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.

.

 

[Ponderous Pillock]

Rumour's abound about fuselage elements showing what seems like 22mm shrapnel holes. Images.

 

[WutangLee]

We just had their #2 guy in charge assassinated after they tried messing with us via proxy terrorist outfits, now you want us to go tell them to go back to doing that, but just in Syria this time? ISIS never really held Iranian territory in the first place, so there's no local group for them to launch a counter-insurgency against.

I don't mean clean up Iraq. I mean stick to fucking around their own sectarian bullshit.

 

[Observotron]

Rumour's abound about fuselage elements showing what seems like 22mm shrapnel holes. Images.

Those are just speed holes so the plane goes faster.

 

[Your Weird Fetish]

oh I get it, it's net positive and frankly Ukrainian military prior to 2014 (Russian invasion) was total shit and underfunded.

The problem is that US had made promises like 4 trillion in reparations to VietNam for Paris accords, nukes in Ukraine ... people eventually will get a wiff that giving up nukes isn't a good idea. I can't blame Kim for not wanting to give up nukes ... or Iran. US promises are useless and it's not lost on tyrants of the world. Once Kim gives up nukes Norks become Angola or some other African shithole without leverage on the world. Keeping promises makes sense, it goes a long way to maintain your integrity as a country to keep promises.

At this point it'd probably take 20 years or more of lawful neutral obsessive levels of promise keeping before the US's reputation as inconstant and unreliable actually reverses sadly so maybe we should just stay unpredictable. I dunno.

 

[The Pink Panther]

Now reading some of his speech, I learned something.

People often lean towards one extreme or another. This includes presidents. More militaristic or no militaristic action. But Tramp is a combo pack of both extremes, which surprised me. You think that someone, especially like him, would go all in sometimes and then another. But it seems to be more strategic here. There is a balance and I think I can kind of admire that. I think he might be one of those people that understands both sides of a scenario and uses either benefit of each when needed. I wish he represented this mindset more in his rhetorical stances. I mean he's a businessman, he's certainly had to make decisions like that before.

 

[Null]

100% correct and everything we've said is preposterous nonsense, deliberately insulting us

I didn't insult anyone, calm down.

 

[Imperial Citizen]

This is absolute fucking nonsense and it's preposterous to even try and fling it.

The rest of your post is optimism about civic nationalism faggotry better suited for a Chuck E. Cheese 4th of July music video.

Null, there is a reason for why you refer to yourself as a person from the United States rather than these United States.

You’ve bought into the lie of civic nationalism by thinking that you share a connection with people from Minnesota or Hawaii despite you not being from there.

 

[Jarolleon]

So why is the alt-right mad that we defended our self against Iran attacking our embassy?

Because America's continued presence there only serves Da Jooz (supposedly). Also they're paranoid (hard not to be as an alt-righter) & thought this "defense" was planned to provoke a full-on war, right in time for Trump to lose the election so the new woke administration could replace the war dead with rapefugees, sealing White America's fate (source, Killstream superchat).

 

[Wuornos]

You know the Brits and Canadians will blame this on Trump.

What do you base that on when most Brits support Trump? The BREXIT result and the majority of the country voting for Conservative Boris Johnson for Prime Minister should have made that obvious..

 

[thx1138]

So, 16 hours later what do we have?

Internationally, everyone's holding their breaths but focusing on Iran specifically (as noted before):
Zero points scored with the missile strikes. A net negative, since they attacked sovereign Iraqi soil/airspace.
No massive US counterstrike to go crying to the world about.
Deaths of their own citizens, by their own hand, as well as the deaths of Canadians, Britons, etc. in the 737 shootdown. Not so smug about Iranian Air 655 now are we, Iran? Not so simple, is it?
World markets are up.
Oil prices haven't budged and if the prices I saw at the gas stations this morning are any indication, they've come down a tad (I know the distance between a barrel of oil and a gallon of gas, price-wise, is huge, but an IDF soldier on vacation can sneeze in Haifa and gas prices will jump $.10 a gallon).
Trump's taking the "Okay...you all done? You got that out of your system? Are you ready to act like adults and talk about this?" approach, which is helping the previous two items.

I'm not sure if nervous nellies on social media are still screeching about MUH DRAFT and MUH 100,000 CASUALTIES. I almost (but not really) wish certain posters could be reached for their opinions on how this was in fact a massive strategic win for both China and Iran...but in actuality, no.

 

[Sanshain]

I didn't insult anyone, calm down.

You call our evidence preposterous, thereby insulting our intelligence. You call our world-views a naive fantasy, implying that we're stupid for holding it. Just because you did not directly and unambiguously disparage us doesn't mean your tone wasn't deliberately confrontational and derogatory.

We're all calm here. None of us (to my knowledge) are raging or in any way angry. We're just a bit disappointed that you seem to think we're enemies. That's all. I'm sorry if I gave an impression otherwise.

 

[Sophia_orr]

"Finally, to the people and the leaders of Iran: We want you to have a future--and a great future--one that you deserve. One of prosperity and hope and harmony with the nations of the world. The United States is ready to embrace peace with all who seek it."​

@Cosmos This is why people support Trump. When you ignore the breathless, first-second headlines and weave through the fear-mongers and doom-criers, you don't wind up being a hyperventilating reactionary who thinks a peace-bringer is a war-hawk. The media's sole job right now is to terrify you to fuel ad revenue. Stop letting them manipulate your emotions.

There's not going to be a WW3. There never was going to be a WW3, just like the last five times they tried to make everyone shit their pants and send the entire country into a mouth-frothing panic. I'd ask if we could stop doing this every single time that the media wants us to do this, but I know for a fact that the second another conflict like this kicks off, we'll be right back to everyone shrieking about how WW3 is right around the corner. Again.

You know It's not often I see someone who talks sense. It's refreshing to see it instead of always seeing the exhausting same thing time and time again. Sometimes I curse the human mind for being so easy to be tricked by seeing the media talk about something. but oh well.

I'm not sure if nervous nellies on social media are still screeching about MUH DRAFT and MUH 100,000 CASUALTIES. I almost (but not really) wish certain posters could be reached for their opinions on how this was in fact a massive strategic win for both China and Iran...but in actuality, no.

Eh, I saw a few on twitter still doing that but some are calling Trump weak for not going to war most likely. But those nervous nellies aren't really the brightest mankind has to offer. then again mankind's offers have for the most part have become bottom barrel tier.

 

[RodgerDodger]

So why is the alt-right mad that we defended our self against Iran attacking our embassy?

never try and make any sense of the Richard Spencer idiocy. Down that road lies madness. Just accept that anything coming from him or his witless minions is moronic idiocy.

If Iran did shoot down the Ukranian plane near Tehran, it will have officially killed 82 Iranians, 63 Canadians, 11 Ukrainians, 10 Swedes, 4 Afghanis, 3 Germans, and 3 Britons + dozens of Iraqis in its retaliation against the U.S, which so far hasn't killed any US.

So, following the US assassination of Qassem Soleimani, Iran's response has so-far seen:
- A crush at his funeral that killed 56 Iranians
- A ballistic missile strike that killed nobody but continue to violate Iraqi Sovereignty.
- A shoot down of a civilian airliner killing 82 Iranians.

Trump may be one of the most cost effective Presidents we’ve had. For the price of just one outdated Hellfire missile fired he has brought about the deaths of hundreds of his enemies. Talk about efficiency!

Rumour's abound about fuselage elements showing what seems like 22mm shrapnel holes. Images.

Those arejust the free Bullet Hole Stickers they give you with every fill up of gas down at the Iranian Airport Quickimart.

 

[Null]

You call our evidence preposterous, thereby insulting our intelligence.

I can't help how you feel about something, but don't claim I did anything more than saying your assertion was wrong when I fucking didn't.

I once had a middle school substitute teacher yell at me, literally holding me by my shoulders and shouting "are you insulting my intelligence?" and I remember thinking "I wasn't before". Thanks for reminding me of that.

 

[Iwasamwillbe]

I didn't insult anyone, calm down.

You are, however, acting like a hysterical idiot over the supposed dawn of global Chinese hegemony.

I can't help how you feel about something, but don't claim I did anything more than saying your assertion was wrong when I fucking didn't.

I once had a middle school substitute teacher yell at me, literally holding me by my shoulders and shouting "are you insulting my intelligence?" and I remember thinking "I wasn't before". Thanks for reminding me of that.

Now you're just being disingenuous, as if you didn't read the rest of the post.

 

[Christ Cried]

@Cosmos made a post about this in the other thread and got bombed for it, but I completely agree that we should have no military presence in the old world, especially not the middle east. We should not have bases within 50 miles of every border Iran shares with its neighbors.

A primary concern with Clinton to me was that she had previously stated that she intended to go to war with both Russia and Iran. When the Orange-Man-Russian-Callooshun shit started up I made an active decision I'd rather have someone financially involved in making deals with Russia than some crazy lady who obsessively hated Putin.

I don't care what Iran does. I don't care if Iranians are killed by the Iranian government. I don't care if they bomb Iraq or Afghanistan. I don't care. I don't give a fuck about any of these shithole countries. Fuck off.

Nuke the darkies, Lebensraum now!

 

[saralovesjuicyfruit]

Everyone arguing about China is posting cringe bro and are going to lose subscriber

 

[No Ma'ams Land]

The simps are mewling again.

 

[mindlessobserver]

Those are some very suspicious looking holes on the tail fin debris.

 

[Sanshain]

I can't help how you feel about something, but don't claim I did anything more than saying your assertion was wrong when I fucking didn't.

I once had a middle school substitute teacher yell at me, literally holding me by my shoulders and shouting "are you insulting my intelligence?" and I remember thinking "I wasn't before". Thanks for reminding me of that.

We're not /pol/. You don't have to engage in weird word-games to try and maintain a perfect platform of unassailable righteousness. What are you even trying to accomplish with all this? We're not your enemies, we're not trying (well, I'm not anyway) to make you cough up random quotes to add to your ED page as evidence of your total lunacy or whatever it is your detractors are trying to do these days.

I'll be perfectly honest here. You can say that doesn't matter to you all you like, but it matters enough to you that you feel a strong urge to keep justifying yourself over it. If anyone else was acting in the exact same way you're acting right now, you would be one of the first people to call them out on it, hang them out to dry and respond to every new post with some variant of 'lol look at this dude being mad on the internet'.

I'm not asking you to back down or admit you're wrong. I can't objectively say that you're wrong anyway, and being right doesn't exactly matter very much to me. I'm asking you to take a step back and take a look at what your actions say about yourself right now. I don't like to see you this hot and bothered over an otherwise meaningless discussion.

So again. Please. Stop treating us like we're your enemies.