The Trump Regime's War with Iran Would Be Far Worse Than Iraq

With an occupant of the White House who is a malignant narcissist, has no knowledge of history, doesn't read and only wants reports on a single page that tell him what he wants to hear, saber rattling and possible war with Iran is a recipe for disaster. Surrounding himself with delusion war mongers like John Bolton only makes the danger to the nation and the lives of our military service members far worse.  Trump - who seemingly like Hitler uses war and military threats and posturing to make up for his diminished manhood - has learned nothing from the Iraq War debacle and the trillions of taxpayer dollars (which would have been better spent on America's infrastructure) squandered in that fiasco.  As a piece in the Washington Post makes clear, a war with Iraq will be far worse than the Iraq catastrophe both in terms of cost, lost lives, and destabilizing America's already tarnished standing in the world. Making matters even worse, the USA could find itself with few coalition partners save for perhaps the toxic and brutal  regime.  Here are article excerpts that ought to terrify sane Americans: 

Judging from appearances, the United States and Iran are worryingly close to conflict. This weekend, only days after the United States dispatched warships and bombers to the Middle East to deter what it deemed Iranian threats, two Saudi oil tankers and a Norwegian ship were damaged in apparent acts of sabotage in the Persian Gulf.

The dispute between a [Trump] U.S. administration led by a tough-talking Republican president [would be führer] and an embattled but antagonistic Middle Eastern power has reminded many observers of the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 — a move that, in the years since, has been widely condemned as disastrous for all involved.

Even some of the characters in this apparent remake are the same: John Bolton, President Trump’s national security adviser, played a key role in President George W. Bush’s buildup to the Iraq invasion as undersecretary of state for arms control and international security.

Bolton’s actions at the time earned him a reputation as reckless. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif appeared to allude to him on Tuesday, telling reporters that “extremist individuals in the U.S. administration” were falsely trying to blame Iran for the incidents in the Persian Gulf.

[A] conflict with Iran would not simply be a redux of the 2003 war with Iraq. It would be quite different in many ways — and it would almost certainly be substantially worse. Present-day Iran is a significantly different country compared to Iraq in 2003. The way it would fight a war is very different, too.

If nothing else, Iran is simply a bigger country than Iraq was before the 2003 invasion. At the time, Iraq’s population was about 25 million. Iran’s population is estimated to be more than 82 million. Iran spans 591,000 square miles of land, compared with Iraq’s 168,000 square miles.

[T]he Iraqi army had fewer than 450,000 personnel when the invasion began. Recent estimates suggest that Iran has 523,000 active military personnel, as well as 250,000 reserve personnel.

Just as important, however, is Iran’s location. Unlike Iraq, Iran is a maritime power bordered by the Caspian sea to the north and the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman to the south. It shares land borders with several troubled U.S. allies, including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkey and Iraq.

About a third of the world’s oil tanker traffic passes through the Strait of Hormuz, which is bordered by Iran and Oman. At its narrowest point, this shipping route is just under two miles wide. Blocking it could lead shipments of daily global oil exports to drop by an estimated 30 percent.

In terms of conventional military strength, Iran is far weaker than the United States. But the country has long pursued asymmetric strategies that could allow it to inflict serious damage on U.S. interests in the region.

Iran’s navy has a real advantage against the United States, too. It doesn’t need big ships or firepower to block off the Strait of Hormuz, for example, but could use mines or submarines to force a halt in trade.

U.S. war games have suggested that speedboat suicide attacks and missiles could be surprisingly effective against the American military.

The invasion of Iraq involved 150,000 U.S. troops, along with tens of thousands from allied nations. The financial cost of the Iraq War was pegged at over $2 trillion in 2013, with about 400,000 people estimated to have been killed between 2003 and 2011.

American military planners know all this. However, the U.S. government cannot say that there are no good options to militarily engage Iran, because doing so would take the threat of military action off the table and diminish the pressure that it hopes to maintain on Tehran. It’s a risky strategy that has even some of America’s closest allies worried.

The US would likely go it alone and the expense in lives and wasted taxpayer funds would make the Iraq disaster pale in comparison. Only a fool would push this agenda, but then again, that's what we have in the White House, a narcissistic, dangerous fool.