When your predictions don’t match up with reality, you’ve lost the argument.
It’s rarely a good idea to premise a policy debate on one huge false assumption, whether it’s Iraqis will welcome democracy or taking out Iran’s nukes means World War III. The anti-interventionists built a house of cards around the idea that Iran was so terrifying or that, as Tucker Carlson claimed, Russia and China would intervene and set off WWIII.
The overhpying of Iran’s military capabilities was a mistake that clearly both sides were guilty of. Israel’s tactics were brilliant and as a religion person the role of G-d in human affairs, especially those touching on Israel, is paramount, but Iran also proved weaker than expected when it came to maintaining air power and being able to defend against air strikes.
That backfired mostly on the anti-interventionists who had set up the myth of WWIII. The anti-interventionists kept harping on the Iraq War, but this time they were the ones who had based everything on a false assumption about how things would work out.
Once the presumption you’ve based everything on falls apart, what’s left besides furious arm waving? It didn’t work for the neocons and it’s not working for the libertarians.
When your predictions don’t match up with reality, you’ve lost the argument.
somehistory says
As wise King Soloman wrote, “Time and unforeseen occurrence befall us all.”
And as all God-fearing persons know, He can direct matters any time and with any nation or person. As the Bible says, ‘He sets-up kings, and takes them down.’
࿗Infidel࿘ says
If the 00s were about overhyping our capabilities over that of our enemies – particularly in Iraq & Afghanistan (not about military superiority necessarily but our inability to handle guerrilla warfare), the last 4 years have been about exposing countries we previously thought of as superpowers to be paper tigers
In 1990, when Iraq occupied Kuwait, Saudi Arabia was originally exposed as a paper tiger, pretty much filling up its diapers until the US sent troops there. Fast forward to the Trump 45 term, and they showed how ineffective they were again by struggling against the Houthis – a bunch of ragtag militias operating in the country formerly known as North Yemen. It was easy enough to send troops into Bahrein during the Arab Spring to prevent a shi’a takeover, but put them against a larger force, and they are out of their league
In 2022, Russia found out the same thing. Ukraine was supposed to be a walkover, and completely fold, and it was expected that Russian tanks would roll into Kyiv, topple Zelenskyy and establish a new regime there. Instead, while the entire Donbass and the Azov coast fell, as well as Kherson, Russians seemed unable to move anywhere beyond that. Normally, people would gauge the relative power of Russia vs Ukraine by just looking at a map (similarly for Saudi Arabia and Yemen), but Ukraine’s resistance just made a mockery of Russia’s claim to be a superpower. Not only are they in a quagmore almost worse than Afghanistan: they’ve been unable to support their interests outside their near abroad. Syria fell, and Russia was unable to do anything about Iran either
Which finally brings us to Iran. The extent to which Mossad had infiltrated Iran makes that country a complete parody of itself. I read back in the day of Mossad once having one of their agents work his way up to become the Defense Minister of Syria, but this stuff goes way beyond that. If Israel actually wanted to colonize Iran, I’m not sure they would have struggled
Downside of these incidents is that it could encourage neocons in future to gain a fresh lease on life in demanding new adventures
Proud American says
Daniel, please don’t use the Jew-hating right’s epithet, “neocon,” as if people who believe in being responsible in defeating growing security threats before they met the size metastasize are somehow “new” conservatives.