Thanks for the response. The main Iraq comparison that I see here is on the "facts" about Iran's uranium enrichment and its development of delivery systems. This smells like another big batch of yellowcake to me. Among other things --
- The IAEA director said in a press conference on March 2 that the Iranians were not close to having a bomb.
- There's no evidence Iran has resumed enrichment of uranium since last June's strikes. In fact, the two sites that had the capacity to do that were heavily damaged and, according to satellite imaging, have not resumed operations.
- If there are activities so deeply buried at Esfahan or some other location that they're operational now, our bombs have no ability to impact them. The only way to get rid of those capabilities is to put boots on the ground.
- There's no evidence Iran is anywhere close to developing a ballistic missile that could fly more than about 2,000 km, which means the continental US and most of Europe are not at risk of a missile fired from Iran.
The evidence we have seen so far is overwhelming that this war has little, if anything, to do with Iran's nuclear or ballistic missile programs. It DOES appear to be motivated by Israel's long-term plan for regime change and the US's decision to fight that battle with Israel. I agree we can disagree as to whether that justifies what we're doing, but I do think we need to be clear-eyed about why we're doing it. Failing to do that led to an absolute shitshow in Iraq, and this one has the potential to be much worse than that.
