Mike Pence said this earlier in Munich

[bathroommonkey76]

"Under President Trump, the United States will remain fully committed to ensuring that Iran never obtains a nuclear weapon capable of threatening our countries, our allies in the region, especially Israel," he said.

Does this mean more sanctions? Precision naval strikes? Or both.

Link to tweet

[DFW]

1. So far, this means:

More hot air and token gestures. Republicans are essentially cowards--they are not fond of launching attacks against countries that will shoot back. They prefer attacking places like Panama and Grenada. Iraq was a miscalculation due to Rumsfeld's incompetence ("Maybe six days, maybe six weeks, certainly not six months&quot .

Besides, Iran's population has a young average age. They hate their authoritarian government of religious conservatives (sound familiar?). The only way to unite them WITH the government is to attack them from the outside (think 9/11/2001--again, sound familiar?).

[bathroommonkey76]

3. I'd agree with you

but I have to say this isn't a regular Republican administration-- Tangerine Tornado is 1000 times worse than Bush. They have nothing to lose with a few airstrikes to take out Iran's nuclear reactor. Bannon and company know that a war with them will boost Sunburned Stalin's approval ratings.

[DFW]

4. A war with them, besides being even more stupid than war with Iraq

Would start a wave of anti-American terrorism heretofore unknown. An air strike on their reactor would be the beginning, not the end. Maybe Trump would think "mission accomplished," and think he could go home with no harm done. Iranians are everywhere, well-educated and technically savvy. Many of them hate their regime, and would only side with it if we attacked them. It would isolate us politically, possibly to the point of splitting NATO. We would be condemned in the UN (I know, Trump wouldn't care), and lose out on business deals worldwide (NOW Trump would care, but too late). Putin would love it, of course.

The ONLY time I ever disagreed with Wes Clark on a geopolitical subject was on Iran. Twelve years ago, he thought Cheney would find a pretext to invade Iran before he left office, and I said that after Iraq, I thought the Bush Lite regime had lost its appetite (and budget) for further invasions. THAT time I was right. If Wes were to come out with his theory again, I'd be hard put to counter his argument this time.

[BlueMTexpat]

5. +1! eom

[OnDoutside]

2. He lies ! He lies ! He lies !