually happened to Iran’s principal instruments of power – its ballistic missile arsenal, its nuclear infrastructure, its air defences, its navy and its proxy command architecture – the picture is not one of US failure. It is one of systematic, phased degradation of a threat that previous administrations allowed to grow for four decades….

    The campaign has moved through two distinct phases. The first suppressed Iran’s air defences, decapitated its command and control, and degraded its missile and drone launch infrastructure. By March 2, US Central Command announced local air superiority over western Iran and Tehran, achieved without the confirmed loss of a single American or Israeli combat aircraft.

    The second phase, now under way, targets Iran’s defence industrial base: missile production facilities, dual-use research centres and the underground complexes where remaining stockpiles are stored. This is not aimless bombing. It is a methodical campaign to ensure that what has been destroyed cannot be rebuilt.

    Iran now faces a strategic dilemma that tightens every day. If it fires its remaining missiles, it exposes launchers that are promptly destroyed. If it conserves them, it forfeits the ability to impose costs of the war. Missile and drone launch data suggest Iran is rationing its remaining capacity for politically timed salvoes rather than sustaining operational tempo.

    This is a force managing decline, not projecting strength.

    The closure of the Strait of Hormuz is dominating the critical commentary. US Senator Chris Murphy has called it evidence that President Donald Trump misjudged Iran’s capacity to retaliate. CNN has described it as proof that the administration has lost control of the war’s escalation.

    The economic pain is real: Oil prices have surged, a record 400 million barrels of oil will be released from global reserves, and Gulf states are facing drone and missile strikes on their energy infrastructure.

    But this framing inverts the strategic logic. Closing the strait was always Iran’s most visible retaliatory card, and always a wasting asset. About 90 percent of Iran’s own oil exports pass through Kharg Island and then the strait.

    China, Tehran’s largest remaining economic partner, cannot receive Iranian crude while the strait is shut. Every day the blockade continues, Iran severs its own economic lifeline and alienates the one major power that has consistently shielded it at the United Nations. The closure does not just hurt the global economy; it accelerates Iran’s isolation.

    Meanwhile, the naval assets Iran needs to sustain the blockade – fast-attack boats, drones, mines, shore-based antiship missiles – are being degraded daily. Its naval bases at Bandar Abbas and Chahbahar have been severely damaged.

    The question is not whether the strait reopens but when and whether Iran retains any naval capacity to contest it. Critics compare the challenge of escorting a hundred tankers daily to an impossible logistical burden. But you do not need to escort tankers through a strait if the adversary no longer has the means to threaten them. That is the operational trajectory.

    (Hat tip: Instapundit.)

  • Strait of Hormuz update: “War risk insurance peaks at 5% of hull value. Insurance costs reach highest level since Iran-Iraq Tanker War (1980s). Oil tanker valued at $100M now costs $5M to insure for single transit. Strait effectively closed despite technical navigation possibility.”
  • Israeli drones are hunting Basij in Tehran.
  • “Reports indicate clashes between security forces and citizens around Chaharbagh Square in Tehran. The sound of gunfire can be heard.” Not the only area where such clashes are reported.
  • Five KC-135 tankers damaged in an Iranian missile strike at Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia:

    Suchomimus notes that there’s simply not a lot of space to park at that base, so there’s going to be risk parking so many tankers (or other large aircraft) there. None of the planes were destroyed, and all are being repaired.

  • Iranian hovercraft base at Bandar Abbas hit:

    I don’t get to use the “Hovercraft” tag nearly enough…

  • Adventures in self-delusion: “Iran’s new supreme leader demands US, Israel ‘brought to their knees.'”

  • “More than a dozen $16M Reaper drones have been destroyed in Iran operations, US officials say.” Well, they’re far cheaper than losing a plane with a pilot, so they’re quite acceptable losses.
  • Famous Democrat lawyer David Boies thinks Trump is doing the right thing in Iran and “Democrats should get behind the President, and make sure that he finishes the job.”

    Boies, a Democrat, argues passionately in favor of the war, and scolds people—mainly other Democrats—for, in his mind, letting their dislike of President Trump affect their opinion of attacking Iran. As he writes, “If we believe that Iran presents a serious threat, we need to support the president on this issue. There’s plenty to disagree with him about, and we don’t need to like or admire him. But on Iran we should be on common ground.”

    Chances of Democrats heeding this advice:

    (Hat tip: Ann Althouse.)

  • Another successful Iranian strike (or possibly Iranian-linked militia) in Iraq:

  • Footage of the Yak-130 intercept:

    Not being tied into Air Force slang, I was previously unaware that the F-35 was nicknamed “Fat Amy”…

  • OK, I’ll embed one Tweet:

    (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • Babylon Bee: “Ayatollah Disappointed To Learn 72 Virgins Awaiting Him In Paradise Are All Women.”

    • Once again, this was just what I was able to gather from the news. If you think I’ve missed something, feel free to share it in the comments below.

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    Posted in Democrats, Foreign Policy, Jihad, Military, video | 17 Comments »

    Iran Strikes: Day 12

    Wednesday, March 11th, 2026

    Iranian ships reportedly laying mines go boom, as does another suspected Iranian nuclear site, Iran hits Jordan and Iraq, the Israelis dirtnap more Basij, VDH weighs in, the Saudis are buying Ukrainian MilTech, and a quick guide to drones.

    Another day, another 429 error. This one cleared up while I was out riding my bicycle (which broke).

  • “US destroys Iranian navy vessels — including 16 minelayers — near Strait of Hormuz.”

    US forces obliterated several Iranian navy vessels — including 16 minelayers — near the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday as President Trump warned the Islamic Republic against planting explosives along the critical global trade route.

    The strikes came amid reports that Iran had already begun laying mines along the vital shipping lane — which carries about 20% of the world’s oil supply — despite Trump’s demands that it remain open and unaffected as tensions with the US and Israel escalate.

    Trump himself doesn’t sound sure mines were actually laid: “If Iran has put any mines in the Hormuz Strait, and we have no reports of them doing so, we want them removed, IMMEDIATELY!”

  • And the video compilation of those same boats going boom:

  • “It’s more fun to sink them.”
  • Last month: Sat photos shows suspected Iranian nuclear site Taleghan 2 being buried under dirt. This month: “Taleghan 2 has been attacked, likely destroyed internally. Three holes can be seen in the soil covering its roof.”
  • Media outlets are reporting that three cargo ships have been hit by projectiles in the Strait of Hormuz.

    Among the three cargo vessels that were hit in the strait was a Thai-flagged vessel, which was 11 nautical miles north of Oman. A fire broke out on board and the Royal Thai Navy said the 23 crew members were rescued.

    Iran has claimed responsibility, saying the ship’s crew ignored warnings.

    The second vessel was a Japanese-flagged container ship that was struck 25 nautical miles off the coast of the United Arab Emirates, sustaining minor damage.

    A third cargo vessel was hit about 50 nautical miles north-west of Dubai, according to UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO).

    Also: “32 countries voted unanimously to the release of 400 million barrels of oil due to the “unprecedented” situation, the International Energy Agency (IEA) announced.” Including the U.S. (See below.)

    Iran also threatened $200 a barrel oil, which will make them super popular with any country that isn’t Russia.

  • The Israelis are also yeeting a lot of the hated Basij religious police into the afterlife.

    The Israel Defense Forces on Tuesday declared it had dismantled most key assets of Iran’s internal security forces in Ilam province, a western region that became a flashpoint during the anti-regime protests that swept the Islamic Republic earlier this year.

    Security forces and members of the Basij—the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ volunteer militia—”carried out many terror attacks and brutally repressed internal protests during demonstrations that took place across Iran in the December–January period,” the IDF stated.

    Since the start of “Operation Roaring Lion” on Feb. 28, Israeli Air Force jets struck the local headquarters of Tehran’s internal security forces, including barracks of a special forces unit; an office of the regime’s Intelligence Ministry; an IRGC command center responsible for battalions that suppress protests; and several Basij and IRGC infrastructures used to reinforce the regime’s control, it said.

    The IDF noted that the damage to repression and control mechanisms in the Ilam province, which borders Iraq and has a significant Kurdish population, was just “one example of many” of its recent operations.

    The security forces “form part of the Iranian regime’s security apparatus and have for years been responsible for executing terror activities,” said the army, noting that they also lead Tehran’s main “repression efforts against internal protests, particularly in recent periods, using severe violence, mass arrests, and force against civilian demonstrators.”

  • “Powerful explosions at Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan targeted US forces and assets. Multiple attacks struck US Camp Victoria near Baghdad International Airport in Iraq, causing fires.”
  • Israel reportedly hit an Iranian bank. I certainly hope not. We need to seize the records of all Iranian banks to find out what bribes were paid out to Obama and Biden Administration officials…
  • Victor Davis Hanson on the long road to war with Iran.

    Until last year, for some 46 years, Iran enjoyed a North Korea-like reputation in the heart of the Middle East: always unpredictable, reckless, dangerous, inevitably to be nuclear, self-destructive, and nihilistic.

    All that said, was it really ever all that formidable?

    The mullahs came into power after the removal of the Shah and, subsequently, the interim secular socialists. They did so by taking American hostages, murdering opponents, executing former supporters, and transforming the most secular and modern of the Middle East Muslim nations into the most medieval that routinely hung homosexuals, adulterers, and almost anyone who questioned the authority of the ayatollahs. In other words, these were gruesome people, but they didn’t necessarily have a competent military.

    The theocracy’s only constant with the prior monarchical Iran was that it inherited near limitless oil and natural gas reserves, sophisticated arms, and the Shah’s modernized cities. It controlled the key strategic chokepoint at the Strait of Hormuz and enjoyed a geostrategically critical location between Asia and the Middle East. It fueled Iran’s historical chauvinism and pique that the millennia-long historical preeminence of Middle Eastern Persia was not fully appreciated by its Arab neighbors. So there were lots of natural advantages—and all for the most part squandered.

    Under the camouflage of Shiite puritanism and otherworldliness, the ayatollahs proved even more corrupt (and far more incompetent) than the Shah’s entourage. They fought a destructive eight-year war with Saddam Hussein’s overrated Iraqi dictatorship and showed they were mostly just as militarily incompetent.

    Over decades, they killed and wounded thousands of Americans by bombing U.S. embassies, barracks, and bases in the Middle East—without directly confronting the American military. For years, they sent lethal shaped charge IEDs to the Shiite insurgents to slaughter and maim thousands of Americans in Iraq and to the Taliban to do the same in Afghanistan.

    At the first sign of popular protests, the regime never hesitated to gun down thousands of unarmed protesters. And, of course, they were abject hypocrites—hating the West, damning the Great Satan—and sending their pampered children to universities in America. The apparat proved quite earthly in its desire for money, estates, foreign travel, and the good life.

    Their general strategies were never hard to follow.

    One, the theocrats’ prior familiarity with Americans under the Shah and in exile in Europe bred an irrational fixation with and hatred of the West in general that made them useful proxies for the grand designs of communist and then later oligarchic Russia, and later ascendant communist China.

    Iranian realpolitik alliances with secular communists were based on the quid pro quo of granting Russia and China access to the Gulf, selling oil to China, and buying arms from both.

    Two, they were endlessly chagrined that the Persian Shiites had been overshadowed by more populous Sunni Arab neighbors that supposedly lacked their own historical sophistication and more legitimate claims of embodying and speaking for global Islam.

    So they would correct that historical travesty by doing their best to mobilize their clients and proxies to bully, isolate, and weaken Arab autocracies, especially those that are pro-Western.

    Three, their planned eventual destruction of Israel would ensure that theocratic and Shiite Iran regained its lost prestige and honor by finally accomplishing what the Sunni world had failed to do. By arming murderous clients in Lebanon, Gaza, Syria, the West Bank, and Yemen, they fashioned a global network of death that compromised European foreign policy toward the Middle East and terrified Western leaders and many of their Arab neighbors.

    Fourth and finally, they sought to diminish the role of the United States in the Muslim world, drive it from the Middle East, and wage a virtual 47-year opportunistic war against American citizens and soldiers, with help from their terrorist surrogates.

    Iran’s zenith in power and prestige came during Obama’s presidency (2009–17), and the so-called “Iran Deal” that they believed would guarantee them eventual nuclear power status.

    But far more importantly, their massive acquisitions of air, land, and sea weapons and the empowering of terrorists, coupled with their passive-aggressive claims to victimhood, both scared and enticed President Obama into dropping sanctions. Soon, he was apologizing for supposed past sins and nocturnally sending them millions of dollars in Danegeld.

    But worse by far, Obama thought he had squared the circle of neutralizing the supposed Middle Eastern Iranian juggernaut by envisioning it as an empathetic victim—and eventual friend if not ally.

    Iran was to be rebooted as the Persian and Shiite righteously aggrieved underdog—bullied unfairly by Western imperialists and their surrogate corrupt Arab petro-kingdom clients for its asceticism and courage in fighting the West since its own birth in 1979.

    Obama would remedy this “injustice” by bolstering Iran as a counterweight to not just the Sunni Arab world but to Israel itself. The reset would include an American détente with the murderous pro-Iranian Assad regime in Syria, the supposedly benign neglect of Hezbollah’s takeover of Lebanon, and the championing of the “Palestinians,” which de facto had insidiously become indistinct from Hamas terrorists.

    Such creative tension between the Iranian Shiite crescent and a diminished Arab world would be adjudicated from time to time by Obama himself, whose America would go from oppressor to ally of the oppressed.

    Snip.

    In sum, no one apparently realized—with the exception of Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu—that beneath its rough, ugly shell, theocratic Iran was rotten and decayed inside. Its corruption and the hatred of its own people ensured that even its huge revenues and sophisticated Chinese and Russian weapons could never translate into a modern, lethal military.

    And in summer 2025, the Israelis and Americans first proved that Iran was indeed hollow.

    Read the whole thing.

  • “President Trump has authorized the United States to release 172 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.”
  • “Iran has sent at least 11.7 million barrels of crude oil through the Strait of Hormuz since the war began on Feb. 28, all of which were headed to China, Samir Madani, co-founder of TankerTrackers said. – CNBC
  • The Saudis are also buying Ukrainian MilTech

  • Director Blue offers up a handy guide to military drones.

    • Again, if I’ve missed anything notable in the conflict, feel free to note it in the comments below.

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    Posted in Foreign Policy, Jihad, Military, Obama Scandals, video | 19 Comments »

    Iran Strikes: Day 11

    Tuesday, March 10th, 2026

    Another day of airstrikes against the Islamic Republic of Iran, another roundup of news.

    Note that earlier in the day the blog went down with a 429 (too many requests) error. I rattled Bluehost’s cage and they fixed it. Hopefully it doesn’t happen again…

  • Strikes will intensify until regime improves.

    Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine held a press conference this morning with a few updates on Operation Epic Fury.

    “On day ten of Operation Epic Fury, we are winning with an overwhelming and unrelenting focus on our objectives, which are the same as the day I gave my first briefing here on Operation Epic Fury,” said Hegseth. “They’re straightforward, and we are executing them with ruthless precision.”

    Hegseth also reiterated the objectives: “One, destroy their missile stockpiles, their missile launchers, and their defense industrial base missiles and their ability to make them. Two, destroy their Navy, and three, permanently deny Iran nuclear weapons forever.”

    Tuesday will be another bad day for Iran:

    It’s a laser-focused, maximum authority mission, delivered with overwhelming and unrelenting precision. No hesitation, no half measures. As President Trump declared yesterday, we’re crushing the enemy in an overwhelming display of technical skill and military force. We will not relent until the enemy is totally and decisively defeated. But we do so — we do so on our timeline and at our choosing. For example, today will be yet again our most intense day of strikes inside Iran.

    The most fighters, the most bombers, the most strikes, intelligence more refined and better than ever, so that’s on one hand. On the other hand, the last 24 hours have seen Iran fire the lowest number of missiles they’ve been capable of firing. Yet just the bifurcation, just the trend lines that we talked about on our first briefing. You see, this is not 2003. This is not endless nation-building under those types of quagmires we saw under Bush or Obama. It’s not even close. Our generation of soldier[ [sic] will not let that happen again. And nor will this President, who very clearly ran against those kinds of never-ending, nebulously-scoped missions. Those days are dead. Instead, we’re winning decisively with brutal efficiency, total air dominance, and an unbreakable will to accomplish the President’s objectives on our timeline. We stay locked on the target because here at the Department of War, that’s our job.

  • Stephen Green: “Iran’s Richest Oil Region Demands Freedom, Democracy.”

    Khuzestan is Iran’s most oil-rich and ethnically diverse province — and the Arabs there have finally had it up to here with the theocrats who run things in Tehran. Whoever they are today, that is.

    In a daring new statement, the Khuzestan Arab Tribes Assembly this week calling for “a free, democratic, and federal Iran,” and that they “firmly believe that the Islamic Republic’s system has violated the rights of the people of Iran.”

    While Khuzestan borders Iraq and is roughly one-third Arab, the assembly called the province the “beating heart of Iran” and emphasized “the protection of Iran’s territorial integrity and reject any separatist or divisive project that harms the homeland of Iran.”

    “We see ourselves in the transitional phase from the current repressive regime toward a free, democratic, and federal Iran. We can play a constructive role alongside other compatriots in building a prosperous and united Iran.”

    “We, along with all Iranians—Persians, Kurds, Baluchis, Azeris, Lors, Turks, and others—stand hand in hand for freedom, prosperity, and the bright future of Iran.”

    You don’t put out a statement like that one unless you enjoy at least some confidence that “security” troops won’t soon make a visit to explain to you the error of you ways. You know, in a dark cell somewhere from which you will only ever emerge feet-first. So whatever the real-world political efficacy of the assembly may or may not prove to be, the people behind it seem to believe that the IRGC’s reach no longer extends there.

    And — this is kind of a big deal — Khuzestan holds about 80% of Iran’s onshore oil reserves, and also accounts for about the same percentage of Iran’s onshore production. That’s nearly 60% of all of Iran’s oil production.

  • Also Stephen Green: Schrodinger’s Ayatollah.

    But he also owes his position to the IRGC, unofficially making the ayatollah subordinate to the military for the first time in the Islamic state’s 47-year history.

    And yet… Mojtaba’s figurehead status might be even less than it appears because there’s also the question of whether Mojtaba remains upright and breathing. Also on Monday, Iran state television confirmed that Mojtaba was wounded, presumably during an airstrike. AP reported: “The anchors read reports describing him as ‘janbaz’ or wounded by the enemy,” even as they parade him around — virtually only! — as the new boss.

    Mojtaba has yet to be seen in public since his promotion. Strange way to reassure the public about the succession, yes?

    In addition to Ali Khamenei, also believed dead in the compound airstrike is the elder Khamenei’s wife, a daughter, a grandchild, a son-in-law, and Mojtaba’s wife.

    Maybe it’s a bit of a stretch to believe that coalition airpower took out so much of the Khamenei family, except for the one guy the IRGC needed as a well-known figurehead to consolidate its power during a chaotic time when one military and theocratic leader after another gets chalked up as KIA.

    I also note that the IRGC will need to maintain the fiction of him alive if they want to access those untold billions the Khamenei clan withdrew from government funds to stash in international bank accounts…

  • IRGC Qods Force Colonel Majid Kashefi killed in Israeli drone strike:

  • Is Iran getting ready to mine the Strait of Hormuz?

    US intelligence has begun detecting indications that Iran may be preparing to deploy naval mines in the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints. Officials cited by CBS News say Tehran is believed to be using small boats capable of carrying two to three naval mines each. Estimates suggest Iran could possess between 2,000 and 6,000 naval mines, including Iranian-made systems as well as variants designed in China and Russia.

    More recent intelligence reporting indicates that Iran has already begun laying a limited number of mines, with a few dozen reportedly placed in the waterway in recent days. However, the deployment remains limited for now. Officials say Iran still retains around 80% to 90% of its small boats and mine-laying vessels, meaning it could potentially place hundreds more mines if tensions escalate.

    US intelligence has begun detecting indications that Iran may be preparing to deploy naval mines in the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints. Officials cited by CBS News say Tehran is believed to be using small boats capable of carrying two to three naval mines each. Estimates suggest Iran could possess between 2,000 and 6,000 naval mines, including Iranian-made systems as well as variants designed in China and Russia.

    More recent intelligence reporting indicates that Iran has already begun laying a limited number of mines, with a few dozen reportedly placed in the waterway in recent days. However, the deployment remains limited for now. Officials say Iran still retains around 80% to 90% of its small boats and mine-laying vessels, meaning it could potentially place hundreds more mines if tensions escalate.

    Given the indiscriminate nature of naval mines, I can’t imagine that China would be pleased if one of their cargo or tanker ships were hit.

  • Coalition air strikes continue to hit regime police stations.
  • “Ukraine sends experts to Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE amid Iranian drone strikes.”

    Kyiv has dispatched three teams of military experts to the Middle East, President Volodymyr Zelensky said on March 10 amid Iran’s ongoing drone strikes in the region.

    “This week, all three (teams) will be in three different countries… Qatar, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Saudi Arabia,” Zelensky said in a briefing with journalists.

    Countries across the Middle East have come under fire from Iranian Shahed drones and missiles in the wake of Israeli-U.S. strikes against Iran on Feb. 28.

    Ukraine has signalled readiness to share its extensive experience with countering the low-cost kamikaze drones, which Russia launches in daily attacks against Ukrainian cities and infrastructure.

  • MSM reporting on Iran sucks.

    I suspect anyone reading this roundup already knew that…

  • Saudi Aramco is using their East-West pipeline to reroute oil exports away from the Strait of Hormuz to terminals on the Red Sea.
  • Iranian “numbers” station under attack. Numbers stations are mysterious radio stations that feature numbers spoken over the air, presumably to send coded messages to spies and other agents. But Iran seems to be jamming the station, suggesting someone other than the regime put it up.

    • Once again, if there are any bits of news you think I missed, feel free to share them in the comments below.

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    Iran Strikes: Day 10

    Monday, March 9th, 2026

    Day 10 of the Iran War: Oil spikes then falls, Iran gets a new theoretical Supreme Leader, China’s low cost GPS substitute is just as crappy as their other MilTech, the gulf states are investing in Ukrainian MilTech, and Habitual Linecrosser tries to cut through the fog of war.

  • President Donald Trump seems optimistic that the war will be over soon.
    • He told CBS News “I think the war is very complete, pretty much”, and said the US was “very far ahead of schedule”
    • Speaking to NBC, he left open the prospect of acquiring Iranian oil, saying “certainly people have talked about it”
    • In an interview with the New York Post, he said the administration was “nowhere near” making a decision on whether to order US troops into Iran
    • Speaking to Republican lawmakers, Trump said the US was drawn into a “short-term” military operation in Iran to “get rid of some very evil people”
    • He went on to say: “We’ve already won in many ways, but we haven’t won enough”
    • Trump told the New York Post he is “not happy” with Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, but at his press briefing later did not make clear who he wants to take his place – or how that will be achieved
    • At his press briefing, Trump reiterated that the operation in Iran has been a “tremendous success”, but also added that he wants to ensure Iran cannot develop nuclear weaponry “for a very long time” – a much bigger task
    • The US still has targets in Iran, Trump tells reporters, but they could be taken out “in one day”
    • Still, he says the war will be over “very soon”
  • Trump was also reportedly very upset at Israeli strikes on Iranian oil infrastructure.
  • Oil prices briefly spiked around $120 per barrel…and then fell almost as quickly, and closed below $89.
  • Theoretically, Mojtaba Khamenei survived the leadership airstrike and is now the Iran’s new supreme leader. Maybe, but I wouldn’t put it past the people currently not running the country to announce him as leader even though he’s room temperature so they can continue to keep not running the country without U.S. and Israeli planes sending them to Allah.
  • “Third Iranian Shahid Soleimani-class Corvette Hit By America: At Bandar Abbas Port.”

  • Israeli strikes continue to hit not only Tehran…

    …but also Isfahan, include Shahed factories.

  • Meanwhile, Iran is hitting only purely military targets. Ha, just kidding! They’re hitting desalinization plants, in Bahrain and UAE.
  • No sleep till Brooklyn regime change:

    The war between the U.S., Israel and Iran has entered a decisive phase that may determine the political future of the Middle East for decades to come.

    President Trump declared that there will be no deal with the Iranian regime — nothing short of unconditional surrender. Tehran responded with predictable defiance, announcing that it would never surrender. Yet behind the regime’s rhetoric, reality appears very different.

    Much of the leadership now reportedly communicates from undisclosed locations, hiding from sustained strikes while the propaganda machine attempts to project strength and resilience.

    The scale of the military campaign has been extraordinary. In the first week alone, the U.S. reportedly struck approximately 3,000 Iranian targets across the country and the region. Israel has launched repeated waves of air strikes — more than twenty separate operations — systematically dismantling the regime’s military infrastructure. Missile launchers, air defense systems, command centers and naval facilities have been destroyed. Advanced weapons systems and new technologies, including next-generation laser defense platforms, are shaping the battlefield.

    Israel has reportedly targeted and dismantled hardened command structures associated with the regime’s leadership, including the underground bunker networks linked to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Several key figures may have been killed in these operations, though the regime has yet to publicly acknowledge casualties buried under the rubble of destroyed facilities.

    Meanwhile, the Islamic Republic’s military capacity has been devastated. What once appeared to be a formidable regional force increasingly looks like what many analysts suspected all along: a paper tiger built on intimidation, propaganda and bluff.

    For decades, the regime invested enormous resources in projecting power across the Middle East, building proxy networks and threatening neighboring states. Now it faces an unprecedented strategic crisis. Today, it is focused primarily on surviving.

    The central question confronting policymakers in Washington and Jerusalem is not whether the regime’s military capabilities can be degraded — that process is already underway — but whether the campaign will stop short of dismantling the Islamic Republic itself. Anything short of regime-change risks allowing the system to recover, reorganize and once again threaten regional stability.

    The military balance of power favors the U.S. and Israel. Iran’s conventional warfighting capabilities have been severely degraded. Air superiority allows continued targeting of strategic assets, meaning the regime’s ability to project military power beyond its borders will keep declining as long as the campaign persists. In the short run, this places the regime in a defensive posture.

    But the weakening of Iran’s military does not automatically translate to the collapse of the regime. The Islamic Republic has historically relied less on conventional military strength and more on asymmetric tools — intelligence networks, ideological mobilization, proxy militias and global terrorism. Even if its missile forces, navy and air defenses are heavily damaged, the regime’s internal security structures — the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the domestic Basij security force, intelligence services and propaganda apparatus — can still function. Note that these institutions exist primarily to protect the regime rather than to defend the country.

  • We have confirmation that the A-10 participated in the strikes on Iran. Which should give most people “Bingo!” on their types of American airpower used card.

  • A rundown of American weapons used in the war:

    Weapons covered:

    • LUCAS drones (“even cheaper than the Shahed, around $15,000”).
    • Ship-based anti-drone lasers (cost per kill: 50¢).
    • Tomahawk
    • Precision Strike Missile
  • Evidently American forces have found a way to jam China’s BeiDou system, their version of GPS:

    Also, BeiDou seems to include its own text message system, which comes with a lot of drawbacks in an active combat environment…

  • A document circulating lays out the possibility of a limited campaign for U.S. ground forces to taking over Bandar Abbas and surrounding areas.

    It is important to note that the United States does not currently maintain the ground force numbers in the region required for a full-scale invasion of Iran, nor has it established the logistical infrastructure that such a campaign would demand. Furthermore, there is no visible mobilization that would indicate preparation for a large occupation force. However, the US does have a large number of forward-deployed naval assets, rapid deployment units available back home, and special operations forces that could deploy within 18 to 48 hours to conduct a limited landing designed to seize specific objectives only.

    The current goal of the ongoing air campaign appears to be to undermine the Iranian military and political leadership, to ignite internal dissent and local opposition movements, and whereafter, support these through air support and supply drops. Nevertheless, if current aerial efforts fail to create such a scenario, the US may consider scaling up its efforts.

    One viable strategy could entail securing a foothold inside Iran to host a provisional government and facilitate overland supply routes instead. The most likely target for such a landing is Bandar Abbas, Iran’s primary southern port and a central node in its oil export system. In addition to establishing a bridgehead, capturing the city would allow US forces to obtain Iran’s main naval base. The accompanying port infrastructure, including cargo terminals and former fleet facilities, could then be repurposed to rapidly unload supplies and serve as a staging ground to support friendly forces inland.

    Most importantly, Bandars Abbass’ is strategically located on the Strait of Hormuz. Following the attack, Iran is attempting to blockade the Strait, causing disruptions that are already affecting global shipping lanes. Securing Bandar Abbas would give the US a position from which to guarantee maritime passage to the major oil flows and deny Iran the ability to leverage the strait as a pressure tool.

    In preparation for a landing, the US would shift focus to an air campaign aimed at degrading Iranian coastal defenses, displacing Iranian army units from the shoreline, and disrupting their ability to maneuver along the main logistics corridors leading into Bandar Abbas. With defenses disrupted, a numerically smaller landing force could then move into secure administrative buildings, port facilities, and the surrounding districts, in order to secure a perimeter and consolidate control. Infiltration routes through the mountains would be used to send small special forces groups to link up with local resistance networks as well as provide supplies and weaponry overland. Any landing would also force Iranian army units hiding in the surrounding mountains into the open terrain, if they want to contest the US bridgehead. However, any attempt to mass forces for a real counterattack would expose them to US and Israeli airstrikes almost immediately; with over 150 US combat aircraft, several cruisers, and guided-missile destroyers, ready to provide fire support to any landing party.

    The alternative for the Iranian army would be a shift toward a guerrilla‑style resistance inside the city and surrounding area. But the operational impact of such a campaign would remain limited if the United States avoids expanding the offensive inland, and positions itself as a supporting force for a new government, instead of an occupying one. High local pro‑Western sentiment, visible in the large protests in the cities and towns here earlier this year, could additionally constrain the Iranian army’s ability to operate covertly.

    Highly speculative, but it does contain a certain logic. Plus, with physical control of the oil export terminal, the U.S. could start selling oil in exchange for direct payment, promising to turn over any proceeds after a non-Jihadist government takes power…

  • Add the Royal Jordanian Air Force to the list of countries flying defensive missions over the Persian Gulf, specifically protecting Bahrain and UAE.
  • But some of Iran’s drones are still getting through, injuring 32 in Bahrain.
  • Azerbaijan has reportedly reopened the border with Iran, but the source is TASS, so several grains of salt are probably in order.
  • Jordan Peterson and Douglas Murray talk about what a scumbag death cult Hamas is.

  • UAE is investing in Ukrainian MilTech companies and buying Flamingo missiles to counter Iran.

    • “The United Arab Emirates-based Edge Group is set to purchase a 30 percent ownership stake in Fire Point, Ukraine’s combat-proven missile and drone manufacturer. The proposed deal of around 760 million US dollars will raise the total valuation of the Ukrainian defense firm to roughly 2.5 billion US dollars. Fire Point, which produces the FP-1 and FP-2 unmanned aerial systems as well as the Flamingo cruise missile, has risen to become Ukraine’s leading defense technology manufacturer within just two years, with production of drones currently reaching 6,000 per month.”
    • “The most interesting product in Fire Point’s arsenal is the Flamingo cruise missile, of which the company produces 1 to 2 units per day. With 30% share in the company and certain agreements, the UAE can receive around 10 to 20 such missiles and 1800 drones per month, significantly enhancing its ability not only to protect itself against enemies like Iran, but to carry out preventive strikes. Combat-proven with an estimated range of 3,000 kilometers and already successfully used to target critical Russian infrastructure within the 2,000 kilometer range, the missile is capable of reaching and destroying any target across Iran. Air bases, command centers, and missile storage facilities can be targeted with ease by its 1,150 kilogram warhead, forcing the Iranian command to change planning due to another deadly threat in the region.”
  • And what’s happening in the “southern front” of the war? In Lebanon, Israel seems to settling Hezbollah’s hash in both Beirut…

    …and southern Lebanon.

  • Today’s Habitual Linecrosser:

    • As usual, if you think I missed any significant stories on the war, feel free to share them in the comments below.

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    Iran Strikes: Day 2

    Sunday, March 1st, 2026

    If it wasn’t clear from yesterday’s roundup, it appears that a whole lot of Islamic Republic of Iran leaders were physically meeting at Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s bunker in Tehran when the successful decapitation strike was carried out as part of Operation Epic Fury/Roaring Lion. The operations are still ongoing, and here are some news updates.

  • “‘All’ of [Ali Khamenei’s] likely successors are ‘probably dead’ following US-Israeli strikes.”

    • Mick Mulvaney, former Trump OMB head and Chief of Staff: “A high risk, high reward type of operation.”
    • A “once in a lifetime opportunity” to both end the nuclear program and effect regime change. “All the [Iranian] senior leadership gathered together at one place at one time.”
    • The daylight attack must have meant we had really solid intel on the regime meeting. Most of our Middle East strikes happen at night during a new moon. “An opportunity they simply couldn’t pass up.”
    • “All of [Ali Khamenei’s] likely successors are probably dead as well.”
    • “The chances of getting a pro-Western, pro-American regime in Iran were as high as it ever was going to be.”
    • John Bolton was lamenting that these actions weren’t taken six or seven years ago, but the situation on the ground now is very different. “Everything has to come together at the same time for this to work.”
    • “This can’t be a forever war.”
    • Taking out the mullahs is “a step toward peace.”
  • New Guy steps into the leadership crosshairs. “Iranian Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref informed officials of plans to have him take charge of the nation during wartime, according to a report from the Iranian Students’ News Agency (ISNA) published on social media late Saturday night. There was no explicit note of President Masoud Pezeshkian’s ability to carry out presidential duties.”
  • Simon Whistler covers the strikes:

    Much of this covers information included here yesterday, but here are a few new tidbits.

    • Whistler states Iran is claiming they hit Riyadh in Saudi Arabia. LiveUAMap shows a strike against Prince Sultan Air Base, which is over a 100 miles from Riyadh. I mean, they’re both in central Saudi Arabia, but, eh.
    • In Yemen, Houthis threaten retaliation. Nothing yet.
    • The gulf states are plenty pissed at Iran tossing drones and missiles at them.
    • Russia issued a single proforma condemnation of U.S. attacks. China, on the other hand, hasn’t even done that.

  • A lot of Chinese MilTech deals were supposedly in the works when things kicked off, but it looks like very little (if any) actually made it to Iran.
  • Suchomimus video the first:

    • “It is quite telling that [Khamenei]’s death is being celebrated on the streets.”
    • Khamenei was likely killed in the opening strike. “A few sources are now saying it was Israel that hit this.”
    • “Iran isn’t showing any signs of giving up. Well, these could just be the last temper tantrum of the finished regime. The generals and remaining politicians lashing out knowing their time is over and that a surrender is inevitable and just trying to inflict damage.”
    • Suchomimus sees regime change as unlikely without “boots on the ground.”
  • Suchomimus video the second, which is all damage assessment:

    • One Iranian frigate hit, but two more showing no signs of damage.
    • Bandar Abbas radar site hit. Bandar Abbas is the port city directly north of the Strait of Hormuz.
    • Four MiG-29 fighters destroyed out of 30 in service.
    • Israel took out a Basij installation in northern Tehran, they being the hated Iranian religious police. The video shows four large buildings all exploding in a matter of seconds. “Iran’s air defense is completely ineffective here.”
    • Iran’s counterstrikes have had some limited success. In Kuwait “Ali al-Salim air base was hit.” The image shows smoke rising up from three different points, one evidently from a fuel storage strike. “One of Iran’s most successful strikes to date.” Plus a car park and a support facility.
    • Iran also hit Erbil air base in Iraq, where a large fire was seen burning. No information yet on what was hit.
    • Iran also hit Al-Udeid air base in Qatar. “This is the largest American base in the Middle East.” Videos show Patriot intercepting Iranian vehicles, but also one miss and one Patriot interceptor wandering off course and hitting the ground.
  • More IDF footage of the Basij strike:

  • The War Zone’s rolling coverage yesterday. Some highlights:

    I see Tomahawks, F-18s and F-35s, and a lot of Iranian targets going boom. And other American assets are poised to join the action:

  • Update: B-2s are already in-theater pounding Iranian ballistic missile facilities.
  • Here’s The War Zone’s day two coverage.

    Plus President Trump was stating that Iranian retaliation was less than expected.

    Also this: “Imagery circulating points to Iranian attacks in the vicinity of France’s naval base in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.” In other news, there’s a French naval base in Abu Dhabi…

  • Beware of Astroturf protesters. “CCP-Linked NGO Network Prepares “Emergency Protests” In US After Trump’s Iran Strikes Jeopardize Oil Flows To China.”

    Planned demonstrations branded “Hands Off Iran” or “Stop The War On Iran” are scheduled to take place this afternoon in major cities across the U.S. From New York to Los Angeles, left-wing organizers have circulated digital flyers, coordinated social media blasts, and activated email lists urging supporters to mobilize within hours of the announcement. This activation alert for the protest-industrial complex occurred shortly after the Department of War’s “Operation Epic Furry” began in Iran.

    To the average person, this afternoon’s protests may look like a groundswell of outrage over the U.S. strikes on Iran, especially given that the Trump administration campaigned on no new foreign wars. But the speed, uniform messaging, and coordinated national footprint suggest something highly more organized – and familiar for readers, as we’ve diligently followed the activities of the protest-industrial complex.

    This is the same mobilization network that has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to move tens of thousands of social justice warriors into the streets in under 12 hours.

    Earlier this year, that same protest infrastructure powered nationwide pro-Maduro demonstrations almost immediately after developments in Venezuela made national headlines. In the months prior, overlapping coalitions were instrumental in organizing the anti-Israel encampments at Columbia University and other campuses, as well as anti-ICE demonstrations in Los Angeles and other sanctuary cities. The causes shift. The slogans change. The logistical infrastructure – or the machine that makes this spark – remains the same.

    What we are witnessing is not a loose collection of anti-war activists or 1970s-style hippies responding independently to global events. It is a coordinated ecosystem of dark-money funded nonprofits, advocacy groups, campus organizations, and ideological networks that can rapidly repurpose whatever geopolitical flashpoint dominates the news cycle. From the George Floyd riots to pro-Palestine protests to anti-Tesla protests to anti-Trump protests and anti-Elon Musk protests to anti-DOGE protests to anti-ICE protests/riots, these movements are not dedicated to a single issue. They are part of omni-cause mobilizers, sowing chaos deep within the nation’s core.

    Whether the banner reads “Free Palestine,” “Hands Off Venezuela,” “Abolish ICE,” or now “Hands Off Iran,” the same names frequently appear on sponsorship lists. The same fiscal sponsors provide infrastructure. The same activist pipelines appear.

    This brings us to far-left billionaire Neville Roy Singham, whom The New York Times recently described as “known as a socialist benefactor of far-left causes” and as someone who “works closely with the Chinese government media machine and is financing its propaganda worldwide.”

    Singham’s network, shortly after Operation Epic Furry began, announced on X “New York City Emergency Protest” to “Stop The war On Iran.”

    “The U.S. and Israel are carrying out an unprovoked, illegal bombing campaign on Iran. This war serves no one but a tiny elite and oil executives and is a continuation of more than two years of genocide in Palestine and US-Israeli aggressions throught the region,” the People’s Forum, a Manhattan far-left non-profit also linked to Singham, wrote on X.

    Other left-wing groups on the flyer tied to Singham’s network include the ANSWER Coalition and CODEPINK. Also on the list are the Democratic Socialists of America, American Muslims for Palestine, the National Iranian American Council, the Palestinian Youth Movement, Black Alliance for Peace, and 50501.

  • After almost half a century, we’re finally cutting the head off the snake.

    November 4, 1979 — almost 47 years ago — Iran seized the American embassy in Tehran and held its staff hostage. Ever since then, American presidents have struggled with what to do.

    Jimmy Carter temporized for many months, even as ABC’s newly created Nightline — a nighttime news show created specially to cover the hostage crisis — opened every night with “America held hostage, day XXX.” His wife, First Lady Rosalynn Carter, finally prodded him to do something. The “something” turned out to be a shambolic rescue mission that ended in disaster.

    President Reagan intimidated the mullahs a bit, but never seriously retaliated for the Beirut barracks bombing that killed over 200 Marines along with over a score of other service personnel. George H.W. Bush invaded Iraq but left the mullahs largely alone. Bill Clinton did nothing of substance. George W. Bush had a chance to bring the Iranians to heel after the conquest of Iraq, but inexplicably failed to press his advantage. Barack Obama was, basically, complicit in their nuclear program, to the point of famously sending them pallets of cash totaling over a billion dollars.

    President Trump, on the other hand, killed General Soleimani and told other Iranian leaders that they could be next. And now they are next.

    So what have we learned, and what’s likely to happen in the future?

    Well, first, with the capture of Maduro and now this, we’ve learned that our military can do things no one else can. We seized a leader of a hostile nation from his largest military base and brought him to custody without losing a single American life. Now we’ve killed the single biggest threat to American interests in the Mideast, along with much of his senior leadership, again without losing a single American life.

    Why didn’t we do this before? And why could we do it now? The reason we can do it now is mostly leadership. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth quickly prioritized precision and lethality in the military; President Trump was willing to use the military in ways prior presidents were not.

    Why didn’t we do this before? Part of that is because the foreign policy establishment, like the domestic policy establishment, doesn’t exist to solve problems. It exists to manage those problems in ways that keep its members cushily employed. To, in Myres McDougal’s words, “maintain tensions at a level short of unacceptable violence.”

    Trump, on the other hand, wants to solve things, even if it involves inflicting unacceptable violence on the enemy. Also, he regards our enemies as actual enemies, not as “foreign colleagues” or “partners in peace.” To quote author Keith Laumer, “there’s nothing as peaceful as a dead troublemaker.” Khamenei is now peaceful.

    In fact, Trump’s approach across the board, which has brought him success after success in his first 13 months back in office, is to solve problems the way the guys in the bar say they would do it. Too much illegal immigration? Close the border and deport the illegals. Problems with Iran? Kill their leaders and encourage a revolution. Venezuela shipping drugs and gangs to the U.S.? Capture their leader and encourage his successor to cooperate or share his fate. You can just do things.

    The thing is, though, that there’s a subtlety in this approach. Just doing things turns out to work. But if you take a step back from these actions of Trump’s, the big picture shows a pretty coherent strategy. Trump wants to weaken China without going to war with China. He has now cut off two major suppliers of oil to the PRC, which produces hardly any oil of its own. (It’s worse than that, because China wasn’t paying for that oil with dollars, and now it will need dollars to buy oil elsewhere.) That applies a squeeze to an already squeezed CCP, and will make Xi’s position, domestically and internationally, weaker. Also the military excellence recently displayed has to inspire second, third, and fourth thoughts about invading Taiwan.

    Trump’s tactics typically have two characteristics: He goes after his opponents’ source of sustenance (usually that means money, but not always) and he accomplishes more than one thing at a time. In neutralizing Iran, Trump accomplishes a lot of things. First, of course, he neutralizes a major hostile regional threat.

    But second, he cuts the ground out from under what’s left of Hamas and Hezbollah. He also shuts off the pipeline of cash that was being used to bribe politicians and journalists in Europe (the Iranians have basically admitted that they do that) and support various NGOs and the like that serve anti-American and anti-Israeli ends. Iran has been a major sponsor of terrorism around the world; that will end.

    With Iran gone (and India, thanks to tariffs, eager to be on our team) the threat of the BRICS has been sharply reduced. Brazil under Lula isn’t friendly, but isn’t a power house. Russia and China don’t like us but China needs oil and Russia is broke and mired in an endless and ruinous war of its own devising.

    With Iranians free to say what they think of the mullahs’ regime, he also delegitimizes the left’s narrative that fundamentalist Islam somehow has some sort of anti-colonial virtue. In fact, the mullahs ran Iran as a Persian colony of an Arab ideology. The Iranian public is well aware of this, and will be saying that a lot.

    And if he’s able to see a new pro-American government in Iran (distinctly likely) we’ll have a regional ally that will encourage the Arab states, currently friendly to us and Israel out of fear of Iran, to remain friendly to us and Israel out of a different sort of fear of Iran.

    • As they say: Developing…

    Update Some tidbits of news from the Suchomimus discord:

  • Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian claims he’s alive and in charge:

    Power struggle between him and Mohammad Reza Aref, or just confusion?

  • Iranian foreign minister is suggesting that no one is actually in charge, that the chain of command has broken down and the military is just sort of acting on general vibes:

    Which is not what you want to hear less than 48 hours into a shooting war…

  • Mojtaba Khamenei, Ayatollah heir apparent, is apparently dead as well.

  • That four building complex previously described as Basij headquarters is here described as “Sarallah Headquarters” or “security crisis management command center of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in Tehran”:

    Now technically, the Basij is a subset of the IRGC, so that may be where the confusion comes in. Or the complex could be both. Google Maps isn’t helping me out here…

  • More of Iran’s classic aircraft destroyed:

  • Despite claims of not being involved, UK fighters are reportedly flying CAP over the Persian Gulf:

    • I’m dancing as fast as I can…

    Update 2: Another Suchomimus video. Did Iran just sink their own shadow fleet tanker?

    Update 3 via Instapundit:

  • Also dead: Iran’s ex-president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
  • More Iranian officials killed:

    “Gen. Abdol Rahim Mousavi and Defense Minister Gen. Aziz Nasirzadeh were killed at the meeting alongside the head of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard and security adviser Ali Shamkhani.”

  • Why do feminists hate women’s freedom?

    • Update 4 via the Suchomimus Discord.

  • More dead regime bigwigs:

    “Iranian state media confirmed the killing of seven senior Armed Forces commanders in the US-Israeli strikes. Those killed include Supreme Leader’s office chief Mohammad Shirazi, his deputy Akbar Ebrahimzadeh, Armed Forces intelligence deputy Saleh Asadi, logistics deputy Mohsen Darreh Baghi, police intelligence chief Gholamreza Rezaeian, Armed Forces operations planning chief Bahram Hosseini Motlaq, and Armed Forces logistics chief Hasanali Tajik.”

  • More regime buildings go boom:

    • Update 5 Saw ships, sunk same.

    U.S. President Donald Trump announced Sunday that nine Iranian naval ships have been sunk as part of combat operations against Iran.

    “I have just been informed that we have destroyed and sunk 9 Iranian Naval Ships, some of them relatively large and important,” Trump wrote in a post on X, adding that Iran’s naval headquarters has been “largely destroyed” in a different attack.

    “We are going after the rest — They will soon be floating at the bottom of the sea, also!” Trump wrote.

    U.S. Central Command officials said earlier Sunday that an Iranian Jamaran-class corvette was struck by U.S. forces at the beginning of Operation Epic Fury.

    “The ship is currently sinking to the bottom of the Gulf of Oman at a Chah Bahar pier,” the statement reads. “As the president said, members of Iran’s armed forces, IRGC and police ‘must lay down your weapons.’ Abandon ship.”

    Update 6: The SUPERgeniuses controlling Iran’s missiles decided it was a swell idea to toss ballistic missiles at a UK base in Cyprus.

    Result: Craven jihad apologist Keir Starmer grows something vaguely resembling a spine and gives the U.S. permission to use Cyprus base for “defensive purposes.” With so many Middle East bases to chose from, I’m not sure the US actually has any assets they can usefully deploy there, but still.

    Clarification: Here Starmer makes clear that “defensive purposes” includes letting American assets use British bases, including those in the Persian Gulf, to hunt Iranian missile launch sites and storage facilities:

    “They say his spine grew three times as large that day…”

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