Comment by nicbou
13 hours ago
They did not manage to bomb Germany, North Korea, or North Vietnam into submission and they tried for years. Winning through bombing alone has never worked.
13 hours ago
They did not manage to bomb Germany, North Korea, or North Vietnam into submission and they tried for years. Winning through bombing alone has never worked.
Do not underestimate the effects of modern precision bombing, the technology moved forward (especially if we compare it with II. world war). Today it's much easier to destroy any kind of infrastructure, power plants, bridges, dams, water preparation facilities, waste treatment, cement, steel production, food silos, fuel storage, vehicle manufacturing, etc.
This is very important because, population in cities is much more dependent on infrastructure, than rural population. Rural population is mostly self sufficient. Over 60% of Iranians live today in cities, but under 20% of Vietnamese lived in cities at the time of Vietnam war. Vietnam was also strongly supported by China, with transportation using Laos and Cambodian.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-of-population-livin...
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-of-population-livin...
Iran is even now under sever water crisis.
https://www.wri.org/insights/iran-war-water-crisis-middle-ea...
So a large scale bombing of all Iranian infrastructure would probable not cause the fall of the regime, because they have the guns and can take anything they want, but the suffering and famine of Iranian people would be enormous.
Sometimes large scale bombing causes submission, for example fire-bombing of Japanese cities (atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was in the scale of destruction and loss of life comparable to Tokyo fire bombing, only much cheaper in the number of airplanes).
https://www.nippon.com/en/in-depth/d01171/
My point is that you can't bomb a country into submission. You can use strategic air power in addition to other methods, but the bombing alone was proven again and again to fail. More often than not, it hardens the enemy's resolve.
Bombing Britain failed. Bombing Germany failed (except for dragging the Luftwaffe into a war of attrition). Bombing Japan failed on its own until Japan had no navy left afloat, and the Russians savaged their army in China. The bomb accelerated a victory achieved through other means.
In Korea, Americans levelled cities and infrastructure until there was nothing left to bomb. That did not win the war.
In Vietnam, Linebacker failed. Linebacker II bought slightly more favourable terms for the US in negotiations, but in the end, North Vietnam won.
Even the Desert Storm curbstomp would not have worked without boots on the ground.
I'm just rehashing a better post on this exact topic: https://acoup.blog/2022/10/21/collections-strategic-airpower...
The destruction of Japan and Germany was much more extensive than Britain.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_bombing_during_World...
Yes bombing of Japan was a factor in surrender, but not the only one. Destruction of much industry, destruction of navy, all their allies were defeated. There were preparations for invasion of Japan or continuous atomic bombing, if Japan would not surrender.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Shot
"Two more Fat Man assemblies were readied and scheduled to leave Kirtland Field for Tinian on 11 and 14 August"
"At Los Alamos Laboratory, technicians worked 24 hours straight to cast another plutonium core. Although cast, it still needed to be pressed and coated, which would take until 16 August. Therefore, it could have been ready for use on 19 August."
The rate of bomb production was one of the Manhattan Project’s most closely guarded secrets. Expected rate of production by General Groves:
"The production rate of 3 bombs per month in August was expected to rise to 5 bombs per month in November, and 7 bombs per month in December. In 1946, it could rise much higher."
https://www.dannen.com/decision/bomb-rate.html
As is written in: https://acoup.blog/2022/10/21/collections-strategic-airpower...
"In Vietnam, the same problem complicated any effort at industrial bombing: the factories that supplied the North Vietnamese forces (both the regular PAVN and irregular NLF) were in China and especially the USSR. Moreover the population was not broadly dependent on centralized utilities (like electricity) which could be bombed."
The article tries to apply lesson from past bombing campaigns to war in Ukraine, but this don't apply because Russia could not establish air supremacy over Ukraine and could not apply large scale heavy bombing. And I hope that they never will...
1 reply →
No, it would achieve the three primary goals of this conflict.
It would cause catastrophic economic damage to Iran, and given how politically unstable Iran currently is (millions of people rioted earlier this year), the regime would not survive the oncoming civil unrest.
It would be a humanitarian disaster, but from the US/Israel's point of view, it would be a victory. An Iran with no electricity has no capacity for industry, and has no ability to manufacture missiles, drones, or have a nuclear program.
Without ability to manufacture missiles, Iran would be unable coerce people to buy into it's Hormuz transit toll system, and the strait would reopen.
This weakened Iran would have no ability to produce nukes, close the strait, and make missiles; for at least a decade while they recover economically.
> This weakened Iran would have no ability […], close the strait, […]
Here is where we disagree. And i think this is the only point which matters.
I agree with you that the US always had the ability to destroy Iranian civilian infrastructure. I agree with you that doing so would cause catastrophic economic damage, civilian unrest, regime overthrow etc. It would seriously disrupt their nuclear program for sure.
What it wouldn’t do is reopen the strait. As long as some ships pay the toll those monies can be used to pay the “warfighters” and their weapons. It is relatively cheap to do so. Ukraine demonstrated this with their unmanned surface vessels. This they can do even if the whole hinterland of Iran is in flames and turmoil.
In fact the more their economy collapses the more lucrative this coastal piracy “business” relatively to other opportunities becomes. People who “before the bombing” had better things to do will find that shaking down foreign ships is still doable “after the bombing”. Some of it will be out of ideology and hate for sure, destroying all the civilian infra of a country tends to whip up emotions in people. But fundamentally they can keep doing it because it is a business which pays.
And regime overthrow won’t help with this either. In the absence of a strong central coordinating force you might get multiple separate pirate outfits camping at different parts of the coast trying to take tolls. That obviously wouldn’t improve their economic success, but would increase chaos and hinder transportation even more.
In short while the USA could destroy Iran as a nation, doing so would not eliminate the threat to shipping in the region.
Iran's "toll booth" only functions because they shoot missiles at ships that don't pay up. If they didn't shoot missiles, nobody would pay. They have no legal ability to do this; the strait is split between Iranian and Omani territorial waters. Iran does not have legal control over Omani waters. Actually enforcing their "toll" means firing missiles at ships in Omani waters who don't pay. It's a combination of piracy, terrorism, and an act of war (violation of Omani sovereignty).
This situation is unacceptable for every other Gulf country. It may not be dealt with in the coming weeks, but will be addressed in the coming months, in a similar fashion to how Somali piracy was neutralized.
Also, a neutered Iran would not have the capability of producing anti-ship missiles, which is the primary enforcement mechanic of this toll.
"Without ability to manufacture missiles, Iran would be unable coerce people to buy into it's Hormuz transit toll system, and the strait would reopen."
You don't need missiles to keep Hormuz closed. Cheap drones, naval mines and such are enough, and those don't require that much production capabilities, especially if you get some help from Russia. It's enough to hit a ship every now and then, which keeps the insurers away.
Even without any infrastructure IRGC could wage a guerrilla war for a long time.
In an industrial collapse scenario people in Iran, including IRGC, might have something more urgent than antagonizing ships. Things like subsistence farming.
3 replies →
Turning Iran into another Afghanistan would not have been a win for anyone with a memory longer than the last two election cycles.
It's still a victory. It postpones Iran's nuclear and missile capabilities by a decade, and kicks the can down the road so another administration can come back and clean up the mess again.
Putting aside the fact that the humanitarian disaster you envision would not produce the simple result you expect, it's quite disturbing that you have completely glossed over the fact that destroying Iran's ability to produce electricity is a war crime.
Committing an act of genocide against a country of 90+ million people would be the death of the US as we know it.
Ah yes, a comment from the morality police. According to international law, if the electrical grid directly enables Iran's military, then it is a valid military target. In every major conflict since WWII, electrical infrastructure has been targeted. This includes WWII, the Korean war, Vietnam War, Iran-Iraq War, the Gulf wars, 2003 Iraq War, and the Russo-Ukrainian War.
So no, it's not automatically a war crime, it's a case-by-case basis.
And claims of "genocide" from are laughable and ludicrous, the target is the IRGC, and regime change. If they wanted genocide there are far more effective ways to do so.
4 replies →
Nobody with any slight acquaintance with history could believe any of these.
Well yes, if cruelty is the goal, bombing civilians is cruel.
If I'm not mistaken, the Obama administration was about to accomplish every single one of those goals with a treaty, which the Trump administration cancelled. Bombing a country into accepting terms that they had already agreed to is not that impressive.
[dead]