Foad Izadi
english.khamenei.ir

In this interview, Foad Izadi, Associate Professor of American Studies at Tehran university, explains how a direct US military involvement against Iran could lead to devastating troop losses, economic turmoil, and legal crises, while exposing Israel’s true goal: Fragmenting Iran. Yet instead of weakening the country, the aggression has only fueled unprecedented national unity against foreign threats.

According to American sources themselves, the US has over 50,000 troops stationed across ten bases in the region, many of which are located very close to Iran’s borders. Some are situated along the Persian Gulf, while others are slightly farther away — yet still significantly closer than the Zionist regime. Given this proximity, Iran’s various ballistic missiles can easily reach these bases, and the short distance makes intercepting these missiles extremely difficult. An Iranian missile can strike these bases within just 3 to 5 minutes.

Even in the occupied territories (Israel), where a multi-layered missile defense system has been developed over years, a significant number of Iranian missiles would still penetrate. How, then, could US bases — which lack such defensive systems — possibly withstand such attacks?

As a result, 50,000 American soldiers are within range of Iran’s highly advanced ballistic missiles. This number — 50,000 — matches the total casualties the US suffered over 12 years in the Vietnam War. In this region, however, thousands of American troops could be killed within just a few days. This would be an unbearable cost for the US. One of the key reasons Washington has avoided direct military engagement so far is precisely this fear of massive troop losses in the region.

Andrew Korybko
Andrew Korybko's Newsletter

Benjamin Netanyahu, other members of the Israeli government, and anti-Iranian hawks within Trump’s own convinced him that a window of opportunity has opened up to knock Iran out of the geopolitical game for good.

Trump’s decision to bomb several nuclear sites in Iran is the due to him letting Israel shape the conflict’s military-strategic dynamics in ways that made this scenario too tempting for him not to pursue. [cf. trump chabad -Ed.] Observers should remember that he was aware of Israel’s plans to bomb Iran, and though he might have pressured them into delaying it till after his 60-day deadline for another nuclear deal had passed, he fully supported them afterwards. That made the US’ direct involvement in the conflict inevitable in hindsight.

Israel significantly degraded Iran’s military capabilities since the start of its ongoing US-supported bombing campaign but then began to claim that it can’t finish the job without American bunker busters. Influential MAGA thought leader Steve Bannon considered this to be a betrayal of their countries’ special relationship since Israel shouldn’t have started a war that it couldn’t win on its own. Many members of Trump’s movement agree with this assessment and that’s why his base is deeply divided over this issue.

For his part, Trump either doesn’t care what they think, is convinced that most of them will come around to supporting him, or expects them to hold their nose and still vote for the candidates that he endorses (including whoever his envisaged successor might be), so he bombed Iran in spite of this. He did that even though there’s a real risk of Iran targeting regional US bases and/or blockading the Strait of Hormuz, which Trump sought to deter by threatening it with unprecedented fire and fury in that event.

The Dissident
The Dissident (Substack)

Iran does not have nuclear weapons, but Israel does and is willing to use them if they believe they are about to lose.

Recently, the genocidal IDF tweeted out a propaganda video showcasing the effect of a Nuclear launch.

“The world is facing one of its biggest nuclear threats in decades,” the announcer of the video said.

The video ends by claiming that “the biggest terrorist army in the world was about to have (a nuclear weapon) in their hands,” referring to Iran.

But Israel's claim - that Iran was about to obtain a Nuclear weapon- was completely fabricated.

Former CIA head William Burns, current DNI head Tulsi Gabbard, and even the U.S. intelligence community’s annual threat assessment report, put out in March, all acknowledge that there was no intention on the part of Iran to build a nuclear bomb.

This propaganda video was not intended to scare people about the non-existent Iranian nuclear threat, but was put out as a veiled threat of what Israel may do if it feels they are losing the war with Iran.

Israel, unlike Iran, does have a massive Nuclear arsenal, and a doctrine -dubbed the Samson Option- where they call to use it if they feel they will lose a war.

After a long investigation, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh revealed all of this in his 1991 book, “The Samson Option: Israel's Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign Policy”.

In this article, I will review the history of Israel obtaining the bomb and its continued threat to use it, including as a threat of blackmail to influence U.S. foreign policy.