Pre-match: The inevitable war with Iran

bombing each other silly might not change things but we’re as close as we’ve ever been to finding out.

 

Its not about invading. Neither side has the capacity to invade the other.
But this about establishing escalation dominance. Like I said, Iran seem to have made a strategic decision to active deterrence.

Which means that we are in for a dangerous period, which will most probably have global impact.

Whats gonna happen is that Israel is going to move up the escalation ladder and retaliate against Iranian assets. What they are, we dont know yet.

Iran will assess the damages, and further move up the escalation ladder and attempt to inflict a larger cost on Israel with missile strikes.

And then its gonna go in a tit-for-tat manner until the costs of escalating further will be too unbearable for either side, or until external powers exert pressure on either side to stop because of the potential ramifications on the global economy.
And then a new deterrence equation is set.

 

But what is Iran's next escalation level? They sent 200 missiles, what could come next? 1000? Does that change anything?

They could always start a ruckus in the gulf but does that deter Israel? For me that looks more like damaging yourself.

 

I have no idea.
Im just laying out what we can expect from Iran and Israel going forward, in terms of competing for that escalation/deterrence dominance.

The time lapsing between different stages of escalation doesnt necessarily have to be short (unless it descends into a shooting war). As we saw, Iran waited months before the this latest missile strike.
Iran could revise it nuclear doctrine and leave the NPT, and attempt to develop a nuclear arsenal of their own, which would take time. That in of itself would markedly be seen as escalation. But that would carry considerable risks of its own and probably be pretty high on the ladder, depending on what kind of strikes Israel does, and would most likely inevitably draw in the US.

Anyway Im just spitballing. We wont actually know until events unfold.

 

I don't know who Israel's mole is but he (or they) has to be operating at Hezbollah's highest levels.

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If true, and even if the top target walked away with cuts and bruises, this is the most extraordinary High Value Targeting (HVT) campaign in history. Israel has achieved total intelligence dominance over Hizballah.

 

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This escalation is what Bibi wants. Can't vote for a new leader during a time of war.

 

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I doubt Israel will strike Kharg Island or the oil fields - too much global economic damage with real diplomatic costs - but oil refineries are a very logical target. Crude exports would continue, but the domestic economy will seize up until petrol and diesel imports reach sufficient volumes.

There will be significant logistical bottlenecks to that: petrol and diesel terminals, storage and distribution facilities, tanker trucks, etc. take time and money. Lots of money when all of the work has to be done at once. It's cliched to say that it's recipe for months of total chaos, but managing that process will stretch the capacities of every level of government, business and society to the limit.

Those imports will be expensive, especially for a county that's short on foreign currency reserves (about the same as Serbia but with 15 times the population) that will have to rebuild its refineries with (heavily sanctioned) specialist equipment while continuing fund conventional weapons, its nuclear ambitions, as well as rebuild Hezbollah, plus maintain the Houthis and at least 2 more militias.

As the presidential elections indicated, the regime - certainly its hard line factions - could count on the support of no more than 1/3 of a restive population that is seriously struggling economically. It's a very combustible internal mix.

Something will have to give. If "something" is Kamanaei's nerves, there will be fireworks.

 

I'm actually shocked how stable oil prices have remained throughout this crisis thus far. We've barely seen a lift.

 

True but also very marginal. America always personalizes foreign policy and the man is a particularly obnoxious character who is also exceptionally good on TV. That lets his personality loom larger than usual in anglosphere minds - which he adores - but it also prevents outsiders form recognizing a past his sell-by-date politician who is riding rather than harnessing political currents.

If Bibi had died in, say, 2008 but nothing else had changed, we would be either pretty much where we are today or we would have passed this point 6 months ago. Don't let his Sunset Boulevard psychodramas obscure that fact.

 

Israel is probably under a lot of pressure to avoid hitting crude oil export production facilities.

If it doesn't, exports will continue and oil supplies won't be much disrupted and not for long.

If it does, there's plenty of crude oil capacity out there that can be brought on line rather quickly. Most of that is in the hands of Arab countries that don't like the regime at all. The rest of it is in the hands of Arab countries that hate their guts. If it would normally take, say, 4 months for those wells to hit peak capacity, the latter group would go to great lengths to ensure it happens 3 or less.

 

I get the whole meet the new boss, same as the old boss point. I still blame Bibi for the death of Yitzhak Rabin and how things have fallen since. Yes, anglomedia is bad and he is slick on TV, I also think the fact that he looks like a generic white guy with an accent plays well on Anglo media helps his Schick.

When it comes to the mideast, there are no heroes just villains of different shades and tiers. I put him up there with some of the worst ever in modern day thats Hasan Nasrallah, Ahmad Yasin, Sharon and Bibi. MBS and Sadam just below.

 

More on Bibi doing his part to re elect Trump…

What Israel’s ground operation into Lebanon drives home about America | CNN Politics

 

Attacking oil infrastructure would change that on top of being against international law. Best to stick to military targets

 

I get where you are coming from, but since when has that ever stopped any of Israel's enemies.

 

I don't think Iran hit any civilians infrastructure when they retaliated. All I'm saying is that Israel going rogue and doing this will just further isolate them on the international stage which won't help their case down the road

 

I imagine there are upper level guys in Hezbollah right now who are losing their desire to move up in the ranks of the organization.

 

Hitting peak capacity is fairly useless if they can’t get it through the strait of Hormuz. If Iran's government sees an existential threat, they will try to block that route.

The Houthis are already raiding shipping lanes, the Iranians will add to that nuisance significantly.

 

That's not my point.

Markets hate uncertainty. Markets are generally forward looking and oil futures especially are historically known for being sensitive to geopolitics. The fact world prices haven't already spiked a lot given the elevated tension is unusual to say the least. At least to me it is.

 

Iranians have always been adding to that nuisance. As far as I know they still mostly have gunboats which will be quickly sunk, if they try to block the strait of Hormuz, which is pretty wide as I recall, having sailed through there 45 years ago when Iran first became a pariah on the world stage.

 

It took Pakistan about 23 years to develop and test a nuclear bomb (in 1998) after they spied in the Netherlands and 1975, when nuclear spy Kan didnot return to the Netherlands.
Since that test by Sunni Pakistan, Iran wanted it's own nukes. So they're busy at it for about the same time, but they didnot have to start from scratch, like Pakistan.
Maybe they already started, when it became clear Khan had grabbed essential information to start a nuclear bomb programm.
I havenot heared any argument from watchers of the Iran efforts, that makes clear they havenot got the capabilities of Pakistan and lack them in such a way they still after the same amount of time, maybe even longer, still havenot managed to master the trick.

 

True and it's happened before in the late 80s. The result was the US Navy and IIRC other Western navies (successfully) escorting tankers through the Gulf. The whole thing lasted about 2 years and became kinetic a few times, always with heavy American counter-attacks.

Iranian attacks and minelaying stopped for 2-3 months amid deep divisions in the Iranian regime about whether to give up or to keep going.

The downing of Iran Air Flight 655 did a lot to bring that debate to an end, but the end of the Iran-Iraq War was the most significant (though lack of international sympathy for the shooting down was a factor in that). Once the war was over, there was no need for Iranian mine laying operations in the Gulf - which a case could be made for - and then there was no need for escorts.

This time is likely to be different. The war itself wasn't existential for Khomeni staying in power and the tanker issue was a derivative of that. 40 years on, the revolutionary fervour is gone and Khamanei is no Khomeni. He can't be anything like as sure about his ability to back down and survive but maybe you have better sources. @teammellieIRANfan or @Iranian Monitor probably would.

Iran has better capabilities now and adapting ultra-fast speedboats as drones as the Ukrainians have has changed many navies' thinking about how to operate. It won't be as easy to operate as it was 40 years ago and there's a real chance of a naval vessel being sunk, which will increase Iran's risk tolerance.

Against that, the other Gulf states have much better navies and air forces and they have always been anxious about Iranian domination and have a lot of skin in the game themselves. They are likely to contribute to convoy-protection missions. They will in other ways.

 

It started in 79-80, during the hostage crisis. I was on a US Navy destroyer at the time, doing exactly that…making sure those tankers could get through, unimpeded by Iran.