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Comment by HWR_14 | Hacker News Reader

Assisting the US with regard to Iran is phenomenally unpopular. The increase in energy prices isn't outweighing people's desire not to have their country assist.

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The other thing is: even if a country like the UK committed billions of dollars to joining the fight in the gulf - there’s no reason to think it’d lower their energy prices, or earn them any favours from Trump.

Short of a nuclear strike (which isn’t on the cards thankfully) nothing short of a ceasefire can get shipping moving again. Sending more warships doesn’t help with that.

So it’s not just that helping Trump would be incredibly unpopular at home - there’s also no guarantee the huge expense would lower energy bills at all.

Many countries have said they will help patrol the strait as long as the war stops. Iran wont be able to keep this after the war. Iran wont declare war against the entire world, so they wont shoot down their destroyers.

The attack on Iran was an attack on the globe, causing energy and supply chain issues for everybody, including the attackers.

Other countries are not volunteering to help prosecute more attacks on Iran, because they are already victims of those attacks, and it's bad enough that the USA and israel aren't even apologizing for hurting them, much less paying for the damages.

Thus, the offer to "help patrol the strait" once the USA and israel stop attacking is meant to persuade the USA and israel to stop attacking, not an indication of support for the USA and israel's attacks. Indeed, most countries do not support the USA and israel's attacks on Iran, were totally okay with the status quo, and would have preferred if the USA and israel had not attacked Iran.

So what? Attacking Iran was a stupid move, but the US and Israeli regimes don't particularly care about the other victims whining. If other countries are going to make themselves dependent on fossil fuels from the Persian Gulf region then they'll either have to secure their own sea lines of communication or accept that supplies are unreliable. Asking for apologies or payments won't accomplish anything. That is the geopolitical reality.

There are refeniries dependent on the Persian Gulf region(PGR) but the majority of countries are dependent on the the general commodities market of downstream products. The US famously produces more oil than it uses and is not generally receiving fuel that's downstream of the PGR and yet if you look at the gas prices in the US you'll realise that it's not as simple as being reliant on fossil fuels from the PGR.

That's without taking into account other things like high grade helium or specific niche products.

The us imports more crude oil than it exports. An easily looked up fact.

The us does export more refined products than it imports but it’s highly dependent on crude imports for it’s significant refining capacity.

Yes but crude is not really fungible. About 14% of US crude imports are effected which is about 8% of overall crude refining.

By the US not being reliant on imports I was saying that even with just local crude oil production the US can satisfy internal demand for petroleum products.

My wider point is that of course everyone knows that that's not how the economy really works and I was replying to nradov oversimplifying by pointing out that if it was that simple US petrol prices wouldn't have gone up as much as they did. Because even though it's only a few countries with specific refineries that are actually reliant on the straight being open to get their specific required flavour of crude it's everyone in the refined markets that are actually effected by the supply of that crude because it effects the supply those refined products.

> the US and Israeli regimes don't particularly care about the other victims whining

This does seem to be true of israel, but as for the USA, it does not, hence the USA limiting their attacks.

> If other countries are going to make themselves dependent on fossil fuels from the Persian Gulf region then they'll either have to secure their own sea lines of communication or accept that supplies are unreliable.

This sort of rhetoric is why other countries do not support the USA and israel: the other countries already did that, then the USA and israel came and attacked those supply lines, thus attacking those countries.

It strikes me as gaslighting abuser language to attack someone else, then blame it on them for not protecting themselves better. It's better for the attackers to acknowledge their mistakes, apologize for them, and pay restitution.

It's not rhetoric. I'm not trying to convince anyone, I'm just explaining how things work. Since the other countries largely lack the ability to act, their support or lack thereof is irrelevant. The US and Israel have no incentive to apologize or pay restitution; more likely outcomes are that they either escalate, or unilaterally disengage and leave others to clean up the mess.

The world does have another much better option: they can pay the Iranian ransom and call it a day. No need to participate in another war.

You're not thinking through the long-term consequences of that option. The Iranian extortion fees will likely escalate over time. Other countries will use that precedent to impose fees for passage through their territorial waters. Most of the countries that rely on maritime trade would prefer to avoid that outcome, even if it causes deaths and economic pain in the short term.

The world must go multipolar. US has proved us repeatedly that it cannot lead.

It may mean that we'll have to pay tolls everywhere, but that's still better and cheaper than getting f*ked by the US now and then.

> The Iranian extortion fees will likely escalate over time.

Nowhere near as much as the American extortion costs.

> Since the other countries largely lack the ability to act, their support or lack thereof is irrelevant.

How is their support, or lack thereof, irrelevant to our discussion that is literally about whether they support the war? Here is a reminder of the topic, from the post you replied to:

> Assisting the US with regard to Iran is phenomenally unpopular. The increase in energy prices isn't outweighing people's desire not to have their country assist.

That poster and I are just explaining how things work. Seems like you might agree with us here? Indeed, since most other countries do not support the war, their ability to act is irrelevant.

You're really missing the point. Whether they support the war or not is largely irrelevant because support doesn't count for anything.

> You're really missing the point. Whether they support the war or not is largely irrelevant

Am I? No, I don't think so: Whether they support the war or not is literally the topic of discussion, so by definition it can't be irrelevant to the discussion.

> support doesn't count for anything

Whether or not you feel "support doesn't count for anything" is irrelevant to the discussion of whether the support is there in the first place.

It's also sour grapes: the USA tried to gain the support of other countries, and because it failed, the support it failed to get is suddenly "irrelevant". Lol. It sure wasn't irrelevant when the USA was begging and threatening countries to help them.

And yet national leaders do phenomenally unpopular things all the time when they decide it's necessary. In this particular case it's mostly moot because none of the other impacted countries really has the capability to act regardless of popularity or lack thereof. Like the UK chose to spend all of their money on nationalized healthcare instead of the military. I don't mean that in a critical or negative way, on balance that might have been the right choice for them. But that choice does constrain their options in a crisis.

The UK spends a lower fraction of its GDP on health than the US (the US is an outlier because of its system).

The UK's NHS is not why it's not taking part in this mess.

Would it not be pretty counterproductive for other countries to assist the US in this case? That seems only likely to prolong / exacerbate the war. The US giving up would be much faster.

Whether it would be counterproductive or not depends on what those other countries are trying to produce. None of them particularly want to pay tribute or protection money to Iran, especially because Iran could then decide to close the strait again or raise the fee at any time. They also don't want to set a precedent that other countries might exploit for charging transit fees through their national waters. And the USA might impose secondary sanctions on any country which makes payments to Iran. So the current stalemate might last quite a while.

"Like the UK chose to spend all of their money on nationalized healthcare instead of the military"

I believe the equation is a bit more complex than that.

Fair enough. There are a multiple additional reasons why the UK can no longer afford an expeditionary military to protect their overseas interests, but the full explanation can't fit into an HN comment. The exact reasons aren't relevant to the current state of affairs, the main point is that they lack the capability to do anything even if they wanted to.

The simple reason is, the british stopped being a big empire in the wave of decolonisation. They lost most of their colonies. Not just for military reasons, but human progress. Self determination of people etc. So had no need or funds to sustain a mighty global fleet anymore.

(And health care sounds like a way more useful thing to fund, than the capability to wage war around the globe)

Maybe the US needs to learn that lesson, too? Right now all the US with all its might achieved is blocking a former free flowing transit.

The US national security establishment is unlikely to learn any lasting lessons from this debacle. So the UK and other impacted countries will need to deal with the situation as it actually exists, not in some hypothetical alternate reality with a less interventionist US foreign policy.

this is in no small part because Iran is viewed a bit like America's Poland.

Yes, I know ww2 comparisons are tired but honestly the Lebensraum explanation makes more sense than what trump has said publicly, so here we are...

I really doubt USA is planning to settle Iran and replace Iranians by Americans at conquered land.

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