Still, the fact that the US can kill people without any cost because they send drones to do it doesn't sit well with me at all.
Not sure why you're being downvoted. Russia's economy and military have been flogged by their war in a way America's has not. Moreover, we have midterms this year and a Presidential election in 2. Moscow has no similar 'fuck it' exit option.
The two powers have wildly different militaries and strategies. Comparing body counts is never gonna be a super helpful metric by itself.
Russia's military power has been vastly diminished by its war. If America committed to a ground invasion and then stuck with it through the next President, yes, we'd probably see similar degradation of American martial ability over years.
> two powers have wildly different militaries and strategies. Comparing body counts is never gonna be a super helpful metric by itself
Agree. But it does point to the extent to which one system will go to reduce loss of life.
No, we're not. It's bad. But it's nothing compared to Russia.
Look at the body exchange ratios. Russia exchanges 20+ bodies for each received from The Ukraine. X and Telegram channels are full of videos of freshly dug graves in The Ukraine.
Mediazona (a BBC propaganda arm) tracks obituaries in Russia and even a blatantly biased outlet is unable to prove such assertions like 20 people per hour.
Edit: since Hypocrisy News is rate limiting me I can't reply to the redditor asking for a source:
Source?
1000 Ukrainians for 38 Russians. Such exchanges with similarly lopsided ratios happen every couple weeks.
That could be bullshit. But it holds water as a hypothesis. If Ukraine were suffering 20:1 casualty ratios against itself on the field, Russia would have won already. There are no weapons that can overcome a small belligerent losing more bodies than the larger one.
The fact you use this term makes it quite clear which side you’re speaking for.
And yes, it's absolutely deliberate.
It's just Ukraine. Unless you're doing this on purpose.
>>and even a blatantly biased outlet is unable to prove such assertions like 20 people per hour
https://www.csis.org/analysis/russias-grinding-war-ukraine
It seems to hover around 30k dead a month recently, so 1000 people a day, divided by 24, that's actually ~41 people an hour.
But you know, even if we assume these numbers are wildly innacurate and only half those given...that's still 20 per hour?
>>X and Telegram channels are full of videos of freshly dug graves in The Ukraine.
No doubt, but what does that have to do with anything.
>>Edit: since Hypocrisy News is rate limiting me I can't reply to the redditor asking for a source:
So on one hand you call BBC a highly biased source, and then you link an article from it? So which one is it? Is it biased, or is it the source of your information?
Even a highly biased source like the BBC admits to a highly skewed KIA ratio favouring - poor choice of words but meh - Russia.
Let that sink in. The real ratio must be much higher.
How can you make such a confident assumption? Like I said in another comment - it could be simply that Russians are being killed in places where Ukrainians can't or won't retrieve their bodies from. As Russians are the aggressors and moving into Ukrainian territory, this seems almost expected?
>>Even a highly biased source like the BBC admits to a highly skewed KIA ratio favouring Russia
Except they aren't doing that at all, because unlike you, they aren't equating bodies traded with KIA ratios. Maybe nuance isn't my forte, but then again, I'm not sure what yours is.
...anyway... Seriously bros, this is a war where one side is making wildly inflammatory, specific and credible threats against the civilian infrastructure of the other and this is a response to that, hardly even a response in kind. If they strike these assets it will cause financial burden for rich people, not plunge millions of civilians into darkness as the POTUS is credibly threatening to do.
Iranian attacks on US soil: Fuck all! So why is America fighting Iran? Insane ziofascist cultists picking fights on the other side of the planet to provoke the Apocalypse so they can all be raptured to paradise. (Translation: boomers are getting old and they want to see burning flesh one more time before they die.)
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-live-hegseth-and...
> In a Truth Social post on March 30, Trump warned that the U.S. would obliterate "all of their Electric Generating Plants, Oil Wells and Kharg Island (and possibly all desalinization plants!), which we have purposefully not yet 'touched.'"
AFAIK there is no exemption that says it is OK to commit war crimes if the other side does.
If attacking power plants and oil production is a war crime, then Russia, Ukraine, and many other countries are guilty of it.
Of course not, but I still think the expectation that someone doesn't commit war crimes against you disappears relatively quickly when you're openly and proudly admitting you'll open to violating the rules of war and saying international humanitarian law doesn't matter.
It's Iran. They haven't been following international law since 1979. That isn't an excuse to commit war crimes against them. But Iran really doesn't have any legs to stand on when it comes to complaining about targeting civilian infrastructure–they and their proxies have been doing this for decades.
History doesn't start in 1979. Why not go back to 1953? Overthrowing another country's elected government is no more conscionable under international law.
Nobody said you can't. I don't think the point is undermined. Neither the U.S. nor Iran have shown any consistent affection for international law.
Stubbing one's toe and complaining "both sides" - the pebble and me.
Complaining I am being hit back because I hit first, does not elicit support. Especially, when one is less than forthcoming about who made the move on a sovereign country first. Made a move just because that country had resources you are interested in.
If you want the resource then buy it. Norway nationalised it's oil, Iran had equal sovereign right to do so.
You and I agree on many things. This one is not one of them.
CNN: Trump threatens Iran ahead of deadline: "A whole civilization will die tonight" (speaking about 92 million people)
Sort of? I don't think that's really how war crimes work. Unless we're objectively in eye-for-an-eye territory, in which case we're not really talking about international law anymore. (To be clear, I think everyone talking about international law in this conflict is posturing. We've been collectively setting new norms for years, and between Russia, China and America, the rules seem to have inched closer to total war.)
Or threatening some water facility in a country with functioning air defense vs threatening entire population of 92 million with complete anihilation ("A whole civilization will die tonight" like Trump just said on behalf of all americans - credible threat from a nuclear superpower with enough nukes to spare), in a country where they can't really defend against this other than spreading the costs on enemy-allied countries.
There's bad, and there's 100x worse. And yeah, people should focus on stopping the 100x worse first, is my belief.
Iran's targeting strategy has been a capability restrained tit for tat, for the most part. This is true except for attacks on other gulf states right after US-Israel decapitation strike.
I remember national state TV in Russia talking about "we are ready to nuke United States if needed" in 2014 [1].
So, domestically, government made sure people believe that the West is the mortal enemy and we were are already at some kind of cold war since Crimea annexation, it's just West didn't notice, seems like.
Then, there were also artifical immigration crisis at EU borders created by Russia and Belarus.
And many other various hybrid and asymmetrical attacks.
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TA9mVLomYo8
So, USA recognized the danger and started dismantling the problem piece by piece, to ensure a long term peace and safety of its people. Could it be better organized and coordinated with allies? Probably, yes, but the meaning stays.
I think you are right that the West is complacent about its enemies because it cannot really shake the belief in its superiority that came from winning the cold war and dominating the world in the decades after, I just do not think that is the biggest threat.
Putting these all in the same list conflates very different situations.
- Big actual threat with body count: Russia.
- Russian proxies: Syria (very lethal, but mostly within Syria, not a "threat to the west", complicated by Daesh and AQ)
- Nasty autocracy but stable cold war: NK
- Autocracy, but largely minding their own business and with no real capability to threaten: Cuba, Venezuela
- Major trading partner: China
Trump era has systematically downplayed the threat from Russia. And let's not forget how many members of Trump campaign staff were jailed due to Russian influence.
By becoming part of the problem? Trump threatening to invade Greenland was a wake-up call for Europe. Actively supporting forces that want to tear down democracy in Europe isn’t particularly helpful either.
If we become like China and Russia then why is our civilization in any way better?
Iran is not passive - iran is active, a wannabe us (lets call it micro-satan) - that wants to do what russia did along its borders.
Iran doesn't use any of these to attack America. You seem to be confusing Israel for America, a common problem in American politics.
The post was replying to this:
>Iran doesn't use any of these to attack America.
This is false, as the post explained.
Saying “what about the US attacking Iran?” does not change the above being false. In fact the US attacking Iran does not change the above false either.
Even if we accept both things as true:
1. Iran has historically attacked the US 2. The US has historically destabilized/attacked Iran
It doesn’t change the fact that “Iran does not use any of these (proxy groups) to attack America” is a false statement.
Skip me with your emotional arguments because I’ll just think you’re posturing and just trying to advance your agenda :-)
More so if those primary attacks had 50K killed by way of proxies (100K according to more realistic estimates).
Sometimes, what one dishes out, comes back. If it does, rest of the world thinks it is only fair. Yes Iran has been retaliating, very weakly, to counterbalance attacks on itself by the US and its proxies.
There is not much doubt on who acted in bad faith first.
The US hurting its toe by kicking a stone and then complaining that it is the stone that attacked is not a good argument.
It was the US that upended Iranian parliamentary democracy with a military coup, sponsored chemical weapons attacks on Irani population (through its proxy Iraq). This killed some 30k to 50k by way of chemical attacks alone. Credible sources estimate 100K killed by these chemical weapons attacks alone.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_chemical_attacks_against...
US shot down their passenger jet. US has imposed crippling sanctions that have decimated the economic well being of the country compared to what it could have been.
Iran Air Flight 655 was an international scheduled passenger flight from Tehran to Dubai via Bandar Abbas that was shot down on 3 July 1988 by two surface-to-air missiles fired by USS Vincennes, a United States Navy warship. The missiles hit the Iran Air aircraft, an Airbus A300, while it was flying its usual route over Iran's territorial waters in the Persian Gulf, shortly after the flight departed its stopover location, Bandar Abbas International Airport. All 290 people on board were killed. No apologies yet.
Talking about Iranian proxies alone is one-sided if you don't consider what US-Israel proxies have been doing to them. US Israel have inflicted 10 to 100X more Irani deaths than what Iran has done in retaliation.
You are either ignorant or deliberately underplaying that. Most likely the latter.
That would be ultra orthodox zionists and illegal settlers that has been stealing land for decades now.
https://www.primevideo.com/detail/Louis-Theroux-The-Ultra-Zi...
An illuminating documentary. Everyone should give it a watch to understand the Zionist belief system.
There is very little room to doubt who the bad actor is and was. No matter how many canards you can try and thrust, how many attempts you make to color this as a religious holy war.
That the Islamic revolution was and is against Jews is a lie. In any case the Islamic revolution happened because of excesses by the US sponsored Shah who was put in charge after the US dismantled Iran's parliamentary democracy.
Even today Tehran hosts Dr. Sapir Hospital and Charity Center, a Jewish charity hospital, the largest charity among the religious minorities in Iran. It is doing well, thank you.
Ayatollah Khomeini himself wrote a personal note thanking the hospital for its help after the revolution succeeded.
Synagogues in Tehran are doing very well in the Islamic regime, thank you. Except for one that US+Israel bombed recently in Tehran.
This is in contrast to Israeli false flags, such as the Lavon affair and Baghdad synagogue bombings by Israel to drive a rift between Jews and the country they were residing in. Israel has a long documented history of bombing synagogues in other countries in false flag operations.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavon_Affair
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1950%E2%80%931951_Baghdad_bomb...
In fact Irani Jews have often criticized Israel when Israel has acted against Palestinians. Chief Rabbi of Iran https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yehuda_Gerami has denounced Zionist and Israeli policies.
https://www.csmonitor.com/1998/0203/020398.intl.intl.3.html
""" It comes as a surprise to many visitors to discover that Iran, a country so hostile to Israel and with a reputation for intolerance, is home to a small but vibrant Jewish community that is an officially recognized religious minority under Iran's 1979 Islamic Constitution.
"Khomeini didn't mix up our community with Israel and Zionism - he saw us as Iranians," says Haroun Yashyaei, a film producer and chairman of the Central Jewish Community in Iran. """
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Deuteronomy%202...
"When you march up to attack a city, make its people an offer of peace. If they accept and open their gates, all the people in it shall be subject to forced labor and shall work for you.
If they refuse to make peace and they engage you in battle, lay siege to that city. When the Lord your God delivers it into your hand, put to the sword all the men in it. As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves. And you may use the plunder the Lord your God gives you from your enemies. This is how you are to treat all the cities that are at a distance from you and do not belong to the nations nearby.
However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy[a] them—the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites—as the Lord your God has commanded you"
Not to mention Israel's acts on Middle Eastern Jewish people
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavon_Affair
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1950%E2%80%931951_Baghdad_bomb...
America never invaded Greenland. Nevertheless, we're facing blowback because we threatened it.
Iran has been chanting "death to America" for decades. That isn't casus belli. Not by a long shot. But pretending Iran hasn't been playing the part of belligerent for years is rewriting history.
1983 Apr - Beirut, Lebanon — 17 Americans killed (U.S. Embassy bombing)
1983 Oct - Beirut, Lebanon — 241 U.S. military killed (Marine barracks bombing)
1984 Mar - Beirut, Lebanon — 1 American killed (CIA chief Buckley kidnapped, later killed)
1985 Jun - Beirut, Lebanon — 1 American killed (TWA Flight 847 hijacking)
1989 Jul - Lebanon — 1 American killed (Col. Higgins murdered)
1995 Apr - Gaza Strip — 1 American killed (car bomb)
1995 Aug - Jerusalem, Israel — 1 American killed, 100+ wounded (bus bombing)
1996 Feb - Jerusalem, Israel — 3 Americans killed, 3 wounded (bus bombing)
1996 Mar - Tel Aviv, Israel — 2 Americans killed (shopping center bombing)
1996 May - West Bank — 1 American killed, 1 wounded
1996 Jun - Khobar, Saudi Arabia — 19 Americans killed, ~500 wounded (Khobar Towers)
1997 Sep - Jerusalem, Israel — 1 American killed, 7 wounded (mall bombing)
1998 Aug - Nairobi/Dar es Salaam — 12 Americans killed, thousands wounded (embassy bombings)
2001 Sep - New York/Washington D.C. — Iran facilitated transit of hijackers (2,977 total killed)
2002 Jan - West Bank — 1 American killed
2002 Jul - Jerusalem, Israel — 5 Americans killed (Hebrew University bombing)
2003 Aug - Jerusalem, Israel — 5 Americans killed (bus bombing)
2003 Oct - Gaza Strip — 3 Americans killed (diplomatic convoy bombing)
2003-2011 - Iraq — 603 U.S. troops killed (Iranian-backed militia IED/EFP campaign)
2011 - Washington D.C. — 0 casualties (assassination plot on Saudi ambassador foiled)
2019 Jun - Strait of Hormuz — 0 casualties (U.S. Global Hawk drone shot down)
2019 Sep - Saudi Arabia — 0 American casualties (Abqaiq oil facility drone strike)
2019 Dec - Baghdad, Iraq — 0 casualties (U.S. Embassy stormed)
2020 Jan - Ain al-Assad, Iraq — 100+ U.S. troops with traumatic brain injuries (ballistic missile strike)
2021-2022 - Iraq/Syria — ongoing U.S. base attacks by Iranian-backed militias
2023 Oct-Nov - Iraq/Syria — 60+ attacks in Iraq, 90+ in Syria; scores of U.S. troops wounded
2024 Jan 28 - Tower 22, Jordan — 3 Americans killed, 34+ wounded (drone strike)
2024 - Red Sea/Yemen — ongoing Houthi drone/missile attacks on U.S. naval assets
2024 Nov - United States — 0 casualties (Trump assassination plot foiled)
This is an active unhealed wound in Iran. Families of the dead still grieve those killed in cemeteries and graves that are there in almost all their major cities.
Iran has every reason to not like the US which has been destabilising and killing and crippling them economically for several decades.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_chemical_attacks_against...
Iran Air Flight 655 was an international scheduled passenger flight from Tehran to Dubai via Bandar Abbas that was shot down on 3 July 1988 by two surface-to-air missiles fired by USS Vincennes, a United States Navy warship. The missiles hit the Iran Air aircraft, an Airbus A300, while it was flying its usual route over Iran's territorial waters in the Persian Gulf, shortly after the flight departed its stopover location, Bandar Abbas International Airport. All 290 people on board were killed.
No apologies have been forthcoming.
The 47th war criminal in chief Trump and his Secretary of War(crimes) is making threats on TV and social media.
I would love to see the terrorist regime of Iran collapse but in this scenario, sorry, the US is completely in the wrong.
Blame is a weird word for geopolitics. I think Iran fucked up hitting those targets pre-emptively. Someone at home had to show their hard-liner boss that they were just as hard-line as he is. So they did something macho. The consequences be damned.
The mirroring of dysfunction on each side of this war is uncanny.
Sounds like a thing a state would not want to do to their neighbor out of the blue.
It's not out of some kind of kindness Iran is doing, it's just good strategy.