"Tuesday will be power plant day and bridge day, all wrapped up in one in Iran. There will be nothing like it. Open the fuckin strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in hell. Just watch. Praise be to Allah."
--Donald J. Trump, President of the United States of America
During the Second World War, the United States Navy unleashed naval bombardment on Japanese troops who were protected deep inside cement tunnels, only to emerge to slaughter American marines once the bombing stopped.
During the Cuban Missile Crisis, as President Kennedy considered his options, the possibility of simply launching a quick strike with Marines to depose Castro and to defeat the Cuban government was considered. Marine Commandant David Shoup briefed President Kennedy and his advisors. General Shoup displayed a large map of Cuba, and in the middle of the island was a red dot. That red dot was to scale representing the island of Tarawa. "It took us 18,000 Marines," he said and the casualties were enormous. What do you think, he asked, the cost of invading Cuba would be, and how long would it take?
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| Charlottesville Rambos |
JFK was a veteran of the Pacific war, where Guadalcanal, another small island, claimed the lives of seven thousand Marines and took 6 months to subdue.
JFK took invasion off the table.
Donald J. Trump's bone spurs precluded any chance he would have first hand knowledge of what combat can and cannot achieve.
There is an old adage in the Pentagon: "Never allow an air force general to be chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when you are facing a ground war: They only know what you can see from ten thousand feet." Which is to say, you cannot win a war with air power alone. When air force generals argue that World War Two was ended by the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they are wrong. Japan was already defeated by naval blockade, and an island hopping grinding war and when the Russians entered the war and overwhelmed the Japanese army in Manchuria, the Japanese finally capitulated. The atomic bombs were not decisive.
What really worries most of the true cognoscenti is that Israel may use a score of atomic bombs against Iran, as Israel faces effective missile and drone strikes from Iran which Israel's "Iron Dome" cannot defend against.
And, of course, Trump's threats are empty. Even if he damaged Iran's economy and infrastructure severely, the damage to Western, and yes, to America's economy would be worse.
The question is: Can Trump's advisors put together a video to show him which might help him understand this.
Russia expected a quick victory in Ukraine. They did not expect drones would decimate their columns of tanks.
The best we can hope for is a TACO (Trump always chickens out) Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Renee Good and Alex Pretti are still dead.
And so, for that matter, is Jeffrey Epstein.
