Iranian Chill Thread

[Blue In Green]

Very bizarre indeed and nothing like what we expected.

Few cyberattacks.
Maybe they are doing large scale electronic warfare but I really don't think so..
They've used Iskanders and Calibrs and they have done heliborne landings which failed and if the IL-76 is true, that is the second failure which is quite bad.

Russian special forces with SAA and airpower performed very well and it's like we are seeing none of that here at all. And a shockingly low amount of footage from both sides, I'd certainly expect Russia to hold the airspace in several parts of the country, but no sign of drone strikes and suicide drones at all.

If they are only using a fraction of their force, then they have achieved ALOT of ground, but if this is their main playbook, then it's not a good performance even if they succeed.

TheImmortals second/third-tier theory would have to be true or else the Russians look VERY BAD as far as their military performance goes against a state like Ukraine.

 

[Stryker1982]

Putin’s public image is over. When Companies around the world are positing support of Ukraine. I mean I saw damn Simpson’s cartoon tweet in support of Ukraine. Like wtf

Russia is officially a pariah and Putin is now a Stalinist.

I hate to sound like a “I told you so”. But maybe @SalarHaqq can go back in my posts as far back as 2-3 years ago probably even longer where I said Russia is gonna get pinched by NATO to the point they get Russia right where they want them and Russia will have to make a choice.

Make no mistake, the West has a raging erection right now for what is happening. Putin offered to meet in Minks for neutrality and winner terms and the West rebuffed him. I mean these guys don’t want peace, they have been preparing this sanctions book for decades and are now going page by page.

Putin is never going to get rehabilitated. And he knows that. But he has finally accepted something he should have done years ago, that either you fight the West designs now or just be content with turning your country over in less than 50 years.

To Putin’s credit, he could have easily lived the good life and cooperated with the West. Let the West continue to move to its borders (like he pragmatically did last 20 years). The media would have praised him and Russia would have Nordstream 2 online and making even more money.

But the dark side of that deal, is one day that mafia you let run around will put a bullet in the heart of your country and devour it from within.

I have to give MI6/CIA and Western news media and western mega conglomerates A lot of ****ing credit. They built one hell of a information machine that can trick most of the globe into believing a country defending its self interest and future preservation is the bad guy. And a country (USA) that steals a 3rd world countries central bank assets (Afghanistan) and gives most of it to US citizens as war gifts is somehow the “bringer of freedom” in the world.

I mean ****ing sociopathic genius the Western propaganda machine is. Never seen anything like it.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1497457307470467077

I should add Russia’s lack of PGM or lack of willingness to use its PGM stockpile is causing fighter jets to have to get closer to their targets to avoid civilian casualties with dummy bombs.

It makes me wonder how much PGM stockpile Iran truly has? Hopefully they are watching the Russian situation.

So the Russians under Putin have no other real choice other than to fight Western expansion with force come hell or high water then huh? Jesus.....

How far you think it's gonna go?

Can you blame them?

TheImmortal made a good point, contrast to Iran who immediately jumped into battle against the designs of the western deep state. Russia let them go for a while, and is having to pay deeper costs.

@TheImmortal

So what are your thoughts about Iran. Are we f***ed too and be in the Russian position someday?

Unlike Russia, if we attack somebody we will have to pay a massive price from a UN coalition even if it is for our self-preservation.

Why?
Because we don't have a nuclear arsenal and some people here still trying to make excuses for why we shouldn't have any.

 

[Blue In Green]

Can you blame them?

TheImmortal made a good point, contrast to Iran who immediately jumped into battle against the designs of the western deep state. Russia let them go for a while, and is having to pay deeper costs.

No not at all, I think we all knew that at some point. The West and East would have had to come to some sort of confrontation over differing ideologies. There will be more of this to come this decade and the next, that much is assured.

China-Taiwan
Russia-Ukraine
Iran-Middle East

You name it, these extremely volatile situations aren't going to just solve themselves overnight nor peacefully (for the most part).

 

[TheImmortal]

Can you blame them?

TheImmortal made a good point, contrast to Iran who immediately jumped into battle against the designs of the western deep state. Russia let them go for a while, and is having to pay deeper costs.

@TheImmortal

So what are your thoughts about Iran. Are we f***ed too and be in the Russian position someday?

Unlike Russia, if we attack somebody we will have to pay a massive price from a UN coalition even if it is for our self-preservation.

Why?
Because we don't have a nuclear arsenal and some people here still trying to make excuses for why we shouldn't have any.

Iran has too many “tentacles” to be able to be boxed like Russia. The West tried to sever the tentacles by going after weakest link (Assad).

Right now, Iran thru the proxy theory is avoiding major UN rebuttal as Hezbollah/Iraq legions/and Houthi’s act as a buffer to western designs while giving plausible deniability. Where as if Iran had large scale Iranian troops in Iraq/Syria/Lebanon/Yemen the entire west would scream bloody murder.

But make no mistake the West has not given up. They are patient. They are methodical. Negotiations are a stalling tactic till Iran shows a weak point. Iran has to continue to expand across the Middle East. It is the only way to kick the designs down the road till the West suffers its Rome is Burning moment....then go nuclear.

But as Russia has shown, nukes don’t stop sanctions. Nukes don’t stop NATO coming to your border. Nukes don’t stop CIA backed protests inside your country aimed at destabilizing your rule.

I hope people who ask for Iran getting nukes realize that the West can live without Iran economically, which means nukes will never get Iran free of sanctions.

The second Iran builds nukes its entire missile fleet becomes useless and not operational. Because how would the opposing country know if a Qassem Solemani missile or a Emad missile or a Sejill missile or future Iranian ICBM is carrying conventional payload or nuclear? It would be impossible.

Now you can say come on man Iran isn’t suicidal. But this is the type of move the Western propaganda machine will take and run with to force Iran into an arms control treaty!

So nukes right now when Iran’s airforce, navy, and air defense is weak is actually counter productive IMO.

The most important thing for Iran in next 20 years is make sure that rahbar transition to a new rahbar goes smoothly and new rahbar is able to consolidate power and is a Ideologically similar to Khamenei.

The risk here is Iran’s fractured power system becoming a free for all under a weak Rahbar or even worse a Ghorbchev type Rahbar that will dismantle the country and hand it to the West (ie if Rouhani becomes Rahbar).

 

[Stryker1982]

The second Iran builds nukes its entire missile fleet becomes useless and not operational. Because how would the opposing country know if a Qassem Solemani missile or a Emad missile or a Sejill missile or future Iranian ICBM is carrying conventional payload or nuclear? It would be impossible.

Fair enough to your other points,


But Russia has used both ballistic and cruise missiles in Ukraine.

Can they live without Iran economically when Russia is now showing it's teeth to Europe and China is on the rise?
If anything they would need to pull Iran from their sphere, in order to access it's vast gas and mineral reserves among others.

 

[OldTwilight]

it almost 11 years that I am saying this ...

we ( Iran ) should have nukes

کشورهایی که می تونند بمب اتم داشته باشند و از ترس بهش نمی رسند یا خودشون رو خلع سلاح می کنند باید منتظر باشند تا بفیه کونشون رو پاره کنند ..‌‌.


این حقیقت واضح به زبان کوچه بازاری هست

 

[QWECXZ]

The second Iran builds nukes its entire missile fleet becomes useless and not operational. Because how would the opposing country know if a Qassem Solemani missile or a Emad missile or a Sejill missile or future Iranian ICBM is carrying conventional payload or nuclear? It would be impossible.

Now you can say come on man Iran isn’t suicidal. But this is the type of move the Western propaganda machine will take and run with to force Iran into an arms control treaty!

This kind of logic is something that I will never understand.

Russia is firing ballistic and cruise missiles right now and people say the moment that a country goes nuclear its arsenal becomes useless. How? Why? Russia is even moving Topol missiles as we speak, but nobody thinks even for a second that the missiles they are firing now are nuclear. Plus, we aren't going to use our missiles to target the US territory, or the territories of nuclear powers. So, why would anyone want to attack Iran with nukes when we are not attacking their territory? Makes no sense. I hear this kind of propaganda only from Khamenei apologists to be honest. I am surprised to hear it from you.

But as Russia has shown, nukes don’t stop sanctions. Nukes don’t stop NATO coming to your border. Nukes don’t stop CIA backed protests inside your country aimed at destabilizing your rule.

Yeah. Nukes don't stop NATO coming to your border, in fact nothing will because nukes are not like some magical wand that gives you the power to tell others, particularly with similar number of nukes, what to do, but nukes do stop NATO from coming to your capital and invading it. And it does in fact stop sanctions. The reason that Russia is getting away with all of this serious shit with absolutely minimal economic cost is because of their nukes. If Iran had done a remotely similar thing, like invading Bahrain, we were fighting with a US/Arab/Israel coalition right in the middle of Iran under complete siege and a UN declared no-fly zone over our entire airspace.

 

[TheImmortal]

Fair enough to your other points,


But Russia has used both ballistic and cruise missiles in Ukraine.

Can they live without Iran economically when Russia is now showing it's teeth to Europe and China is on the rise?
If anything they would need to pull Iran from their sphere, in order to access it's vast gas and mineral reserves among others.

Russia uses BM and CMs that are agreed upon in arms control treaties to remain non nuclear. And a nuclear capable BM is a whole different ballgame than the much slower moving CM. Russia also has the benefit of being a UN Security Council veto holder and been the 2nd nuclear power after USA. So it gets treated like a big boy with its missiles, Iran the “brown” people nation of “crazy Mullahs” will never get that privilege.

Yes Europe can live without Iran. Azeribajian pipeline to Europe and Qatar pipeline to connect to azeri and Turkish pipeline and future US LNG development means that Iran is not needed in the space.

Also natural gas can be a CO2 emissions emitter. Nordstream 2 would have released 100M tons of Greenhouse gas per year.Most natural gas powered plants do not recapture most of their CO2 emissions. So this will motivate the tree hugger Europeans to double down on fusion, hydrogen and other renewable clean energy to be ready by 2100.

Russia cannot turn the taps off its biggest customer (Europe) it would be like shooting yourself in the foot. Actually more like cutting off both limbs.

And Europe is an important trading partner with China, it’s going to be pragmatic. People think China’s rise is gonna be like the Sith Empire in Star Wars. Chinese have shown to be very non violence and extremely pragmatic. Maybe even more so than Iran. So China will rise as peacefully as it can in order to keep its economic benefits in place. The west hasn’t fully finished pivoting to Vietnam and other Asian countries to wean itself off China’s trade and maybe never will.

Thus China is a special case altogether. All parties are interested in keeping the trade cycle going.

 

[Stryker1982]

The reason that Russia is getting away with all of this serious shit with absolutely minimal economic cost is because of their nukes. If Iran had done a remotely similar thing, like invading Bahrain, we were fighting with a US/Arab/Israel coalition right in the middle of Iran under complete siege and a UN declared no-fly zone over our entire airspace.

I wouldn't say their cost is minimal but I 100% agree with your other points.

If we touched another country like that, they'd be assembling a UN Coalition against us, no one dares touch Russia today.

 

[QWECXZ]

Russia uses BM and CMs that are agreed upon in arms control treaties to remain non nuclear. And a nuclear capable BM is a whole different ballgame than the much slower moving CM. Russia also has the benefit of being a UN Security Council veto holder and been the 2nd nuclear power after USA. So it gets treated like a big boy with its missiles, Iran the “brown” people nation of “crazy Mullahs” will never get that privilege.

Yes Europe can live without Iran. Azeribajian pipeline to Europe and Qatar pipeline to connect to azeri and Turkish pipeline and future US LNG development means that Iran is not needed in the space.

Also natural gas can be a CO2 emissions emitter. Nordstream 2 would have released 100M tons of Greenhouse gas per year.Most natural gas powered plants do not recapture most of their CO2 emissions. So this will motivate the tree hugger Europeans to double down on fusion, hydrogen and other renewable clean energy to be ready by 2100.

Russia cannot turn the taps off its biggest customer (Europe) it would be like shooting yourself in the foot. Actually more like cutting off both limbs.

And Europe is an important trading partner with China, it’s going to be pragmatic. People think China’s rise is gonna be like the Sith Empire in Star Wars. Chinese have shown to be very non violence and extremely pragmatic. Maybe even more so than Iran. So China will rise as peacefully as it can in order to keep its economic benefits in place. The west hasn’t fully finished pivoting to Vietnam and other Asian countries to wean itself off China’s trade and maybe never will.

Thus China is a special case altogether. All parties are interested in keeping the trade cycle going.

Then Iran can sign a similar treaty with our adversaries. Why not?

A nuclear Iran does not need to sit idle and watch passively what happens in the Caucasus as we are doing now. If Iran had nukes, there would be no Azerbaijani or Turkish pipelines, or a Qatari pipeline without our permission. Just as simple as that.

I wouldn't say their cost is minimal but I 100% agree with your other points.

If we touched another country like that, they'd be assembling a UN Coalition against us, no one dares touch Russia today.

The majority of sanctions that are placed on Russia are still quite childish to the sanctions that they have imposed on Iran over absolutely nothing. Iran has never done anything that can be deemed a threat under the NPT or the UN charter, yet we were only one inch away from being placed under Article 42 of the UN charter. So, yeah. The cost does seem to be minimal to me. They are not even kicking Russia out of the WTO or SWIFT. Iran hasn't been allowed to even enter the WTO.

The moment that Iran invades one of its neighbors like Russia has done multiple times in just recent history, will be the moment that over 20 countries will attack us in coordination and they will completely cut off all our trade routes on the ground or even international waters. Nobody can talk like this about Russia even in their dreams.

 

[TheImmortal]

Russia is firing ballistic and cruise missiles right now and people say the moment that a country goes nuclear its arsenal becomes useless. How? Why? Russia is even moving Topol missiles as we speak, but nobody thinks even for a second that the missiles they are firing now are nuclear.

Russia was the second nuclear power in the world and helped win WW2 and holds UN Security Council Veto and literally went to the brink of nuclear war and showed it wouldn’t end the world.

You are asking why Iran cannot be viewed in that light with the same privileges? I mean when you say it out loud it’s hilarious.

Also Russia and US are under certain arms control agreements that agree on what can or cannot be nuclear in the BM/CM realm due to depeleted time for a either party to react if a short range projectile is nuclear.

Also Topol is not being moved that video circulating online is old fake news by CIA propaganda machine. Literally zero reason for Russia to move Topol right now as it has plenty of range for all of Europe.

Lastly no country on the planet relies on its BM arsenal for deterrence like Iran. You are giving the West a reason to dismantle it by going nuclear with no added benefits. You say that it prevents capital being taken, who in their right mind would invade Iran by land?

US plan is to collapse Iran from within and start a ethnic war or infighting Republic power struggle if possible.

No one on the planet seriously contemplates a land invasion of Iran requiring basically 750K to 1M soldiers to secure the Middle East.

So again nukes don’t help Iran at this present time. Hence why threshold state is needed till Iran fixes its economic woes and gets some damn economic reform passed. The country’s economic ease of business index is terrible.

 

[TheImmortal]

Then Iran can sign a similar treaty with our adversaries. Why not?

A nuclear Iran does not need to sit idle and watch passively what happens in the Caucasus as we are doing now. If Iran had nukes, there would be no Azerbaijani or Turkish pipelines, or a Qatari pipeline without our permission. Just as simple as that.

So you are okay with Iran going from 10,000 long range missiles to 1,000? You are okay with Iran guaranteeing Fateh family Missile will never be nuclear equipped and sharing telemetry data with the West to better prepare their missiles against this fact?

I mean come on. Iran doesn’t have an Air Force, navy, large amount of cruise missiles. It has nothing to back itself up conventionally just to get some nuclear tipped missiles.

Russia isn’t able to invade Ukraine because of nukes. It is able to invade Ukraine because its Permanent UN Security Council member with a VETO

Literally they couldn’t even pass a resolution condemning Russia....because Russia veto’d it. China abstained along with India and UAE.

I mean you guys are saying blah blah Iran was put under UN sanctions for doing much less why doesn’t Russia get this treatment. Because It has ****ing veto. You cannot pass **** in UN against Russia. And if you tear up the self veto, then China will just veto on Russia behalf. And if you eliminate veto then you are setting the world on path of WW3.

Veto has kept the world powers from heading to another WW. Yes it’s not perfect. Yes US uses it to cover the genocide committed by Israel. But it’s better that all of humanity survives then risking eliminating something that could lead to the end of the modern world.

Also Newsflash guys you cannot force people to trade with you. So if US and Europe decide on their own they don’t want to trade with you...you cannot force them at UN or force them with nukes.

That would be like Israel screaming that Iran should supply it oil and gas. Iran doesn’t have to do jack**** if it doesn’t want to.

So again nukes won’t make the West trade with you and won’t buy you any more security. And they sure as hell won’t let you invade other countries if you don’t have a veto power at the UN.

 

[QWECXZ]

Russia was the second nuclear power in the world and helped win WW2 and holds UN Security Council Veto and literally went to the brink of nuclear war and showed it wouldn’t end the world.

You are asking why Iran cannot be viewed in that light with the same privileges? I mean when you say it out loud it’s hilarious.

Also Russia and US are under certain arms control agreements that agree on what can or cannot be nuclear in the BM/CM realm due to depeleted time for a either party to react if a short range projectile is nuclear.

Also Topol is not being moved that video circulating online is old fake news by CIA propaganda machine. Literally zero reason for Russia to move Topol right now as it has plenty of range for all of Europe.

Lastly no country on the planet relies on its BM arsenal for deterrence like Iran. You are giving the West a reason to dismantle it by going nuclear with no added benefits. You say that it prevents capital being taken, who in their right mind would invade Iran by land?

US plan is to collapse Iran from within and start a ethnic war or infighting Republic power struggle if possible.

No one on the planet seriously contemplates a land invasion of Iran requiring basically 750K to 1M soldiers to secure the Middle East.

So again nukes don’t help Iran at this present time. Hence why threshold state is needed till Iran fixes its economic woes and gets some damn economic reform passed. The country’s economic ease of business index is terrible.

First of all, the WW2 world order is not going to be there forever. I mean for f*ck's sake, it belongs to 1940s. There are so many emerging powers that will very soon challenge this world order. India, Brazil, Turkey, even countries like Iran and Nigeria. Japan has been eyeing a permanent seat at the UNSC for a long time. So, yeah. The Russian federation as the successor of the Soviet Union, one of the officially recognized victors of the World War II has been given a permanent seat at the UN. But who says that this status quo will remain forever? Even right now the US is talking about the cancellation of Russia's permanent seat at the UNSC, which is beyond ridiculous, but it just shows that the UN can effectively end even in our life times.

Iran's reliance on our BM arsenal for deterrence is out of necessity because we cannot procure modern fighters. If China and Russia accept Iran as an equal, our defense ties with them would reach a strategic level, particularly at the current situation where Russia feels encircled by the NATO. Iran's lack of game changing weapons is in fact the very reason that we have been forced to rely only on missiles because we do not have the technological expertise in other areas and selling to us is nothing but trouble. And Russia and China look at Iran and what they see is that it is a weak country that can help them in no way if push comes to shove. Missiles and proxies like Hezbollah are not going to cut it when big powers go to war. A powerful Iran will be respected by countries like Russia and China who share similar interests with us. They won't help us become powerful, but if manage to do it, they will welcome increasing their ties with us.

Nobody is contemplating a land invasion of Iran because the current status quo in the world and the region is not being challenged. The world is currently in peace time and all powerful adversaries try to avoid direct conflicts. There is absolutely no reason to think that this will always remain the case. Just because something hasn't happened for a long time, it doesn't mean that it is impossible to happen in future.

So you are okay with Iran going from 10,000 long range missiles to 1,000? You are okay with Iran guaranteeing Fateh family Missile will never be nuclear equipped and sharing telemetry data with the West to better prepare their missiles against this fact?

I mean come on. Iran doesn’t have an Air Force, navy, large amount of cruise missiles. It has nothing to back itself up conventionally just to get some nuclear tipped missiles.

Russia isn’t able to invade Ukraine because of nukes. It is able to invade Ukraine because its Permanent UN Security Council member with a VETO

Literally they couldn’t even pass a resolution condemning Russia....because Russia veto’d it. China abstained along with India and UAE.

I mean you guys are saying blah blah Iran was put under UN sanctions for doing much less why doesn’t Russia get this treatment. Because It has ****ing veto. You cannot pass **** in UN against Russia.

Newsflash guys you cannot force people to trade with you. So if US and Europe decide on their own they don’t want to trade with you...you cannot force them at UN or force them with nukes.

That would be like Israel screaming that Iran should supply it oil and gas. Iran doesn’t have to do jack**** if it doesn’t want to.

So again nukes won’t make the West trade with you and won’t buy you any more security. And they sure as hell won’t let you invade other countries if you don’t have a veto power at the UN.

Who says that we should go from 10,000 long range missiles to 1,000? It's not like the terms are fixed. But I would very much prefer to have 50 megaton ICBMs and 2,000 SRBMs instead of just 10,000 conventional MRBMs.

I addressed your point about the state of the IRIAF. If Russia and China conclude that Iran is a global power, we will not be ignored like now. China and Russia show a lack of interest in expanding their military ties with us because we bring nothing to the table but trouble for them. What can China or Russia gain from military cooperation with today's Iran? A nuclear Iran can be a completely different beast though.

Sure. Who would've thought that? lol The whole idea of passing a resolution against Russia at the UNSC was a symbolic move and borderline lunacy.

Russia has been forcing Iran to trade with her for years. Iran showed no interest in the Soviet Union after the revolution. It was only out of necessity that Iran was forced to turn to Russia for its security needs after the Iraq-Iran war. And ever since, even when Russia failed to observe its commitments like the S-300 deal or on-time construction of the Bushehr reactor, Iran has been forced to remain partners with Russia.

Iran is an energy super power. We are one of the world's leading nations in oil reserves, gas reserves and helium reserves. People are forced to trade with us. Otherwise Iran would've collapsed under Trump's unilateral sanctions in 3 months, just as Trump thought. The very reason that Iran's economy is stagnating instead of completely collapsing is because countries are forced to trade with us, and when armed with nuclear weapons, more countries will be forced to trade with us.

 

[BigMelatonin]

Russians are being treated "better" because they are Europeans at the end of the day. Countries like Iran and even China will never be viewed as equals to western powers, not in the past, not now, and not in the future. A portion of the American right wing even advocates for an alliance with Russia to destroy China while asian-americans are being killed daily in the US now because of how hard the US propaganda complex was pushing anti-asian sentiment. Racism and colonialist attitudes didn't die with the European empires, they still view us as squatters on what should be their land. That's why Iran can't sign a similar treaty to them and that's why Iran will get hit with 10x worse sanctions for asserting it's sovereignty.
Iran needs to keep this in mind when negotiating with Europeans. This new deal will be ripped up again in 3 years when the republic party comes and European certainly isn't going to start trading with Iran in the interim. IMO Iran's future lies with Asia and it needs to realize that instead of trying to play this pointless "independent" role.

 

[TheImmortal]

First of all, the WW2 world order is not going to be there forever. I mean for f*ck's sake, it belongs to 1940s. There are so many emerging powers that will very soon challenge this world order. India, Brazil, Turkey, even countries like Iran and Nigeria. Japan has been eyeing a permanent seat at the UNSC for a long time. So, yeah. The Russian federation as the successor of the Soviet Union, one of the officially recognized victors of the World War II has been given a permanent seat at the UN. But who says that this status quo will remain forever? Even right now the US is talking about the cancellation of Russia's permanent seat at the UNSC, which is beyond ridiculous, but it just shows that the UN can effectively end even in our life times.

Iran's reliance on our BM arsenal for deterrence is out of necessity because we cannot procure modern fighters. If China and Russia accept Iran as an equal, our defense ties with them would reach a strategic level, particularly at the current situation where Russia feels encircled by the NATO. Iran's lack of game changing weapons is in fact the very reason that we have been forced to rely only on missiles because we do not have the technological expertise in other areas. And Russia and China look at Iran and what they see is that it is a weak country that can help them in no way if push comes to shove. Missiles and proxies like Hezbollah are not going to cut it when big powers go to war.

Nobody is contemplating a land invasion of Iran because the current status quo in the world and the region is not being challenged. The world is currently in peace time and all powerful adversaries try to avoid direct conflicts. There is absolutely no reason to think that this will be always the case. Just because something hasn't happened for a long time, it doesn't mean that it is impossible to happen.

1) The veto will not be expanded. No one on the council wants more powers in the circle. The West is racist colonialists who think they are superior race and East doesn’t want anymore countries to challenge their spot.

2) Nuclear threshold state addresses all the issues you have with zero drawbacks. By the time Iran finishes IR-10,

1,000 IR-10 (100,000 SWU) would have more capacity than 10x natanz today. Meaning Iran could go nuclear in a heartbeat and no one would know.

The world isn’t going to magically not have Russia in it or China or the West so fast that Iran cannot go nuclear. I mean come on.

3) brazil is a nobody and disaster economy, Turkey is even bigger nobody and disaster economy, and Nigeria...really dude? Anyone else you want to add to the list? Maybe Bahamas? Sir Lanka? India will never escape China’s shadow nor will China ever agree to veto ascension.

4) Did nukes make North Korea “equal” in the eyes of Russia or China? Did Nukes stop US from flying in unannounced and killing Bin Laden?

I mean nukes are beyond overrated. If you do research you will see the world powers are moving to weapons with massive explosion potential and very limited to no radiation clouds. Or even better, no damage to buildings and infrastructure, but only to life forms. Nukes are old tech. Iran chased it because fear of Saddam getting a nuke by 2000. After Saddam was disposed Iran decided staying threshold was a much better option.

So nuclear threshold is the way to go. Now if Iran had a Germany like economy that it could rely on to survive sanctions then yes I might be more inclined to green light a nuclear drive as long as JCPOA gets torn up for 2nd time (in 2024).

I think Iran needs to repair itself from the inside before dashing for the bomb. Dashing would just make Iran like Russia today...further destroy its image. At least in the case of Russia it was forced to make a decision. IRan is not forced at all, threat of war is at the lows, and it has opportunity to repair itself.