This. This is what it boils down to. This is why Pakistan and India keep getting away with the shit they pull along with all other nuclear nations. The moment Iran claims nuclear capable, “restraint” will be shown. With the amount of back channel communication that’s been happening between the US and Iran over the Gaza and Israel situation, it’s very likely they already have shown their hand and ability to be nuclear, and therefore the calculus is now extremely complex compared to something like Iraq and Afghanistan.

This also explains why Iran demonstrated and telegraphed their attack the way they did and the US agreed to it, despite the “Iran is the devil” rhetoric being perpetuated worldwide.

Hate to say it, but might is right and has always been.

Edit: To add, if they admit they are nuclear capable publicly, they are inviting more sanctions and another escalation which is the last thing they need given the state of their economy. They will also be on the back foot because Israel gets the moral high ground for being right about their nuclear ambitions.

There's no black and white morality in real life. Even the chance to choose between actual totalitarianism and a hypocritical rules based world order is a massive privilege most don't get. Most of us are born into one or the other and that's that.

But with the Iranian drone/missile strike US and other allied forces were doing interceptions.

From what analysis I've read, the Iranian strike largely landed in empty desert. It was intended as a show of force, not a provocative attack.

And one thing it showed that the US and Israel genuinely struggle with is that Iran can launch a $100 missile that US/Israel needs a $10,000 defensive rocket to knock down. Yeah, they got 99% of their targets. But they exhausted a fortune to achieve it.

Ukraine has the same problem with Russia. They have to expend enormous amounts of defensive weaponry to counter an incoming Russian strike. And Russia can simply wear them down by targeting over a large border and at a long range.

That’s not happening in Ukraine unless there are some dramatic escalations, right wing memelords or no.

Because Russia and Iran are operating as war-time at-cost economies, while the US and Israel are running their militaries as for-profit private enterprises, the scale and scope of operations they're capable of can eclipse more advanced nations simply because they aren't running every weapons purchase through a dozen middle men.

Ukraine tried to operate as a war-time at-cost economy, but the Russians were too good at targeting their domestic factories and munitions plants. So now they're out of domestic weaponry and forced to rely on foreign exports.

Israel doesn't have this problem which - paradoxically - makes them a better market for US arms sales (they've got more money to spend and they can afford to spend it at market rate rather than cost).

If Dems retake the House, they'll start re-gearing the war economy to be at-cost rather than for-profit. Republicans won't. But that's what's really at stake here.

Russia borders Israel

I guess if you want to lean hard into Syria as a Russian client state... maybe?

Although, the truly Big Brain move is to assert the Bible is talking about the Godless Protestants of Europe.

We tell the GOP that Russia is launching planes full of pregnant women wanting abortions towards Ukraine. The GOP would then go all-in on intercepting those planes. Except in reality those aren't planes; they're Russian cruise missiles heading to Ukrainian cities.

They should have joined NATO