US US Politics General 2: Hope Edition - Discussion of President Trump and other politicians

BigGuyOS 6 : Jovial Janny said:

Thank you for taking time to archive that footage from Twitter, and even bother linking to it. Are you flying right now?

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The IRGC claims it fired four anti-ship ballistic missiles at the USS Abraham Lincoln in the Arabian Sea. The Pentagon has not confirmed a hit. It does not matter. What matters is what just happened for the first time in the history of naval warfare. A nation-state deliberately launched anti-ship ballistic missiles at a United States aircraft carrier.This is the scenario that the entire US Navy has been war-gaming for two decades. Not this specific attack. This category of attack. The anti-ship ballistic missile targeting an aircraft carrier at sea. China developed the DF-21D for precisely this purpose and the US Naval Institute assessed in 2009 that there was “currently no defense” against it if it worked as designed. The United States restructured its entire Pacific naval strategy around the theoretical possibility that a ballistic missile could be guided to strike a moving ship. It developed the AirSea Battle doctrine. It redirected most of its ballistic missile defense capable ships to the Pacific. It increased procurement of SM-3 interceptors. Billions of dollars. Decades of planning. All for a scenario that had never actually occurred in combat.Until now. Iran just ran the experiment.The Abraham Lincoln is operating off Oman with a carrier strike group that includes Aegis equipped destroyers carrying SM-3 and SM-6 interceptors, the most sophisticated naval missile defense architecture ever deployed. The strike group carries F-35C stealth fighters with advanced sensor fusion, E-2D Advanced Hawkeye airborne early warning aircraft, and EA-18G Growlers for electronic warfare. It is layered defense at its most extreme. If the IRGC’s four missiles were intercepted, it validates that the multi-billion dollar Aegis architecture works against real anti-ship ballistic missiles in real combat conditions, not simulations. That is worth more than the cost of the interceptors.But if even one missile penetrated the defense envelope, even without hitting the carrier, the implications cascade across every navy on earth. The Houthis came within 200 meters of the USS Eisenhower with an ASBM in 2024, according to the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point. That was a non-state actor with Iranian supplied weapons. This is the Iranian state itself, with its full indigenous missile program, targeting the Lincoln with dedicated anti-ship ballistic missiles.The Abraham Lincoln is a 100,000 ton nuclear powered aircraft carrier carrying approximately 80 aircraft and 5,000 personnel. It costs $13 billion to replace. Its strike group represents the single most concentrated expression of American military power on earth. The entire theory of American force projection since 1945 rests on the assumption that carrier strike groups can operate with acceptable risk in contested waters. China has built its entire anti-access strategy around challenging that assumption. Iran just tested it live.CENTCOM stated that it suffered no casualties and minimal damage from hundreds of Iranian missile and drone attacks across the region. If that assessment holds for the Lincoln specifically, it means Aegis works. It means the carrier remains viable in a ballistic missile environment. It means China’s DF-21D theory does not automatically translate to carrier kills. That would be the most consequential combat validation of American naval defense systems since the Patriot batteries of 1991, and far more significant because the target was moving.The IRGC’s claim may be propaganda. The missiles may have been intercepted hundreds of miles from the ship. Or they may have splashed close enough to vindicate every admiral who argued that the carrier era is ending. We will not know the full truth for days or weeks. But the strategic fact is already established. The taboo against firing ballistic missiles at an American aircraft carrier has been broken. Every navy on earth is now recalculating.https://open.substack.com/pub/shanakaanslemperera/p/the-arithmetic-of-collapse-irans?r=6p7b5o&utm_medium=ios

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IRAN JUST ACTIVATED ARTICLE 111 OF ITS CONSTITUTIONFor the first time in 36 years, Iran has a new face at the top.Ayatollah Alireza Arafi. 67 years old. And most people have never heard his name.Here’s everything you need to know about the man now running Iran:He’s not doing it alone. Iran formed a 3-person leadership council: Arafi, President Pezeshkian, and Chief Justice Mohseni-Eje’i.They’re splitting Khamenei’s powers between them until the Assembly of Experts picks a permanent Supreme Leader.But Arafi is the one everyone’s watching.This guy has been quietly stacking power for DECADES.Born in 1959 in the small town of Meybod. His father was reportedly close with Khomeini himself, the original Supreme Leader. He was sent to Qom for religious training at age 11.By 33, Khamenei personally made him Friday prayer leader. That doesn’t happen unless you’re trusted at the highest levels.He simultaneously held THREE of the most powerful positions in the country:– Director of Iran’s entire seminary system– Member of the Guardian Council (the body that vets every law and every candidate)– Member of the Assembly of Experts (the body that literally picks the Supreme Leader)The man who now temporarily IS the Supreme Leader was already on the committee that CHOOSES the Supreme Leader.He’s what makes him different.He speaks fluent English and Arabic. He met Pope Francis at the Vatican in 2022. And he’s been openly pushing for Iran to adopt artificial intelligence to spread its message globally.He’s being described by Reuters as a “completely trusted loyalist” of the regime. The IRGC sees him as a safe pair of hands.Some analysts had him on the shortlist to replace Khamenei for YEARS. Now he’s effectively filling that role, at least temporarily.The real question: does the Assembly of Experts make it permanent? Or does someone else emerge?I will keep you updated as this story develops.

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The Israeli Air Force released footage of strikes on the IRGC headquarters in Tehran. Millions are sharing it. Almost nobody understands what they are actually watching.You are watching the largest Israeli air sortie in history. Two hundred fighter jets launched simultaneously as part of Operation Roaring Lion, striking five hundred targets across Iran. The United States ran its parallel campaign under Operation Epic Fury, deploying Tomahawk cruise missiles, HIMARS rockets, and for the first time in combat, the Precision Strike Missile, a next-generation ballistic weapon that had only entered full-rate production months earlier. CENTCOM released the footage of its first operational firing. A weapon went from production line to combat debut faster than most defense programs complete testing.The strikes were timed with intelligence precision that borders on the surreal. According to Reuters, the operation was launched to coincide with a high-level meeting at a secure compound in central Tehran where Khamenei was present with his inner circle. The CIA had tracked his movements for months. When signals intelligence confirmed the meeting, the order was given. Israeli officials told Axios they were targeting the entire Iranian leadership, political and military, past, present and future.Fox News reported the division of labor. Israel targeted leadership. The United States targeted military infrastructure and ballistic missile sites. This is not two countries cooperating. This is a single integrated kill chain across two sovereign command structures with shared intelligence and synchronized timing. The IDF Chief of Staff said the two militaries worked together for months with unprecedented cooperation.The first wave was pure decapitation. CNN reported strikes on residences of Khamenei, Pezeshkian, the Armed Forces Chief of Staff, and the IRGC Commander. Iran International reported four intelligence officials killed: the head of foreign intelligence, the chief of the security branch, the director of counterterrorism, and the adviser overseeing the war portfolio with Israel. This was not a bombing campaign. This was an organizational chart converted into a target list.Footage shows more than twenty one Tomahawk cruise missiles transiting Iranian airspace in a single sequence. A Reaper drone operated over Shiraz before twenty explosions were reported. Strikes hit Tehran, Karaj, Tabriz, Kermanshah, Bushehr, Qom, Isfahan, Chabahar, and Konarak. The geography tells you this was not a limited strike. This was a nationwide campaign from air and sea simultaneously.Every defense ministry on Earth is downloading this footage right now. Not because it shows explosions. Because it shows what an integrated precision strike architecture looks like when the political decision is made to use it at full capacity. This was the demonstration. The question every capital is now asking is not what happened to Iran. It is what would happen to them

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