War in 4 days?

[NewTeaBag]

As the Gunny alluded to, those who actually have to do the fighting and dieing are rarely the ones itching for war. Their are other significant military concerns in mounting action against Iran as well. The Coalition Naval forces are in quite a vulnerable position compared to the Iranian Coastal Missile, Naval and Air defence forces. Any attack would HAVE to be preceded with a massive air strike to eliminate these coastal defence positions/air units otherwise the results would include CNN/BBC pix of a sinking aircraft carrier in the Gulf. This would NOT be an easy operation and as the Gunny also alluded to The Iranian Naval, Air, and Ground forces are far more advanced, better equipped and better motivated for a fight.

[ilikeaces86_]

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As the Gunny alluded to, those who actually have to do the fighting and dieing are rarely the ones itching for war. Their are other significant military concerns in mounting action against Iran as well. The Coalition Naval forces are in quite a vulnerable position compared to the Iranian Coastal Missile, Naval and Air defence forces. Any attack would HAVE to be preceded with a massive air strike to eliminate these coastal defence positions/air units otherwise the results would include CNN/BBC pix of a sinking aircraft carrier in the Gulf. This would NOT be an easy operation and as the Gunny also alluded to The Iranian Naval, Air, and Ground forces are far more advanced, better equipped and better motivated for a fight.

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LOL NO.

[NT!]

i think people should be allowed maybe two or three threads like this which don't pan out before something bad happens to them

[NewTeaBag]

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As the Gunny alluded to, those who actually have to do the fighting and dieing are rarely the ones itching for war. Their are other significant military concerns in mounting action against Iran as well. The Coalition Naval forces are in quite a vulnerable position compared to the Iranian Coastal Missile, Naval and Air defence forces. Any attack would HAVE to be preceded with a massive air strike to eliminate these coastal defence positions/air units otherwise the results would include CNN/BBC pix of a sinking aircraft carrier in the Gulf. This would NOT be an easy operation and as the Gunny also alluded to The Iranian Naval, Air, and Ground forces are far more advanced, better equipped and better motivated for a fight.

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LOL NO.

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Excellent retort sir.
Well done on not sullying it with any fact, experience, or thought.

[PLOlover]

From what snippets I've heard the air force and navy obviously are a joke for US forces but army is better than iraqis and they have some soviet support, for example some short range missiles or something.

[NewTeaBag]

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From what snippets I've heard the air force and navy obviously are a joke for US forces but army is better than iraqis and they have some soviet support, for example some short range missiles or something.

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This is tremendously untrue wrt Naval forces. Their navy is tiny in comparison with our forces, but bear in mind our ships would be operating in highly restricted waters all within range of numerous coastal defence batteries of anti ship missiles. Remember our success at suppressing Iraqi SCUD attacks during the 1st Gulf war? Also remember that it only takes ONE battery to survive and ONE missile to get through the barriers to hit and destroy/permanently disable a Capital warship/Aircraft carrier. The same applies to their fast patrol craft. They would get chewed up pretty quickly but only ONE getting through would be enough.

IOW The opening of any attack on Iran would require a massive, supremely coordinated attack on all these positions/craft prior to ay other significant military action.

[PLOlover]

thats what i meant thier russian supplied missiles might sink US ships but their navy itself as far as ships would get chewed up by US navy ships.

IIRC as far back as the falklans war it was demonstrated that naval ships were very vulnerable to missles, I think argentina sunk/damaged some british ships and that was argentina 20 years ago.

[NewTeaBag]

PS Them there Cruisers and Carriers go for over a $1Billion a pop and carry thousands of sailors so are a bit more difficult to explain away to the country than another foot soldier blown away by an IED. IOW right or wrong, ANY attack on Iran would require serious preparation and execution and is not as simple as "we'd kick those crazy Iranian's arses" as some might like to believe.

[asterion]

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according to reports in the Russian media

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I'm not too worried about this.

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lol, me neither

[/ QUOTE ]Hey now, remember that "Pravda" means "truth".

[Spud CA]

I had posted this as an individual thread:
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showfl...e=0#Post9826355

I received a message from iron81 asking me to repost in another Iran thread. Just following instructions. This is my first post as Spud CA and I have just signed up with 2+2 today.

I would like the repliers to my reply post to address the following points which I will address myself:
1. Are we going to preemptively strike Iran? Please explain why yes or no. If no skip the rest of the questions.
2. What is your time estimate for when and why?
3. To what extent can Iran hurt us and our interests if we hit them?
4. How will all this affect our stock market?

I think the standoff with Iran will lead to military conflict. It is clear to me that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons. They seem to be getting closer and closer to attaining this goal. I don’t see our administration allowing Iran to turn nuclear. If they do, our administration knows that Hezbollah has cells in USA and other countries. Iran will no doubt make this technology available to Hezbollah which will in turn find ways to smuggle these weapons onto American soil. It’ll be Iran’s form of strategic nuclear deterrence similar to how we have Ohio class submarines armed with nuclear SLBMs, namely, Trident missiles.

Much to our chagrin, Iran continues to interfere in Iraq, Lebanon and Palestinian territories. In so many different ways, Iran has made it clear that they will not only halt their meddling but assist us in the region as long as we provide approval or even tacit approval to their nuclear program. They are not backing down from their nuclear program. They are pursuing it with whatever might they have.

Now that I am clear in my thinking that we will hit Iran, I say it will be happening sooner rather than later. Us waiting will only further their advancement in reaching their nuclear goal. Us waiting will only cause our slow bleed in Iraq and Afghanistan to continue. Bush would not want to wait till the end of his term to call such a strike. As such, I see us striking Iran April-May 2007 timeframe.

Sure, Iran is no match to our mighty military and fine tuned war machine but Iran can strike back in many ways. First, Iran has a massive indigenously manufactured missile force with wide ranges. All of our military bases in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Bahrain, UAE and elsewhere in the region as well as even some bases in Europe are within the reach of Iranian missiles. Our naval fleets in the Persian Gulf where we currently have two super carrier groups are certainly within the reach of their missiles particularly their advanced anti-ship missiles. Just FYI, the USS Stennis and the USS Eisenhower carrier groups are currently in the Persian Gulf.

Iran most likely has massive missile arsenals deployed to numerous locations within its borders. Now sure, our bases as well as naval vessels are protected with ABM batteries such as the Patriot but when Iran launches 100 missiles at a location, how many can our Patriot missile batteries intercept. My point is that some of their missiles will reach their targets.

In Iraq, we’ll see Shi’a forces loyal to Iran and even Iranian agents take on covert operations against us. We can kiss goodbye any transportation whether in armored vehicles or helicopters, Iran has the technology to penetrate our finest armor and bring down our best helicopters. Pro-Iranian forces in Iraq are known to posses Katyusha rockets, advanced anti-tank missiles and MANPADS. In Lebanon, expect Hezbollah to deploy its forces and bring down the Lebanese government. Also expect attacks on Israel from Hamas and/or Hezbollah. Also, Iran has agents in the West. Expect suicide attacks and/or other action on American soil.

Iran possesses some state of the art Russian air defense system equipment such as Tor-M1 and S-300PMU-1. Iran also posses advanced Sukhoi and Mig fighter jets not to mention a few F-14 Tomcats that are still in service. One thing that Iran has proven is that its forces are very well trained and that it is skilled in guerilla warfare. While I think we can at the end of the day prevail over Iran, that would come at a heavy price in terms of American casualties, damage to our interests and cost. With how the Iraq war has been going, I am not sure we can stomach a war with Iran not that that will inhibit Bush from moving forward with such an undertaking.

To destroy Iran’s military capabilities, we’ll have to strike multiple targets repeatedly. Iran was smart enough to spread out their military industry and many of their high value sites are buried deep under ground. That’ll require high number of air sorties with repeated strikes.

Finally, I will comment on what effect this will have on the stock market. Traditionally, stock markets go up in times of war. To be more specific, stock markets usually go down during buildup and go up when bullets start flying. In this instance, I believe that war with Iran will have deleterious effects on our economy as a whole and of course on the stock market. Iran will most likely cause temporary closure (in the order of two weeks) to the Strait of Hormuz where a third of the world’s oil goes through. Iran will strike at oil facilities in the region. In other words, expect the price of oil to skyrocket and stay very high for weeks. Massive American loss of life will have a major effect onto our collective psyches brining down moral. In addition, to oil installation expect Iran and its proxies to strike at other American interests in the region. I would expect stock market to take a solid hit if we hit Iran. In the initial phase of a war with Iran, I see stock market dropping 10-20%.

As you can see, I presented how I feel about the four questions I posed above and why I think what I think. I am curious to hear what others think on these matters. Please break down where you stand. I have no problem with someone disagreeing with me. In fact, I really hope I am wrong about my grim assessment for the sake of all of us. In the end, the real question is: is a war with Iran worth it or would we better served allowing them to acquire nuclear weapons?