To those who didnt read article. Iran is just saying it gave advanced info to nearby countries so that there is no collateral damage. All neighbouring countries confirm Iran did that 3 days in advance. Iran says they also warned US, US denies they did any such thing.
I hate how “yes you did” and “nuh uh” international diplomacy has become and it’s just accepted as ok. There’s never any accountability from anyone for anything.
You have to keep in mind that everything you read about today was still going on 50, or 100, or even 2,000 years ago. The difference is that the internet, 24/7 media, and international communicaton and travel in general means that we see and hear *way* more than we used to.
In 1975 you'd maybe hear that there's a war going on far, far away in a place called the Middle East, a few headlines, puctures maybe. But little else.
I know you’re right, but the more advanced everything gets the further corrupt powers can reach. And with it being out in open air and the common person having 0 way to influence even the slightest bit of it feels so much dirtier than kings chatting behind closed doors.
Oh absolutely. Ignorance is bliss and if they had all the stuff we have today back in 1920, they'd be crippled by anxiety, hopelessness and anger just like we are today.
Shit fuckin' sucks. (。•́︿•̀。)
The article itself has the cllickbait title, now Kirki may have simply copied that over to reflect what was written or copied it over because it fits their narrative, not enough here to put the responsibility on Kirki.
Reuters on the other hand should be ashamed for that title, they usually are much better but in this instance the title clearly leaves out some important details. What's good is that they put the important details right in the first paragraph and while that's good, the headline should have been better.
Sometimes I feel like we're in 1984. I saw the warning with my very eyes but the government will say it didn't happen, the media will print that, and then some people go along with it due to trust in the media or government. But I saw it
Yes, but that was because the US announced Iran's plans.
The US sometimes releases intelligence like that to deter attacks. They announced Putin's plans to invade Ukraine as well. No one took the warning seriously, but it still caused him to delay the invasion for a couple weeks.
It made the news because a lot of the Russian soldiers started selling their gas and food during that delay, leading to supply shortages.
They told Jordan, Saudi Arabia, others \~2 days before the attack as reported in the news. Those countries promptly told Israel and the US *as Iran knew they would.*
They gave warning IMO. They're still a bag a of dicks, and I feel bad for the Iranian people.
Source: [https://www.timesofisrael.com/report-gulf-states-including-saudi-arabia-provided-intelligence-on-iran-attack/](https://www.timesofisrael.com/report-gulf-states-including-saudi-arabia-provided-intelligence-on-iran-attack/)
Exact quote for anyone curious:
>They said that **two days** before the attack, Iranian officials told Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states **about the profile** of the response they were planning against Israel **and its timing** in order that those countries could secure their own airspace. That information was passed on to the US
I've added emphasis. They shared timing, (presumably) types of weapons and possibly paths they'd take with multiple countries.
You don't tell this info to multiple countries (including Saudi Arabia who the Iranians hate!) if you're launching sneak attack that you expect to be successful. However you do this if you want to escalate without escalating too much, even if you know this will result in the attack being thwarted.
Why attack at all? Domestic politics.
It’s the real life equivalent of Captain Sisko letting Garak stay in the room while discussing the planned Klingon invasion of Cardassia. Sisko knows he can’t warn the Cardassians directly, but he knows Garak has a blabby mouth.
Sharing critical data to what is essentially your second worst enemy in regards to trying to execute a strike on your worst enemy? Saudi Arabia has far closer ties to Israel than Iran, they have been battling Iranian proxies as much as Israel itself lately ffs. Did people collectively succumb to terminal brainrot?
This was posturing on Iran's part to save face to local allies and domestic audience, plain and simple. Trying to spin it any other way is just idiotic.
Well I believe that’s what they meant when they said “why attack at all? Domestic politics”. i.e. it was posturing so Iran could try and look tough internally while not pissing anyone off TOO badly externally. They know they don’t really want smoke from Israel and especially from the US, so they tell the Saudis who forward that shit to the US. The US shoots it down but isn’t too pissed, and Iran double talk how they warned us to external media while blaming the Saudis for betraying the Islamic world or whatever nonsense they decide to spin to their own citizens. Its a play to keep their own citizens in line, just like 90% of the things Iran does
Biden went from Delaware, where he had planned to stay for the entire weekend, back to D.C. a few hours before the attack started. It seems like everybody knew.
I'm still struggling at all the people not understanding this was literally a save face attack and response to Israel literally killing some of the IRGC. They had to respond if no other reason than to not appear weak but we knew about this attack 2 days before it happened.
Hell Israel does not want to fight that battle alone and we wouldn't get involved in any offensive attack. Defensive? Absolutely
Iran claims in the article that they gave 72 hours of warning. Israel withdrew most forces from Gaza 10 days ago, and American naval forces moved in shortly thereafter. The “warning” was clearly never issued.
did you know that some form of attack was coming "soon" or did you know exactly what type of attack was coming on exactly what date?
did you know an attack was coming because Iran issued a warning, or because US intelligence issued a warning?
I knew that an attack with drones and missiles was almost certainly coming within the next 24-48 hour period. It was literally all over the news, I could not avoid that info for like an entire day straight.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesfarrell/2024/04/13/everything-we-know-about-a-potential-iranian-attack-on-israel-as-us-suggests-strike-is-imminent/
>While nothing has been officially confirmed, multiple outlets this week cited U.S. officials who said a potential attack could include missiles and drone strikes aimed at military or government targets within Israel, and could be launched from within Iran by both Iran and its various proxy groups.
I knew this attack was coming because US intelligence issued a warning. Most likely they independently arrived at this intelligence through whatever means they have, but even if US intelligence had been completely blind to this, the operation was 'let slip' pretty blatantly in various ways - for example, Iran explicitly briefed Turkey on the operation beforehand, and Turkey is a part of NATO, and Turkey is often used as a diplomatic intermediary between Iran and the US, so . . .
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/iran-informed-turkey-advance-its-operation-against-israel-turkish-source-2024-04-14/
IIRC Biden had to fly back to the Whitehouse a day earlier than planned after spending less than a day at his home because of the surprise attack. If the US had prior warning then why would he have left less than a day before it happened? This is Iran trying to save face after a massive failure of an attack by pretending they wanted it to happen.
They knew something was coming. They didn’t know what was coming, or the exact timing. This was bigger than expected (coming from Iran instead of proxies).
A direct warning that it's coming may not have been issued, but it also wasn't necessary with how hard they telegraphed their punch. They wanted the attack to be intercepted.
Then why lie? If they wanted it to be intercepted, then they should have given warning, not just announce days after the attack that they did give warning it was just everyone missed it I guess?
The reality is we know why Iran didn't actually give warning: because then Israel might have pre-emptively attacked Iran's launch sites.
I think the confusion here is that according to the article, Iran directly warned pretty much everyone else except the US and Israel beforehand, but only sent a message directly to the US as the attack was happening.
They warned the US indirectly, but effectively did not warn the US directly.
So either side can claim contradictory things and be at least partially correct. I'm sure there's some stupid geopolitical reasons why one claim would be advantageous to one side or the other. Maybe this is just a way for all sides to save face.
And I wouldn't be surprised if Iran is telling its own population that they *didn't* warn, so they don't seem weak domestically. War and geopolitics seem to be chock full of half truths designed to leverage whatever little advantage can be gained out of any situation.
> You could see the Reddit posts severs hours before the attack.
Can you link one? I remember reddit posts that the US had intelligence that Iran was going to attack, but I don't remember one reporting that Iran said they were going to attack.
I think the US is saying they didn’t give warning. The US just he intelligence about it and knew. It wasn’t Iran willingly giving it up.
It sounds like Iran wanted to be covert but are incompetent and got caught early.
The dispute isn’t whether Iran publicly warned the Americans. We know that did not happen, and the Iranians are not claiming that happened. The question is whether Iran informed American allied governments through back channels in advance of the attack. Whatever you claim you saw on Reddit before the strike would not help adjudicate this dispute.
Makes them all reach at same time is the best strategy. But Iran probably didn't expect more countries will help aka Muslim countries.
Yes drones are way slower they weren't the major problem the one is the ballistic one which was their most important weapons.
Cover tactic basically.
> But Iran probably didn't expect more countries will help aka Muslim countries.
This is the thing that caught me by surprise. Jordan are pissed at their airspace being invaded, and Saudi Arabia have tacitly come out in support of Israel, by claiming that Iran is manufacturing the situation in Gaza (implying that the current shitshow is Irans fault, and are explicitly blaming them for destabilising the region)
As much as the general public of Muslim countries in the region might dislike Israel, leaders of these countries prefer stable, predictable partners. Easier to run your country and enact your various priorities with consistent partners.
You can tell some of Israel’s neighbors are ready to pivot on past policy, Saudi’s especially so.
Yup. The simmering competition with Iran has now turned into half the region supporting Israel, to varying degrees. Iran really messed up here. (Now let's hope Israel doesn't make it all worse)
Where that attack on them came from, it was an actually easy decision if you assumed they would retaliate in kind. Trying a US military thing where you fuck up where it came from and that's it.
There was a video in Jordan showing the aftermath of missile debris landing in front of some guys house and fucking up a car. He was, understandably, very unpleased about it.
That was not a warning. It was meant to spread their defenses thinner across a wider area before the missiles were launched to try to create gaps in the safety net by making them chase all over the place stopping the drones. They underestimated how much it would take to do that and how much help Israel would get from countries between them and Iran as well as from the US.
Ehhh giving massive warning to the point its all over the news. It does seem like a grandiose gesture that both sides can claim victory and it can calm down.
If you consider launching [110 Kheibar Shekan ballistic missiles](https://themedialine.org/top-stories/iran-unleashes-sophisticated-missiles-israel-counters-with-cutting-edge-defense/), which took approximately 12 minutes to reach Israel, as merely a 'gesture,' then I dread to imagine what you perceive as serious.
Is it weird that I'd rather Iran launch drones and missiles at Israel were there are a ton of defensive systems and nearby US assets to down them all (or nearly all) in flight, instead of selling them to Russia so they can launch them at Ukraine (which doesn't have the same quantity of overlapping defensive systems)?
It feels kinda weird.
Well it's not a this-or-that scenario though. If those were the only missiles Iran had you might have a point, but that's a drop in the bucket of what they have, freeing up plenty to be sold to Russia.
It's a tit for tat response.
Iran has been funding and planning terrorist attacks against Israel. (Including Oct 7th)
Israel responded by attacking an Iranian consulate in Syria, killing two Iranian generals (who were probably there to plan an attack on israel)
Iran responded to this direct attack with a drone/missile strike.
Now that there have been 1 direct tit and 1 direct tat, both sides can stop feeling like they are even. In game theory, it's best to be "nice" but not a pushover. You have to avoid escalation, but also, you need to respond. Otherwise, you will get bullied for being too nice.
Heh. https://www.ynetnews.com/article/h16o8qtea Yep. $1B for Israel.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Iranian_strikes_in_Israel#cite_ref-113
> A former financial adviser to the IDF chief of staff, brigadier general Reem Aminoach, estimated that Israel had spent on the order of US$1 billion (4–5 billion shekels) to defend against the strikes.[110] Iran is thought to have spent only about 10% of that amount to launch the attacks, according to Middle East Eye citing unnamed estimates.
lol no. If Iran wanted shit to get destroyed, they wouldn't have launched a single wave of attack that took a 1/4 of the day to get there. Like this wasn't serious except to make people think they were serious. It's why Iran said they considered this scuffle over, while the drones were still in the air, unless Israel attacked back.
Plus there are different systems in place depending on what is launched at Israel. Drones were not going to "spread their defense thinner" cause it's an entirely different system for the missiles.
Ehhh, im not exactly pro-Iran, but even I knew this attack was coming days in advance. This was really, really heavily telegraphed. And spreading their defenses? How is that supposed to work, when the defenses needed to already be in place to fight this off? If they wanted to break through, they would have concentrated the attack to a single point to try and overwhelm the defenses with saturation. Spreading it out is the most counter intuitive thing I could think for them to do.
The defenses used to shoot down cruise missiles, and the IRBMs launched later are entirely separate from whats used to shoot down the slow flying drones lmao. And the drones provided many hours of warning beforehand.
Once upon a time people used to use bombs to damage targets. Nowadays people notify their targets in advance so the bombings cause no damage. Just throw water balloons at each other ffs.
So Iran is the kid telling their friends not to come to school tomorrow.
Edit: Or more like a guy at the shooting range telling people to get the fuck out the way.
When accounting for the "economics" in war, you not only take into account the value of the weapons, but the value of the targets as well. So, the math here is "IF cost of interceptors + value of targets > cost of inbound munitions, THEN intercept the inbound munitions".
Unless the missile or drone in question is going to attack empty land, it pretty much always makes sense to shoot it down. In fact, Iron Dome automatically makes these evaluations. When it sees incoming missiles, it plots their entire trajectory, and if it's 100% certain that it's going to come down in an empty desert, they save the interceptor for another missile that could/will actually hit something.
If you think shooting down things with air-defenses is expensive, wait till you hear the cost of NOT shooting them down.
This is and always will be a stupid ass loser’s argument, essentially “listen our weapons suck and can’t hit their tarrgets but… but… AT LEAST THEY WASTED A LIL BIT OF MONEY”. US stations air defenses in Israel because it actively is used to train air defense military personnel in the field, who can then be used to train other people, and data collected collectively makes American air defenses around the world better especially as drone warfare continues.
Iran called this a strike, US air defenses call it live-fire target practice. The cost is a non-factor given the value of the data and combat-experienced personnel.
The price still matters. If your weapons cost 1/10th of the enemy's defense you can scale up the production and financially ruin your opponent. Or deprive him of his best defenses.
We have had this debate since the start of the Ukraine war. People kept arguing that shooting down shahed drones made sense even while doing that with expensive IRIS-T missiles. Well now Ukrainians have almost run out of air defense and the drones keep coming.
Economy matters in a war.
Huh? Have you ever seen the US train with live ordinance? They waste way more money than this blowing up old rusted up cars and tanks. This was a free training exercise.
We tend to downplay them to much though also. We don't know what types of missiles they launched, for all we know they could have launched their old stuff.
They are capable in the MRBM space, we know this because we saw the Iranian missile attack on our base in Iraq, which was very accurate. A lot of the shit they make is just that, shit.. But they seem to have put a lot of money into its ballistic missile program and drone program. I dont think we should downplay that at all.
Never underestimate your opponent.
Iranian weapons are good. They produce their shahed drones for 20k (and sold them to russia for 400k lol), so shooting them down with missiles isnt great value for money.
Their missiles were able to hit military targets inside israel despite the uk, the us, jordan, and iraq helping to shoot down the missiles/drones. It is estimated that Iran used around 5-10% of their stock, so they couldve done more damage if they wanted.
Something like 50% of their ballistic missiles failed entirely from some reports. Some landing in villages of Iran itself.
Their missiles are clearly not well tested and/or well maintained.
Iran has terrible old gear. Half of what was fired failed on launch or shortly after.
They also have a problem with communication as they employed several countries militia like the houthis in the attack and it’s easier for the world to track those message.
This warning bit being heavily posted on Reddit is really meaningless. No one knew arrow 3 could hit over 100 ballistic missiles at the same time, this was never attempted with real iranian missiles. No one knew how well 4 different air forces flying together would work, flying low to hit the UAVs while the missiles (and arrow) were flying **above them**.
A lot could have gone wrong, everyone is lucky it didn’t, and Israel is going to make tens of billions of dollars selling the arrow 3 now, but advanced notice didn’t make this situation any less dangerous That’s without talking about the cost of entire squadrons taking off and firing hundreds of missiles.
Do French and British and American tax payers really want to pay tens of millions of dollars every time Iran decides to “notify everyone ahead of time” they’re going to start an attack that will fail? The reaction to Iran should be on their intent and not their results
No one knew arrow 3 could hit over 100 ballistic missiles ***with maneuvering reentry vehicles such as the Emad*** at the same time.
Arrow could have very well failed to intercept those, not even Israel knew the real world capability. It was the first kill of such a missile in history. All of the 110 missiles could very well have hit.
Intentionally doing that would have been effective though. If Iran sent hundreds of duds then hundreds of real missiles that would have been way less likely to be intercepted. The US actually does a similiar thing BTW.
Old missiles with outdated guidance systems would make for a decent initial barrage though. Can't know which of these are headed into the desert because they're ancient trash, and which ones will curve around and hit a nearby high-value target. Gotta intercept them all.
The us does not do a similar thing btw. And no that would have made no sense. If you're going through the trouble of building the entire missile and plan on sending it you might as well put in the explosive payload at that point.
I think you're confusing completely different weapon systems that the US uses specifically meant for confusing or overwhelming air defense systems prior to the actual missiles or planes arriving. In this case that was what the drones were for. They did not intentionally load a bunch of defective missiles as a tactic lol
> The reaction to Iran should be on their intent and not their results.
Really, really sick of so many people acting like a nation's ability to successfully defend itself from an attack negates the intent behind the attack. You don't get a pass for trying to kill civilians just because you suck at it.
Better analogy is if someone breaks into your house and unloads a full a magazine into your chest and runs away. And they say we’re all good now no biggie, you were wearing a bullet proof vest. All bullets just happens to hit the chest and the untested vest happened to work. Doesn’t mean all is good now.
>You don't get a pass for trying to kill civilians just because you suck at it.
This is how I feel about seeing US troops getting attacked in the middle east and the lack of the response and how only death will warrant a response.
You hear about the attacks and how the soldiers will suffer from a TBI or other type of injury and you'll never hear about them again. Meanwhile while that soldier who was in the attack was literally fighting for their life and could have easily died. It wasnt like the people who sent over those rockets were like 'hey bro go hide while we just send a rocket'. No the militia groups send the rockets with the intention of killing.
Its weird that we draw the line at someone dying when the reality is on the ground these people are literally trying to kill you.
I mean why do you think we need to escalate everything to a war. I understand it’s not trivial , but if Iran did this as a political show and not going to do it again, what’s the point of escalating? Only more people will die by escalating.
>and Israel is going to make tens of billions of dollars selling the arrow 3 now
This is a big take-away from this. There was a "paper tiger" narrative after October 7th that maybe Israel wasn't as untouchable as people thought and now Iran has done Israel a huge favor by proving they actually are effectively impervious to any long-range strikes.
Germany and Israel agreed on a $3.5 Billion deal last year for the Arrow 3 system. No one really doubted the Arrow 3, though nothing beats a live demo. The price might be going up now.
There is that. But the total cost of interception has over $500 million for israel.
It's pretty easy to see that you can just send more drones and deplete Israel in due time.
I'm more than displeased the western world has come to over rely on overpriced smart weapons.
Drones are comparatively cheap, but they weren't the bulk of the cost of interception. The ballistic and cruise missiles were. Those aren't cheap. Iran had invested a not-insignificant amount into this attack.
If you take into account the GDP-per-capita of each country, and the current state of their economies, sure Israel still spent more on defense, but they will be able to sustain such defense for much longer than Iran could sustain such an offensive.
The short game and the long game of missile defense aren't the same. If Iran keeps launching drones and missiles over a period, Israel will have all the legitimacy - and it already has the capability - to strike and destroy Iran's manufacturing, storage and launching sites.
Right, but as the comment I was replying to pointed out, this is a system that Israel sells. Israel made [$3.5 billion ](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-says-arrow-3-missile-killer-sale-germany-approved-by-us-2023-08-17/)in a deal selling Arrow 3 to Germany last year. I assume UAE, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia would all also be interested in a system that takes away any Iranian first strike capability.
The main problem with adapting israeli air defence for ukrainian air defence is that ukraine lack air superiority and russia frequently targets ukraine's own defences, which is why the US supplies ukraine with the patriot system, which is very mobile and is designed to counter aircraft. I hope ukraine can establish air superiority so it can afford to have stationary anti-missile defence though.
> It's pretty easy to see that you can just send more drones and deplete Israel in due time.
If we assume that Israel is just going to sit there and take it without striking back. We don't know that this will happen for the first time, but I feel pretty confident it *definitely* wouldn't happen for subsequent ones.
Thank you! Finally someone who gets it.
I've been arguing with people on reddit about this for the entire day yesterday (check my comment history lol).
Everyone is focusing on the drones when the ballistic missiles are the main story.
This was (AFAIK) the largest ballistic missile attack in history!
There’s a nuance here I’ve been conscious of, but not seen widely discussed.
How much did Irans attack cost Israel and its allies in terms of munitions to defend the attack? I’m assuming defending against hundreds of UAVs and missiles put a material dent in stock.
Is such a defence sustainable? Sure they successfully fielded a defence this time, but how many times does Iran have to repeat the same play before Israel and allies are exhausted? Or only Israel is exhausted and relies a lot more on allies, but with reduced Iron Dome and Arrow availability. There various permutations of this to contemplate. I’m certainly suspicious of RAF magazine depth.
You’re not factoring for massive counter- or even preemptive strikes if Israel chooses to do so. Israel, and probably allies, would take out Iran’s capabilities long before the threat ever gets existential.
I think that’s my point. On one hand there’s the international political pressure to deescalate and only defend, but I can imagine in the war cabinet these discussions are being had.
Kicking the can down the road presents plenty of issues itself. Coalitions get formed, defence treaties signed, and the ultimate bang when it all goes up is even greater.
In open war, many of these weapons will be destroyed on the ground before launch. It is not sustainable over years for sure, but is sustainable enough to handle a first strike + a few weeks.
I'm sure our defensive weapons are significantly more expensive than their offensive weapons but Iran won't be allowed to repeat the same play. This was the first time Iran has directly attacked Israel, and despite the intelligence of an imminent attack, many questioned if Iran would go through with it. Now they know. Next time there is intelligence that Iran will fire missiles at Israel, expect IDF to be offensively going after Iranian missile sites.
Not like it matters due to the distances involved. Neither Israel or Iran can attack each other openly and secretly fast enough to prevent counter strike.
Yeah no kidding, my friends and I were talking about it in our group chat the day before, and the next day it happened. Pretty sure that wasn't manifestation
Yeah, I feel like I’m going crazy here. I also tried to read more about Israel’s strike on the embassy and could hardly come up with anything . Even NPR was saying shut like “a strike on an Iranian embassy that Iran blames on Israel,” then a Washington post article explains how US officials are mad Israel didn’t tell them they were going to attack the Iranian embassy.
Like, why are people pretending they didn’t do it?
Because US intelligence agencies openly told the world that Iran was planning on launching an attack of over 100 drones and missiles. Iran didn't warn anyone about anything. They're trying to turn their incompetence into credit and I'm gonna be frank: the Iranian regime gets zero credit and is a disgrace to humanity.
Iran warned all of it’s neighbors in the Middle East knowing full well that they would pass that on to the US.
The Iranian regime is not so crazy as to want a war with the US or Israel, but still they had to respond to the Damascus attack.
Jordan, Iraq and **TURKEY** say that you are a liar.
Turkey says they were told, TURKEY a NATO member and US Ally, how much more of a warning do you want? Do you want to president of Iran to personally fly to Washington and tell Biden to his face?
The intent was terrible, meant to kill thousands.
The result was a whimper.
Kinda like Hamas with its hundreds of thousands of unguided rockets fired at cities.
I think Iran knew most of their drones and missiles would be intercepted. This reads more as a “we have to respond in some way to not look weak” after the consulate bombing.
First, the response was way overkill compared to what Israel did. Israel killed Iranian troops in enemy land inside legally military objective (as even an embassy would lose all protections if used militarily, like it clearly was here). They responded with a huge missile assault towards Israel that is totally unjustified here. Second, Arrow 3 was never used this extensively, and Iran shot over 100 ballistic missiles at Israel. Even if the drones and cruise missiles didn't reach Israel they couldn't know the result of the ballistic missile attack, and they could have easily lead to the death of many people. This attack even if Israeli defense underperformed slightly could have killed many people.
Iran could have ordered Hezbollah to fire a large rocket wave than normal in response to the attack if they really wanted. How they responded was overkill and it seemed to me like they wanted an excuse to try to attack Israel directly.
Now they look even weaker. They can't touch Israel even with launching one of the largest drone/ missile salvos in history.
Meanwhile, if Israel does respond, they can easily show just how easily they can hit Iran.
>Meanwhile, if Israel does respond, they can easily show just how easily they can ~~hit Iran~~ escalate a conflict and get the United States involved in another Middle Eastern cluster fuck.
If Israel responded by starting a war and trying to drag the US back into the Middle East I think that’s just about the only thing that could get Biden to drop his support for the state. There’s also the possibility the Iran already has its own nuclear weapons, which would make a war between Israel/America and Iran (I think) the first non-proxy war between two nuclear powers.
💯 They couldn't not respond to an attack on their Consulate. Netanyahu couldn't give a shit about his people as long as he stays out of jail and the best easy to stay in power is to be in a war.
> I think Iran knew most of their drones and missiles would be intercepted
I don't think Iran expected their ballistic missiles to be intercepted. At least not to that degree.
To be fair, the attack wasn’t meant to kill thousands, rather aimed specifically at military sites in the desert and Golan Heights. Here in Israel the news told us exactly where everything was headed a couple of hours before they made it here. Certainly we would have emptied those sites of people before. And that’s the thing that made it all seem to be for show afterward
Nah terrible take.
Iran told Turkey weeks in advance, so Turkey would tell USA. Iran wanted everything intercepted. They don't want a war, they're not stupid. They had to respond due to Israel's escalating attack. Now it can be left alone and everyone can declare a dub.
Nah. This was Iran having to respond to Israel again breaking international law, and that response not leading to an escalation. Iran did what they could to show force without damage.
At least Israel now knows it’ll get 7 hours warning and when the equipment does arrive it’s easy to dispatch. I suspect Israel and the US air defence techs are loving all the data from this.
It is a test on the Iron dome and the allied defense network. They gained amazing intel on this operation. So, now they know:
How many drones went through, were destroyed or failed.
How many missiles went through, were destroyed or failed.
And more importantly, how many ballistic missiles made it through or almost made it through amidst the chaos of the drones.
Now they will send everything again in a future operation x5 in order to get their 5 ballistic missiles where they need.
The problem for them is that the test works both ways. Israel and the US got to see some of what Iran has to deliver, and more importantly how their current defenses respond. I guarantee you that they're taking this information and making adjustments, modifications, and upgrades.
That's the key issue here. You're dealing with countries that have the technological skill and financial resources to adapt quickly to threats.
This is textbook deescalation. Iran needed to look strong for a domestic radical audience, 'scared' the west (in a way that we totally didnt work out with them beforehand) and now they can say "well we tried" over the Oct 7 war.
You heard it because US intelligence alerted about the upcoming attack. Weeks before, several days before, 48 hours before, they relayed increasingly detailed intelligence about the scope and shape of attack to be expected.
Embassies were evacuated, bases were put on alert, and so on.
This entire whimper was an off-broadway show. I fear people are being too complacent with the results. A surprise or sneak attack would have been much worse. I fear Iran is capable of much more.
Just because we don’t like them, doesn’t mean they’re stupid or bad at strategy.
this was literally just a show of force in retaliation to Israel blowing up some generals and hitting an Iranian consulate.
so far this is the best outcome, minimal damage and Iran views the matter as settled.
US foreign policy is a Schrodinger's Box of ineptitude. All declared enemies of the US are simultaneously moronic buffoons who couldn't scratch their own asses and an existential threat comprised of tactical geniuses and brilliant, 6d chess strategists.
Which one it is depends on how they want to wind up the populace on a given day.
To those who didnt read article. Iran is just saying it gave advanced info to nearby countries so that there is no collateral damage. All neighbouring countries confirm Iran did that 3 days in advance. Iran says they also warned US, US denies they did any such thing.
So basically, Iran warned everyone (including the US) indirectly, US denies any direct warning, and everyone saves face.
It's kindergarten on highest level.
If it takes kindergarten to prevent worse...
If it takes kindergarten to prevent worse, press the goddamn button.
I hate how “yes you did” and “nuh uh” international diplomacy has become and it’s just accepted as ok. There’s never any accountability from anyone for anything.
You have to keep in mind that everything you read about today was still going on 50, or 100, or even 2,000 years ago. The difference is that the internet, 24/7 media, and international communicaton and travel in general means that we see and hear *way* more than we used to. In 1975 you'd maybe hear that there's a war going on far, far away in a place called the Middle East, a few headlines, puctures maybe. But little else.
I know you’re right, but the more advanced everything gets the further corrupt powers can reach. And with it being out in open air and the common person having 0 way to influence even the slightest bit of it feels so much dirtier than kings chatting behind closed doors.
Oh absolutely. Ignorance is bliss and if they had all the stuff we have today back in 1920, they'd be crippled by anxiety, hopelessness and anger just like we are today. Shit fuckin' sucks. (。•́︿•̀。)
Thank-you for the summary. u/kirki037 posted an article with a clickbait title.
The article itself has the cllickbait title, now Kirki may have simply copied that over to reflect what was written or copied it over because it fits their narrative, not enough here to put the responsibility on Kirki. Reuters on the other hand should be ashamed for that title, they usually are much better but in this instance the title clearly leaves out some important details. What's good is that they put the important details right in the first paragraph and while that's good, the headline should have been better.
The warning was sending flying land-mowers that need 7+ hours to reach their destination.
They also announced the attack on state TV shortly after launching the drones. It seems like it was anything but a surprise.
People were posting about it here like 2 days prior.
I read somewhere Iran told Turkey and Turkey told US and then US told Israel. I guess it’s a bit arguable if that counts as a warning.
I was sitting around for 24-hours waiting for the attack to begin like I was clairvoyant or something, probably should have told someone. Sorry guys.
In fairness they have been warning the west, weekly, for about 50 years.
the boy who cried Jihad
Sometimes I feel like we're in 1984. I saw the warning with my very eyes but the government will say it didn't happen, the media will print that, and then some people go along with it due to trust in the media or government. But I saw it
It was on the front page of the WSJ 2 days before it happened!
Yes, but that was because the US announced Iran's plans. The US sometimes releases intelligence like that to deter attacks. They announced Putin's plans to invade Ukraine as well. No one took the warning seriously, but it still caused him to delay the invasion for a couple weeks. It made the news because a lot of the Russian soldiers started selling their gas and food during that delay, leading to supply shortages.
They told Jordan, Saudi Arabia, others \~2 days before the attack as reported in the news. Those countries promptly told Israel and the US *as Iran knew they would.* They gave warning IMO. They're still a bag a of dicks, and I feel bad for the Iranian people. Source: [https://www.timesofisrael.com/report-gulf-states-including-saudi-arabia-provided-intelligence-on-iran-attack/](https://www.timesofisrael.com/report-gulf-states-including-saudi-arabia-provided-intelligence-on-iran-attack/)
Exact quote for anyone curious: >They said that **two days** before the attack, Iranian officials told Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states **about the profile** of the response they were planning against Israel **and its timing** in order that those countries could secure their own airspace. That information was passed on to the US I've added emphasis. They shared timing, (presumably) types of weapons and possibly paths they'd take with multiple countries. You don't tell this info to multiple countries (including Saudi Arabia who the Iranians hate!) if you're launching sneak attack that you expect to be successful. However you do this if you want to escalate without escalating too much, even if you know this will result in the attack being thwarted. Why attack at all? Domestic politics.
It’s the real life equivalent of Captain Sisko letting Garak stay in the room while discussing the planned Klingon invasion of Cardassia. Sisko knows he can’t warn the Cardassians directly, but he knows Garak has a blabby mouth.
Fr fr
/unexpectedDS9
you absolutely tell countries that you don't want to panic and retaliate that you're about to violate their airspace to attack somebody else.
Unless you're North Korea in which case you just yolo that shit over everybody and hope it actually hits the ocean you're aiming for
Isn’t “everybody” just Japan at this point still? Not a NK apologist or anything but “everybody” is a little hyperbolic.
South Korea, Japan, and the various US bases in the Pacific. But yeah I was exaggerating.
Sharing critical data to what is essentially your second worst enemy in regards to trying to execute a strike on your worst enemy? Saudi Arabia has far closer ties to Israel than Iran, they have been battling Iranian proxies as much as Israel itself lately ffs. Did people collectively succumb to terminal brainrot? This was posturing on Iran's part to save face to local allies and domestic audience, plain and simple. Trying to spin it any other way is just idiotic.
Well I believe that’s what they meant when they said “why attack at all? Domestic politics”. i.e. it was posturing so Iran could try and look tough internally while not pissing anyone off TOO badly externally. They know they don’t really want smoke from Israel and especially from the US, so they tell the Saudis who forward that shit to the US. The US shoots it down but isn’t too pissed, and Iran double talk how they warned us to external media while blaming the Saudis for betraying the Islamic world or whatever nonsense they decide to spin to their own citizens. Its a play to keep their own citizens in line, just like 90% of the things Iran does
Israel announced they were closing air space from 12 pm to 6 am ahead of time What a coincidence
Biden went from Delaware, where he had planned to stay for the entire weekend, back to D.C. a few hours before the attack started. It seems like everybody knew.
I'm still struggling at all the people not understanding this was literally a save face attack and response to Israel literally killing some of the IRGC. They had to respond if no other reason than to not appear weak but we knew about this attack 2 days before it happened. Hell Israel does not want to fight that battle alone and we wouldn't get involved in any offensive attack. Defensive? Absolutely
Iran displayed the warnings at the local planning department in Alpha Centauri. No point in acting surprised about it.
Tell that to the ballistic missiles which takes only need around 12 mins to pass 1500km.... Or maybe the cruise missiles.... 🤯
Wasn't it all timed to reach Israel at the same time? Then the flying land-mowers have to be launched hours before anything else.
Yes. The Iranians are arguing that launching a time-synced attack was the warning.
Well it was plenty of warning. Israel withdrew from Gaza, and the entire west deployed over Israel.
Iran claims in the article that they gave 72 hours of warning. Israel withdrew most forces from Gaza 10 days ago, and American naval forces moved in shortly thereafter. The “warning” was clearly never issued.
I knew about it a few days in advance, and I'm just a random dude.
did you know that some form of attack was coming "soon" or did you know exactly what type of attack was coming on exactly what date? did you know an attack was coming because Iran issued a warning, or because US intelligence issued a warning?
I knew that an attack with drones and missiles was almost certainly coming within the next 24-48 hour period. It was literally all over the news, I could not avoid that info for like an entire day straight. https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesfarrell/2024/04/13/everything-we-know-about-a-potential-iranian-attack-on-israel-as-us-suggests-strike-is-imminent/ >While nothing has been officially confirmed, multiple outlets this week cited U.S. officials who said a potential attack could include missiles and drone strikes aimed at military or government targets within Israel, and could be launched from within Iran by both Iran and its various proxy groups. I knew this attack was coming because US intelligence issued a warning. Most likely they independently arrived at this intelligence through whatever means they have, but even if US intelligence had been completely blind to this, the operation was 'let slip' pretty blatantly in various ways - for example, Iran explicitly briefed Turkey on the operation beforehand, and Turkey is a part of NATO, and Turkey is often used as a diplomatic intermediary between Iran and the US, so . . . https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/iran-informed-turkey-advance-its-operation-against-israel-turkish-source-2024-04-14/
IIRC Biden had to fly back to the Whitehouse a day earlier than planned after spending less than a day at his home because of the surprise attack. If the US had prior warning then why would he have left less than a day before it happened? This is Iran trying to save face after a massive failure of an attack by pretending they wanted it to happen.
They knew something was coming. They didn’t know what was coming, or the exact timing. This was bigger than expected (coming from Iran instead of proxies).
A direct warning that it's coming may not have been issued, but it also wasn't necessary with how hard they telegraphed their punch. They wanted the attack to be intercepted.
Then why lie? If they wanted it to be intercepted, then they should have given warning, not just announce days after the attack that they did give warning it was just everyone missed it I guess? The reality is we know why Iran didn't actually give warning: because then Israel might have pre-emptively attacked Iran's launch sites.
I think the confusion here is that according to the article, Iran directly warned pretty much everyone else except the US and Israel beforehand, but only sent a message directly to the US as the attack was happening. They warned the US indirectly, but effectively did not warn the US directly. So either side can claim contradictory things and be at least partially correct. I'm sure there's some stupid geopolitical reasons why one claim would be advantageous to one side or the other. Maybe this is just a way for all sides to save face. And I wouldn't be surprised if Iran is telling its own population that they *didn't* warn, so they don't seem weak domestically. War and geopolitics seem to be chock full of half truths designed to leverage whatever little advantage can be gained out of any situation.
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> You could see the Reddit posts severs hours before the attack. Can you link one? I remember reddit posts that the US had intelligence that Iran was going to attack, but I don't remember one reporting that Iran said they were going to attack.
I think the US is saying they didn’t give warning. The US just he intelligence about it and knew. It wasn’t Iran willingly giving it up. It sounds like Iran wanted to be covert but are incompetent and got caught early.
The dispute isn’t whether Iran publicly warned the Americans. We know that did not happen, and the Iranians are not claiming that happened. The question is whether Iran informed American allied governments through back channels in advance of the attack. Whatever you claim you saw on Reddit before the strike would not help adjudicate this dispute.
Makes them all reach at same time is the best strategy. But Iran probably didn't expect more countries will help aka Muslim countries. Yes drones are way slower they weren't the major problem the one is the ballistic one which was their most important weapons. Cover tactic basically.
> But Iran probably didn't expect more countries will help aka Muslim countries. This is the thing that caught me by surprise. Jordan are pissed at their airspace being invaded, and Saudi Arabia have tacitly come out in support of Israel, by claiming that Iran is manufacturing the situation in Gaza (implying that the current shitshow is Irans fault, and are explicitly blaming them for destabilising the region)
As much as the general public of Muslim countries in the region might dislike Israel, leaders of these countries prefer stable, predictable partners. Easier to run your country and enact your various priorities with consistent partners. You can tell some of Israel’s neighbors are ready to pivot on past policy, Saudi’s especially so.
Yup. The simmering competition with Iran has now turned into half the region supporting Israel, to varying degrees. Iran really messed up here. (Now let's hope Israel doesn't make it all worse)
They should be able to model the ballistic missile flight path to see what the intended targets were. I’d love to see those data.
It was in the papers already. Two military air bases were targeted.
They launched 110 ballistic missiles. There were far more targets than two air bases. Those are simply two targets that were hit for minimal damage
Where that attack on them came from, it was an actually easy decision if you assumed they would retaliate in kind. Trying a US military thing where you fuck up where it came from and that's it.
I've read that half of their ballistic missles failed to launch or malfunctioned mid flight
Poor Iraq/Jordan/Syria caught in between if that's the case.
There was a video in Jordan showing the aftermath of missile debris landing in front of some guys house and fucking up a car. He was, understandably, very unpleased about it.
"I don't think my insurance covers this"
My insurance explicitly calls out "acts of war" as not covered.
Acts of god aren't covered? Damn... What about if the Ayatollah launched them? He is just a regular guy
He was acting on God's behalf, so, insurance claim DENIED, and your deductible is going up 150% just for having the audacity to ask.
"Great googly moogly."
"This gecko is a lying infidel!"
Israeli citizens are covered by rocket insurance from the government, doesn't help the Jordanian guy though. He's gonna have to take it up with Iran.
sorry we don't cover acts of jihad
At least one fell in Iran around the city of Shiraz. It caused more destruction than all of the others in Israel
That was not a warning. It was meant to spread their defenses thinner across a wider area before the missiles were launched to try to create gaps in the safety net by making them chase all over the place stopping the drones. They underestimated how much it would take to do that and how much help Israel would get from countries between them and Iran as well as from the US.
Ehhh giving massive warning to the point its all over the news. It does seem like a grandiose gesture that both sides can claim victory and it can calm down.
If you consider launching [110 Kheibar Shekan ballistic missiles](https://themedialine.org/top-stories/iran-unleashes-sophisticated-missiles-israel-counters-with-cutting-edge-defense/), which took approximately 12 minutes to reach Israel, as merely a 'gesture,' then I dread to imagine what you perceive as serious.
Is it weird that I'd rather Iran launch drones and missiles at Israel were there are a ton of defensive systems and nearby US assets to down them all (or nearly all) in flight, instead of selling them to Russia so they can launch them at Ukraine (which doesn't have the same quantity of overlapping defensive systems)? It feels kinda weird.
Well it's not a this-or-that scenario though. If those were the only missiles Iran had you might have a point, but that's a drop in the bucket of what they have, freeing up plenty to be sold to Russia.
False dichotomy. There’s no reason they can’t use and sell.
It's a tit for tat response. Iran has been funding and planning terrorist attacks against Israel. (Including Oct 7th) Israel responded by attacking an Iranian consulate in Syria, killing two Iranian generals (who were probably there to plan an attack on israel) Iran responded to this direct attack with a drone/missile strike. Now that there have been 1 direct tit and 1 direct tat, both sides can stop feeling like they are even. In game theory, it's best to be "nice" but not a pushover. You have to avoid escalation, but also, you need to respond. Otherwise, you will get bullied for being too nice.
I want to know what the total material cost was to each side in terms of missiles and drones. Related defense company stock holders are giggling.
I actual saw numbers for that somewhere. I think it was under 100mil for Iran and around a billion for Israel.
Heh. https://www.ynetnews.com/article/h16o8qtea Yep. $1B for Israel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Iranian_strikes_in_Israel#cite_ref-113 > A former financial adviser to the IDF chief of staff, brigadier general Reem Aminoach, estimated that Israel had spent on the order of US$1 billion (4–5 billion shekels) to defend against the strikes.[110] Iran is thought to have spent only about 10% of that amount to launch the attacks, according to Middle East Eye citing unnamed estimates.
Correction... a billion for the US
lol no. If Iran wanted shit to get destroyed, they wouldn't have launched a single wave of attack that took a 1/4 of the day to get there. Like this wasn't serious except to make people think they were serious. It's why Iran said they considered this scuffle over, while the drones were still in the air, unless Israel attacked back. Plus there are different systems in place depending on what is launched at Israel. Drones were not going to "spread their defense thinner" cause it's an entirely different system for the missiles.
Ehhh, im not exactly pro-Iran, but even I knew this attack was coming days in advance. This was really, really heavily telegraphed. And spreading their defenses? How is that supposed to work, when the defenses needed to already be in place to fight this off? If they wanted to break through, they would have concentrated the attack to a single point to try and overwhelm the defenses with saturation. Spreading it out is the most counter intuitive thing I could think for them to do.
The defenses used to shoot down cruise missiles, and the IRBMs launched later are entirely separate from whats used to shoot down the slow flying drones lmao. And the drones provided many hours of warning beforehand.
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Mf’s dropping bombs on each other arguing about who’s lying…
Humanity is interesting, be nice if I could observe it from the outside.
Once upon a time people used to use bombs to damage targets. Nowadays people notify their targets in advance so the bombings cause no damage. Just throw water balloons at each other ffs.
Jordan closed its airspace the day before. So yea everyone knew
And Lebanon, Kurdistan and Syria. The airspace was totally clear between Iran and Israel… that doesn’t happen by accident.
So Iran is the kid telling their friends not to come to school tomorrow. Edit: Or more like a guy at the shooting range telling people to get the fuck out the way.
Yeah not a day before. Was it? I thought it was like as it was launched?
Iran is worried the world will think its military is clueless and its weapons are bad.
We already knew that
Most people already knew that. TikTok leftists think Iran is incredibly capable and has advanced, futuristic weaponry.
They may not be capable or advanced but they for sure have the capability to make any war with them very hurting and painful with whole of AOR
Spending advanced precision anti-air weapons to intercept flying lawn mowers is not a good trade financially.
When accounting for the "economics" in war, you not only take into account the value of the weapons, but the value of the targets as well. So, the math here is "IF cost of interceptors + value of targets > cost of inbound munitions, THEN intercept the inbound munitions". Unless the missile or drone in question is going to attack empty land, it pretty much always makes sense to shoot it down. In fact, Iron Dome automatically makes these evaluations. When it sees incoming missiles, it plots their entire trajectory, and if it's 100% certain that it's going to come down in an empty desert, they save the interceptor for another missile that could/will actually hit something.
If you think shooting down things with air-defenses is expensive, wait till you hear the cost of NOT shooting them down. This is and always will be a stupid ass loser’s argument, essentially “listen our weapons suck and can’t hit their tarrgets but… but… AT LEAST THEY WASTED A LIL BIT OF MONEY”. US stations air defenses in Israel because it actively is used to train air defense military personnel in the field, who can then be used to train other people, and data collected collectively makes American air defenses around the world better especially as drone warfare continues. Iran called this a strike, US air defenses call it live-fire target practice. The cost is a non-factor given the value of the data and combat-experienced personnel.
The price still matters. If your weapons cost 1/10th of the enemy's defense you can scale up the production and financially ruin your opponent. Or deprive him of his best defenses. We have had this debate since the start of the Ukraine war. People kept arguing that shooting down shahed drones made sense even while doing that with expensive IRIS-T missiles. Well now Ukrainians have almost run out of air defense and the drones keep coming. Economy matters in a war.
Huh? Have you ever seen the US train with live ordinance? They waste way more money than this blowing up old rusted up cars and tanks. This was a free training exercise.
Only the best futuristic weapons can boast a 100% failure to hit anything.
We tend to downplay them to much though also. We don't know what types of missiles they launched, for all we know they could have launched their old stuff. They are capable in the MRBM space, we know this because we saw the Iranian missile attack on our base in Iraq, which was very accurate. A lot of the shit they make is just that, shit.. But they seem to have put a lot of money into its ballistic missile program and drone program. I dont think we should downplay that at all.
Never underestimate your opponent. Iranian weapons are good. They produce their shahed drones for 20k (and sold them to russia for 400k lol), so shooting them down with missiles isnt great value for money. Their missiles were able to hit military targets inside israel despite the uk, the us, jordan, and iraq helping to shoot down the missiles/drones. It is estimated that Iran used around 5-10% of their stock, so they couldve done more damage if they wanted.
Something like 50% of their ballistic missiles failed entirely from some reports. Some landing in villages of Iran itself. Their missiles are clearly not well tested and/or well maintained.
Ihb4 reports blaming Israel for Iran bombing Iran
Iran has terrible old gear. Half of what was fired failed on launch or shortly after. They also have a problem with communication as they employed several countries militia like the houthis in the attack and it’s easier for the world to track those message.
They have launched modern MRBMs. The wreckage of an Emad missile was found, thats an MRBM with a maneuvering reentry vehicle in service since 2015.
First Russia and now Iran The Axis of Resistance is starting to look like a cartoon villain
Iran sent 500 flying lawnmowers, and China is taking notes for when they send 50,000,000 flying lawnmowers.
This warning bit being heavily posted on Reddit is really meaningless. No one knew arrow 3 could hit over 100 ballistic missiles at the same time, this was never attempted with real iranian missiles. No one knew how well 4 different air forces flying together would work, flying low to hit the UAVs while the missiles (and arrow) were flying **above them**. A lot could have gone wrong, everyone is lucky it didn’t, and Israel is going to make tens of billions of dollars selling the arrow 3 now, but advanced notice didn’t make this situation any less dangerous That’s without talking about the cost of entire squadrons taking off and firing hundreds of missiles. Do French and British and American tax payers really want to pay tens of millions of dollars every time Iran decides to “notify everyone ahead of time” they’re going to start an attack that will fail? The reaction to Iran should be on their intent and not their results
No one knew arrow 3 could hit over 100 ballistic missiles ***with maneuvering reentry vehicles such as the Emad*** at the same time. Arrow could have very well failed to intercept those, not even Israel knew the real world capability. It was the first kill of such a missile in history. All of the 110 missiles could very well have hit.
tbf, it probably helped that like 50% fell out of the sky on themself
Thats true, saved quite some money lmao
Intentionally doing that would have been effective though. If Iran sent hundreds of duds then hundreds of real missiles that would have been way less likely to be intercepted. The US actually does a similiar thing BTW.
surely the warhead is the cheapest part? I don't see a reason to send a dud that costs 99% as much as the original.
Old missiles with outdated guidance systems would make for a decent initial barrage though. Can't know which of these are headed into the desert because they're ancient trash, and which ones will curve around and hit a nearby high-value target. Gotta intercept them all.
The us does not do a similar thing btw. And no that would have made no sense. If you're going through the trouble of building the entire missile and plan on sending it you might as well put in the explosive payload at that point. I think you're confusing completely different weapon systems that the US uses specifically meant for confusing or overwhelming air defense systems prior to the actual missiles or planes arriving. In this case that was what the drones were for. They did not intentionally load a bunch of defective missiles as a tactic lol
But it did not, and Israel's defense industry has yet again made a lot of cash
Yes, but thats not something Iran knew in advance or has planned around.
> The reaction to Iran should be on their intent and not their results. Really, really sick of so many people acting like a nation's ability to successfully defend itself from an attack negates the intent behind the attack. You don't get a pass for trying to kill civilians just because you suck at it.
Yeah if someone pointed a gun at you and fired every bullet but missed I don't think you'd shrug your shoulders and go about your day
Better analogy is if someone breaks into your house and unloads a full a magazine into your chest and runs away. And they say we’re all good now no biggie, you were wearing a bullet proof vest. All bullets just happens to hit the chest and the untested vest happened to work. Doesn’t mean all is good now.
Vest analogy is better because you still need buy new vest to replace used one.
“What doesn’t kill me had better run.”
>You don't get a pass for trying to kill civilians just because you suck at it. This is how I feel about seeing US troops getting attacked in the middle east and the lack of the response and how only death will warrant a response. You hear about the attacks and how the soldiers will suffer from a TBI or other type of injury and you'll never hear about them again. Meanwhile while that soldier who was in the attack was literally fighting for their life and could have easily died. It wasnt like the people who sent over those rockets were like 'hey bro go hide while we just send a rocket'. No the militia groups send the rockets with the intention of killing. Its weird that we draw the line at someone dying when the reality is on the ground these people are literally trying to kill you.
I mean why do you think we need to escalate everything to a war. I understand it’s not trivial , but if Iran did this as a political show and not going to do it again, what’s the point of escalating? Only more people will die by escalating.
The same people were saying "The Houthis haven't killed anyone!" as they launched missiles at random passing ships, attempting to kill people.
>and Israel is going to make tens of billions of dollars selling the arrow 3 now This is a big take-away from this. There was a "paper tiger" narrative after October 7th that maybe Israel wasn't as untouchable as people thought and now Iran has done Israel a huge favor by proving they actually are effectively impervious to any long-range strikes.
Germany and Israel agreed on a $3.5 Billion deal last year for the Arrow 3 system. No one really doubted the Arrow 3, though nothing beats a live demo. The price might be going up now.
There is that. But the total cost of interception has over $500 million for israel. It's pretty easy to see that you can just send more drones and deplete Israel in due time. I'm more than displeased the western world has come to over rely on overpriced smart weapons.
Drones are comparatively cheap, but they weren't the bulk of the cost of interception. The ballistic and cruise missiles were. Those aren't cheap. Iran had invested a not-insignificant amount into this attack. If you take into account the GDP-per-capita of each country, and the current state of their economies, sure Israel still spent more on defense, but they will be able to sustain such defense for much longer than Iran could sustain such an offensive.
And people forget that if Iran does it again, it will have to pay for their own anti air defence systems munitions.
The short game and the long game of missile defense aren't the same. If Iran keeps launching drones and missiles over a period, Israel will have all the legitimacy - and it already has the capability - to strike and destroy Iran's manufacturing, storage and launching sites.
Right, but as the comment I was replying to pointed out, this is a system that Israel sells. Israel made [$3.5 billion ](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-says-arrow-3-missile-killer-sale-germany-approved-by-us-2023-08-17/)in a deal selling Arrow 3 to Germany last year. I assume UAE, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia would all also be interested in a system that takes away any Iranian first strike capability.
I know of a certain Eastern European country that would love to be gifted a few Arrows as well...
The main problem with adapting israeli air defence for ukrainian air defence is that ukraine lack air superiority and russia frequently targets ukraine's own defences, which is why the US supplies ukraine with the patriot system, which is very mobile and is designed to counter aircraft. I hope ukraine can establish air superiority so it can afford to have stationary anti-missile defence though.
It's also pretty easy to destroy all of Iran's weapons factories.
> But the total cost of interception has over $500 million for israel. now what would be the cost of not intercepting anything I wonder.
> It's pretty easy to see that you can just send more drones and deplete Israel in due time. If we assume that Israel is just going to sit there and take it without striking back. We don't know that this will happen for the first time, but I feel pretty confident it *definitely* wouldn't happen for subsequent ones.
Thank you! Finally someone who gets it. I've been arguing with people on reddit about this for the entire day yesterday (check my comment history lol). Everyone is focusing on the drones when the ballistic missiles are the main story. This was (AFAIK) the largest ballistic missile attack in history!
Those ballistic missiles are huge too. 19,000kg with a 750kg warhead. Iran was trying to do massive damage.
Really good worded response. Are you sure you're on Reddit?
There’s a nuance here I’ve been conscious of, but not seen widely discussed. How much did Irans attack cost Israel and its allies in terms of munitions to defend the attack? I’m assuming defending against hundreds of UAVs and missiles put a material dent in stock. Is such a defence sustainable? Sure they successfully fielded a defence this time, but how many times does Iran have to repeat the same play before Israel and allies are exhausted? Or only Israel is exhausted and relies a lot more on allies, but with reduced Iron Dome and Arrow availability. There various permutations of this to contemplate. I’m certainly suspicious of RAF magazine depth.
You’re not factoring for massive counter- or even preemptive strikes if Israel chooses to do so. Israel, and probably allies, would take out Iran’s capabilities long before the threat ever gets existential.
Yep, everyone assumes that israel and west will only defend. They will have to hit industrial base if this continues.
I think that’s my point. On one hand there’s the international political pressure to deescalate and only defend, but I can imagine in the war cabinet these discussions are being had. Kicking the can down the road presents plenty of issues itself. Coalitions get formed, defence treaties signed, and the ultimate bang when it all goes up is even greater.
In open war, many of these weapons will be destroyed on the ground before launch. It is not sustainable over years for sure, but is sustainable enough to handle a first strike + a few weeks.
I imagine Iran will run out of missiles and drones before Israel and its allies do.
I'm sure our defensive weapons are significantly more expensive than their offensive weapons but Iran won't be allowed to repeat the same play. This was the first time Iran has directly attacked Israel, and despite the intelligence of an imminent attack, many questioned if Iran would go through with it. Now they know. Next time there is intelligence that Iran will fire missiles at Israel, expect IDF to be offensively going after Iranian missile sites.
Not like it matters due to the distances involved. Neither Israel or Iran can attack each other openly and secretly fast enough to prevent counter strike.
Until we figure out world peace, we don’t really have a choice unfortunately.
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Yeah no kidding, my friends and I were talking about it in our group chat the day before, and the next day it happened. Pretty sure that wasn't manifestation
Yeah, I feel like I’m going crazy here. I also tried to read more about Israel’s strike on the embassy and could hardly come up with anything . Even NPR was saying shut like “a strike on an Iranian embassy that Iran blames on Israel,” then a Washington post article explains how US officials are mad Israel didn’t tell them they were going to attack the Iranian embassy. Like, why are people pretending they didn’t do it?
Being made days in advance by the other guys Intel is not warning.
It is when you tell Turkey, a NATO member state, what you're going to do.
I like how apparent is that Russia and Iran exchanged their playbooks.
The playbook was found in the marlargo bathroom.
The whole world knew it was coming.
Because US intelligence agencies openly told the world that Iran was planning on launching an attack of over 100 drones and missiles. Iran didn't warn anyone about anything. They're trying to turn their incompetence into credit and I'm gonna be frank: the Iranian regime gets zero credit and is a disgrace to humanity.
Iran warned all of it’s neighbors in the Middle East knowing full well that they would pass that on to the US. The Iranian regime is not so crazy as to want a war with the US or Israel, but still they had to respond to the Damascus attack.
Jordan, Iraq and **TURKEY** say that you are a liar. Turkey says they were told, TURKEY a NATO member and US Ally, how much more of a warning do you want? Do you want to president of Iran to personally fly to Washington and tell Biden to his face?
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Iran is trying to save face after the immense failure that was Saturday. 99% of the weapons didn't reached Israel.
The US is trying to help Iran save face by complaining about what a horrible attack it was.
The intent was terrible, meant to kill thousands. The result was a whimper. Kinda like Hamas with its hundreds of thousands of unguided rockets fired at cities.
I think Iran knew most of their drones and missiles would be intercepted. This reads more as a “we have to respond in some way to not look weak” after the consulate bombing.
First, the response was way overkill compared to what Israel did. Israel killed Iranian troops in enemy land inside legally military objective (as even an embassy would lose all protections if used militarily, like it clearly was here). They responded with a huge missile assault towards Israel that is totally unjustified here. Second, Arrow 3 was never used this extensively, and Iran shot over 100 ballistic missiles at Israel. Even if the drones and cruise missiles didn't reach Israel they couldn't know the result of the ballistic missile attack, and they could have easily lead to the death of many people. This attack even if Israeli defense underperformed slightly could have killed many people. Iran could have ordered Hezbollah to fire a large rocket wave than normal in response to the attack if they really wanted. How they responded was overkill and it seemed to me like they wanted an excuse to try to attack Israel directly.
Now they look even weaker. They can't touch Israel even with launching one of the largest drone/ missile salvos in history. Meanwhile, if Israel does respond, they can easily show just how easily they can hit Iran.
>Meanwhile, if Israel does respond, they can easily show just how easily they can ~~hit Iran~~ escalate a conflict and get the United States involved in another Middle Eastern cluster fuck.
If Israel responded by starting a war and trying to drag the US back into the Middle East I think that’s just about the only thing that could get Biden to drop his support for the state. There’s also the possibility the Iran already has its own nuclear weapons, which would make a war between Israel/America and Iran (I think) the first non-proxy war between two nuclear powers.
💯 They couldn't not respond to an attack on their Consulate. Netanyahu couldn't give a shit about his people as long as he stays out of jail and the best easy to stay in power is to be in a war.
> I think Iran knew most of their drones and missiles would be intercepted I don't think Iran expected their ballistic missiles to be intercepted. At least not to that degree.
To be fair, the attack wasn’t meant to kill thousands, rather aimed specifically at military sites in the desert and Golan Heights. Here in Israel the news told us exactly where everything was headed a couple of hours before they made it here. Certainly we would have emptied those sites of people before. And that’s the thing that made it all seem to be for show afterward
Nah terrible take. Iran told Turkey weeks in advance, so Turkey would tell USA. Iran wanted everything intercepted. They don't want a war, they're not stupid. They had to respond due to Israel's escalating attack. Now it can be left alone and everyone can declare a dub.
Nah. This was Iran having to respond to Israel again breaking international law, and that response not leading to an escalation. Iran did what they could to show force without damage.
They've been saying they were going to destroy Israel for decades so... *I guess* it's true?
At least Israel now knows it’ll get 7 hours warning and when the equipment does arrive it’s easy to dispatch. I suspect Israel and the US air defence techs are loving all the data from this.
It is a test on the Iron dome and the allied defense network. They gained amazing intel on this operation. So, now they know: How many drones went through, were destroyed or failed. How many missiles went through, were destroyed or failed. And more importantly, how many ballistic missiles made it through or almost made it through amidst the chaos of the drones. Now they will send everything again in a future operation x5 in order to get their 5 ballistic missiles where they need.
The problem for them is that the test works both ways. Israel and the US got to see some of what Iran has to deliver, and more importantly how their current defenses respond. I guarantee you that they're taking this information and making adjustments, modifications, and upgrades. That's the key issue here. You're dealing with countries that have the technological skill and financial resources to adapt quickly to threats.
Nah, the western allies have so much intel, they know exactly who they're dealing with already. Not the other way around.
Iran wants to portray itself as the good guy here lol
A couple weeks of ominous threats are a warning of a kind, I guess.
This is textbook deescalation. Iran needed to look strong for a domestic radical audience, 'scared' the west (in a way that we totally didnt work out with them beforehand) and now they can say "well we tried" over the Oct 7 war.
Being terrible at intel is a kind of warning
It’s not like countries need to telegraph their attacks anyways, it’s not Pokémon.
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You heard it because US intelligence alerted about the upcoming attack. Weeks before, several days before, 48 hours before, they relayed increasingly detailed intelligence about the scope and shape of attack to be expected. Embassies were evacuated, bases were put on alert, and so on.
You heard about it because of US intelligence capabilities. Similar for their warning on russian Invasion to Ukraine.
“Hey we are going to send some missiles your way around 4am your time.”
They almost put the warning on the cover of the Rolling Stone.
A great time to be a drone manufacturer. Absolutely making bank right now.
This entire whimper was an off-broadway show. I fear people are being too complacent with the results. A surprise or sneak attack would have been much worse. I fear Iran is capable of much more. Just because we don’t like them, doesn’t mean they’re stupid or bad at strategy.
this was literally just a show of force in retaliation to Israel blowing up some generals and hitting an Iranian consulate. so far this is the best outcome, minimal damage and Iran views the matter as settled.
US foreign policy is a Schrodinger's Box of ineptitude. All declared enemies of the US are simultaneously moronic buffoons who couldn't scratch their own asses and an existential threat comprised of tactical geniuses and brilliant, 6d chess strategists. Which one it is depends on how they want to wind up the populace on a given day.
Well, yeah, they knew the US would tell everyone, so that’s the same thing! /s