War Iran-United States Military Crisis of 2020 - US Baghdad embassy under siege, rocket fire in US Baghdad green zone, Ukrainian Airlines flight 752 crash, and more!

January 10th:
Exclusive: Informants in Iraq, Syria helped U.S. kill Iran's Soleimani - sources (archive)(post)
Iraqi Shia cleric whose militia killed American troops says crisis is over following Iran strike and Trump speech (archive)(post)
Iraqi PM tells US to decide mechanism for troop withdrawal (archive)(post)
Mike Pence says Congress might 'compromise sources and methods' if fully briefed on the Soleimani strike (archive)(post)
Unidentified planes hit Iraqi militiamen in Syria, killing 8 (archive)(post)
Iraq: The Master Of Mayhem Meets A Missile (archive)(post)
Eliminating Qasem Soleimani was Donald Trump’s Middle East farewell letter (archive)(post)
Iran uses BULLDOZERS to clear debris from plane crash site while accusing US of ‘big lie’ that they shot it down (archive)(post)
Swiss Back Channel Helped Defuse U.S.-Iran Crisis (post)

January 11th:
UKRAINIAN AIRCRAFT WAS BROUGHT DOWN IN IRAN DUE TO 'HUMAN ERROR' (archive)(post)
Iran minister says 'human error' caused by 'US adventurism' led to deadly crash of Ukrainian jetliner (archive)(post)
Ukrainian aircraft was brought down in Iran due to 'human error' (archive)(post)
Trump, at Ohio rally, says Democrats would have leaked Soleimani attack plans (archive)(post)
The Atlantic's David Frum blames Trump for downing of plane in Iran, deaths of 176 (archive)(post)
Associated Press changes ‘shockingly bad’ headline about Soleimani, Ukrainian plane crash after backlash (archive)(post)
GOP Rep. Doug Collins apologizes for saying Democrats are 'in love with terrorists' (archive)(post)
Iran demands West 'show findings' as new video reveals aircraft was struck before fiery crash (archive)(post)
Warren town hall interrupted by angry protester accusing her of ‘siding with terrorists’ (archive)(post)
Trump administration announces new sanctions on Iran (archive)(post)
Prepare For the Worst From Iran Cyber Attacks, As DHS Issues Warning: Experts (archive)(post)
Trump tells Fox News' Laura Ingraham 'four embassies' were targeted in imminent threat from Iran (archive)(post)
Trump tweets support for Iranian protesters as they demand Khamenei quit (archive)(post)
Trump warns Iran against ‘another massacre’ as protests flare over downed jet (archive)(post)

January 12th:
Trump tweet in Farsi 'the most liked Persian tweet' in history of Twitter (archive)(post)
Iraq warned to keep US troops or risk financial blow-WSJ (archive)(post)
Iran arrests UK ambassador in what Britain calls ‘flagrant violation of international law’ (archive)(post)

January 13th:
Trump authorized Soleimani's killing 7 months ago, with conditions (archive)(post)

edit: This is a WIP. All links are posted in the order they appear in the thread, not in chronological order of their publication.


---Original OP before the merge---
Iraqi supporters of Iran-backed militia attack US Embassy
https://apnews.com/75228a8a607a44863b57021ac33264dc (http://archive.vn/ljm9Y)

By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA12 minutes ago

BAGHDAD (AP) — Dozens of angry Iraqi Shiite militia supporters broke into the U.S. Embassy compound in Baghdad on Tuesday after smashing a main door and setting fire to a reception area, prompting tear gas and sounds of gunfire.

An Associated Press reporter at the scene saw flames rising from inside the compound and at least three U.S. soldiers on the roof of the main building inside embassy. It was not clear what caused the fire at the reception area near the parking lot of the compound. A man on a loudspeaker urged the mob not to enter the compound, saying: “The message was delivered.”

The embassy attack followed deadly U.S. airstrikes on Sunday that killed 25 fighters of the Iran-backed militia in Iraq, the Kataeb Hezbollah. The U.S. military said it was in retaliation for last week’s killing of an American contractor in a rocket attack on an Iraqi military base that it had blamed on the militia.

Dozens of protesters marched inside the compound after smashing the gate used by cars to enter the embassy. The protesters, many in militia uniform, stopped in a corridor after about 5 meters (16 feet), and were only about 200 meters away from the main building. Half a dozen U.S. soldiers were seen on the roof of the main building, their guns were pointed at the protesters.

Smoke from the tear gas rose in the area, and at least three of the protesters appeared to have difficulties breathing. It wasn’t immediately known whether the embassy staff had remained inside the main building.

The protesters hanged a poster on the wall: “America is an aggressor.”

Shouting “Down, Down USA,” the crowd tried to push inside the embassy grounds, hurling water and stones over its walls. They raised yellow militia flags and taunted the embassy’s security staff who remained behind the glass windows in the gates’ reception area. They sprayed graffiti on the wall and windows in red in support of the Kataeb Hezbollah militia: “Closed in the name of the resistance.”

Hundreds of angry protesters, some in militia uniforms, set up tents outside the embassy. As tempers rose, the mob set fire to three trailers used by security guards along the embassy wall.

No one was immediately reported hurt in the rampage and security staff had withdrawn to inside the embassy earlier, soon after protesters gathered outside.

The U.S. attack — the largest targeting an Iraqi state-sanctioned militia in recent years — and the subsequent calls by the militia for retaliation, represent a new escalation in the proxy war between the U.S. and Iran playing out in the Middle East.

Tuesday’s attempted embassy storming took place after mourners and supporters held funerals for the militia fighters killed in a Baghdad neighborhood, after which they marched on to the heavily fortified Green Zone and kept walking till they reached the sprawling U.S. Embassy there.

AP journalists then saw the crowd as they tried to scale the walls of the embassy, in what appeared to be an attempt to storm it, shouting “Down, down USA!” and “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.”

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Sunday’s strikes send the message that the U.S. will not tolerate actions by Iran that jeopardize American lives.

The Iranian-backed Iraqi militia had vowed Monday to retaliate for the U.S. military strikes. The attack and vows for revenge raised concerns of new attacks that could threaten American interests in the region.

The U.S. attack also outraged both the militias and the Iraqi government, which said it will reconsider its relationship with the U.S.-led coalition — the first time it has said it will do so since an agreement was struck to keep some U.S. troops in the country. It called the attack a “flagrant violation” of its sovereignty.

In a partly televised meeting Monday, Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi told Cabinet members that he had tried to stop the U.S. operation “but there was insistence” from American officials.

The U.S. military said “precision defensive strikes” were conducted against five sites of Kataeb Hezbollah, or Hezbollah Brigades in Iraq and Syria. The group, which is a separate force from the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, operates under the umbrella of the state-sanctioned militias known collectively as the Popular Mobilization Forces. Many of them are supported by Iran.

.

 

[Iwasamwillbe]

Holy shit you moron. People aren't mad because they think they're going to be drafted. People are mad because we've spent literally trillions of dollars over the course of this occupation that has gone nowhere and our military budget is inflated to 700 billion dollars. Yet back at home we're told we can't afford healthcare or education or new infrastructure etc..

We responded to an attack on a US embassy. The situation is already resolved on the US side. No money is being excessively wasted here.

The reasons you give for people being mad certainly go against what I've seen in this very thread.

Also, nobody cares about your dying grandparents. And who the fuck is saying that we can't afford healthcare, education, or infrastructure in general?

 

[zap2theextreme]

I bet you have a liberal arts degree.

These are basic observations dude, but to the incurious and uncritical kiwiposter that never leaves a boot unclean it's mind bending. Crazy that people here have the same political inclinations of an old decrepit boomer twice their age.

 

[Shield Breaker]

How old are you? Why are you overreacting this hard to otherwise great news when there is no sign of a draft coming? Why are you acting that all this is a Saudi-Israeli plot when this has nothing to do with either? Why are you seriously blubbering about "American imperialism" as if you're a post-modernist college professor at a university when the entity that America is currently opposing is fucking Iran?

Jesus Christ, it's like people's brains are smoothing over in this thread because it's about US activities in the Middle East.

Earlier in the thread someone said that the Iranian Kiwi would be throwing a fit, so I thought it was this guy. However, they said 'our infrastructure' so I guess it is Rose McGowan.

 

[Iwasamwillbe]

Faggots in this thread are going wild over their fevered hallucinations of getting drafted to fight a US-Iran war for their Jewish and Saudi Arabian overlords.

 

[Pocket Dragoon]

No going to lie, hearing about and seei.g Soleimani getting turned into giblets on BIAP's service road got me a little hard; that fucker has been responsible for shit like Iranian EFPs being used on that same road against us since '05. I've rolled on that same route, past countless burnt-out up-armored vehicles that got hit by EFPs, recovered more than a few with my team on the main road to Samarra & Tikrit, and sat through more briefings than I care to remember from EOD about shit from Iran.

And then Soleimani decided to fly directly into Baghdad? Ha.
I'm disappointed we didn't use a ginsu-missile, but erasing him with standard Hellfire sends a decent enough message.

 

[Iwasamwillbe]

These are basic observations dude

Yeah, like the observation that this is a response to an attack on a US embassy.

An observation you persist in refusing to make.

Earlier in the thread someone said that the Iranian Kiwi would be throwing a fit, so I thought it was this guy. However, they said 'our infrastructure' so I guess it is Rose McGowan.

I think you mean @3119967d0c, who is curiously nowhere to be found about this.

 

[Kaiser Wilhelm's Ghost]

This won't lead to a war and even if it did it would be a territorial war between Iran and Iraq. Iran doesn't have the capability to actually launch a conventional war against the US and could only target it's partner states in the region, which lets face it the big two are the Saudi's and Israel.

If it goes to war with Israel it does face the very real threat of 1) a competent military fighting against it. 2) Israels nuclear capabilities.

The Saud's would be a softer target, but then it would be seen as an attack on another Arab state, which would lead to issues with it's allies and within the Arab league itself.

They will bitch and they will moan about this but it won't lead to a war. Hopefully they will learn to reign in their generals and not condone attacks on American installations.

 

[zap2theextreme]

We responded to an attack on a US embassy. The situation is already resolved on the US side. No money is being excessively wasted here.

The reasons you give for people being mad certainly go against what I've seen in this very thread.

Also, nobody cares about your dying grandparents. And who the fuck is saying that we can't afford healthcare, education, or infrastructure in general?

in regard to the embassy vvvv

When you brutalize, demolish, and rape a country for 20 years and destabilize it so badly that a literal death cult takes over, and you continue to proceed to bomb the people that are attempting to fight it you don't need to "instigate" an attack. Motherfuckers are going to storm an embassy

As to that second part I won't even attempt to address as you apparently have no empathy and you're clearly operating in some other realm of reality since you think America's 20 year long and still going occupation of the middleast is okay because the Persian Empire was a thing 1000 years ago.

 

[Freddy Freaker]

Yeah, like the observation that this is a response to an attack on a US embassy.

An observation you persist in refusing to make.

I think you mean @3119967d0c, who is curiously nowhere to be found about this.

Don't you know when the brave holy warriors of the Islamic Republic strike at the Great Satan, we're supposed to just allow our embassies to get overrun, and maybe send pallets of cash? Anything else means we're performing evil foreskin magic for muh juice.

Edit:

As to that second part I won't even attempt to address as you apparently have no empathy and you're clearly operating in some other realm of reality since you think America's 20 year long and still going occupation of the middleast is okay because the Persian Empire was a thing 1000 years ago.

I honestly agree that ancient Persia isn't exactly super relevant. Should we get out of the Middle East? Certainly. In a military sense. We'd probably still have embasies and other standard foreign relations stuff. And when another country gets agressive, you dont just passively ignore it. You don't immediately go full on war either but ignoring or appeasing arent good moves. Oh who am I kidding, I'm just a dumb borgar with shlomo subliminally directing my posts through porn or something.

 

[Кот Бегемот]

US, quite famously, never had air supremacy over Vietnam.

I won't argue this corollary, but main point was that there was no central munition or small arms or power plants to destroy. It's a jungle where trickles of supplies come from outside.

That's why I say the Iranian army would die quickly, but occupying Iran is a nightmare.

True, because you are talking about destroying centralized enclaves vs. potentially guerilla insurgency.

The Taliban caved like a rotten banana when it came to stopping the US getting troops unto thwir territory and shredding them any time they tried to put up a "real fight."

They don't use IEDs because they're cowards. They're trying to win. If they hopped into entrenchments in the mountains, we'd genocide them.

There is no "they". It has always been massively decentralized. Take it from Russia trying to deal with Caucus tribes for several centuries now. Yes centuries, as long as Tsars tried to claim that territory. The best solution so far is to give massive dotations to Chechen's "leader" Khadirov who keeps the rest of clans in check by any means whatsoever. Chechnya is human rights train wreck and still there are clans fighting Moscow's friend regardless.

In Afganistan, Soviets DID genocided something like guestimating millions. I'd have no idea that many people lived there. But yes, they bomb the crap out of them at every opportunity. They also did massive initiatives to "civilize" Afgans by liberating and educating women, opening schools, hospitals, public works. It's the same Iraq "nation building" but on steroids. Population centers are easier to control, but it wasn't enough.

 

[zap2theextreme]

lmao still can't believe people are clutching pearls over an embassy take over that happened without so much as a shot being fired which btw was sparked by the US blowing away a bunch of Iraqis that were fighting ISIS

 

[Imperial Citizen]

This won't lead to a war and even if it did it would be a territorial war between Iran and Iraq. Iran doesn't have the capability to actually launch a conventional war against the US and could only target it's partner states in the region, which lets face it the big two are the Saudi's and Israel.

If it goes to war with Israel it does face the very real threat of 1) a competent military fighting against it. 2) Israels nuclear capabilities.

The Saud's would be a softer target, but then it would be seen as an attack on another Arab state, which would lead to issues with it's allies and within the Arab league itself.

They will bitch and they will moan about this but it won't lead to a war. Hopefully they will learn to reign in their generals and not condone attacks on American installations.

This is all just saber rattling. Iran can’t risk a full out war because their enemies surround them and outnumber them. They’ve tried to do these little pushes against America, whether that be detaining a US ship for a bit in 2015, or shooting down a drone.

The response to this embassy attack shows that America has the intelligence to identify where Iran’s commanders are and the strength to eliminate them.

I expect Iran to either slow down their ME power play moves or use more indirect proxies.

 

[IAmNotAlpharius]

Honestly I prefer this approach over killing civies and grunts. A lot of these top heavy regimes don’t care if their people or underlings die. They do care if they die.

 

[Iwasamwillbe]

in regard to the embassy vvvv

"America started it against Iraqis" is a laughable attempt to obfuscate the fact that the American embassy was just minding it's own business in Iraq, only to get an unprovoked attack by Iranian-backed militias.

Frankly, all I'm getting that is you're screaming about the death of Saddam Hussein, and are now vomiting up this hyperbolic nonsense against America in order to make the attack on the US embassy seem justified. You are also implying that we should do nothing when Middle Easterners aggress on US soil because "muh Iraq War".

As to that second part I won't even attempt to address as you apparently have no empathy

Cry more, faggot.

and you're clearly operating in some other realm of reality since you think America's 20 year long and still going occupation of the middleast is okay because the Persian Empire was a thing 1000 years ago.

Absolute straw man. When the fuck did I even imply that? I'm just saying that Iran has it's own imperialist ambitions, so crying about the "American Empire" as if imperialism is unique to America is moronic.

lmao still can't believe people are clutching pearls over an embassy take over that happened without so much as a shot being fired which btw was sparked by the US blowing away a bunch of Iraqis that were fighting ISIS

"But the US started it against Iraq!"

The smell of whataboutism in your posts is palpable.

 

[Maculo]

For obvious reasons the focus has been Soleimani, but I thought this airstrike also killed top officials from Hezbollah and other Iraqi-Shia militia. If true, I am surprised top-level officials from Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon would conveniently gather in one location in Iraq. I do not want to dip into pure conjecture, but unless there were some top-level negotiations taking place, why would they not just meet in Iran? What would necessitate meeting together in an area the US could strike?

 

[Jewelsmakerguy]

The Iranians won’t do shit and this dude deserved it. What the hell was he even doing there if not to attack US assets and instigate an Iraqi civil war?

Fuck him and the Ayatollah.

Edit: What a surprise, blue check Twitter is melting down and defending the Iranian terrorist general. Gee wonder why they lose so much...

I mean he ain't trump and trump bad, so terrorist good guy despite being bad guy at same time! DUUURR AM I SMRT?

But seriously, the blue checkmarks defending a known terrorist and dictator makes me wonder when, or if, they'll join ISIS or something because defending terroism is about as bad as being a terroist if you ask me. Especially if it's regarding the Middle East.

This is all just saber rattling. Iran can’t risk a full out war because their enemies surround them and outnumber them. They’ve tried to do these little pushes against America, whether that be detaining a US ship for a bit in 2015, or shooting down a drone.

The response to this embassy attack shows that America has the intelligence to identify where Iran’s commanders are and the strength to eliminate them.

I expect Iran to either slow down their ME power play moves or use more indirect proxies.

Way I see it, Iran has one of two options, either:

-They decide to declare war on one of their neighbours (like Saudi Arabia or Israel) or try to strike one of the US or their allies' other occupied areas within the region
- Realize they're fucked and surrender like the suicidal tards they are.

And given how Iran's fuming over this loss, I fully suspect the former to happen, and for them to realize they're fucked as soon as the US catches on and launches more air strikes on their shithole.

 

[Ogg66]

Honestly I prefer this approach over killing civies and grunts. A lot of these top heavy regimes don’t care if their people or underlings die. They do care if they die.

Given how Bush reacted, Trump has to a large extent been mild and quite considered, though if he wants to actually do something to sort it out he has to consider the very risky strategy of taking out the Ayatollahs but that could seriously backfire. As it stands the general will be replaced by another dangerous type.

 

[It's HK-47]

Honestly I prefer this approach over killing civies and grunts. A lot of these top heavy regimes don’t care if their people or underlings die. They do care if they die.

And they care a lot. I'm finding all sorts of videos of people way up the chain literally crying over this.

 

[murdered meat bag]

WW3 probably won’t start and the draft won’t be reinstated, but if it does happen and they’re looking for able bodied dudes to fight then I’ll just claim I have aspergers or something.

Just tell them you're a racist or make some off colour jokes. the head Liaison of whatever branch will pull you aside and tell you your enlistment is denied because they don't take in racists or people affiliated with racism. I doubt 2020+ military will be different from when i tried during the obama admin.

Something like this would be extremely causality heavy:

Millennium Challenge 2002 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The only winning move here is not to play.

It's great you remembered this massive fuck up; it is one of the prime examples of how singleminded our military leadership is. Basically, Red Team thought outside of the box, demolished Blue Team in two days (utter complete loss) and Blue team was so upset that Red defeated textbook US Military doctrine that they reset the playfield and forced Red to play by Blue's Script which led to Red's defeat. This was hailed as a success for US Military Doctrine.

 

[OnMoTi]

Iran attacks an Iraqi military base, killing an American, and then they try to storm the US embassy. And when Trump responds, he's the one at fault? I don't understand these people. I get not liking Trump (personally I don't care for the man,) but it seems tens of millions of Americans are truly suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome and it's pathetic.