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Author Topic: AmeriPol thread  (Read 3534887 times)

Dorsidwarf

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19770 on: May 12, 2018, 04:26:24 pm »

To my knowledge Russia is allies with both Israel and Iran. Dunno how they expected allying with two groups who have declared each other mortal enemies was going to go, but here we are.
presumably they stay out of israel/iran spats and just focus on other threats
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smjjames

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19771 on: May 12, 2018, 10:00:49 pm »

To my knowledge Russia is allies with both Israel and Iran. Dunno how they expected allying with two groups who have declared each other mortal enemies was going to go, but here we are.
presumably they stay out of israel/iran spats and just focus on other threats

Except it never works that way does it? They’ll eventually be forced to choose a side. As long as it’s this simmering tit for tat, they can probably get away with it, but if it escalates, they’re going to have to choose. Unless they do something like supply arms to both sides or some such.

Also, if they weren’t in Syria, they’d have a much easier time staying out of it, now they’re literally in the crossfire.
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sluissa

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19772 on: May 13, 2018, 11:51:58 am »

To my knowledge Russia is allies with both Israel and Iran. Dunno how they expected allying with two groups who have declared each other mortal enemies was going to go, but here we are.
presumably they stay out of israel/iran spats and just focus on other threats

Except it never works that way does it? They’ll eventually be forced to choose a side. As long as it’s this simmering tit for tat, they can probably get away with it, but if it escalates, they’re going to have to choose. Unless they do something like supply arms to both sides or some such.

Also, if they weren’t in Syria, they’d have a much easier time staying out of it, now they’re literally in the crossfire.

Given how much conflict around the world involves Russian equipment fighting Russian equipment, I think you underestimate the likelihood of that.
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Teneb

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19773 on: May 13, 2018, 11:57:10 am »

To my knowledge Russia is allies with both Israel and Iran. Dunno how they expected allying with two groups who have declared each other mortal enemies was going to go, but here we are.
presumably they stay out of israel/iran spats and just focus on other threats

Except it never works that way does it? They’ll eventually be forced to choose a side. As long as it’s this simmering tit for tat, they can probably get away with it, but if it escalates, they’re going to have to choose. Unless they do something like supply arms to both sides or some such.

Also, if they weren’t in Syria, they’d have a much easier time staying out of it, now they’re literally in the crossfire.

Given how much conflict around the world involves Russian equipment fighting Russian equipment, I think you underestimate the likelihood of that.
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scriver

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19774 on: May 13, 2018, 12:49:35 pm »

To my knowledge Russia is allies with both Israel and Iran. Dunno how they expected allying with two groups who have declared each other mortal enemies was going to go, but here we are.

I dunno, how did the US expect allying with Saudi Arabia and Israel to go?
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Frumple

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19775 on: May 13, 2018, 05:01:16 pm »

... from the perspective of relations specifically between those two countries, I guess. Less sanguine about that in a general sense, but I suppose from the context the comparison arose from...
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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19776 on: May 13, 2018, 05:25:32 pm »

The Golan Heights are the strategic high ground that secures Syria's approaches to Israel.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

If you were, say, a Syrian tank... that is pretty much the valley of death.

It was the Iran deal that put Iranian power in such ascendancy (40% defense budget increase thanks to the sanctions being lifted and literal pallets of cash being flown in from the US) that Israel and Saudi Arabia entered into mutual understanding based upon not liking Tehran's aggressive foreign policy and terrorist funding against both of them.

If anything this all teaches foreign countries that when negotiating with the United States, they need to insist on ratified treaties and our legal process for diplomatic arrangements rather than a President pinkie-swearing. The Iran deal was such a dramatic and contentious reversal of US foreign policy that it is practically a textbook case in why the Constitution requires ratified treaties. So far as America's allies are concerned, we're back to business as usual with our credibility restored.
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Reelya

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19777 on: May 13, 2018, 06:33:33 pm »

You shouting "40% increase" is designed to give the impression that Iran spends more than the other nations, so the other nations had to increase their own spending in response. It's very misleading to state it that way without actual figures for context.

Even with a 40% increase in Iran's defense budget, Israel or Saudi Arabia individually invest more in arms than Iran, both in raw dollar terms, and in proportion of spending terms.

You can measure military spending several ways: raw spending, spending per % GDP, spending per-capita, and proportion of manpower in active duty (e.g. how many soldiers per citizen).

- Iran spends $14 billion total on defense, out of $393 billion in GDP (e.g. 3.5%), against a population of 80 million people (so $175 per person). 1 active soldier per 153 citizens.
- Israel spends $18 billion total on defense, out of $313 billion in GDP (e.g. 5.7%), against a population of 8.5 million (so $2117 per person). 1 active soldier per 48 citizens.
- Saudis spend $70 billion total on defense, out of $693 billion in GDP (e.g ~11%) against a population of 32 million (so $2187 per person). 1 active soldier per 46 citizens.

I will define a "military-focused" nation as being one that spends more on weapons, or a higher proportion of their GDP on weapons, or one that spends more per person, or one that puts a higher proportion of their citizens into military service than another nation. By all four measure, Iran is noticeably not a "military-focused" nation compared to typical nations in their region.

It's just more logical and reasonable to believe that Iran has noticed that Saudi Arabia spends $70 billion a year on weapons, and presses triple the proportion of their citizens into armed-service than they do, and that Iran increased their own spending from $10 billion to $14 billion to prop up their own self-defense in response. But even given the "40% increase" Iran is still less military-focused than either Israel or Saudi Arabia, when measured in terms of how much of their resources are directed to warfare-related stuff.
« Last Edit: May 13, 2018, 07:23:59 pm by Reelya »
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Starver

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19778 on: May 13, 2018, 06:50:11 pm »

(40% defense budget increase thanks to the sanctions being lifted
From the figures I've seen, nothing like that, while some sanctions were eased off, but a distinct uptick (and now moreso in future forecasts) upon expectations of Trump reneging.

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and literal pallets of cash being flown in from the US)
From Europe. Even with the Iranian's own cash (money they were legitimately owed, by an internationally-recognised legal ruling about debts not honoured by the US and the interest upon those debts) there was still a restriction upon using US currency in payments to Iran.

But it sounds better to say that it was all a ransom being paid, or something, if you want to believe in a certain world-view.
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Reelya

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19779 on: May 13, 2018, 07:34:00 pm »

Also relevant is the graph in this 2014 article listing the biggest arms-spenders per GDP, back in 2014

https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2015/06/25/the-biggest-military-budgets-as-a-percentage-of-gdp-infographic-2/#45bb69664c47

Note that Saudi Arabia was #1 in the world, with 10.5%/GDP arms spending, followed by Israel with 5.2%/GDP arms spending.

A "40% increase" for Iran is actually relatively small, since percentages are relative to where you started out. e.g. in 2014, Saudi Arabia increased their arms-spending by only 17%, but the increase was actually far greater in size than the "40% increase" by Iran, since Iranian budgets were coming from a much lower %, of only 1-2% GDP at the time, vs 8% from Saudi Arabia - and of course the difference in raw dollars is inflated by the fact Saudi Arabia has almost double the GDP.

And you know what? With the lack of any credible regional military powers other than Israel and Saudi Arabia even existing, the most likely interpretation is that Israel and Saudi Arabia are actually in an arms-race with each other. This is the only interpretation that makes sense, since the arms race has been going on for a decade or more, well before Iran starting boosting their investment in defense. Both of them claiming they only need the weapons "in case of Iran", a much weaker nation, is probably a convenient diplomatic dodge to avoid mentioning that they actually need the weapons to out-compete each other.

Also, official Pentagon report on Iranian military:

http://freebeacon.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Iranmilitary.pdf

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(U) Iran's military doctrine is defensive. It is designed to deter an attack, survive an initial strike, retaliate against an aggressor, and force a diplomatic solution to hostilities while avoiding any concessions that challenge its core interests.

So basically, they're not a nation that invests in first-strike capabilities or force-projection outside their own borders. It's not part of their military doctrine, so they don't invest in that.
« Last Edit: May 13, 2018, 07:53:38 pm by Reelya »
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Reelya

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19780 on: May 13, 2018, 08:18:02 pm »

Well if you're including material support as spending, then Israel and Saudi Arabia also give aid to allied groups, which would be similarly not counted as defense-spending.

And Iran lost over 4000 of their own actual troops in Syria, so the point that Iran only uses other people's military would need evidence to back it up. e.g. how many Israeli and Saudi troops have actually been killed in Syria? I'd be surprised if it's on the scale of the 4000 Iranians who died.

With base Iranian spending of 3.5% vs Israel's 5.7% and Arabia's 11%, the Iranians would have to give a lot to other people's militaries to even come close.

e.g. assuming that the 5.7% GDP spending is the entire Israeli spending, then Iran would need to spend an additional 2.2% of their GDP on foreign militias, to meet or exceed that. But remember that would have to be a good additional 10% of their entire national budget. There's no way that something on that scale could happen yet not leave a significant paper-trail. A 10% budget hole for the entire nation would definitely be noticeable enough for it to be headline news.

Also, such a scale of spending would effectively then mean they're expending 40% of all their military spending on ad-hoc foreign militias, rather than using that same money to ensure their own guys have better gear (e.g. which could have prevented the deaths of the 4000 Iranian Revolutionary Guard troops in Syria). Which seems very unlikely, especially when there's no actual evidence supporting the assertion.
« Last Edit: May 13, 2018, 08:29:36 pm by Reelya »
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Reelya

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19781 on: May 13, 2018, 08:31:48 pm »

Well wikipedia says 2000 we native Iranians, and 2000 were Pakistani and Afghan recruits who were previously settled in Iran (e.g refugees from previous conflicts). So they're not "Iranians" but they're no less Iranian troops than a Mexican immigrant who signs up for the US Army isn't an American troop.

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I imagine that they have far bigger bang for their buck with what they're spending it on.

No, you're just making it up that it's true, without any material evidence, because it suits you to believe that it's true. I "imagine" that the moon is made of green cheese, because I'm hungry.
« Last Edit: May 13, 2018, 08:34:24 pm by Reelya »
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Reelya

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19782 on: May 13, 2018, 08:35:22 pm »

Except that the link you just provided contradicts your orginal assertion:

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It is funded, trained, and equipped by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and fights under the command of Iranian officers

Your point was that these groups weren't having their costs counted against the Iranian defense budget, but your link suggests that they are. The ethnicity-argument that you're currently engaged in "not properly Iranian" would seem to be shifting the goalposts from what you were original arguing.

Reelya

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« Reply #19783 on: May 13, 2018, 08:39:19 pm »

But there's no evidence anywhere in that, to support your assertion that they're receiving "off the books" material support.

The first part says that they're funded by Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps directly. The second part says that the recipients downplay this link.

Spending by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is still counted as military spending of Iran, since Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is part of the Iranian military which draws its funding from the defense budget.

e.g. if the US Marines go and help someone, and that someone denies getting assistance from the US Marines, that isn't "evidence" that the US Marines are getting additional funding outside the of the Marine's allocated budget: it's evidence that the Marine's own existing budget was used for that purpose.
« Last Edit: May 13, 2018, 08:46:42 pm by Reelya »
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Reelya

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Re: AmeriPol: new thread subtitle pending
« Reply #19784 on: May 13, 2018, 08:49:33 pm »

Well my point was that if the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps are providing support for someone, then the most logical assumption is that the support is coming out of the budget of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which is already included in the defense budget.

The fact that the recipient denied getting support doesn't provide any evidence that the material support was provided by some third-agency. It's just a complete non-sequiter, so I'm baffled as to how it is evidence? You just need more than that, such as evidence of transfers of money that come from somewhere outside of the Iranian military, or military units who get funding, but they're not sourced from the normal chain of command's money supply. That's why I said you need a "secret army" as the smoking gun.

~~~

e.g. you're making a claim that the Iranian military spending could be 50% larger than it is on paper. the onus is on you to provide material evidence that this is a thing. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. The thing is: you're making an extraordinary claim, then backing it up with ambiguous assertions which really don't say what you're trying to prove, at all.

e.g. if your core assertion is that the Iranians are spending significant off-the-books money on the military, then showing clandestine operations by their above-board military doesn't actually prove anything related to that, since the funding for that could clearly just have been taken from normal military spending. e.g. if the US Marines conduct a secret operation that's denied, that's not in any way evidence that they got secret off-the-books funding for said operation. Similarly IRGP operations in Syria don't prove that they used funding from another source. In both cases, you need a source which claims the third-party funding exists, then that claim can be checked out.
« Last Edit: May 13, 2018, 09:00:19 pm by Reelya »
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