Nathan Goldwag

We'll see what happens next but their strike numbers dropped off *dramatically* today.

I mean, I'm sure they'll try, I think that's easier said than done, especially given how bad their economy is right now.

Yeah, the mere fact that they can *threaten* random violence is going to keep uncertainty high for a while, but I expect that facade to start breaking down soon if strike tempos keep falling at this rate.

Other possibility seems to be that Iran runs out of strike capability but refuses to surrender and so we just keep bombing them........indefinitely?

Yeah, I just mean I do know the point Mehdi was gesturing at--there is a level of explicit antisemitism that has traditionally been verbatim, whereas open islamaphobia/racism is basically endemic on the Right and expected--but also that dynamic is shifting very rapidly.

I do think there has been a phenomenon in US politics/culture where for a while now antisemitism has been the last *real* taboo that almost everyone has to pay lip service to, though I also think that's eroding very fast now.

I'm not happy.

Oh I agree lol, it doesn't really make any sense. It was enjoyable! I still have complaints about pacing and structure, but it's a fun read.

Think it's safe to say now that Tehran is scraping the bottom of the barrel, rather than pursuing a deliberate strategy of pacing their fires.

(SOURCE: x.com/MarioLeb79)

So, in 1944 the Soviets launch a mecha-blitzkrieg into Eastern Europe but the Germans stop them along the Oder using nerve gas so they roll south and punch through Northern Italy and Southern France instead, where they link up with advancing US troops.

Have a #MapMonday bonus, this is my most recent creation, based off of @birmo.bsky.social's AXIS OF TIME: RELOADED SERIES, where a fleet of modern warships from 2021 get sent back in time to 1942, inadvertently triggering WWIII in 1954.

The advantage to not having any political or strategic objectives is that you can't fail to accomplish them.

Sure. Makes sense.

It's all very millenarian, including everybody whipping themselves up into an ecstatic state trying to immanentize the eschaton, and then collapsing into cynicism and despair when the Messiah fails to return on the appointed date once again.

This is from eleven hours ago as far as I can tell, though there were just some attacks in Kuwait and bombings in Iraq.

My prediction continues to be that this tapers off sometime this week, both sides declare victory, and then we do it again every six months or a year for the foreseeable future.

There is actually quite a lot of de facto convergence between the stated US war goal of "bomb Iran until we decide to stop" and the Iranian war goal of "continue to exist once they stop bombing us".

I think about this so much you cannot even imagine.

The Iranian attacks on ships thus far have been pretty random all over the Gulf; idk if this represents a change in targeting or a shortage of weapons or just tighter control from the IRGC, but they were hitting oil tankers docked in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait a few days ago.

It is very difficult to know how much command-and-control Iranian strategy is actually operating under.

Yeah, something much closer to the original Treaty of Sevres goes into effect here.

No, most of the attacks have been pretty random and against docked tankers throughout the Gulf.

It has been pretty clear for a while that their actual military ability to close the straits is very limited, they can provide harassing attacks and keep the risk high, but that's about it.

Not yet and won't be for a while, just trying to provide context and information.

It's not a binary, traffic will probably start picking up again in the next week or so, but tensions will remain elevated for the foreseeable future, and that's going to have an impact.

In the Middle East Maritime Region, yes. Idk about the rest of the world.

It has now been forty-eight hours since the last confirmed attack on a ship, just FYI.

Ah well, nevertheless.

Also did this scenario in Victoria II, using cheat codes to westernize Persia in 1836. Pretty successful. 😄

There either has to be an earlier POD, yeah, or pretty major disruptive changes in India that mean the British pull back from the Northwest Frontier.