Tag: war

Once more, the Douhetians are proven wrong about the strategic capabilities of airpower:

A confidential CIA analysis delivered to administration policymakers this week concludes that Iran can survive the U.S. naval blockade for at least three to four months before facing more severe economic hardship, four people familiar with the document said, a finding that appears to raise new questions about President Donald Trump’s optimism on ending the war.

The analysis by the U.S. intelligence community, whose secret assessments on Iran have often been more sober than the administration’s public statements, also found that Tehran retains significant ballistic missile capabilities despite weeks of intense U.S. and Israeli bombardment, three of the people familiar with it said.

Iran retains about 75 percent of its prewar inventories of mobile launchers and about 70 percent of its prewar stockpiles of missiles, a U.S. official said. The official said there is evidence that the regime has been able to recover and reopen almost all of its underground storage facilities, repair some damaged missiles and even assemble some new missiles that were nearly complete when the war began.

Airpower never accomplishes one-tenth of what its advocates say it will, because airpower never does even one-tenth the damage that the after-action assessors think it did. Desert Storm was the salient ultimate proof of this, as Col. Douglas Macgregor admitted that an Iraqi tank battalion that was bombed for 30 days in the desert was discovered after the war to have survived with 85 percent of its vehicles still operational.

The average US tank battalion couldn’t survive with 85 percent viability after thirty days of operation on the basis of its maintenance issues alone.

In case you haven’t noticed, despite their relative lack of air forces, both Hezbollah and the Ukrainian armed forces are still in the fight after years of war.

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If a ship is hit by a missile in the Gulf of Oman, but the Department of War denies it, does it make a sound?

• Reports are coming in indicating that at least four ships are on fire in the Gulf of Oman, near the Persian Gulf, after Iran fired missiles.The image above, from NASA FIRMS satellite data, shows fire ignition in the Strait of Hormuz off Oman’s Musandam province at 22:21 UTC, in roughly the same area where Iran’s IRGC Navy said three US destroyers were damaged and forced to “flee” toward the Sea of Oman.
• Reports are beginning to surface saying that during yesterday’s battle with Iran, ten (10) U.S. Sailors were wounded and Five (5) others are “Missing.” How could five Sailors be “Missing” unless they got blown off a Destroyer by the Concussion Wave of missile(s) impacting? Yet we’ve been told by US Officials that none of the missiles fired by Iran hit any of our ships.

The gap between what we’re told and what actually happened would appear to be growing.

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I can’t believe they’re going to try to pull this off again. It should be educational to see how many people fall for it:

Donald Trump is on the verge of securing a sweeping peace deal with Iran that would lift US sanctions and unlock billions in frozen assets for Tehran. A one-page, 14-point memorandum of understanding is being negotiated between senior Iranian officials and Trump envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. The White House believes the memo could finalize a framework to end the war within 48 hours.

If signed, the memo would formally end the war and open a 30-day window for both countries to negotiate a larger agreement covering the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, the lifting of all US sanctions on Iran, and new limits on its nuclear program.

The deal calls for Iran to halt all uranium enrichment for 12 to 15 years with automatic extensions if Tehran violates the terms.

Another key provision would have the regime remove its highly enriched uranium stockpile from the country though the memo does not specify a destination.

Trump has been at pains to avoid anything resembling the 2015 Obama deal he spent years trashing as the ‘worst deal ever.’ But the emerging framework echoes it in striking ways: sanctions lifted, frozen billions released, and Iran capped at the same 3.67 percent enrichment level agreed to by Obama.

Oil prices plunged on news of the proposed deal with Brent crude, the global benchmark, falling by more than 10 percent to below $100 per barrel. Stock futures tied to the Dow rose 1.1 percent, S&P 500 futures surged 0.9 percent, while Nasdaq futures climbed 1.6 percent.

I’m not saying it’s impossible. I’m just saying that if you look at the recent past, the closer the US supposedly is to a peace deal, the sooner it is the attack can be expected to take place. Also, for the record, since people are already trying to revise history and claim that this war the previous war was not fought on behalf of Israel.

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Maybe. Perhaps. You see, it’s a very clever way to declare that the war is over, so the administration doesn’t need to get Congressional approval for this little humanitarian flotilla that just happens to be sailing into the very waters that were being violently disputed for the last few months.

TAMPA, Fla. — U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) forces will begin supporting Project Freedom, May 4, to restore freedom of navigation for commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.

The mission, directed by the President, will support merchant vessels seeking to freely transit through the essential international trade corridor. A quarter of the world’s oil trade at sea and significant volumes of fuel and fertilizer products are transported through the strait.

“Our support for this defensive mission is essential to regional security and the global economy as we also maintain the naval blockade,” said Adm. Brad Cooper, CENTCOM commander.

Last week, the U.S. Department of State announced a new initiative, in partnership with the Department of War, to enhance coordination and information sharing among international partners in support of maritime security in the strait. The Maritime Freedom Construct aims to combine diplomatic action with military coordination, which will be critical during Project Freedom.

U.S. military support to Project Freedom will include guided-missile destroyers, over 100 land and sea-based aircraft, multi-domain unmanned platforms, and 15,000 service members.

So clever… this is why constitutions and laws are effectively pointless over time. At the end of the day, it is the quality of the decisionmakers that are the sole brake on government action.

Larry Johnson assumes it’s just bait. Perhaps the fourth time will prove the charm? Probably not.

The most likely first move will be an aerial assault on Iranian positions in and around Qeshm Island using US aircraft currently based at Al Dhafra Air Base, just south of Abu Dhabi. It would not surprise me to learn that the US has coordinated with the owners of one of the tankers stuck in the Persian Gulf to make a deliberate run to breach the Strait at a pre-coordinated time. The US will have its air assets aloft ready to attack any Iranian small boat effort to stop the tanker. That will kick off a new phase in the war with Iran that, notwithstanding Trump’s claim the war has ended, will ignite a new round of air strikes and missile attacks by both sides.

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• Israeli TV Channel 12 is reporting tonight that: “Israel is preparing to officially announce the collapse of negotiations with Iran.”
• The US has delivered 6,500 tons of munitions and equipment to Israel within 24 hours, West Jerusalem has said. The announcement coincided with media reports claiming that the head of US Central Command, Brad Cooper, has briefed US President Donald Trump on a plan for the potential renewal of military action against Iran in a bid to pressure it to consent to a more favorable peace deal.

Considering that Israel hasn’t been able to do much more than fight Iran to a stalemate with the active assistance of the US military and 115,600 tons of military equipment via 403 airlifts and 10 sealifts since the US-Israeli attack on Iran began on February 28, I fail to see what another 6,500 tons of munitions are expected to accomplish. Especially if those 6,500 tons don’t include any missile interceptors.

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It appears the Epstein Alliance has finished resupplying and reloading and is going to take its fourth crack at Iran since last summer. It will be interesting to discover which side has made more profitable use of the latest ceasefire.

The Trump administration is setting the stage to renew its attack on Iran. White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said on Friday that the “Iranians reached out” and requested an “in-person meeting,” so President Trump “dispatched Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to go hear what they have to say.” This is a complete fabrication.

Iran wasted no time in destroying that claim. Iran’s Foreign Ministry Spokesman, Ismael Baqaei, confirmed in a post on X late on the 24th that NO meeting — I repeat, NO meeting — is planned with US officials. Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi is in Islamabad to meet with high-level Pakistani officials in order to give them a written document with Iran’s views on recent developments, which will be delivered to Witkoff and Kushner.

I think that Trump is trying to create a narrative to justify renewing the US and Israeli attack on Iran. He is sending his Jewish emissaries to Islamabad ostensibly to meet with Iranian negotiators only to discover that Iran allegedly bailed out. Trump will claim this is an act of bad faith and is going to punish Iran accordingly.

If the following posts on Telegram are true, then the war will be back in its full fury by Sunday night:

• China urges its citizens to leave Iran as soon as possible – Chinese Embassy in Tehran
• India urges its citizens to leave Iran.

It also appears that Trump gave Bibi permission to trash the ceasefire with Hezbollah, according to another recent Telegram post: The Israeli Air Force resumed strikes on southern Lebanon, a moratorium on which was part of the ceasefire between the US and Iran.

I see absolutely no likelihood that the fourth round of attacks will be any more successful than the previous three rounds. And I am half-convinced that the main reason the Iranians haven’t seriously tried to sink the US carriers is because they wanted to get as many of them in the kill zone as possible before they target them.

The missile-attrition angle is objectively part of Iran’s strategic logic, whether Iran planned the current concentration or merely benefits from it. The cost-exchange ratio is brutal: Iranian ballistic missiles at ~$100K–$1M per unit against SM-3 Block IIA interceptors at ~$27M, with US production rates for the high-end interceptors in the low dozens per year. THAAD and SM-6 stocks have been drawn down hard across the 2024 Houthi engagements, the 2025 Twelve-Day War, and now six weeks of sustained interception. The US cannot replenish at engagement tempo. Every additional carrier group in theater is another defensive perimeter consuming from the same finite magazine, which inverts the usual logic of concentration — more carriers means each individual carrier’s defensive budget shrinks, not grows.

Hence the parallel to the Sicilian Expedition.

Athens projected decisive naval power into confined waters far from home. The initial campaign achieved tactical effects without strategic decision. Nicias’s letter warned that the fleet was degrading and Athens should either withdraw or massively reinforce — Athens chose reinforcement. Syracuse, backed by a major-power ally (Sparta, via Gylippus), had turned the Great Harbor into a kill box by the time Demosthenes arrived. The concentration created by reinforcement was precisely what made the trap work. The hegemon was effectively broken by one engagement in waters it could not leave gracefully.

Current situation: six-week campaign destroyed Iranian nuclear and leadership targets without producing strategic capitulation. Hormuz closed. Ford already past normal deployment length per CNN. Decision to reinforce with third carrier rather than withdraw. Russia and China providing ISR (satellite kill-chain support against mobile naval targets is the classic gap in Iran’s capabilities, and closing that gap is exactly what a major-power ally would provide). Hormuz is the Great Harbor.

Iranian strategic writing, drawing on both Islamic precedent and Sun Tzu-adjacent thinking via Chinese military exchange, explicitly privileges sabr and drawing the adversary onto defender-favorable terrain. Accepting the ceasefire while continuing Hormuz harassment fits patient-ambusher doctrine cleanly: conserve offensive munitions, probe defenses, keep the kill chain warm, let the hegemon commit further.

What would falsify it: Iran escalating to maximalist Hormuz action before the third carrier is fully in position, i.e. before the bait is fully set. What would confirm it: a period of continued attritional pressure — commercial shipping incidents, minelaying indicators, drone-boat probes — while the high-end anti-ship inventory (submarines, ASBM regiments, smart mines) remains conspicuously unused until the US force posture maximally exposes it.

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The US military has exhausted itself trying to defend Israel from Iran:

The U.S. has burned through so many munitions in Iran that some administration officials increasingly assess that America couldn’t fully execute contingency plans to defend Taiwan from a Chinese invasion if it occurred in the near term, U.S. officials said.

The U.S. has fired more than 1,000 long-range Tomahawk missiles since the war with Iran began on Feb. 28, as well as 1,500 to 2,000 critical air-defense missiles, including Thaad, Patriot and Standard Missile interceptors, according to U.S. officials who declined to give exact figures.

Wholly replacing those stockpiles could take up to six years, officials said, kicking off discussions in the administration about adjusting operational plans in preparation for any potential presidential order for the military to defend Taiwan.

And now, with three carrier groups in the Middle East, the US military appears to be beautifully set up for a potential Syracuse Expedition. While three carrier groups and more than 200 warplanes pack a serious offensive punch, they don’t necessarily have enough ability to defend themselves from a serious attempt at sinking them. The destruction of the dozens of US bases in the reason should suffice to demonstrate the Iranian capabilities in that regard.

I was wondering why the Iranians didn’t make any serious and concerted attempts on the one carrier that was in range during the first month of the war. It may be because the Iranian strategists actually wanted to encourage more US forces to enter the region, as that’s the only place they can be successfully attacked and potentially destroyed.

Regardless, what we’ve witnessed here is confirmation of the end of the sole global superpower era.

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