Gulf States Accept a New Normal in Hormuz: Iran Is in Control | Hacker News Reader

Gulf States Accept a New Normal in Hormuz: Iran Is in Control

wsj.com

56 pointspetethomas23 comments

To the EU - we need a new global leader. Please get your act together and step up.

The EU leadership is even worse than what they have in USA.

Perhaps worse than what the US had before the fall, but it's still an open question of whether Europe will hold it together or fall to the same corpo-authoritarian + revanchist-destructionist movements that are killing the US.

Have you met China?

Mission Accomplished!

(I miss the days when evil was halfway competent at working to further the interests of the domestic power structure)

The Iranian civilization is five thousand years old. It's not out of the blue that they have a hundred underground missile and drone cities. They know how to play the long game, and America never does.

Yes I expect they started digging those missile bunkers 2000 years ago knowing that one day someone, somewhere, would invent something they could launch at passing ships.

> expect they started digging those missile bunkers 2000 years ago

Huh. They didn't, but probably several decades ago.

Tell me, which American project took several decades to come to maturity? There has been none. Its focus and attention span isn't long. The next President cancels or doesn't follow up with what the previous President starts, which effects a limit of eight years to any project. There is zero civilizational thinking.

The US spent decades building their own missile program…

Yes, I apologize. The US has had a number of defense programs that lasted a while, but were not continuous in their execution, and met with cancelations before they were later resumed. As far as public works programs go, there has been nothing notable going on since the highway construction program ended in the 1990s. This entire century has had nothing to speak of in terms of notable long-term non-defense projects.

The ancient Qanats are actually vertical launch shafts, with a convenient water supply for transportation below. It helps that they've had a single unbroken administration for 5,000 years. Helps for long term planning.

China and Iran are the two oldest administrations in the world. What is interesting is even when conquered, as long as they aren't genocided/colonialized, administration transcend culture and religion (China is the best example for culture, Iran for religion). Everybody knows that Iran administration is stable. It survived two civil war within 30 years with at most moderate changes.

It appears the situation has developed not necessarily to our advantage.

A world screwed by a mouth breathing MAGA cult. I guess democracies should have programmatic indicators when the idiocy levels start increasing. Countries that cross a bunch of "idiocy indicators" will need intervention.

There is something seriously wrong with american system where a felon can become president and steal openly.

Who's going to intervene on the country with the largest nuclear arsenal in the world?

It is very easy if they stop:

1. Using the USD as a reserve.

2. Buying its treasuries.

3. Using the USD for trade with other countries.

Nearly the entire political class here has wanted this war for decades, but held back because they knew how risky and unpopular it would be. They were very happy when Trump came along and was dumb enough to do it and take the blame on himself. Chuck Schumer put out a video last year egging him on! https://x.com/SenSchumer/status/1929676991789203528 Trump is not the actual problem, just a useful idiot

Is this really the quality of comment that belongs on HackerNews?

Under ordinary circumstances, no.

But these are not ordinary circumstances. This is the collapse of the country that is the center of the tech universe. More than a few on HN are supporters of the administration. The frustration of HN users appalled at the situation is on topic.

The "most powerful man in the world" is an incompetent fucking clown unfit to run a local McDonalds franchise.

That's the world we all live in.

the more terrifying question is "now this is the new baseline for normal, how much worse will it get?!?"

It’s not the new normal

sure it is. a whole generation is growing up with this as the baseline.

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