The US would not win a ground war in Iran. Before every US war, people tend to think the US military and their $800 billion/year budget are unbeatable. But look at outcomes of significant US ground wars since WWII - only one clear victory:

  * Korea: Stalemate, which is still a problem now 70
    years later
  * Vietnam: Loss
  * Gulf War: Victory
  * Afganistan: Loss, after 20 years of fighting
  * Iraq: Mixed results after 8 years: Saddam Hussein threat
    eliminated, Iran and ISIS made significant gains

Iran is larger and has more people and resources than Afghanistan and Iraq combined. Terrain in Iran is a game world-builder's fantasy of defensibility:

https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2F...

Iran is far more capable militarily than Iraq and Afghanistan and, particulary, their military may be world's the leading experts on assymetric warfare; they train everyone else - Hezbollah, the Houthis, etc. Their proxies held off the US military and allies in Iraq, a neighboring country, where Iran had far less motivation than to defend their own homes from a US invasion.

The US could win given unlimited political will and time, but it would be very costly and anyway, the US couldn't sustain that will for much easier situations in the prior two wars. Nobody is crazy enough to launch a ground invasion of Iran, I hope.

▲ vjvjvjvjghv 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

All the lost wars had very vague objectives. A war where you try to fight a military while trying to “liberate” the population in the same area basically can’t succeed. In WW2 they bombed the hell out of Japan and Germany and after the war they were the winners who set the course. They were also lucky that Germany and Japan were functioning societies that didn’t have much violent infighting. In Gulf War 1 there was a clear objective to get Iraq out of Kuwait.

All the other wars depended on installing a friendly and competent government that would take over. That is a very hard thing to do. It’s too easy to support a friendly government that’s also corrupt and incompetent.

In Iran it will be the same problem after military victory. The US doesn’t want to run the show so what’s next? Nobody knows and it will take years to see where this is going. I hope they don’t destroy too much infrastructure there so people can rebuild quickly and society goes back to some normal.

▲ aucisson_masque 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> I hope

I sincerely hope too but the man is lunatic.

▲ pfannkuchen 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

But if the goal was actually to destabilize those places then maybe it worked as intended?

	▲	actionfromafar 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		If think assume too much competence. I'm sure there are various plans (ok maybe not with this "administration", their "plans" seems to be fast-forward grift) but I have very little confidence in them going in any particular direction.

▲ metalliqaz 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Depends on how bad the leaks from the E-files are