As war rages, Iranian politicians push for exit from nuclear weapons treaty

Through decades of my own experience, I can tell you: Never say stuff like "even X isn't dumb enough" or "you can't be dumber than that" because it'll be like a challenge to the universe which it'll win every time to prove you wrong.

China's protection is flimsy, if they can see a way not to get involved then they won't. They will block unification but they don't care about the current leadership. Hell if they thought they could get their guy in charge they might join un a US lead coup.

Yup we sure are. With the Middle East now the hot bed of nuclear arms proliferation, you can guess other countries will also want to hop on the bandwagon to secure their sovereignty.

They've been preparing for this since 1979

well the thing is Iran is not planning any large scale invasion or attack requiring big coordination. They just need to inflict enough pain or just fear in the strait or to any landing force to win the war

They have been a perfectly functional nation and state for centuries. They are not a drug cartel where a 'Kingpin strategy' would work. These groups will remain loyal to their nation in the face of indiscriminate attacks against their military, cultural, and industrial assets. Especially when their enemies have shown they don't respect negotiations even with the country's top leaders. Why would a lower-ranking official trust them enough to negotiate anything at all?

You just need to leave them alone for a bit at some point. If they don't have an imminent threat to rally the banners for then strategic decentralization usually blows up.

If one weights avoiding a future where Iran doesn't acquire nuclear weapons heavily enough a failed Iranian state is preferable to the pre-war status quo.

Pretty much. Distributed leadership is only ever a stop-gap measure, it's not sustainable. It's only a matter of time before one regional commander's interests collide with another guy's interests and there's internal war. So really you just decapitate until you get to people who have no idea how to actually run anything and all hate each other, and the whole thing collapses.

Do you have an idea of what would happen to Iran after this whole thing( if ever blows over?) From my understanding, Israel has already taken out a lot of their leader candidates and heads of the military. If they manage to continue this till the us pulls out, would Iran as a state no longer exist, with multiple territories lead by different leaders? Or would Iran still have a form of government left? And judging by what I’ve seen, it seems impossibly hard for a civilian revolution, since protests are crushed and it becomes a bloodbath. I have little hope for a civilian takeover of the country. The other likely possibility is Iran surviving as a military state with the IRGC ruling. Honestly things don’t look good for the region at all. I have a suspicion that this is going to take the better part of this century to fix( might be exaggerated but it’s going to take a long time), and thats not mentioning the damage to the energy infrastructure.

 hope not, but its probable. An asymmetrical war, against an opponent with 300k ground force counting the IRGC and Artesh, The only members of the Artesh that are ideologically motivated to fight the United States are the top leaders of the Artesh who are themselves originally from the IRGC. The rank and file...not so much. People forget that during the January protests, they specifically prevented the Artesh from accessing their arms because of the fear of defection. Most of them come from families of ordinary Iranians who absolutely hate the regime and would easily turn on the IRGC. The IRGC is not doing so well either. No salaries since January, the main bank that processes state salaries (Sepah Bank) had its data processing center destroyed(same to the remote back ups) so not just the IRGC but all civil servants are not getting their salaries any time soon. Deserters are now common. that's spent the last 30 years digging tunnels in giant mountains All of which are known to Mossad and the CIA and have been mostly destroyed. And now the US is throwing mines into the missile shafts of many of them. This strategy has even been well covered even by the WSJ on how it is backfiring on Iran because the US and Israel know where the missile cities are and by either bunker busting them or at least burying them, automatically Iran loses access to hundreds of stockpiled missiles and thousands of drones. with a vast arsenal of c****, effective drones & still has ballistic missile capabilities. Drones ,Yes. This is the most problematic weapon that Iran possesses. Ballistic Missiles, not so much anymore. Still a threat but not as much as at the start of the war. While they disrupt 25% of the worlds oil & fertilizer Very true. That is why I am 100% sure the targets of the ground op are the Islands at the Strait of Hormuz and even Hormuzug Province, not Kharg Island. If the US is able to capture those places, Iran can do very little to close the Strait again although Iraqi and Kuwaiti shipping will still face a lot of risks .The main issue long term is the destruction Iran has done to the Gulf facilities, whose effects will be felt for years to come. But I can see the US being in a strong position to re-open the Strait of Hormuz and have large 100k Militia in a neighboring country (PMF Iraq) I think the Basij inside Iran itself is a far bigger factor than the PMF. A few Iraqi millitia have been sent to Iran though. The PMF is facing American attacks in Iraq itself right now. However, as long as the US and Israel have air supremacy, then they are on track to lose thousands of members with zero methods of defending themselves(Gogle what Israel did to Basij members who were camping in tents at a sports complex. One night alone had 300 of them gone). As they already have from Israeli drone strikes on checkpoints in most Iranian cities. There is already a lot of fracturing amongst the Basij who are resorting to hiding under bridges ,underpasses and tunnels .In short, their security presence is collapsing over time. In fact, the Police chief of Iran has been complaining about how they are being worn down, how the Basij are sleeping on the street and how deserters are increasing. all while their proxy harasses another shipping route in the Red Sea (Houthis). The Houthis are to be honest, the most problematic ones right now out of all the others. The US can in theory ask the Yemeni government to restart their anti-Houthi campaign and rely on US air cover in advancing towards Sana'a. However, I think the US is stretched as it is. Israel is so far doing the right thing and not retaliating against the Houthis and that is why the Bab El Mandeb has not been closed. I wonder if this will change once the US starts its ground op.

We completely destroyed their nuclear capabilities last year. Somebody is definitely lying.

And trump proved to the whole world if you dont have nuclear weapons, you are just another target for nuclear countries to flex on.

Yeah it’s ran by a radical nut case who thinks of himself as a god. It’s a good thing he isn’t religious!!

The entire problem is that that's the obvious end result of what the US is doing. Countries like Russia and North Korea are getting away with garbage at least in part because they have nukes, while Ukraine and Iran are attacked. As much as I don't want it to be the case, I find it hard to argue that any country shouldn't come to the conclusion that nukes are the most sure way to protect yourself.

Calling me naive doesn't change history. People said the same thing during the Cold War and with India-Pakistan. Regimes, no matter how extreme, prioritize their own survival. They know using a nuke means they get wiped out too. That balance of terror is exactly what prevents full-scale wars.

Lol, which countries has iran invaded?

Right because north Korea totally stopped with all the pieces to build a nuclear weapon?

You have a hell of a lot more confidence then I do in the current US administration having any sort of solid plan for this.