Quoted: This is from the same county that couldn't win a war against Iraq.

This is the same country that has rearmed since the Iran-Iraq war with the fire sale the ex-Soviet Union was having. They have difficult terrain, good strategic position (Straits of Hormuz), and more people than Iraq that they don't mind killing.
Would they win? No. But it won't be an Iraq.

Quoted: "Does anyone bother to look at a map. Clearly he is talking about the Straits of Hormuz. They only way we can support  that number of troops is by sea and the Straits are very narrow. Could they shut them down? Maybe, but only for a short time. Short term it might look good, but long term it's stupid for them.

I do dport and I see were your coming from… been there, seen that… very vulnerable choke point were they can eyeball you as you pass.





ANdy

Go ahead, make my day.

The Straits of Hormuz can be hairy when passing with a carrier,  The Iranian Navy has lots of little boats that need to be a artificial reef.

I think the bullshit they are spreading is just that, but Iran has been begging to be a parking lot for a long long time now.

Quoted: Quoted: "Does anyone bother to look at a map. Clearly he is talking about the Straits of Hormuz. They only way we can support  that number of troops is by sea and the Straits are very narrow. Could they shut them down? Maybe, but only for a short time. Short term it might look good, but long term it's stupid for them. I do dport and I see were your coming from… been there, seen that… very vulnerable choke point were they can eyeball you as you pass. img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/macandy/sat2b.jpg ANdy

We used to wargame that ALL the time.  We even engaged them HARD in 1988 in Operation Praying Mantis.

Operation Praying Mantis Blows a Hole in Iranian Navy By DAVID F. WINKLER During the Spring of 1988, the U.S. Navy was engaged in Operation Earnest Will, which had as an objective to maintain freedom of navigation in the Persian Gulf as Iraq and Iran continued to fight a seemingly endless war. On 14 April 1988, lookouts on the Perry-class frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts spotted three mines ahead in waters northeast of Qatar. Immediately the frigate's skipper, Cdr. Paul Rinn, sent the crew to General Quarters. Unfortunately, in backing down the frigate hit a fourth mine, which blew a 21-foot hole in the port side, cracking the hull, and injuring ten Sailors. The damage control efforts of the crew have become legendary as they welded cable to the hull to keep the ship from breaking in half. Within a few days, allied minesweepers combed the area and found more freshly laid mines. Judging from the markings, Iran was the clear culprit. In Washington, President Ronald Reagan met with his national security team. Adm. William J. Crowe, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, wanted to go after Iranian warships. Reagan instead favored the less militarily confrontational approach of going after Iranian oil platforms that had been used for command and control purposes. However, Crowe did convince the president to allow for "a very good set of rules of engagement" that would permit the Middle East Force commander to engage Iranian warships should they challenge the American operation. Crowe hoped that the notorious Iranian patrol frigate Sabalan, a warship that had mercilessly attacked many merchant ships and massacred numerous unarmed sailors, would be drawn into the fray. The action was code-named Operation Praying Mantis. Under the command of Rear Adm. Anthony A. Less, three surface action groups of three ships each went into battle on 18 April, with two going after the oil platforms and a third seeking out the Sabalan. Overhead, aircraft from the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise provided cover. Iranians stationed on both platforms resisted, but were overpowered by naval and helicopter gunfire. Marines and SEALs captured the two rigs, set demolition charges, and departed unscathed. Meanwhile the third surface action group operating off Bandar Abbas failed to flush out the Sabalan. Instead the Iranian missile boat Joshan came out to challenge the U.S. ships and fired a Harpoon missile at the cruiser USS Wainwright. The cruiser maneuvered to limit its profile against the cruise missile and fired chaff. The tactic worked as the missile locked onto the foil cloud 100 feet off the starboard beam. The Wainwright immediately fired six Standard missiles at the Joshan followed by a Harpoon. By the time the Harpoon arrived at its intended target, there was nothing left to hit. The Wainwright's surface warriors had no time to celebrate. With an Iranian F-4 fighter quickly closing, the Wainwright's skipper ordered Standard missiles to the rail and away. Two birds streaked towards the jet, apparently causing damage as the plane rapidly fell before returning to Bandar Abbas. To avenge the morning actions against their two oil platforms, the Iranians sent the Sahand, sister ship of the Sabalan, across the Gulf to attack oil platforms of the United Arab Emirates. An A-6E Intruder aircraft from the Enterprise responded to surface-to-air missile launches from the Sahand by firing two Harpoons and four laser-guided bombs. The guided-missile destroyer USS Joseph Strauss fired another Harpoon into what became a burning hulk. Finally at 1700, the scorned Sabalan cleared Bandar Abbas harbor and fired three missiles at a passing A-6E aircraft. Avoiding the missiles, one of the American planes turned and dropped a single 500-pound laser-guided bomb down the Sabalan's stack, ripping apart the engineering spaces. Less requested permission to finish off the ship. However, in Washington, Crowe turned to Secretary of Defense Frank Carlucci and said, "We've shed enough blood today," and called off any further action. For Iran, 18 April was a disastrous day. Besides losing a large portion of its navy, the Iranians suffered setbacks on land as an Iraqi assault reclaimed the Al Faw peninsula. For Iran, the situation only worsened over the next few months. Eight years and hundreds of thousands of war dead drained the revolutionary zeal of the Iranian people. Calls to raise a 100,000-man "Mohammed Corps" went unheeded. Iranian leaders began to consider the reality of ending the war with a non-military solution.

Mass Suacides comes in many forms... but that is truely stupid.
I think they forgot who they're dealing with.  
We need to do some nuke testing in the Middle East.

Diplomats said in Vienna Tuesday that the IAEA would not say in a report next month whether Iran's nuclear activities are of a military nature, nor will it recommend bringing the case before the UN Security Council.

WTF? I'm confused. Wasn't the original purpose of the IAEA's investigation to determine exactly that?! If not, what was its purpose, to determine if any two-headed frogs have been found in the vicinity of the plant?

Rush is talking about this right now.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: We used to wargame that ALL the time.  We even engaged them HARD in 1988 in Operation Praying Mantis.

Remember that well,

Unfortunately, thanks to our Russian, North Korean and Chinese 'friends' Iran has been able to change the ground rules.

Russia has sold them 3 modern KILO class subs and the advanced wake homing torpedoes to go with them. They are also belived to have sold Iran 'SUNBURN' Mach 3 Anti ship missiles. North Korea has sold them plenty of IRBM's and our Chinese 'friends' have sold them advanced mines, fast attack boats and loads of modern anti ship cruise missiles.

This would give the Iranians more than enough capability to block the straits should they chose to… and they have the option of a pre-emptive strike against a carrier transiting the straits.

ANdy

If we don't go for a ground attack & Just try to keep the straits open I give Iran about 2 hours of victory before they are looking for a replacement navy & air force!
If they launch an ICBM against the US of any of our allies the big ball (Nuke) may be dropped on them, Exspecially if they hit Israel!!

Quoted: Would not doubt this at all.  The suppressive government in Iran is losing public support every day and is eventually doomed.  What better way to hold a country together than a war much as they did during the Iran Iraq conflict. Tj

You hit it in one TJ!

I worked with a lot of Iranians back in the late 70's and they hated the Mullahs after they took over and started removing all their freedoms, but as soon as Iraq attacked they rallied to the flag and went back to Iran to fight… If Saadam had not attacked when he did, the Mullahs would have been overthrown in the early 80's as the people were sick of them.

ANdy

Quoted: Remember that well, Unfortunately, thanks to our Russian, North Korean and Chinese 'friends' Iran has been able to change the ground rules. Russia has sold them 3 modern KILO class subs and the advanced wake homing torpedoes to go with them. They are also belived to have sold Iran 'SUNBURN' Mach 3 Anti ship missiles. North Korea has sold them plenty of IRBM's and our Chinese 'friends' have sold them advanced mines, fast attack boats and loads of modern anti ship cruise missiles. This would give the Iranians more than enough capability to block the straits should they chose to… and they have the option of a pre-emptive strike against a carrier transiting the straits. ANdy

I think the biggest threat would be of a stike against a carrier while in the straights.  But I would think that the Cruisers and DDG's on escort duty would most likely be able to repel an attack of that nature.  (Andy, you know better than I... Do you think that a strike against a carrier would be successful?  Or would the AEGIS escorts be able to repel it?)

I would also think that 3 Kilo's wouldn't last long against 688's.  But they could carve up some shipping first.  Don't we also have P-3's in the area that could hunt them down?

I think the Ground troops in Iraq are relatively safe - there's too many of them, and no airstrike would get close w/out being seen - too many AWACs birds around.

I think them attacking us would be suicide, but I'm wondering how much damage they could really do in an initial assault.  (Assuming, for the moment, that they either do not have, or would not use, WMD's.)

Quoted: What a pathetic attempt at saber rattling.  Shit, Fidel Castro does better than that on a montly basis!

Quoted: Quoted: Remember that well, Unfortunately, thanks to our Russian, North Korean and Chinese 'friends' Iran has been able to change the ground rules. Russia has sold them 3 modern KILO class subs and the advanced wake homing torpedoes to go with them. They are also belived to have sold Iran 'SUNBURN' Mach 3 Anti ship missiles. North Korea has sold them plenty of IRBM's and our Chinese 'friends' have sold them advanced mines, fast attack boats and loads of modern anti ship cruise missiles. This would give the Iranians more than enough capability to block the straits should they chose to… and they have the option of a pre-emptive strike against a carrier transiting the straits. ANdy I think the biggest threat would be of a stike against a carrier while in the straights.  But I would think that the Cruisers and DDG's on escort duty would most likely be able to repel an attack of that nature.  (Andy, you know better than I... Do you think that a strike against a carrier would be successful?  Or would the AEGIS escorts be able to repel it?) I would also think that 3 Kilo's wouldn't last long against 688's.  But they could carve up some shipping first.  Don't we also have P-3's in the area that could hunt them down? I think the Ground troops in Iraq are relatively safe - there's too many of them, and no airstrike would get close w/out being seen - too many AWACs birds around. I think them attacking us would be suicide, but I'm wondering how much damage they could really do in an initial assault.  (Assuming, for the moment, that they either do not have, or would not use, WMD's.)

The straits are a navigation headache with lots of shoals and reefs and not enough searoom fore high speed manouvering… would the KILOS's last long against the 688's? Probably, the KILO's will be in their element, lots of sonar noise, the water temperature plays havoc with the sonar too, shallow water and plenty of places to hide. The 688's would be at a severe disdvantage in this situation. I would say the KILO would get in the first shot. The KILOS also have the option of attacking from within their territorial waters.

IRBMS and Anti ship? Time of flight is the bugbear here, yes, over the horizon, the AEGIS system would have no problem taking down the threats along with decoys and ECM. However, yet again the situation favors the Iranians if they are allowed the first shot. We are only talking visual range engaements here, this picture taken from the Oman coast on the south side will give you an idea… that's the coast of Iran behind the tanker (tanker is about the same size as a CVN)



A n American CVN is within 30 miles of the Iranian cost for a long time a good 100 miles or so IIRC. Time of flight for a SUNBURN would be seconds. Yet again they have the advantage in taking the first shot.

Mines…… now that IS a problem, a big one.

ANdy

It seems to me this problem with the strait could be easily solved with a few well placed ICBM's. That 100 mile stretch of coast that's within 30 miles of the Iranian border, filled with reefs and shoals, just became a 400 foot deep, 100 mile wide, luxury lane for our ships to march right on in.

Too bad it would never happen...

I have a plan for Iran
It's simple if you know
Just say the word Mr. Bush
And we'll nuke em til they glow...........


archer2

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Remember that well, Unfortunately, thanks to our Russian, North Korean and Chinese 'friends' Iran has been able to change the ground rules. Russia has sold them 3 modern KILO class subs and the advanced wake homing torpedoes to go with them. They are also belived to have sold Iran 'SUNBURN' Mach 3 Anti ship missiles. North Korea has sold them plenty of IRBM's and our Chinese 'friends' have sold them advanced mines, fast attack boats and loads of modern anti ship cruise missiles. This would give the Iranians more than enough capability to block the straits should they chose to… and they have the option of a pre-emptive strike against a carrier transiting the straits. ANdy I think the biggest threat would be of a stike against a carrier while in the straights.  But I would think that the Cruisers and DDG's on escort duty would most likely be able to repel an attack of that nature.  (Andy, you know better than I... Do you think that a strike against a carrier would be successful?  Or would the AEGIS escorts be able to repel it?) I would also think that 3 Kilo's wouldn't last long against 688's.  But they could carve up some shipping first.  Don't we also have P-3's in the area that could hunt them down? I think the Ground troops in Iraq are relatively safe - there's too many of them, and no airstrike would get close w/out being seen - too many AWACs birds around. I think them attacking us would be suicide, but I'm wondering how much damage they could really do in an initial assault.  (Assuming, for the moment, that they either do not have, or would not use, WMD's.) The straits are a navigation headache with lots of shoals and reefs and not enough searoom fore high speed manouvering… would the KILOS's last long against the 688's? Probably, the KILO's will be in their element, lots of sonar noise, the water temperature plays havoc with the sonar too, shallow water and plenty of places to hide. The 688's would be at a severe disdvantage in this situation. I would say the KILO would get in the first shot. The KILOS also have the option of attacking from within their territorial waters. IRBMS and Anti ship? Time of flight is the bugbear here, yes, over the horizon, the AEGIS system would have no problem taking down the threats along with decoys and ECM. However, yet again the situation favors the Iranians if they are allowed the first shot. We are only talking visual range engaements here, this picture taken from the Oman coast on the south side will give you an idea… that's the coast of Iran behind the tanker (tanker is about the same size as a CVN) img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/macandy/boats2.jpg A n American CVN is within 30 miles of the Iranian cost for a long time a good 100 miles or so IIRC. Time of flight for a SUNBURN would be seconds. Yet again they have the advantage in taking the first shot. Mines…… now that IS a problem, a big one. ANdy

Remember the Kilos are not manned by highly trained operators here, Judging from the performance the Iranians put on in the Iran/Iraq war I doubt they would put the kilos to good use before we sank them.
Remember these guys made the Iraqi army look like a top notch fighting force!

Quoted: I think the biggest threat would be of a stike against a carrier while in the straights.  But I would think that the Cruisers and DDG's on escort duty would most likely be able to repel an attack of that nature.  (Andy, you know better than I... Do you think that a strike against a carrier would be successful?  Or would the AEGIS escorts be able to repel it?)

Depends on the type of strike. They have the advantage of the first shot in an area filled with clutter. I don't want to get more specific than that.

I would also think that 3 Kilo's wouldn't last long against 688's.  But they could carve up some shipping first.  Don't we also have P-3's in the area that could hunt them down?

Vito covered that one pretty well.

I think the Ground troops in Iraq are relatively safe - there's too many of them, and no airstrike would get close w/out being seen - too many AWACs birds around.

How long are they safe without supplies? Professionals think logistics not tactics.

think them attacking us would be suicide, but I'm wondering how much damage they could really do in an initial assault.  (Assuming, for the moment, that they either do not have, or would not use, WMD's.)

In the long run, maybe. How many troops are we willing to commt? Are we even able to invade with the current force structure? They're thinking they'll have to sit through airstrikes, pretty significant ones, but they'll still be around after it's all said and done. The advantage is the prestige that goes along with taking out as many Americans as possible and coming out of it still in power. Remember, Iran is not full of ethnic arabs, they're Persian. They don't want prestige in the arab world; they want prestige in the Muslim world. Even with tremendous losses if the regime was able to maintain power after a large American strike they would be seen as the anti-American leader in the Muslim world.

I can't believe there's people on here who would believe Iran would do that.  My father in the 80's set up a long range radio, the antenna was stretched across the backyard and picked up North Korean radio propaganda in English that said they were going to take out America and South Korea soon.  But the only problem was this was a daily announcement and probably has been for over 50 years.  I'm sure the Iranians know what would happen to them if they attacked US forces in Iraq, plus most of the population there doesn't support the government, I know cause I have friends from Iran who've talked to me about this.  Nuking millions of people because they happen to be victims of their government seems a little extreme, but hey I'm sure the guys on here who are supporting that also claim to be strong Christians, go figure.


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proud to be Muslim, no regrets.
-UT
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FOX NEWS was just talking about this. . .It must be true!

Yeah Fox news is about as Fair and Balanced as Al-Jazeera.

-UT

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Remember the Kilos are not manned by highly trained operators here, Judging from the performance the Iranians put on in the Iran/Iraq war I doubt they would put the kilos to good use before we sank them.

They don't have to be skilled operators, they can sit on the bottom in shallow water within THEIR OWN TERRITIORIAL WATER and take a shot as the carrier passes, look at the picture I posted of the tanker in transit and you will see the firing solution, 688's cannot operate effectively in shallow shoal water due to their size, KILO's can.

ANdy

Quoted: Yeah Fox news is about as Fair and Balanced as Al-Jazeera. -UT

If you watched Arab TV Channels (I do) you would know this to be a false statement.

Andy

The Iranian Navy, what's left of it, is not totally incompetent.  (A few of the Iranian Officers and Cadets I taught actually tried to learn the subject matter, but that's another story.)  As noted flight times are very short and unless we had real good reasons to be launching on warnings rather than launching on launches, we might take the first hit.  We still have the Vincennes incident that colors our thinking.

The government would be willing to sacrifice for their religion, the questions is would the military follow the orders?  Knowing instant destruction would be coming for the sake of religious goals they don't support, the professional military wouldn't.  HOWEVER the Republican Guards and unsophisticated religious fanatics would launch an atack.

The Strais of Hormuz and the Gulf behind them are very poor operating area for our kind of Navy, but lukily we really don't have to go there.  We can wait outside and make them come out to us and that's where almost all our really good capabilities would be matched against there weakest capabilities.

Ethnically, they are Aryans, Caucasians, and Persians, they are not Arabs.  Arabs hate Persians and vice versa.  Most Arab states are mostly Sunnis, the Iranians are mostly Shiites.  In other words, they couldn't reasonably expect much support from anybody local.  Nobody says they are reasonable.  To the west are Arab states, the east is Afghanistan and Pakistan.  No real help from Afghanistan, would Pakistan get involved and risk getting sucker punched from behind by India?  And the other Moslem states east of there have no power projection capability.

Now there is a real bozo who wants to form a line for those 72 virgins that our Marines have turned into non virgins !!!

That should be put up for the Darwin Award.

Talk about some real dumb asses!!   Let them try. There would be a rather large glass lined parking lot next to Iraq !!!

Ya know, we should drop say 99 Nukes on them , just for a show of power. Don't want to use 100 or John Fucking Kerry would say we were not fighting a sensitive war ...

Talk about dumb asses!!!