Comment on WHO officials admit they are preparing for possible nuclear weapon use in Iran
eatCasserole@lemmy.world 1 day agoI think if anyone is going to use a nuclear weapon, it’ll be israel.
The US can pull out, president man-baby can write a fanfiction about himself winning the war, and all his thugs can turn their attention to some other debacle, but israel will always be within range of Iranian missiles.
Without US support (and many Americans, even some of the really evil ones, have had enough of israel at this point) it could end up facing an existential threat. They’ve shown again and again that they have absolutely no regard for human life, and they don’t even seem to consider blowback most of the time. I believe this is by far the most likely nuclear scenario.
azertyfun@sh.itjust.works 16 hours ago
Nuclear weapons are great at leveling cities, but not so great at destroying military infrastructure. On a per-dollar basis they actually kind of suck as weapons of war. From a purely rational strategic perspective, they’re most useful as a deterrent (which is how Israel has been using them). Netanyahu is an imperialist genocidal maniac but he’s not dumb.
Whereas if and when Trump does get his wish to pop a nuke, it won’t be for strategic gain but because he just couldn’t be restrained anymore. This absolute moron wanted to nuke a fucking hurricane FFS. It’s only a matter of time before he gets his wish since the US military has lost all ability to tell him no.
berg@lemmy.zip 10 hours ago
Israel has already shown their willingness to flatten cities and a blatant disregard for civilian life. Their president and a large majority of citizens believe “there are no innocents in Gaza”, and that every child born is “already a terrorist from the moment of his birth”.
Israel would consider a launch far before the US ever would. The US can sail away to safety whenever they choose, but Israel cannot. In the event Israel suffers enough damage, the Samson Option would be considered.
azertyfun@sh.itjust.works 8 hours ago
So that’s making a very critical assumption: that Israel’s territory is being existentially threatened. Iran simply does not have the military capability to do that. And Hamas/Hezbollah is not an existential threat to Israel’s existence despite propaganda to the contrary. We’ve already seen the full extent of their military capabilities.
The Samson Option is a one time, last-resort deterrence option for when all other defensive and offensive mechanisms have failed. Israel’s small size and geopolitical situation basically requires such deterrence against a neighbor who might decide to blitzkrieg into Tel Aviv. Iran simply does not possess that capability.
If Netanyahu pops a nuke for any other reason, he fundamentally shifts his neighbors’ calculus in favor of uniting and attacking Israel because nukes are explicitly not a last resort anymore, therefore Israel becomes an immediate existential threat to all its neighbors that must be dealt with accordingly.
That’s the thing with nuclear deterrence: it works, but only if your enemies are clear on the lines they can’t cross. Otherwise you’re just a threat to be eliminated. And ultimately there’s only so much that propaganda can help with there. Israel may have convinced a majority of their citizens that genocide is good, but they can’t propagandize their enemies into believing that preemptive nuclear strikes are necessary. Netanyahu can whine about Iran’s nuclear program all he wants, none of his enemies seriously believe they are close to having nukes.
Using nuclear weapons as anything but a last resort is therefore an awful gamble that very significantly (if not entirely) weakens nuclear deterrence… All for relatively little military gain. There’s very little a nuke would do that Israel can’t do to Iran with conventional weapons. While there’s a whole lot that nukes don’t do to a prepared enemy with spread out military and command infrastructure.
green_goglin@thelemmy.club 15 hours ago
Bibi and Trump are both desperate and fueled by their own selfish motivations. That being said it’s not a question of stupidity but rather of myopic self-preservation.
azertyfun@sh.itjust.works 12 hours ago
That’s the point, I can’t see how it would help Netanyahu with self-preservation. Going nuclear would be unpopular and ineffective as Israelis understand that their arsenal is more effective in a “will they won’t they” deterrence capacity. He wants constant war and doesn’t need nukes to get it.
Now what he might do is convince Trump to send nukes and pretend he had nothing to do with it. It’s not like Trump is hard to manipulate and Miller probably loves the idea to begin with.
green_goglin@thelemmy.club 12 hours ago
Prolongs their prosecutions and distracts public opinion as well as attention thereof.