[HN Gopher] Iran's Internet Shutdown Hides a Deadly Crackdown
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Iran's Internet Shutdown Hides a Deadly Crackdown
Author : voisin
Score : 122 points
Date : 2022-09-25 18:43 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.wired.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.wired.com)
| bink wrote:
| IANAL, but how are Instagram and WhatsApp allowed to operate in
| Iran? Do embargoes not apply to online services?
|
| I'd love to see companies such as Google and Apple implement
| optional mesh networking as an over-the-air update to their
| phones in order to help people communicate during times like
| this.
| toast0 wrote:
| There's a general license for personal communications services
| in sanctioned countries. There's no required user payments,
| although phone number verification necessarily involves
| payments to the destination telephone company.
| tpmx wrote:
| > IANAL, but how are Instagram and WhatsApp allowed to operate
| in Iran? Do embargoes not apply to online services?
|
| That's a pretty good point, actually.
|
| > I'd love to see companies such as Google and Apple implement
| optional mesh networking as an over-the-air update to their
| phones in order to help people communicate during times like
| this.
|
| The tech isn't really there yet. It's both a hardware (BT
| doesn't reach far enough) and a software problem.
|
| You don't just "casually" implement a global mesh-based network
| without a careful and quite explicit system design involving HW
| and SW in tandem.
|
| Nevermind the largest problem: How do you prioritize traffic in
| a distributed, fair and and scalable way, on nodes that you
| can't trust, once the mesh network gets really popular?
| djbusby wrote:
| Maybe ad-hoc WiFi stuff? Or can you ad-hoc see other hardware
| attached to the same "cell" as you?
| A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote:
| In general, sanctions are notoriously complicated ( sometimes
| with seemingly -- or actually -- contradictory notes ). And
| just to complicate it even further, it uses a system of waivers
| ( licenses ), which allow you to ask OFAC to engage in some (
| usually explicitly listed ) of the otherwise prohibited
| activity. Due to their size and reach, it is not unlikely that
| both entities secured such a license.
|
| Naturally, there is a compliance cost that they incur as a
| result, but I am sure there is an interest in US government to
| keep those lines of communications open for one reason or
| another.
| bink wrote:
| Ah, it looks like you're right. A google for "ofac iran
| instagram" returns: https://therecord.media/us-treasury-
| carves-out-iran-sanction...
| california2077 wrote:
| amir734jj wrote:
| Iranian government has a history of bloody crackdown. Enough is
| enough. There has been no free and fair election in the past
| decades so this government doesn't represent the people. I am
| worried this tyrannical government succeeds in putting down this
| movement and then the western governments sign another nuclear
| treaty which means sanction relief and more money for the regime
| that doesn't represent the people. The west should recognize that
| this government is a dictatorship and is not afraid of using any
| means including live bullets to put down protests.
| [deleted]
| kache_ wrote:
| lol
|
| the naivety of westerners never ceases to amaze me
| petre wrote:
| There won't be another treaty but rather a green pass from the
| US for Israel to attack Iran and even more sanctions. Iran is
| currently cooperating with Russia so it could only go south for
| them.
| [deleted]
| ars wrote:
| It's too far for Israel to effectively attack it. Israel
| would need to refuel over Turkey or Iraq, or launch from an
| American aircraft carrier.
|
| i.e. it would not be a Israeli mission, it would have to be a
| joint mission. Or in other words America would not be able to
| say "Israel did it", America would have to be fully on board
| - and perhaps help.
|
| And that's not something small, that's why it hasn't happened
| yet.
| Alir3z4 wrote:
| Let's think that happens.
|
| Russia-Ukraine case made the whole world go crazy due to
| gas/oil and price increase in anything that touches fossil
| fuels.
|
| Imagine what would happen globally by Iran settings mines
| in Straits of Hormuz or rain missiles on countries that are
| hosting US bases (Oil producers) in retaliation and
| pressuring global economy in order to maximize the effect
| of the war.
|
| The maximum Israel can do is to slow down the progress of
| whatever Israil think Iran is doing, is to conduct sabotage
| missions in Iran, killing scientists, military commanders,
| cyberattacks or lobbying as much as possible in other
| countries for more sanctions etc and so far that has not
| been effective. In matter of fact, it has backfired.
| YZF wrote:
| It's unlikely that Iran would do that in response to an
| attack on their nuclear facilities. What would they gain
| from it? They'd just lick their wounds and move on. Iran
| is already fighting a proxy war against Saudi in Yemen.
| Their military would be eroded pretty quickly in an
| outright direct conflict and that would risk losing power
| internally. Iraq fired plenty of missiles all over the
| place during the gulf war and it didn't really do much.
| Mining the straits will likely just result in the US or
| some international task force taking control over those
| and de-mining.
|
| All that said it's very unlikely there will be an attack
| on Iran. The US would much prefer to see the regime fall.
| That doesn't seem super likely either but attacking Iran
| will probably just strengthen the regime.
| jimbob45 wrote:
| That sounds like a lot of words to say, "we should create
| whatever pretext we need to invade Iran like we invaded Iraq in
| 2003".
|
| I'm not sure Iraq is far enough away in the collective US
| memory for your comment to be received positively.
| Alir3z4 wrote:
| The fact that Rouhani got elected and became a president and
| JCPOA got signed and so many catastrophic events happening by
| that administration shows there's a democratic election.
|
| Impossible to think if it was a "dictatorship", such person
| would be elected in the first place.
| emilsedgh wrote:
| Iran is a semi dictatorship. People have _some_ agency but
| not much.
|
| The _election_ in which you can choose between 2 people who
| have already been filtered out by the regime is not really a
| democratic election.
|
| As someone voted for Rouhani (and would do so again), in a
| democratic situation he would've been my last choice.
| Alir3z4 wrote:
| The fact that presidents get filtered out is a god send tbh
| in case of Iran.
|
| Imagine ending up wit people like Masoumeh Alinejad-Ghomi,
| Reza Pahlavi, Supreme Grandma Maryam Rejavi (_Masoud Rajavi
| decided to become against the IR since his or his party was
| filtered out_) or any other weirdo.
|
| Not so great process, but I don't think letting everyone
| run for presidency has much of its goodies packed with it
| anyway.
|
| In either case, Iran's constitution keeps the president
| above so many levels that having impeachment becomes even
| harder. Whoever president Iran ends up with, it becomes
| almost impossible to replace or take them down by Majles.
|
| I don't know, probably a role of Prime Minister will be
| more suited with some changes to law that person can be
| nailed down in wrongdoing or pressure to step down, but who
| knows, maybe that backfires too.
|
| yuck, so complicated :p
|
| edit: some typos
| lazide wrote:
| Ok, but what does that actually mean?
|
| The reality is, unless the Iranians themselves replace the
| Ayatollahs, it would require a foreign sponsored coup or
| outright invasion to meaningfully change the status quo there.
| case0x00 wrote:
| I do wonder on the feasibility of such events. I don't know a
| huge amount about pre-revolution Iran, but I don't think the
| Shah had an exceptionally powerful security force (I could be
| wrong). But now at least, the IRGC makes a revolution/coup
| very difficult.
| PraetorianGourd wrote:
| The Shah had a very powerful secret police, the SAVAK[1].
| Prior to the overthrow of Mosaddegh, there wasn't a
| comparable security force.. but I think something about
| gaining power in a coup makes one incredibly paranoid about
| being a victim of a coup.
|
| [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAVAK
| [deleted]
| amir734jj wrote:
| It means: 1) publicly condemn the government 2) recognize
| that this government doesn't represent the people of Iran 3)
| don't give money to this government.
| lazide wrote:
| Anyone giving money to Iran already gets sanctioned by the
| US, no? And the gov't is already pretty isolated, except
| for 'persona non grata' countries like North Korea or
| Russia anyway.
|
| And I doubt those folks are going to change their mind over
| what's going on.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _already gets sanctioned by the US_
|
| Iran trades with Turkey, Pakistan, the U.A.E., Germany,
| India, Kuwait and Qatar [1].
|
| [1] https://oec.world/en/profile/country/irn/?flowSelecto
| r1=flow...
| MonkeyMalarky wrote:
| I think point 3 is this, no?
|
| >I am worried this tyrannical government succeeds in
| putting down this movement and then the western
| governments sign another nuclear treaty which means
| sanction relief and more money for the regime
| mdibaiee wrote:
| We are not asking for foreign countries to "replace the
| Ayatollahs" for us. What we are asking, is ending their
| diplomatic relations with this government, or at least
| severing it, instead of trying to strengthen their diplomatic
| relations.
|
| A deal between this dictatorship and the west will only
| strengthen them, leading to more oppression. A weakened
| dictatorship due to foreign pressure will make it easier for
| the people of Iran to replace them.
| fny wrote:
| Unfortunately, foreign governments only care about their
| own strategic interests, not Iranians. Do you forget who
| flew in Khomeini?
| lazide wrote:
| That's already been happening for decades. Has it made any
| difference?
| ghufran_syed wrote:
| Well, there _was_ pressure, until the Obama
| administration released $50 billion back to the regime
| https://www.factcheck.org/2019/03/obama-didnt-give-
| iran-150-...
| lazide wrote:
| Eh, that reduced it but definitely didn't release the
| pressure. Trump turned the screws down pretty tight in
| quick order too.
| largepeepee wrote:
| And economic pressure means nothing to a theocracy that
| governs over a poor population. That is in fact their
| bread and butter.
|
| Look no further than Afghanistan to see how resilient
| they can be. They even withstood decades of occupation.
|
| Hard power alone wouldn't have worked and who knows
| whether soft power could have worked either since there
| were so many saboteurs both internal and external like
| Saudis/Israeli lobbies killing the project in its
| infancy.
| aiProgMach wrote:
| Look I have so strong opinion on what you said that I might
| get banned for even mentioning it. So let me ask you this
| qustion, Why you not just learn from your neighbors, Iraq?
| These exact words were used to ask for American
| intervention and you can see what happened, it's so naive
| to assume that the western colonial powers are your
| friends.
| icare_1er wrote:
| Iranians are quite ambiguous about that. When there are no
| riots, they generally blame the West for sanctions, cutting
| banks out, etc, as it ultimately impacts the normal Joe on
| the street.
|
| Yet, when there are riots, they blame the West for not
| sanctioning enough...
|
| One thing I do not understand - and if journalists are
| reading this, I hope this gets picked up, is that many of
| the Iranian elite's sons and daughters are actually living
| in the US. They try to hide that from both the American
| public, and the Iranian one (complete hypocrisy).
| oliwary wrote:
| I am genuinely curious - are there any historical examples
| where ending diplomatic relationships and imposing
| sanctions on a country has improved the situation for
| people living there?
| weatherlite wrote:
| South Africa
| jokowueu wrote:
| >would require a foreign sponsored coup
|
| Won't be the first time
| Alir3z4 wrote:
| > Ok, but what does that actually mean?
|
| 1. Sanctions: check
|
| 2. International isolation: ~check
|
| 3. freezing foreign assets: check
|
| 4. Bringing freedom to Iran by liberating them (successful
| operations like Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, ....): LOL, never
| gonna happen
| throwayyy479087 wrote:
| You are correct. These are frequent and I'm not paying
| attention until something meaningful changes.
|
| The US will resign the Obama-era nuclear treaty as a fuck you
| to Trump, and the money will reinforce the regime. Little
| people don't count in this situation.
| hsuduebc2 wrote:
| How it is possible to not let send messages containing name of a
| first victim when WhatsApp should have end to end encryption?
| Kinda weird
| changoplatanero wrote:
| my guess is that that part of the article is not referencing
| whatsapp. they are talking about ordinary unencrypted texts
| there
| mylons wrote:
| it's almost like facebook has no incentive to provide a quality
| service that lives up to it's promises given it's monopolistic
| presence/practices.
| BrainVirus wrote:
| We need better news outlets than Wired to cover stuff like this.
| Frankly, after the last few years I don't trust a word they say
| about freedom of speech on the Internet. I don't have any
| reliable knowledge about Iran, so there is no easy way for me to
| double-check anything without spending hundreds of hours on
| research, and even then the results will be uncertain. We live in
| a kind of dark age of news media, while simultaneously suffering
| from information overflow.
| timcavel wrote:
| hi_herbert wrote:
| tpmx wrote:
| The lack of detailed reporting from Iran the past week is
| disturbing, to say the least.
|
| Are there any (for the lack of a better word) "western" (I mean,
| I'd also trust, for example NHK, SBS, ABC Australia, etc)
| journalists from credible journalistic institutions on the ground
| in Iran?
|
| I admit I'm ignorant to the limits of independent reporting I'm
| certain the government of Iran mandates.
| dmix wrote:
| It's very hard to get an Iranian visa as a journo
| pessimizer wrote:
| We do have a habit of sending spies as journalists.
| adventured wrote:
| The US media (in particular) has a very weird bias in favor of
| Iran. It's quite disturbing.
|
| Saudi Arabia murdered Khashoggi - one man - and it was a
| prominent story for years (to be clear, I dislike the
| theocracies in both Iran and Saudi Arabia, they're both vile
| authoritarian systems). Iran's government genocided thousands
| of civilians by shooting them in the streets during the
| protests right before the pandemic, and it was covered for
| weeks in the US media and then the media forgot it ever
| happened. Why doesn't that get the attention of eg Tiananmen
| Square? Media bias is the sole good explanation.
| baskethead wrote:
| This is patently false. Iran has been called part of the Axis
| of Evil since Reagan era. Iran has been reported on as evil
| for decades. This current set of protests have gotten a lot
| of media attention.
|
| The reason why Khashoggi gets so much attention is because
| reporters love nothing more than to report about themselves.
| There are plenty of other people who were killed by Saudi
| Arabia that got buried because the media doesn't care.
| miracle2k wrote:
| He was a journalist, but he was also working for the
| Washington Post in particular, and he was an US resident,
| and the details of this murder where particularly gruesome.
| No need for the jab about the media here.
| baskethead wrote:
| The jab about the media is absolutely warranted. How many
| women are found dismembered in the US almost every day?
| There was just a case last week in NYC. The media doesn't
| pick it up, but with Khashhoggi they did, because they
| care the most about journalists.
|
| I'm not saying that it wasn't horrific what happened to
| him, but the question was why was there so much focus on
| his case, and the reason is because the media loves to
| report on themselves over anything else.
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| When a foreign government is suspected of dismembering a
| US resident it has more geo-political implications.
| Despite the fact that every grusome crime deserves equal
| treatment from the justice system.
| pessimizer wrote:
| The reason that is true about Saudi Arabia is because
| nothing else that Saudi Arabia does gets any reaction but
| tacit approval from the US, and they paid absolutely no
| price for Kashoggi, either.
|
| Right now, the US is screaming about the veil right after
| recriminalizing abortion. Meanwhile:
|
| _Saudi woman given 34-year prison sentence for using
| Twitter_
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/16/saudi-
| woman-gi...
|
| Saudi woman jailed for 45 years over social media use,
| says group
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/30/saudi-
| woman-gi...
|
| Saudi Arabia is imprisoning women while the rest of the
| world is not paying attention
|
| https://theconversation.com/saudi-arabia-is-imprisoning-
| wome...
|
| These get a little attention from the press ostensibly
| because they're about speech, but knowing modern
| journalism most certainly because they are about Twitter.
| Women getting executed for infidelity? Not news.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Why doesn 't that get the attention of eg Tiananmen
| Square?_
|
| Tianamen Square would have been forgotten if immediately
| followed by a global pandemic. With respect to Riyadh vs.
| Tehran, the former has political relevance in America.
| Horrible things happening in Iran isn't domestically relevant
| in the same way since there aren't any pro-Tehran public
| figures who would face pressure from that news.
| Alir3z4 wrote:
| Indeed there's a bias and I promise you, it's not in favor of
| Iran (particularly Iran)
|
| Any news has a usage for whatever political agenda there is
| in the US administration.
|
| If country X is going to help the administration, the bad
| news will fade out, when country x is suppose to be shown in
| bad light, all the dirt will come back to the surface non
| stop on every possible news channel.
| Regnore wrote:
| My wife is Iranian and she says that something people in
| Iran fail to understand about the US is that the US media
| is not controlled by the US government. I've wondered if it
| stems from the fact that Iran media is strictly controlled
| by the Iran government to the point where they are
| indistinguishable. I can assure you in the US this is not
| the case.
|
| > Any news has a usage for whatever political agenda there
| is in the US administration.
|
| If the previous administration was not sufficient proof to
| you that this is clearly wrong, then what proof could
| dissuade you?
| MarkPNeyer wrote:
| What if your belief is that "the US administration" is an
| inertial beaucracy that carries on regardless of who gets
| elected?
|
| Obama ran on ending wars in Iraq and afghanistan, and
| then he got in and those options disappeared. Trump did
| similarly.
|
| So what would it look like if the US had been run for
| decades primarily by unelected agencies, and the us media
| served them, not whoever happened to get elected?
| whatshisface wrote:
| That is not how power works even in military
| dictatorships; all participants have some sway, and reach
| an equilibrium that, while it doesn't tend to involve
| people like us, does not come from a central authority
| either. The Athenian democracy really had voting and
| balances of power, it was just that the farm labor
| couldn't vote. If the US was autocratic you'd see the
| strings running from one place to another - you'd have to
| see them or else they'd have no effect(0) - but instead
| what we see is a give and take between various forces
| that aren't always working in the interest of the average
| person.
|
| Sometimes the forces balance out in a way that a small
| push can move the whole thing in a better direction, and
| that's why we have some hope and a history of a
| reasonable number of successes. If you have too strong a
| dose of "realism" you'll end up not bothering to push
| when you have a real chance, and your life will end up
| with the same effect as if you were zealously pursuing a
| goal with no idea of how things worked. (Both come out to
| nothing.)
|
| (0) Real autocracies do not hide the fact that they are
| pulling strings, in fact they subtly advertise it, and
| they only appear to be hiding parts of it to get people
| to imagine strings everywhere so that they'll never
| spring on an opportunity. If East Germany actually _hid_
| the secret police nobody would be afraid of them! Instead
| they advertised the existence of the secret police while
| hiding the specifics of who they were, so that people
| wouldn 't know when the police _weren 't_ watching.
| largepeepee wrote:
| Just because the leash is longer does not suddenly mean
| there is no leash.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| It isn't controlled overtly but influence is still
| exerted. This was readily apparent when W shunned any
| organization that dared question the justification for
| invading Iraq. News of domestic relevance gets buried all
| the time by upper management who want to curry favor and
| stay in good graces with authorities.
| aiProgMach wrote:
| Actually your wife is wrong. The American media is
| controlled but in smart and efficient way, the average
| Iranian knows this well unless they're the Pro America
| Iranian who only represents small percentage of the
| Iranians (and they are seen as traitors even from many
| opposition parties). The funny thing, the difference
| between the major American media regarding Iran, is that
| some want to starve the people until they can make a
| coup, the other opinion is that Iran should be nuked
| tomorrow. And People has the nerve to call this "freedom
| of speech"
| pessimizer wrote:
| > genocided thousands of civilians by shooting them in the
| streets during the protests right before the pandemic,
|
| I'm going to ignore the word "genocide" here, because I'm
| assuming you're just using this to mean that they were
| killings that you _really_ disapprove of. But are you saying
| that Iran murdered thousands of protestors without providing
| a link? And is everybody else just going with that?
| nemothekid wrote:
| In _favor_ of Iran? Did you forget that right before the
| pandemic Trump assassinated a military general?
| A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote:
| There are biases depending on the 'side' of US political
| spectrum a given medium happens to be supporting. In this
| case, the best you can do is to account for inherent bias and
| ingest the information accordingly.
| VictorPath wrote:
| > Saudi Arabia murdered Khashoggi - one man - and it was a
| prominent story for years
|
| If your country dismembers a Washington Post reporter inside
| a consulate in Turkey, and Turkey releases audio of the
| murder, you're probably going to wind up with some press
| coverage of this in the United States, at least in the
| Washington Post.
|
| The idea that the US media is biased toward Iran is kind of
| bonkers. The US media may be biased about the importance of
| US issues in US/Iran relations. Iran is less threatening to
| the US than it may be for other countries.
| aiProgMach wrote:
| Really? you use "western" and "credible" synonymously? The
| brainwash machnine is so strong indeed.
| MonkeyMalarky wrote:
| I imagine that institutions are still wary of sending their
| journalists to Iran after what happened to Zahra Kazemi.
| klabb3 wrote:
| > The blocks against WhatsApp also appear to have impacted people
| outside of Iran. People using Iranian +98 telephone numbers have
| complained that WhatsApp has been slow to work or not functioning
| at all. WhatsApp has denied it is doing anything to block Iranian
| phone numbers.
|
| I doubt that Zuck would help the Iranian govt, which would
| suggest technical reason or an attack, which makes me curious.
|
| It's likely that +98 numbers outside Iran are connected to those
| inside that are blocked, but could that cause some bottleneck in
| whatsapp infra? Or could the Iranian govt be running some ddos
| style attack on certain phone numbers over whatsapp?
| [deleted]
| icare_1er wrote:
| Creating a Signal Proxy To Bypass Iranian Censorship
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tf-mtjEF4t0
|
| Iran is only topped by North Korea in its backwards oppression of
| Iranians (at least those would did not manage to flee and join
| the huge world-wide diaspora).
| hassanahmad wrote:
| There are some weird news coming from Iran in recent past.
| qwertox wrote:
| What a valuable comment...
| baskethead wrote:
| I'm not a pro-NRA gun nut, and I hate to say it, but this shows
| you the dangers of when only the government has the guns. I'm
| pretty sure that if guns were available to regular people, there
| would have been a transition to a different government decades
| ago. The fact that this backwards, misogynistic government can
| remain in power for the better part of a century despite Iran
| being filled with highly educated people with a rich culture is a
| crime against humanity. And yes, I'm fully aware that this was
| caused by the US and the CIA, my point is that it should be taken
| down by its citizens but it has no power to do so.
| abawany wrote:
| Afghanistan is drowning in guns - I don't see a liberal
| democracy emerging there anytime this century (please let this
| be my "Dropbox is a weekend project" comment - I'd love to be
| wrong.)
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| baskethead wrote:
| Afghanistan is different from Iran. Even today, Iranians are
| highly educated and they have historically been highly
| educated. Most of Afghanistan that the US was trying to
| mobilized was uneducated and living in tiny villages with no
| real stake as to who won or lost. With Iran's highly educated
| population and militarized, they have a much better chance of
| standing up to the fascist government and enacting change.
| brutal_chaos_ wrote:
| A woman in Iran would not be allowed to own a gun. Maybe men,
| if any people. We have cops cuffing you, throwing you in the
| back of their car, and leaving said car on train tracks to be
| hit by an on coming train (see Colorado police video gaining
| traction in the news). The cops (morality police) in Iran
| killed the poor woman for indecency. The cops in the US still
| act egregiously and we have guns. Guns will not help.
| baskethead wrote:
| A woman in Iran would not be allowed to own a gun only
| because of the fascist regime in place today. Back pre-
| Ayatollah, Iran wasn't as misogynistic as it is today. It was
| one of the most forward Muslim nations in the world. I
| imagine that if Iran were liberated, they would be similar to
| Israel in the sense that men and women would all be mobilized
| into an army and trained such that something like the
| Ayatollah could never happen again.
| Alir3z4 wrote:
| That would be civil war for sure. Syria/Libya/etc 2.0
|
| There are enough separatist groups in Iran backed up by many
| foreign countries, already armed and they do their share of
| evil on civilians and law enforcement and military.
|
| Replacing any government by any means usually ends up with
| power vacuum, breeds terrorists and unleash demons from hell.
| int_19h wrote:
| Would it necessarily be a bad thing for Iranian ethnic
| minorities to separate?
| bongoman37 wrote:
| Some girl was killed because she lacked enough haircover. Just
| reading this makes it seem so utterly insane. A living,
| breathing, person was killed for a piece of cloth. Shame on
| anyone who defends it in any way, and shame on a culture that
| thinks it is okay.
| davikr wrote:
| @dang: is someone automatically flagging almost all of this
| user's posts? many past comments and threads seem innocuous at
| a glance but have been flagged dead.
| bongoman37 wrote:
| Wow... how would you even know this? Whose wrath did I incur?
| zmgsabst wrote:
| HN implements shadowbans that way:
|
| Your comments appear, but are automatically flagged dead.
| kache_ wrote:
| the world can be quite brutal, and different. we're not
| special. it's upsetting when we get a reminder, but maybe this
| is a chance to learn that much of the world is.. not so nice.
| tux2bsd wrote:
| > defends it in any way, and shame on a culture that thinks it
| is okay.
|
| It?
| macintux wrote:
| The event. The mentality. The brutality.
| flyinglizard wrote:
| Iran is very good at oppressing and subduing its citizens. There
| won't be any change without foreign military intervention, either
| outright or by arming minorities and the populace to wage an
| internal civil war. A USA which is preoccupied with Russia and
| China and still licking its wounds from Iraq and Afghanistan
| isn't going to do any of those; they'd rather just pay up to keep
| Iran on the right side of the nuclear brink.
|
| I hope I'm wrong on all these counts, but so far the Mullahs have
| been going strong.
| Alir3z4 wrote:
| Iran in particular is very good to keep those foreign military
| intervention checked on their place without even having any
| deterrent like Nuclear bomb capabilities.
| tester756 wrote:
| Why? how?
| Alir3z4 wrote:
| After Iran-Iraq and being sanctioned to hell while even
| being invaded, Iran went into the process of independent
| military complex and so far has mastered to become almost
| fully self-sustaining (except military fighter jets, which
| they're trying to replace with Drones)
|
| The geography of Iran is Afghanistan 100x when it comes to
| moving military equipments as well due to mountains and
| deserts (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Eagle_Claw
| just one of them)
|
| Guerrilla and asymmetrical warfare is up to many levels
|
| Among other is the missile capabilities which changes the
| game dramatically as well.
|
| Another factor, is the mix of regular Army and IRGC which
| is a full topic how they differ and operate.
|
| _above just top of my head and very brief, there so many
| other factors that with good research can be found_
|
| Ofc, not saying Iran is DA GREATEST and MOST POWERFUL, but
| for sure is able to keep up a bloody fight that causes
| damage to the enemy so high that no country after Iraq has
| dared to start one.
|
| Regardless, let's hope no country decides to attack another
| country, there's enough bloodshed
| flyinglizard wrote:
| Lots of leverage through armed proxies like Hezbollah in
| Lebanon, Houthis in Yemen, Shiite militias in Iraq and
| Syria and so on. They can exact a price from anyone in the
| Middle East, and interfere with the global energy market
| (like their cruise missile attack on Aramco or sabotaging
| and kidnapping tankers in the Persian Gulf). It makes
| dealing with them quite geopolitically expensive and a
| nuisance.
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