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I agree with you about the fact that "more" sanctions are likely to do little to stop Iran from doing whatever it wants to do but I am not sure how the type of military action you propose would actually works. None of Iran's direct neighbors(Turkey, Afghanistan, Azerbaijian, Pakistan, and Iraq) would support military action(unlike Kuwait against Iraq in 2003) and by many accounts all actually support the mullahs in Tehran. Essentially the US and Israel would have to re-invade Iraq simply to even get to Iran first and I am not all sure Kuwait would support another invasion of Iraq simply for US troops to move on from to Iran. So we would what have to invade Syria from Israel through the Golan to invade Iraq to invade Iran? I don't think in a million years the American people would ever support such a strategy.

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It would be easier if we had not withdrawn from Afghanistan, and if we weren't seen as so unreliable. Our decreasing presence in the Middle East, although it makes it harder to handle Iran, it makes it yet more necessary that we seek to regain a foothold one way or another, as without the US, we're basically leaving the Middle East to an imperial Iran. Unless we want another Russia-Ukraine situation, that's why we need to clobber Iran, as I say.

I think it was also a big, big mistake that Biden basically scolded Saudi Arabia into alignment with China. However, I think there's still hope to regain lost clout. E.g. Saudi Arabia is aligning with and making peace with China out of fear. If we reassured the Saudis of our security creds and signaled we still want their oil and that Net Zero isn't happening any time soon, we could turn them back our way. And not only Israel but Jordan, Beirut, and Yemen would be on our side, because of the Abraham Accords. We really need to think of the West's task like marshaling the whole Middle East together, that the US has sought to cultivate since the War on Terror, to handle Iran who's is a threat to all of them. We could also offer our services in exchange for counterterrorism in the region. With the Islamic state, the Taliban and Al Qaeda in the background, that would have some heft.

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Jun 22, 2023·edited Jun 22, 2023Liked by Jay Burkett

My sense is one of the few things both left and right agree is they DON'T want oil from Saudi Arabia and would actually go to quite extreme measures to avoid needing Saudi oil. I have long had this discussion with Claire Berlinski and Arun Kapil that there are actually deep similarities between France's pullout of Algeria and today's US policy to the Middle East. France was willing to expend even greater amounts of money to get alternatives to Algerian agriculture and energy resources even after the colonial war had already been won favor of France simply so they could pullout and dump Algeria. The nuclear energy program of France for example really comes out of the ashes of the Algerian pull out. And like the US today you had both the "Gaullist" Right and the traditional left in favor of turning Algeria over to the Islamists with those in favor of continued French involvement in Algeria being a small and unpopular minority(i.e. Jean Marie Le Pen and the Front Nationale).

I will also point out that American Presidents since Nixon have been campaigning against foreign oil imports and especially oil imports from the Middle East. Even a President like George W Bush who was quite close to the Middle East famously said during a State of the Union that American was addicted to oil and in particular oil from what he called "unstable" parts of the world.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S58CcRQcuuw

**Someday when I get my own Substack going I want to do my first post comparing Charles DeGaulle to the Larry the Liquidator corporate raider character played by Danny Devito from the 1991 movie Other People's Money. Essentially DeGaulle viewed French rule of Algeria much in the same way the Lawrence Garfield described New England Wire and Cable in the movie.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOcz-H5u3Rk

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Definitely start your own Substack. You have things to say

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