What makes Iran so secure against a successful invasion?

[DaShi]

Yeah, because the US has been at constant war with all those other countries prior to the Iraqi invasion.

[techumseh]

I never said they were at war, only that they were targets of aggression. Twit.

[DaShi]

Then what respite. Since they were not under attack, they still had plenty of time. You could say that they have more. But to say that they now have a huge respite assumes that they are already under incapacitating violence.

Thanks for the insult. It says a lot about you. But I have to ask, why do so many Canadians on this forum behave this way?

[OneFootInTheGrave]

the "axis of evil" were surely not a target for holiday makers .

Well, I am suprised that nobody mentioned Iraq until the last page.

The Iraq situation renders US power projection almost useless, and the wannabe nuclear power club nations such as NK or Iran have much freer hands now than ever. ()at least as far US threat is concerned. Perhaps NK could be invaded by China if the need arises, and Iran by EU. But when I see the day EU "invades" a country, and do that sucessfully (the invasion part) that will than be scary, as in all likeleyhood you will have even biger nightmare afterwards than Iraq at the moment.

[techumseh]

Originally posted by DaShi
Then what respite. Since they were not under attack, they still had plenty of time. You could say that they have more. But to say that they now have a huge respite assumes that they are already under incapacitating violence.

Thanks for the insult. It says a lot about you. But I have to ask, why do so many Canadians on this forum behave this way?

And the deliberate misrepresentation and the wasn't an insult? Hypocrite.

[DaShi]

No, it's called sarcasm. Twit.

[techumseh]

Moron.

[DaShi]

I give up! You win!

[techumseh]

Good night then.

[Saras]

DaShi and tecumseh sound like Pkunk spaceship captains :SC2 nerd:

[Nickiow]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
Actually wasn't Iraq part of the Persian empire until the Ottomans conquered it? I know that it was during Genghis Khan's lifetime.

I can point you here http://www.friesian.com/philhist.htm

from which you can trace iraq and iran to your hearts content.

http://www.friesian.com/mongol.htm#timurid

http://www.friesian.com/iran.htm#iran

As used for part of Paradox EU data base.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by GePap


Against an enemy with little if any sophistication, and 0 air defences. A real army is a much tougher enemy.



And this makes them tougher enemies. After all, air power in Kosovo failed to destroy a significant portion of the Serbian forces there, and while US technology has improved since 1999, lets not think everyone has studies the ways in which the Serbs fooled and overcame US air power during that bombing campaign.

Air power is a critical adjunct to land power, but even today, air power by itself has yet to become the key. And air power is even further reduced in effectiveness in urban combat, and Tehran is a city of 14 million people. Any determined defender could make trying to take that city a mess, and then you have the problem of logistics and defending the supply lines over mountanous terrian.

IIUC, the case has been made that air power was relatively in effective in Kosovo for two reasons -1. there were no Nato conventional forces on the ground -ergo the Serbs could disperse and hide their armor, and didnt need to concentrate it. Air power works best together with at least some conventional ground forces - the enemy must either concentrate (making him vulnerable from the air) or disperse - making him vulnerable to ground attack - thats COMBINED ARMS. Using air alone is much weaker 2. The USAF in Kosovo did not come in and bomb from low altitudes, in order to minimize the chances of casualties. This also reduced effectiveness.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by OneFootInTheGrave
the "axis of evil" were surely not a target for holiday makers .

Well, I am suprised that nobody mentioned Iraq until the last page.

The Iraq situation renders US power projection almost useless, and the wannabe nuclear power club nations such as NK or Iran have much freer hands now than ever. ()at least as far US threat is concerned. Perhaps NK could be invaded by China if the need arises, and Iran by EU. But when I see the day EU "invades" a country, and do that sucessfully (the invasion part) that will than be scary, as in all likeleyhood you will have even biger nightmare afterwards than Iraq at the moment.

Very true. Bush's personal desire to attack Saddam has left everyone worse off in the long run since now both NK and Iran will get nuclear weapons. Hey but we got one aging dictator who was contained and was no threat to any of his neighbors.

[Patroklos]

That is stupid reasoning.

The American Army is not the deterrent to Iran and NK when as far as nukes. THIS IS NOT THE SAME AS IRAQ. An invasion of either is not likely for the reasons stated in this thead.

It will be a bombardment to destory facilities and inflict as much pain as possible so that they decide it is not worth it to continue their course of action (Iran is rational enough to come to this conclusion, NK would probobly expand the war).

The Navy and Air Force are completely free in most areas to pursue these aims, which is good since these are the branches that would handle things anyways.

[Elok]

Tangent question: I know very little about nuclear weaponry, but isn't Israel sufficiently close to Iran that an attack powerful enough to wipe it off the map would drown half of Iran in fallout as well? I know that the one meltdown in Chernobyl supposedly led to fallout as far away as Finland in the subsequent years.

Anyway, we don't need the hassle of invading Iran (assuming that, by "invasion," the thread's author meant more than bombing). The Iraqis were and are divided by ethnic and religious differences, and they waste a lot of energy distrusting and attacking each other; that same distrust also makes some Iraqis relatively friendly to the U.S. If we invaded Iran, we'd be facing a group of people whose hatred was focused almost entirely on us. Or is there a sizable ethnic division in Iran?