Episode V: The Persian Empire Strikes Back

[Bucky Cornstarch]

Probably unlikely, but there's a chance that gcode will someday understand that he is being manipulated by the media he consumes and regurgitates.

[TylerBeer]

Things are going great:

" Effective April 20, 2026, the U.S. Army is increasing the maximum enlistment age from 34 to 42 and eliminating waiver requirements for a single conviction of possession of marijuana."

[Newbeeee™]

Things are going great:

" Effective April 20, 2026, the U.S. Army is increasing the maximum enlistment age from 34 to 42 and eliminating waiver requirements for a single conviction of possession of marijuana."

"If pHarma doesn't kill you, we'll ship you off to the Ukraine meat grinder"....

[TylerBeer]

"If pHarma doesn't kill you, we'll ship you off to the Ukraine meat grinder"....

...yeaaaah

[Newbeeee™]

...yeaaaah

Great - Something else we agree on!
See, you're coming around....

[Smit]

No troops on the ground?

I expect Iran didn't just roll over and show its belly like President Bone Spurs expected.

The Pentagon orders troops from the 82nd Airborne Division to deploy to the Middle East

Excerpt:

As the war approaches the one-month mark the Trump administration keeps its options open, submitting a ceasefire plan to Iran, while also deploying up to 3,000 U.S. Army paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division to the Middle East.

Revelations about the ceasefire plan come as multiple Iranian officials continue to deny that any negotiations to end the war are taking place.

And the U.S. paratroopers would supplement some 50,000 troops already present in the Middle East, as well as thousands of Marines who are on their way.

[Newbeeee™]

...yeaaaah

See.... just to give some more bones behind my previous statement.... ANOTHER one, and it only took 49 years to retract.
Still, it's only to do with asbestos in baby talc and grinding it into the skin....
https://x.com/TheLancet/status/2036806344657817783

[TylerBeer]

No troops on the ground?

I expect Iran didn't just roll over and show its belly like President Bone Spurs expected.

The Pentagon orders troops from the 82nd Airborne Division to deploy to the Middle East

Excerpt:

The only bombing he has experience with is his many failed businesses - this will continue to be a disaster

[Incogneeto]

The only bombing he has experience with is his many failed businesses - this will continue to be a disaster

Newsome will fix it.   

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/gavin-newsom-floats-idea-of-mandatory-national-service/ar-AA1ZuYvU?ocid=msedgntp&pc=U531&cvid=69c658e712fd491abdde4ec26df9758f&ei=20

[CNCAppsJames]

California Men's Service Challenge, which set a goal of getting 10,000 men to volunteer as mentors, coaches and tutors.

More like he probably promised 10,000 of his pedo donors grooming opportunities is more like it.

 

[neurosis]

Saw this posted on a libertarian facebook feed. 

[Newbeeee™]

^^^^ What if the plan, is the plan..... constructed chaos and hyper inflation?
Who's laughing now....

[Bucky Cornstarch]

More like he probably promised 10,000 of his pedo donors grooming opportunities is more like it.

Good one, Nutboy!   

[gcode]

No plan?

On November 29, 1971, the world barely noticed when Iranian forces seized three specks of land at the mouth of the Strait of Hormuz: Abu Musa, Greater Tunb, and Lesser Tunb. For the UAE and many in the Gulf, this was never a technical border quarrel. It was an act of occupation and a permanent scar.

Today, a comfortable consensus has formed in foreign-policy salons and on Wall Street that the Trump administration has no strategic vision for the Strait of Hormuz, and that Iran is "winning" the confrontation in the Gulf by default. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is hard to believe how casually many of these critics ignore history, including the way control of financing, insurance, and maritime chokepoints has repeatedly reshaped great-power influence.

Half a century after the shah's grab, the question surrounding these islands is no longer simply "who owns them," but "who secures the most critical chokepoint in the global oil trade." With President Trump moving to provide American-backed insurance for ships transiting the Gulf, Washington is displacing the remnants of British dominance in maritime insurance and risk.

Whoever insures the traffic does not just collect premiums; they hold a de facto veto over it and gain visibility into every meaningful cargo, what moves, in what volume, from where and to where.

This emerging architecture gives the United States something London once enjoyed: an indirect presence in every Gulf port that depends on uninterrupted access to global insurance and reinsurance.

The logical next step is geographic as well as financial. Returning Abu Musa, Greater Tunb, and Lesser Tunb to the United Arab Emirates would not only correct a historical wrong against Arab inhabitants whose ties to these islands long predate the shah's gunboat diplomacy. It would also provide the legal and political foundation for a formal U.S.–UAE security arrangement on the islands themselves.

Critics will bristle at the idea of a sustained American military presence on these rocks. But the alternative is not some neutral, demilitarized utopia. The alternative is that the Strait of Hormuz, through which a large share of the world's seaborne oil flows, remains vulnerable to coercion, sabotage, and blockade.

A long-term U.S. presence, at Emirati invitation, would anchor a security order built around free navigation, reliable energy flows, and clear red lines against maritime blackmail.

This is not just about three islands. It is about restoring the principle that territory cannot be seized by surprise and held indefinitely by force, and about extending a coherent maritime strategy from Hormuz to the Bab el-Mandeb.

If the United States is serious about securing the arteries of global trade for decades to come, then correcting the injustice of 1971 and placing these islands under Emirati sovereignty, with an American flag flying alongside the UAE's in a carefully structured basing agreement, is not an overreach.

IMHO, It is the minimum credible foundation for a stable Gulf and the clearest rebuttal yet to those who insist that America has no plan.

[Smit]

Good one, Nutboy!   

Repugs love to hate pedo's unless they're Repug pedos.

Anybody else notice that?