Great column, Matt … Realpolitik indeed! I think the future is ‘unknown and unknowable’ but at least there is a crack of daylight available for the Iranian people that wasn’t there on Friday…
I certainly won't mourn Khamenei's death, nor that of his regime if it does fall. Let's just hope that the aftermath is a wee bit cleaner than Libya or Syria's. You'd also think that there's a bunch of countries with Russian supplied air defenses that are really regretting their purchases, and that Putin is not having a nice weekend.
China, Russia and Iran recently signed a trilateral strategic charter. China was finalizing a deal to supply Iran CM-302 low flying, supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles which would give a ship’s (ie aircraft carrier) defensive systems seconds to react instead of minutes. This could raise the risk to the U.S. navy significantly.
Also Russia signed an air defense deal with Iran in December for 500 advanced man portable air defence launch systems and 2,500 missiles. Delivery scheduled 2027 through 2029.
These weapons had potential to change the outcome.
The same China that is now being hailed as a more reliable partner than the US. Climate Barbie was right, if you say the same thing long enough and loud enough people will believe you.
A bit off topic, but I was surprised when McKenna left. Trudeau's magic touch with women? I disliked her policies, but they were so stupid they must have come from the ever dictatorial PMO.
I hadn't heard that before. McKenna, while not my favorite minister, at least understood her portfolio and worked on it. Folks like Diab, the new immigration minister seem to be in way over their heads.
Waiting for the announcement that Canadian troops will transition from
C7s to China’s infantry standard weapon(QBZ191). For strategic commonality of course.
Of course it’ll take about 30 or more years to allow for setting up a factory in Quebec and translating operating and maintenance manuals to French and English. 🙄
I believe a lot of what is going on globally is the US response to China's financial plays. China has been financing Iran for years, Iran has been financing the Muslim Brotherhood, and the Muslim Brotherhood has successfully infected western countries with anti-western propaganda.
Will beheading Iran be enough to stifle global Islam, or will Qatar pick up the slack? I love the idea of Samidoun being unable to pay their protesters.
Matt, your analysis is quite credible and historically speaking, very well-founded.
You did write something, though, that caused my eyebrows to crawl up towards my hairline:
QUOTE
We also all know, or should, that there is tremendous opportunity here for the people of Iran to seize for themselves the future they so richly deserve, and leave the world a better place for it...
END QUOTE
A number of UK-based commentators have questioned this very notion (that the people of Iran can seize power for themselves in this context).
I think that this is unlikely in the near term, for no matter how much ordnance is rained down from the air upon critical Iranian infrastructure, the consensus would appear to be that elements of the regime would persist. Moreover, there appears to be no "alternative government" or credible resistance movement waiting in the wings.
This suggests that the outcome of the war, beyond the killing of top officials like the Ayatollah Khamenei, will be a vexed and fractious conflict lasting months, if not years, and featuring clashes between competing regime factions more focused on killing each other than on seeing to the welfare of the Iranian people.
*** I hope I'm wrong. ***
But those who believe in a quick and effective popular uprising in Iran seem to be ignoring many important realities about the country.
About 80% of Iranians hate the regime and are behind Pahlavi's government in waiting. Yes, there are many hurdles ahead, but never discount the power of an angry populace yearning for change.
I'm not so sure about Pahlavi having much support within Iran. He might be popular outside it, but there's a lot of suspicion of him just the same. The Hub had a podcast a few weeks back with Kaveh Shahrooz and he expressed a lot of concern with Pahlavi's efforts to suppress any other groups from gaining attention. I think this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgf2d8gsy70
This was published the day before the attacks, and is a very interesting read on regime insiders: https://archive.is/XPfj5
Majoritity of Canadians dont hate Carney. They are smart enough to see he is a completely different PM and has been slowly turning the direction on many of JTs files and is rather centrist appearing.
I’m going by the % of Canadians who didn’t vote for the liberals in the last election. And by the polling numbers prior to Carney’s takeover. I agree hate may be too strong a word in Carney’s case right now but it certainly would apply in Trudeau’s case at the end of his regime. And as long as Carney carries on with Trudeau era policies and the sycophantic Trudeau appointed cabinet members this won’t help his cause IMO
It will definitely be more difficult with the IRGC and proxy militias still (somewhat) intact and armed to the teeth while the civilian population has no natural leadership ready after the barbarous takedown and butcher of the protesters that began their latest fight over two months ago. There will be different factions trying to rise up from the vacuum in leadership including the Reza Pahlavi but that could end up being an internal skirmish that may take years to settle much like past adventures in regime change like Libya et al.
I assume that the IRGC, etc. were staffed at levels appropriate to the status quo. Bombing will reduce those levels and the survivors will scatter and try to hide amongst the population. Any groups of soldiers will be targeted by Israel and/or by civilians. I wouldn't put it past Mossad to have been arming selected civilians over the last two months.
I could be wrong, but it seems to me the leadership of Artesh is not being targeted for elimination to the same degree as the other two military branches (IRGC and LEC). This may be strategic in the hopes of regime 'alteration' without going full bore for regime 'change'. And I keep hearing that term 'alteration' from US/Israeli military leaders. Maybe it means something, maybe it doesn't. But a functional if degraded military would go a long way reestablishing a functional nation if it supported a non death cult, transitional leader like Pahlavi paints himself to be.
Commentators like the Financial Times’ Gideon Rachman, Emile Hokayem of the ISS and Sanam Vakil, Middle East director at Chatham House, have all raised what I believe to have been compelling doubts about the likelihood of an immediate regime change.
They have also underscored the difficulty of regime change in the absence of organized and well-established opposition groups.
One thing I’m curious about is whether Canada sees a dramatic decrease in the number and size of the Palestinian protests that have occurred over the past few years. They were too well planned and strategic for me to believe it was a ground swell movement. We may find out that it was Iranian regime money that was behind a lot of it.
Interesting point. Even stuff like "who bought all those several hundred dollar new tents that appeared in King's College Circle at U of T" has gone unanswered.
I think a surprising number of the otherwise inexplicable destabilizing events taking place in the West in the last 15 years were a result of enemy nation support and psyops, including and especially the entire "woke" ideological movement. It and its backlash (probably also amplified by bad actors) have done more to undermine Western democracies than anything else since the Cold War.
Funny that. I bet China/Russia/Iran each have a network of bot farms designed to stir up shit on a bunch of fronts online. Boost the most divisive content, help elect the most regime-friendly or the most domestically harmful political parties in any given western country, boost fringe regional separatist movements, etc.
Like I suggested, I think their masterstroke was leveraging the genuine tolerance and sustainable diversity achieved by developed nations up to the 2010's against us by promoting ultra-divisive politically correct over-correction, demonization of whites and men, promotion of uncontrolled legal and illegal immigration, and creation of a nativist backlash. These currents led to the elevation of destructive figures like both Justin Trudeau on the left and Donald Trump on the right, whose main political asset seemed to be their cartoonish-level divisiveness.
It stands to reason that we have been in the midst of an international cyber propaganda war since around 2012-2014 when things started to get weird. Before this it still seemed like we were headed in an upward trajectory and adults were more or less in charge.
Agreed. I don't think it's by any measure conspiracy thinking to imagine that the West has been interfered with culturally for that span of time. Xi Jinping knows the West very well, and he is known to be well steeped in the history of the Opium Wars. A culture grown weak with the assumption that its success is inevitable is already vulnerable to wrecking itself...you just need to feed the impulse with the irresistible tools of self-destruction.
I would think so. The Muslim Brotherhood (financed by Iran) might have trouble getting money for Hamas and anti-western propaganda campaigns. Then again destabilizing the west might have a few more donors.
Whenever we ask why Trump did something, there's always the possibility of something trite, or stupid, or impulsive or all three. In terms of US strategic interests, however, it may not be a coincidence that the US has now gone after another (after Venezuela) big supplier of discounted oil to China.
It's completely surprising that no mention of the Iran's relationships with Russia and China was made, when the fall of this regime will likely affect the balance of power long term.
If one thinks of the long term consequences of these actions and specifically how it affects China, it makes a lot more sense.
Don't forget that China has a demographic bomb on its hands and that it may prove to be more of a paper tiger than we think.
There is definitely a connection. My thoughts are that Iran was far closer to the bomb than we realized. That would explain why the rest of the Middle East had thrown their support so clearly behind the US.
"I confess that I’m honestly somewhat uncertain how to explain the choice by the U.S. to side with Israel and launch this campaign."
One word: China.
The explanation? Lots of words.
Iran under the ayatollahs is itself is all about China, it's Chinese weapon systems, its strategic alliance, its exporter of proxy groups intended to turn the Middle East into a quagmire requiring long term US involvement (China's main adversary to its global expansion and dominance), its use of Chinese IT technology and social control mechanisms (the same ones Trudeau had lined up for its - check notes: stolen from Northern Telecom by Chinese 'students' and 'temporary workers' of our 5G network and digital ID 'benefits' of such tech to governmental monitoring of its citizens, as well as ammunition for our military weapons but that's a different story), and especially its arrangement with China as the buyer of its sanctioned oil and recipient of China's satellite imagery for Iran's Iron Age Houthis proxy disrupting western trade by missiles and drones. Iran is (was) the central figure of China's global outreach program to move as much US military focus away from Taiwan as possible and on the opposite end of the globe while, at the same time, using Iran as the central location for setting up the Belt and Road initiative projects throughout the region and Africa (IIRC Saudi Arabia - like Canada - just announced a 'strategic partnership' with China to this end). Adding the nuclear threat Iran's mullahs always posed on top of all this while fooling the majority of westerners that 'negotiations' with Iranian officials were in way meaningful or productive towards achieving lasting peace and prosperity (never on the table) reached a tipping point. As Senator Lindsay pointed out way back in mid January following the mass murdering of tens of thousands of Iranians, if the ayatollahs are going to kill their own citizens protesting for a better life, Donald Trump is going to kill them.
So we knew it was coming (but let's keep talking about Greenland while US carrier groups are on the move into the region). And it specifically targeted the US versus Iran. To have some kind of equivalent regime alteration in Iran as something similar to Venezuela meant requiring the use of superior Israeli intelligence (with military experience and capability offered as a very useful component to deepening ties between the only Middle East liberal democracy and its major benefactor: very much a strategic alliance for both). Israel just so happens to the a nation that has been the main victim of Iran's destabilizing regional designs (thank you KGB for successfully painting Israel as an 'illegitimate aggressor' and thank you, MSM, for pushing this Soviet inspired narrative utilizing religious intolerance so effectively (whodathunk the Jews might be a handy scapegoat and what better longitudinal victim than the 'Palestinians' whose nation building designs and negotiators never fail to miss an opportunity?).
In other words, Israel needs the US to combat Iran and the US needs Israel to combat China's designs through Iran. Add to the mix the number of westerners generally, and US citizens specifically, killed and cowed by Iran's well funded advancing terrorism and we have an alignment of factors Trump recognizes as beneficial to him politically go thwart China's long term goals while setting an example every government in the world recognizes to be a pretty strong negotiating tactic-by-example when negotiations with the US are strategically important to the US. It's realpolitik in action. Canadians would be well served to recognize what all this means and stop being such idiots when it comes to supporting 'strategic partnerships' with China.
Carole, I repeat my previous comment (I know, ad nauseum, right?) that the MOU is a Potemkin village; the MOU is in all respects a facade that is meant to look like something substantive but will not actually produce a new pipeline. Put differently, the MOU was a political document (duh!) but the politics was meant to be different for each of Alberta and the feds. Alberta got to claim that it would get a pipeline and MC got to claim that there would be a pipeline to his friends in China (before he went there in January) and he was able to "reassure" his green supporters that there were many "safeguards" [you should correctly read "traps for Alberta"] in the MOU.
As to Canadians thinking China more reliable than the US, that is totally a) astounding, asinine, so beyond belief, yada, yada, yada; and b) entirely predictable given the stupid anti-American attitude of most Canadians and the laziness of the media in examining what China is and what it wants from Canada.
In any event, I continue to think that the MOU will crash and burn. The interesting thing to me is if it will so crash and burn before or after the referendum. My wish? That the MOU very, very loudly crashes and burns, oh, about two weeks before the referendum and that DS condemns the perfidy of the feds as she makes the announcement.
I consider the Carney's MOUs and speeches to be political theatre, as reliable as his election promises. Like "impossible things at unprecedented speed."
I believe that trashing Carney's MOU is an obligation for not just Albertans but all Canadians, and it can't be trashed often enough.
According to AI 30% of Canadians think China is a more reliable trading partner. I tend to think that 30% of Canadians should spend more time listening to outlets not associated with the MSM.
And yes, a couple of weeks prior to the referendum would be the perfect timing for Carney to cave and Smith to stand up for an independent Alberta.
Bang on assessment! The fall of the current regime in Iran is certainly a setback
but not a defeat for China and its" China Dream" of Chinese National Rejuvenation by its centenary in 2049. China's long term geopolitical strategy is to transform the Nation into a global leader in comprehensive National strength, technology, and international influence (if not control). The Chinese vision involves a system of Sinocentric global order that not only challenges but stops the existing US led, rules based international framework in favour of a more pluralistic strongly influenced Chinese world stage.
The Chinese goal of basic modernization by 2035 has resulted in a totally modernized army and Navy with around two million personnel, new ships and Airforce being built at ten times what the US is turning out, not to mention Beijing's goal of technological superiority by quickly advancing core technologies in AI and semiconductors, aiming to dominate world supply. Their goal of undermining US dominance is based on a multi-regional world order where countries (Canada included) establish cooperative ties with Beijing rather than alliances solely with the US.
China is aggressively defending its' interests in the South China Sea and Taiwan with its' new super-fast , drone equipped, navy gunboats armed with Aircraft Carrier destructive missiles. China's Belt and Road initiative (BRI) in Eurasia is securing energy routes and financial ties to Beijing including the expanded use of the Yuan for trading in the hopes of reducing the dependence on the US dollar. China wants to be the new center of Global order and its one purpose is to remove the US hegemony and at the same time eliminating Russian expansionist goals.
I've heard the goal for military modernization and active deployment has been set for the 'reunification' of Taiwan with China in 2027. (Nice of Canada to pay a mere $10 billion for 4 of the new troop carriers - BC refers to these as 'ferries' I believe.)
Yes. Xi has ordered the PLA to be ready to "reunify" Taiwan by 2027. I'm sure the "ferries" will be ready to transport some "assistants" to explain things to the Taiwanese,
"Left unchecked, the math led to a devastating fork: accept Iranian nuclear breakout behind a missile shield too thick to penetrate, or fight a war in the Middle East with stockpiles earmarked for the Taiwan Strait. Beijing had engineered precisely this dilemma. Operation Epic Fury represented the decision to prevent that choice from ever arriving. By destroying the missiles, the United States turned years of Chinese strategic investment and billions in transferred technology to ash."
And never any mention of what he should pivot to. 16 months of shaking my head and thinking Poilievre is on the right track: ignore Trump as much as possible and focus on fixing Canada. I don't really see much difference between the latest speech and his speech of March 1, 2025 - the one that unfortunately mentioned "biological clock".
I think I over reacted, but it was a column bashing Alberta separatists, and something about owning it.
I come at folks wanting to leave Canada from the perspective of losing practically everything during the NEP years. While I don't think that life is fair, I cannot get behind a government that wilfully destroyed the lives of its citizens. (Rant over)
At least your mini rant was, just that: mini. Oh, and well argued. I also lived through those years and I have (obviously) lived through the subsequent years, particularly the last ten years.
As for those who roll their eyes at the mention of the NEP and tell us to "Get over it, already!" I respond, "Nope, never going to happen."
Those folks who tell us to "Get over it" never had to listen to Marc Lalonde (for you younguns' he was the federal Finance Minister) justify the NEP as being designed to protect Eastern Canada - particularly Montreal and Toronto - by controlling the wealth generated by Alberta. In other words, he said that the financial center of Canada had to be prevented from moving west.
It has been a long while since I have spent so much time in a The Line comment section and learned so much. There are still some great people following The Line.
I don't agree with Jen on her take about the politics here in Alberta but that is okay, she is quite allowed her psychosis. Now, having said that, I do agree that it is tiresome to essentially be told just how dumb I am for the ten millionth time.
Jen, have your opinion but, please, you are far more talented than a continual rant city on essentially one topic.
There. I said it.
G & G, I will continue to read The Line simply because both our editors (and they are OUR editors, thankfully) are immensely talented - as Mr. Gurney has shown today. But the continuous ranting is tiresome. Please accept the implied warning.
Exactly this. That and JG’s incessant US hate mongering. She’s got waaaay way too much air time in what’s supposed to be a 2-way conversation. Matt’s interesting, worthwhile, one learns a lot when he speaks.
Great column Mat. I had never thought about the comparison you draw between Pearl Harbour and Oct. 7...but it should have been obvious. The Iranians have been poking the western Bears for decades...about bloody time, that the reality of what they were doing was spelled out in pretty devastating terms.
Is there a China angle to this action? The US seems to be systematically weakening China's allies: Russia, Cuba, Venezuela and now Iran. This could be a demonstration of America's still unparalleled technological, military, economic and even diplomatic supremecy. China would might be able to lead on one or two of those fronts, but not all four. It could also be an attempt to slow China's natural resource grab. The Americans merely need to slow China's military and economic ascent long enough until aging demographics and American digital imperialism eat away at the CCP.
I wouldn't be surprised if Israeli and American military action targets Iran's drone supply chain. This would be a blow to Russia.
Of course all of this 3D chess could go very wrong.
There is indeed a China angle, and I am wondering how Carney is going to navigate this, now that China is his new best friend AND he's given a statement in support of Israeli and American actions.
China isn't Canada's new best friend. Canada trades less with China than do other developed economies. Doubling trade to China, for example, would still leave it far behind the share with the US, but would provide some diversification and leverage.
lol . Working on tariffs and the trade we do with a very large trading partner (that we will continue to be trading in large numbers with regardless of the party in power) does not make them our best friend. Good lord.
What Canadian parliamentarian wouldn't benefit from the new and improved 'exchange' program... and see how to say, 'Yes Boss' with the best of them? What journalist wouldn't benefit from risking imprisonment with the new and improved 'journalist exchange' program? I mean, so many two-way benefits! And, of course, closer cooperation between the RCMP and Chinese police 'requests' is what any two freedom-loving, mutually respectful partners and equals would do, wouldn't they? (A 'strategic' opportunity, I think, for more Canadians to practice saying that parliamentary one... but this time with much more enthusiasm!)
Very astute. How such a drooling, stupid, ignorant narcissist as Trump could ever align a series of US actions by Oval Office direction that just so happen to have a very clear target (China) adversely affected by the systemic removal of Chinese proxy states from the global playing board of realpolitik (starting in the western hemisphere and moving outwards to different continents) is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.
I suspect - I would love to be wrong - that Jen will call this unbelievable assertion of an effective repositioning of US strategic interests by such a fool as an idiotic belief held by delusional people that therefore "Trump is playing 4D chess..." and I will be sad.
I will be sad because understanding what appears to many much smarter and better educated people than I to be a volatile and inconsistent Trump whose mind changes as often as the hour of the day is just that: a coincidence. Believing it's organized and intentional - because that's what the evidence shows us to be the case - is held only by gullible people. Everybody knows Trump is a fool. Just listen to him. That's what many smart believe - because they WANT to believe it to fit in with all these other smart people who believe it. It's EASY to believe it. Trump goes out of his way to convince people to believe it! But, as has been said since Trump first came to power: watch what he does. Call it 4D chess if you must but it's pretty straight forward even if very ballsy. And what he's doing here through targeted foreign policy is advancing US strategic interests. You nailed it.
Granted, Trump is also doing a lot of other stuff, a lot of it very negative causing long term harm, most notably pissing people off, insulting and belittling others, getting rich, and advancing his own political power at the expense of other people and countries. All true and one does not have to be a member of Mensa to grasp this.
But when it comes to battling China, Trump is far and away the best President the west has ever produced, the one the west needs if we don't want to be Chinese proxy states. Of course, a surprising number of people throughout the west do want to become members of a Chinese proxy state because they believe - sorry, they KNOW - Trump is Bad and so any other alternative must therefore be (at least better if not) good... a fine example of 4D chess on display by such chattering classes who - apparently - simply don't know any better than to assume a totalitarian slave directing chauvinistic regime is somehow 'better' a strategic partner than the 'terrible' US.
Tildeb, I agree that DJT is terrifically misunderstood.
Now, please don't take my above comment or what follows as praise of DJT. He is, in so many respect odious but there is much more than that.
Put differently, people see the buffoon that he plays to perfection - and he is a buffoon so often. To me, some of his buffoonery is deliberate to cause people to underestimate him and some is just Donnie being Donnie (and I suspect that Donnie fully understands this and is laughing at observers while he enjoys whatever, whatever). But there is clearly much more than buffoonery and so, so, so many people just cannot see past the buffoonery.
Clearly, he is a narcissist but that does not mean that he is stupid. Clearly he does some stupid things but that doesn't mean that he only does stupid things.
I expect that by the end of his term in three years time his detractors will still be legion and will still dominate the public discourse; what will be interesting will be to see how history treats him. I won't be around for history's decision as I am almost a contemporary of DJT but others of the readers of these posts may have the opportunity in subsequent years.
“It is interesting that the Americans have not actually declared War on Iran. But they most likely don't want to or must. However, bombs and military steel take no notice of those impediments to total war. This will be a conflict under the heading of "A Blockade" – aka to lay siege - which have been used throughout history as a military strategy to prevent an enemy from receiving supplies, or in this case exporting supplies as well, thereby weakening their ability to fight. In this case the export of oil will further cripple the finances of Iran. There are land routes for oil to be exported from Iran, and the American navy is powerful to police the sea routes and the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic chokepoint for seaborne oil that Iran has long used as a geopolitical bargaining chip, with Tehran repeatedly threatening to close it during times of crisis. But can America block the land routes? There will be no "boots on the ground" from the Americans and the success or failure of this venture will depend on how American diplomacy can hold their friends and repel their enemies until the fog of war clears and there is "regime change" in Iran. What the next regime to rise will be is the burning question and will require billions and billions of Western dollars to achieve. Israel will be happy at these events and fearful of what comes regime comes next. Trump and his administration will get little recognition in the mainstream media, and no doubt the NEWS outlets headed by CNN will begin their usual attack of the POTUS and his strong and necessary action America has taken to begin the dismantling of the Iranian Satan that has stood astride the middle east like a dreadful colossus, a monster that their regime has become with it's avowed mission to annihilate Israel and finance terrorism, death and destruction through its multiple portals aka Hamas, Hezbollah. the al-Quds Brigades, al-Qaeda, Boko Haram and the list goes on, all financed partially or wholly by Iran.”
As someone who is old enough to absolutely remember the 1979 Iranian Revolution unfolding through its first decade, I watched in horror as a former westernized, modern country morphed steadily into a theocratic medieval prison for many of its citizens, most of them too poor or simply having the misfortune of being born with two X chromosomes. The latter reality really made an impression on me, watching on TV in disbelief the women of Iran gradually being dragged backward in time, dehumanized, repressed, tortured, abused, subjugated, and routinely murdered. All this while growing up as a Canadian male youth through to young adulthood in the late 1970s-80s watching the exact opposite track happening for women. I was taught all my young male life by my family, friends, teachers, mentors, and the broader AmeriCanadian culture that women were my equal, that they were to be respected, honoured, and cherished. The tragedy of Iran, particularly for its women, made an enormous impression on me. Through my entire adult life over the last four decades, things only got worse for Iran's women, and, as I increasingly realized, for women across the suddenly widespread Arab world where this specific brand of Islamic theocratic repression dominated. It has always sickened me. I can and will never understand Western women who have deluded themselves that women who live in those conditions do so by choice. At this point, at least two generations of women living in Iran have never understood there was a choice.
I couldn't take my eyes away yesterday watching the Ayatollah and key leaders finally meeting their maker yesterday. As Matt notes, we can debate how America and Israel went about this. Matt has done an admirable job of outlining how October 7th was the turning point for Israel, and I concur completely with his analysis of their resolve. They'd had enough of waiting for the world to help them fix the issue. America has helped them, after they showed America what determined resolve could accomplish.
I mourn all the innocents caught in this hellish conflict through my entire five decades of life watching the Middle East and it's pathogens spread like a virus throughout the world.
Yesterday, my heart and my thoughts were for the women of Iran. My hope is that, though their path forward from yesterday may still be daunting, that perhaps for the first time in nearly fifty years there might be a glimmer of hope that their lives, their prospects, their futures, might hold some new, brighter, happier opportunities.
Great column, Matt … Realpolitik indeed! I think the future is ‘unknown and unknowable’ but at least there is a crack of daylight available for the Iranian people that wasn’t there on Friday…
I certainly won't mourn Khamenei's death, nor that of his regime if it does fall. Let's just hope that the aftermath is a wee bit cleaner than Libya or Syria's. You'd also think that there's a bunch of countries with Russian supplied air defenses that are really regretting their purchases, and that Putin is not having a nice weekend.
On the question of "Why now?":
China, Russia and Iran recently signed a trilateral strategic charter. China was finalizing a deal to supply Iran CM-302 low flying, supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles which would give a ship’s (ie aircraft carrier) defensive systems seconds to react instead of minutes. This could raise the risk to the U.S. navy significantly.
Also Russia signed an air defense deal with Iran in December for 500 advanced man portable air defence launch systems and 2,500 missiles. Delivery scheduled 2027 through 2029.
These weapons had potential to change the outcome.
https://dsm.forecastinternational.com/2026/02/27/iran-turned-to-russia-china-for-missiles-after-12-day-war/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Would that be the same China that our PM has just signed strategic agreements with???
The same China that is building troop carriers, I mean ferries for BC.
The same China that is now being hailed as a more reliable partner than the US. Climate Barbie was right, if you say the same thing long enough and loud enough people will believe you.
A bit off topic, but I was surprised when McKenna left. Trudeau's magic touch with women? I disliked her policies, but they were so stupid they must have come from the ever dictatorial PMO.
Apparently her husband had a hand in her leaving. He did not care for Trudeau and what he was doing to Canada.
I hadn't heard that before. McKenna, while not my favorite minister, at least understood her portfolio and worked on it. Folks like Diab, the new immigration minister seem to be in way over their heads.
Waiting for the announcement that Canadian troops will transition from
C7s to China’s infantry standard weapon(QBZ191). For strategic commonality of course.
Of course it’ll take about 30 or more years to allow for setting up a factory in Quebec and translating operating and maintenance manuals to French and English. 🙄
There zre idle vaccine plants available in Laval ($180M) and Quebec City ($283M).
Would be a good start I guess. Wonder what it would cost to convert them to produce rifles and maybe ammo?
Depends on the federal subsidies available, my son. The larger the subsidies, the larger the opportunities for graft.
Billions, probably. And, as with vaccines and Covid, it'll be finished years too late.
I believe a lot of what is going on globally is the US response to China's financial plays. China has been financing Iran for years, Iran has been financing the Muslim Brotherhood, and the Muslim Brotherhood has successfully infected western countries with anti-western propaganda.
Will beheading Iran be enough to stifle global Islam, or will Qatar pick up the slack? I love the idea of Samidoun being unable to pay their protesters.
I wish I knew. I can't remember who else financed the Muslim Brotherhood, but it wasn't just Iran.
Qatar. But the US has a base there and they gave Trump a plane, so no hope of fixing that.
Very good points.
Matt, your analysis is quite credible and historically speaking, very well-founded.
You did write something, though, that caused my eyebrows to crawl up towards my hairline:
QUOTE
We also all know, or should, that there is tremendous opportunity here for the people of Iran to seize for themselves the future they so richly deserve, and leave the world a better place for it...
END QUOTE
A number of UK-based commentators have questioned this very notion (that the people of Iran can seize power for themselves in this context).
I think that this is unlikely in the near term, for no matter how much ordnance is rained down from the air upon critical Iranian infrastructure, the consensus would appear to be that elements of the regime would persist. Moreover, there appears to be no "alternative government" or credible resistance movement waiting in the wings.
This suggests that the outcome of the war, beyond the killing of top officials like the Ayatollah Khamenei, will be a vexed and fractious conflict lasting months, if not years, and featuring clashes between competing regime factions more focused on killing each other than on seeing to the welfare of the Iranian people.
*** I hope I'm wrong. ***
But those who believe in a quick and effective popular uprising in Iran seem to be ignoring many important realities about the country.
About 80% of Iranians hate the regime and are behind Pahlavi's government in waiting. Yes, there are many hurdles ahead, but never discount the power of an angry populace yearning for change.
I'm not so sure about Pahlavi having much support within Iran. He might be popular outside it, but there's a lot of suspicion of him just the same. The Hub had a podcast a few weeks back with Kaveh Shahrooz and he expressed a lot of concern with Pahlavi's efforts to suppress any other groups from gaining attention. I think this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgf2d8gsy70
This was published the day before the attacks, and is a very interesting read on regime insiders: https://archive.is/XPfj5
Like the power of the majority of Canadians who hate the Trudeau/Carney regime?
Sadly Polievre is no Pahlavi.
Majoritity of Canadians dont hate Carney. They are smart enough to see he is a completely different PM and has been slowly turning the direction on many of JTs files and is rather centrist appearing.
I’m going by the % of Canadians who didn’t vote for the liberals in the last election. And by the polling numbers prior to Carney’s takeover. I agree hate may be too strong a word in Carney’s case right now but it certainly would apply in Trudeau’s case at the end of his regime. And as long as Carney carries on with Trudeau era policies and the sycophantic Trudeau appointed cabinet members this won’t help his cause IMO
It will definitely be more difficult with the IRGC and proxy militias still (somewhat) intact and armed to the teeth while the civilian population has no natural leadership ready after the barbarous takedown and butcher of the protesters that began their latest fight over two months ago. There will be different factions trying to rise up from the vacuum in leadership including the Reza Pahlavi but that could end up being an internal skirmish that may take years to settle much like past adventures in regime change like Libya et al.
Precisely this. Thank you.
"...elements of the regime would persist."
I assume that the IRGC, etc. were staffed at levels appropriate to the status quo. Bombing will reduce those levels and the survivors will scatter and try to hide amongst the population. Any groups of soldiers will be targeted by Israel and/or by civilians. I wouldn't put it past Mossad to have been arming selected civilians over the last two months.
I hope I am right.
I could be wrong, but it seems to me the leadership of Artesh is not being targeted for elimination to the same degree as the other two military branches (IRGC and LEC). This may be strategic in the hopes of regime 'alteration' without going full bore for regime 'change'. And I keep hearing that term 'alteration' from US/Israeli military leaders. Maybe it means something, maybe it doesn't. But a functional if degraded military would go a long way reestablishing a functional nation if it supported a non death cult, transitional leader like Pahlavi paints himself to be.
I'll go a step further: I am probably wrong and I have to defer to your deeper analysis.
I hope Mossad carries on the good work once the air war is over.
After the END QUOTE, total MISREAD.
Commentators like the Financial Times’ Gideon Rachman, Emile Hokayem of the ISS and Sanam Vakil, Middle East director at Chatham House, have all raised what I believe to have been compelling doubts about the likelihood of an immediate regime change.
They have also underscored the difficulty of regime change in the absence of organized and well-established opposition groups.
One thing I’m curious about is whether Canada sees a dramatic decrease in the number and size of the Palestinian protests that have occurred over the past few years. They were too well planned and strategic for me to believe it was a ground swell movement. We may find out that it was Iranian regime money that was behind a lot of it.
Interesting point. Even stuff like "who bought all those several hundred dollar new tents that appeared in King's College Circle at U of T" has gone unanswered.
I think a surprising number of the otherwise inexplicable destabilizing events taking place in the West in the last 15 years were a result of enemy nation support and psyops, including and especially the entire "woke" ideological movement. It and its backlash (probably also amplified by bad actors) have done more to undermine Western democracies than anything else since the Cold War.
KRM, you identify a great sucking black hole smack in the middle of why we are failing to come to grips with our era of cultural upheaval in the West. Could it be that the yawning chasm revealed itself just a little when Iran's leaders set to murdering their own people and hoping it could prevent the world knowing just how bad it was: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15458991/Pro-Scottish-independence-accounts-X-dark-Iran-internet-blackout-experts-revealed-thousands-posts-linked-Tehran-regime.html
Funny that. I bet China/Russia/Iran each have a network of bot farms designed to stir up shit on a bunch of fronts online. Boost the most divisive content, help elect the most regime-friendly or the most domestically harmful political parties in any given western country, boost fringe regional separatist movements, etc.
Like I suggested, I think their masterstroke was leveraging the genuine tolerance and sustainable diversity achieved by developed nations up to the 2010's against us by promoting ultra-divisive politically correct over-correction, demonization of whites and men, promotion of uncontrolled legal and illegal immigration, and creation of a nativist backlash. These currents led to the elevation of destructive figures like both Justin Trudeau on the left and Donald Trump on the right, whose main political asset seemed to be their cartoonish-level divisiveness.
It stands to reason that we have been in the midst of an international cyber propaganda war since around 2012-2014 when things started to get weird. Before this it still seemed like we were headed in an upward trajectory and adults were more or less in charge.
Agreed. I don't think it's by any measure conspiracy thinking to imagine that the West has been interfered with culturally for that span of time. Xi Jinping knows the West very well, and he is known to be well steeped in the history of the Opium Wars. A culture grown weak with the assumption that its success is inevitable is already vulnerable to wrecking itself...you just need to feed the impulse with the irresistible tools of self-destruction.
The protest crowd has left Gaza behind; they won't be back in any large numbers. They move from issue to issue as we all know.
👏👏👏 🎯 🎯 🎯
I would think so. The Muslim Brotherhood (financed by Iran) might have trouble getting money for Hamas and anti-western propaganda campaigns. Then again destabilizing the west might have a few more donors.
Close. Qatar money.
Whenever we ask why Trump did something, there's always the possibility of something trite, or stupid, or impulsive or all three. In terms of US strategic interests, however, it may not be a coincidence that the US has now gone after another (after Venezuela) big supplier of discounted oil to China.
It's completely surprising that no mention of the Iran's relationships with Russia and China was made, when the fall of this regime will likely affect the balance of power long term.
If one thinks of the long term consequences of these actions and specifically how it affects China, it makes a lot more sense.
Don't forget that China has a demographic bomb on its hands and that it may prove to be more of a paper tiger than we think.
There is definitely a connection. My thoughts are that Iran was far closer to the bomb than we realized. That would explain why the rest of the Middle East had thrown their support so clearly behind the US.
"I confess that I’m honestly somewhat uncertain how to explain the choice by the U.S. to side with Israel and launch this campaign."
One word: China.
The explanation? Lots of words.
Iran under the ayatollahs is itself is all about China, it's Chinese weapon systems, its strategic alliance, its exporter of proxy groups intended to turn the Middle East into a quagmire requiring long term US involvement (China's main adversary to its global expansion and dominance), its use of Chinese IT technology and social control mechanisms (the same ones Trudeau had lined up for its - check notes: stolen from Northern Telecom by Chinese 'students' and 'temporary workers' of our 5G network and digital ID 'benefits' of such tech to governmental monitoring of its citizens, as well as ammunition for our military weapons but that's a different story), and especially its arrangement with China as the buyer of its sanctioned oil and recipient of China's satellite imagery for Iran's Iron Age Houthis proxy disrupting western trade by missiles and drones. Iran is (was) the central figure of China's global outreach program to move as much US military focus away from Taiwan as possible and on the opposite end of the globe while, at the same time, using Iran as the central location for setting up the Belt and Road initiative projects throughout the region and Africa (IIRC Saudi Arabia - like Canada - just announced a 'strategic partnership' with China to this end). Adding the nuclear threat Iran's mullahs always posed on top of all this while fooling the majority of westerners that 'negotiations' with Iranian officials were in way meaningful or productive towards achieving lasting peace and prosperity (never on the table) reached a tipping point. As Senator Lindsay pointed out way back in mid January following the mass murdering of tens of thousands of Iranians, if the ayatollahs are going to kill their own citizens protesting for a better life, Donald Trump is going to kill them.
So we knew it was coming (but let's keep talking about Greenland while US carrier groups are on the move into the region). And it specifically targeted the US versus Iran. To have some kind of equivalent regime alteration in Iran as something similar to Venezuela meant requiring the use of superior Israeli intelligence (with military experience and capability offered as a very useful component to deepening ties between the only Middle East liberal democracy and its major benefactor: very much a strategic alliance for both). Israel just so happens to the a nation that has been the main victim of Iran's destabilizing regional designs (thank you KGB for successfully painting Israel as an 'illegitimate aggressor' and thank you, MSM, for pushing this Soviet inspired narrative utilizing religious intolerance so effectively (whodathunk the Jews might be a handy scapegoat and what better longitudinal victim than the 'Palestinians' whose nation building designs and negotiators never fail to miss an opportunity?).
In other words, Israel needs the US to combat Iran and the US needs Israel to combat China's designs through Iran. Add to the mix the number of westerners generally, and US citizens specifically, killed and cowed by Iran's well funded advancing terrorism and we have an alignment of factors Trump recognizes as beneficial to him politically go thwart China's long term goals while setting an example every government in the world recognizes to be a pretty strong negotiating tactic-by-example when negotiations with the US are strategically important to the US. It's realpolitik in action. Canadians would be well served to recognize what all this means and stop being such idiots when it comes to supporting 'strategic partnerships' with China.
Exactly this.
The Iran:China relationship armed and informed
otherwise technologically primitive Houthi tribes.
They drained the US of 1/4 of its interceptor stock (1-4M each).
The US kept the sea lanes going. China didn’t lift a finger to solve the problem they created (surprise).
This asymmetry, and any Iran serving as a Chinese proxy state, is strategically incompatible with engaging another theatre in the pacific.
Trump, for all his faults - and there are many - may recognize that irans current degradation is an opportunity to change that geostragic picture.
This piece: https://x.com/_h16/status/2028381112221806811
Gives further details on the web of money, drugs, gun running, money laundering and influence that the fall of the iranian regime is going to unravel.
It comes from a French writer I've followed for 20+ years, with an analysis rooted in austrian theory. In my book, solid.
It's in French, but I'm sure you tech savvy boomers can figure out how to translate it.
Good analysis. I wonder if China's loss of cheap oil will pause China's goals for Taiwan for a few years.
I think that Carney's MOU with Alberta was specific in specifying that the 'new pipeline' to the west coast would be built only to send oil to Asia.
It seems like a far to large number of Canadians now believe that China is a far more reliable partner than the US. MSM propaganda works.
Carole, I repeat my previous comment (I know, ad nauseum, right?) that the MOU is a Potemkin village; the MOU is in all respects a facade that is meant to look like something substantive but will not actually produce a new pipeline. Put differently, the MOU was a political document (duh!) but the politics was meant to be different for each of Alberta and the feds. Alberta got to claim that it would get a pipeline and MC got to claim that there would be a pipeline to his friends in China (before he went there in January) and he was able to "reassure" his green supporters that there were many "safeguards" [you should correctly read "traps for Alberta"] in the MOU.
As to Canadians thinking China more reliable than the US, that is totally a) astounding, asinine, so beyond belief, yada, yada, yada; and b) entirely predictable given the stupid anti-American attitude of most Canadians and the laziness of the media in examining what China is and what it wants from Canada.
In any event, I continue to think that the MOU will crash and burn. The interesting thing to me is if it will so crash and burn before or after the referendum. My wish? That the MOU very, very loudly crashes and burns, oh, about two weeks before the referendum and that DS condemns the perfidy of the feds as she makes the announcement.
I consider the Carney's MOUs and speeches to be political theatre, as reliable as his election promises. Like "impossible things at unprecedented speed."
I believe that trashing Carney's MOU is an obligation for not just Albertans but all Canadians, and it can't be trashed often enough.
According to AI 30% of Canadians think China is a more reliable trading partner. I tend to think that 30% of Canadians should spend more time listening to outlets not associated with the MSM.
And yes, a couple of weeks prior to the referendum would be the perfect timing for Carney to cave and Smith to stand up for an independent Alberta.
Bang on assessment! The fall of the current regime in Iran is certainly a setback
but not a defeat for China and its" China Dream" of Chinese National Rejuvenation by its centenary in 2049. China's long term geopolitical strategy is to transform the Nation into a global leader in comprehensive National strength, technology, and international influence (if not control). The Chinese vision involves a system of Sinocentric global order that not only challenges but stops the existing US led, rules based international framework in favour of a more pluralistic strongly influenced Chinese world stage.
The Chinese goal of basic modernization by 2035 has resulted in a totally modernized army and Navy with around two million personnel, new ships and Airforce being built at ten times what the US is turning out, not to mention Beijing's goal of technological superiority by quickly advancing core technologies in AI and semiconductors, aiming to dominate world supply. Their goal of undermining US dominance is based on a multi-regional world order where countries (Canada included) establish cooperative ties with Beijing rather than alliances solely with the US.
China is aggressively defending its' interests in the South China Sea and Taiwan with its' new super-fast , drone equipped, navy gunboats armed with Aircraft Carrier destructive missiles. China's Belt and Road initiative (BRI) in Eurasia is securing energy routes and financial ties to Beijing including the expanded use of the Yuan for trading in the hopes of reducing the dependence on the US dollar. China wants to be the new center of Global order and its one purpose is to remove the US hegemony and at the same time eliminating Russian expansionist goals.
I've heard the goal for military modernization and active deployment has been set for the 'reunification' of Taiwan with China in 2027. (Nice of Canada to pay a mere $10 billion for 4 of the new troop carriers - BC refers to these as 'ferries' I believe.)
Yes. Xi has ordered the PLA to be ready to "reunify" Taiwan by 2027. I'm sure the "ferries" will be ready to transport some "assistants" to explain things to the Taiwanese,
Another very insightful and easily readable article is here (https://www.zinebriboua.com/p/under-beijings-wing-irans-arsenal?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=540063&post_id=189709686&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=3s7a0&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email ). It's all about Iran's ballistic tech/materials/fuels, the US' lack of understanding from prior administrations about the strategy and downstream effects and the evidence for significant and growing Chinese involvement in Iranian capability to create a gross regional imbalance aimed specifically at undermining and threatening the US' global interests that reduces military capability in the Pacific.
"Left unchecked, the math led to a devastating fork: accept Iranian nuclear breakout behind a missile shield too thick to penetrate, or fight a war in the Middle East with stockpiles earmarked for the Taiwan Strait. Beijing had engineered precisely this dilemma. Operation Epic Fury represented the decision to prevent that choice from ever arriving. By destroying the missiles, the United States turned years of Chinese strategic investment and billions in transferred technology to ash."
Great article! This is how I remember The Line, not the constant criticism of Alberta separation, Smith and Poilievre.
Jerry, you make a great point.
If I had to read one more time about the lack of a Poilievre Pivot, I was going to lick a metal fence post and stay there until spring.
And never any mention of what he should pivot to. 16 months of shaking my head and thinking Poilievre is on the right track: ignore Trump as much as possible and focus on fixing Canada. I don't really see much difference between the latest speech and his speech of March 1, 2025 - the one that unfortunately mentioned "biological clock".
It is consistent with the speech given at Convention as well.
He has been concise, consistent, and correct, and he has been vilified as a result.
No, don't kick it; lick it and then you WILL stay there until spring.
Me too. I hardly read the Line anymore. If I wanted to be lectured about Alberta separation, Smith and Poilievre, I could watch the CBC for free.
Sorry, I can't let you compare The Line to CBC. Yet.
I was going to write about how At Issue is worse, but damned if I can tell you why.
I think I over reacted, but it was a column bashing Alberta separatists, and something about owning it.
I come at folks wanting to leave Canada from the perspective of losing practically everything during the NEP years. While I don't think that life is fair, I cannot get behind a government that wilfully destroyed the lives of its citizens. (Rant over)
At least your mini rant was, just that: mini. Oh, and well argued. I also lived through those years and I have (obviously) lived through the subsequent years, particularly the last ten years.
As for those who roll their eyes at the mention of the NEP and tell us to "Get over it, already!" I respond, "Nope, never going to happen."
Those folks who tell us to "Get over it" never had to listen to Marc Lalonde (for you younguns' he was the federal Finance Minister) justify the NEP as being designed to protect Eastern Canada - particularly Montreal and Toronto - by controlling the wealth generated by Alberta. In other words, he said that the financial center of Canada had to be prevented from moving west.
So, Hell no! We're not forgetting the NEP.
And there is my mini rant.
Well ranted!
It has been a long while since I have spent so much time in a The Line comment section and learned so much. There are still some great people following The Line.
Carole, you are wickedly sarcastic today.
I don't agree with Jen on her take about the politics here in Alberta but that is okay, she is quite allowed her psychosis. Now, having said that, I do agree that it is tiresome to essentially be told just how dumb I am for the ten millionth time.
Jen, have your opinion but, please, you are far more talented than a continual rant city on essentially one topic.
There. I said it.
G & G, I will continue to read The Line simply because both our editors (and they are OUR editors, thankfully) are immensely talented - as Mr. Gurney has shown today. But the continuous ranting is tiresome. Please accept the implied warning.
10 upvotes for this comment.
Exactly this. That and JG’s incessant US hate mongering. She’s got waaaay way too much air time in what’s supposed to be a 2-way conversation. Matt’s interesting, worthwhile, one learns a lot when he speaks.
Great column Mat. I had never thought about the comparison you draw between Pearl Harbour and Oct. 7...but it should have been obvious. The Iranians have been poking the western Bears for decades...about bloody time, that the reality of what they were doing was spelled out in pretty devastating terms.
FAFO!
Well thought out and written piece Matt
Not sure if this is a nicer way of saying "I hope he had time to suffer", but that's how I'm taking it, and I approve.
Is there a China angle to this action? The US seems to be systematically weakening China's allies: Russia, Cuba, Venezuela and now Iran. This could be a demonstration of America's still unparalleled technological, military, economic and even diplomatic supremecy. China would might be able to lead on one or two of those fronts, but not all four. It could also be an attempt to slow China's natural resource grab. The Americans merely need to slow China's military and economic ascent long enough until aging demographics and American digital imperialism eat away at the CCP.
I wouldn't be surprised if Israeli and American military action targets Iran's drone supply chain. This would be a blow to Russia.
Of course all of this 3D chess could go very wrong.
There is indeed a China angle, and I am wondering how Carney is going to navigate this, now that China is his new best friend AND he's given a statement in support of Israeli and American actions.
China isn't Canada's new best friend. Canada trades less with China than do other developed economies. Doubling trade to China, for example, would still leave it far behind the share with the US, but would provide some diversification and leverage.
lol . Working on tariffs and the trade we do with a very large trading partner (that we will continue to be trading in large numbers with regardless of the party in power) does not make them our best friend. Good lord.
You should read the MOU describing "cooperation between law enforcement agencies and for intelligence sharing." Except you can't. It is secret.
We do know that it includes text on the chilling topic of "repatriating foreign nationals."
What Canadian parliamentarian wouldn't benefit from the new and improved 'exchange' program... and see how to say, 'Yes Boss' with the best of them? What journalist wouldn't benefit from risking imprisonment with the new and improved 'journalist exchange' program? I mean, so many two-way benefits! And, of course, closer cooperation between the RCMP and Chinese police 'requests' is what any two freedom-loving, mutually respectful partners and equals would do, wouldn't they? (A 'strategic' opportunity, I think, for more Canadians to practice saying that parliamentary one... but this time with much more enthusiasm!)
Very astute. How such a drooling, stupid, ignorant narcissist as Trump could ever align a series of US actions by Oval Office direction that just so happen to have a very clear target (China) adversely affected by the systemic removal of Chinese proxy states from the global playing board of realpolitik (starting in the western hemisphere and moving outwards to different continents) is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.
I suspect - I would love to be wrong - that Jen will call this unbelievable assertion of an effective repositioning of US strategic interests by such a fool as an idiotic belief held by delusional people that therefore "Trump is playing 4D chess..." and I will be sad.
I will be sad because understanding what appears to many much smarter and better educated people than I to be a volatile and inconsistent Trump whose mind changes as often as the hour of the day is just that: a coincidence. Believing it's organized and intentional - because that's what the evidence shows us to be the case - is held only by gullible people. Everybody knows Trump is a fool. Just listen to him. That's what many smart believe - because they WANT to believe it to fit in with all these other smart people who believe it. It's EASY to believe it. Trump goes out of his way to convince people to believe it! But, as has been said since Trump first came to power: watch what he does. Call it 4D chess if you must but it's pretty straight forward even if very ballsy. And what he's doing here through targeted foreign policy is advancing US strategic interests. You nailed it.
Granted, Trump is also doing a lot of other stuff, a lot of it very negative causing long term harm, most notably pissing people off, insulting and belittling others, getting rich, and advancing his own political power at the expense of other people and countries. All true and one does not have to be a member of Mensa to grasp this.
But when it comes to battling China, Trump is far and away the best President the west has ever produced, the one the west needs if we don't want to be Chinese proxy states. Of course, a surprising number of people throughout the west do want to become members of a Chinese proxy state because they believe - sorry, they KNOW - Trump is Bad and so any other alternative must therefore be (at least better if not) good... a fine example of 4D chess on display by such chattering classes who - apparently - simply don't know any better than to assume a totalitarian slave directing chauvinistic regime is somehow 'better' a strategic partner than the 'terrible' US.
Tildeb, I agree that DJT is terrifically misunderstood.
Now, please don't take my above comment or what follows as praise of DJT. He is, in so many respect odious but there is much more than that.
Put differently, people see the buffoon that he plays to perfection - and he is a buffoon so often. To me, some of his buffoonery is deliberate to cause people to underestimate him and some is just Donnie being Donnie (and I suspect that Donnie fully understands this and is laughing at observers while he enjoys whatever, whatever). But there is clearly much more than buffoonery and so, so, so many people just cannot see past the buffoonery.
Clearly, he is a narcissist but that does not mean that he is stupid. Clearly he does some stupid things but that doesn't mean that he only does stupid things.
I expect that by the end of his term in three years time his detractors will still be legion and will still dominate the public discourse; what will be interesting will be to see how history treats him. I won't be around for history's decision as I am almost a contemporary of DJT but others of the readers of these posts may have the opportunity in subsequent years.
Excellent. 10 upvotes.
More of this kind of analysis and writing, please.
“It is interesting that the Americans have not actually declared War on Iran. But they most likely don't want to or must. However, bombs and military steel take no notice of those impediments to total war. This will be a conflict under the heading of "A Blockade" – aka to lay siege - which have been used throughout history as a military strategy to prevent an enemy from receiving supplies, or in this case exporting supplies as well, thereby weakening their ability to fight. In this case the export of oil will further cripple the finances of Iran. There are land routes for oil to be exported from Iran, and the American navy is powerful to police the sea routes and the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic chokepoint for seaborne oil that Iran has long used as a geopolitical bargaining chip, with Tehran repeatedly threatening to close it during times of crisis. But can America block the land routes? There will be no "boots on the ground" from the Americans and the success or failure of this venture will depend on how American diplomacy can hold their friends and repel their enemies until the fog of war clears and there is "regime change" in Iran. What the next regime to rise will be is the burning question and will require billions and billions of Western dollars to achieve. Israel will be happy at these events and fearful of what comes regime comes next. Trump and his administration will get little recognition in the mainstream media, and no doubt the NEWS outlets headed by CNN will begin their usual attack of the POTUS and his strong and necessary action America has taken to begin the dismantling of the Iranian Satan that has stood astride the middle east like a dreadful colossus, a monster that their regime has become with it's avowed mission to annihilate Israel and finance terrorism, death and destruction through its multiple portals aka Hamas, Hezbollah. the al-Quds Brigades, al-Qaeda, Boko Haram and the list goes on, all financed partially or wholly by Iran.”
Great column.
As someone who is old enough to absolutely remember the 1979 Iranian Revolution unfolding through its first decade, I watched in horror as a former westernized, modern country morphed steadily into a theocratic medieval prison for many of its citizens, most of them too poor or simply having the misfortune of being born with two X chromosomes. The latter reality really made an impression on me, watching on TV in disbelief the women of Iran gradually being dragged backward in time, dehumanized, repressed, tortured, abused, subjugated, and routinely murdered. All this while growing up as a Canadian male youth through to young adulthood in the late 1970s-80s watching the exact opposite track happening for women. I was taught all my young male life by my family, friends, teachers, mentors, and the broader AmeriCanadian culture that women were my equal, that they were to be respected, honoured, and cherished. The tragedy of Iran, particularly for its women, made an enormous impression on me. Through my entire adult life over the last four decades, things only got worse for Iran's women, and, as I increasingly realized, for women across the suddenly widespread Arab world where this specific brand of Islamic theocratic repression dominated. It has always sickened me. I can and will never understand Western women who have deluded themselves that women who live in those conditions do so by choice. At this point, at least two generations of women living in Iran have never understood there was a choice.
I couldn't take my eyes away yesterday watching the Ayatollah and key leaders finally meeting their maker yesterday. As Matt notes, we can debate how America and Israel went about this. Matt has done an admirable job of outlining how October 7th was the turning point for Israel, and I concur completely with his analysis of their resolve. They'd had enough of waiting for the world to help them fix the issue. America has helped them, after they showed America what determined resolve could accomplish.
I mourn all the innocents caught in this hellish conflict through my entire five decades of life watching the Middle East and it's pathogens spread like a virus throughout the world.
Yesterday, my heart and my thoughts were for the women of Iran. My hope is that, though their path forward from yesterday may still be daunting, that perhaps for the first time in nearly fifty years there might be a glimmer of hope that their lives, their prospects, their futures, might hold some new, brighter, happier opportunities.
May it be so, somehow.
10 upvotes. You described what also I saw during that period to now.
Excellent article.
Great informative article!!