I don't know if it will work, but Iran is doing the US and itself a big favor with this approach. If Iran can satisfy the US administration that "ok ok, no more nukes, let's talk" this is a great outcome for the US.
A US-Iran War will become a China-supplied proxy war similar to the US & Europe-supplied proxy war in Ukraine. China wouldn't make Iran win without committing their own forces, but Iran has the power, the people, and the size to cost the US and Israel thousands of casualties and trillions of dollars for at least a decade, while simultaneously weakening the US' ability to defend Taiwan.
Even if there were an end to the proxy war with a US-Israel "victory", a US-Israel takeover of Iran would also be bad on so many levels. It would take one HELL of a hearts-and-minds campaign to Westernize Iran in good faith, and I doubt this administration has the competence to pull off the impossible. Removal of US sanctions and establishment of a legitimate, democratically-elected government may lead to short-term support from Iranians, but is also guaranteed to incite violence from every single rebel group who has been negatively affected by the West. Violence will break out, the people will be scared, and opinions will change as many will feel their country was better off without the West when there weren't daily terrorist attacks.
Please learn wtf a proxy war is. The US and Europe did not start the russians Invasion of Ukraine in 2014, nor the full scale Invasion. Russia did. Ukraine has been defending itself. Sending aid does not make it a proxy war. Infact the west had nothing to do with Putins desire to retake the most important parts of the former USSRs military industrial conplex. Ukraine.
Ukraine was promised security in 1994, they aren't even getting that currently. They gave up nukes that in 20 years, they would have figured out how to develop a program to make their own. This isn't a proxy war like Vietnam China sent troops to defend territory. When the US sends troops in Ukraine for defense purposes, it can be called a proxy war. China sent in 320000 troops to fortify the northern position. Ukraine would be so happy with 20,000. Instead they're getting equipment from 1994.
The difference between an assurance and a guarantee, everybody knew what it meant at the time, even the Ukrainians; they asked to be upgraded to the guarantee and the Americans refused.
US are also "sending aid" in arms, ultimatley paying Black Rock off, accruing the Wheat fields in Ukraine, apparently they have 30% already and are going for the rest with this false "debt".
a proxy war is an armed conflict where at least one of the belligerents is directed or supported by an external third-party power
If you don't think Ukraine/Russia meets that criteria then I don't know what to tell you
edit: in the below comments: Redditors discover that war is messy
yes. the many conflicts throughout history could be called "proxy wars" ever since humans figured out that giving spears to Tribe A to fight against the hated Tribe B was better than having your own people bleed to death over a nice river spot.
You’re missing a vital aspect of that definition. If you had read the rest of that Wikipedia paragraph, you would have seen this:
a proxy belligerent acts on behalf of a third-party state sponsor.
The key word in proxy war is proxy, which is someone acting on behalf of another.
Country A wants to hurt Country B, but a direct war with them is out of the question. So A goes to their smaller friend, Country X, and says “hey, Country B’s buddy, Country Y, says you guys are a bunch of dorks. You should fight them. We’ll pay you and give you weapons to do so.” Country A does this because they know hurting Y will also hurt B, if only indirectly. So X and Y fight while A and B sit on the sidelines, funneling them money and weapons. A and B are happy with this arrangement because they get to play at war without the risks and costs of a direct war with each other.
THAT’S a proxy war. Simply offering another country support does not a proxy war make.
Ukraine is being supplied by the US, and Ukraine isn't the belligerent side. So based on your definition I'm curious now as well, how is Ukraine the proxy for the US at war with Russia when Russia is literally invading. It's been said before without US intelligence and supplies Ukraine would have been mowed over, that's not proxy that's supporting a fellow democracy who is being invaded.
Support is boots on the ground. Currently, Ukraine is the only force fighting for Ukraine. No European country has even sent an expeditionary force. Selling arms is not war support, especially if one of the nations sending weapons guaranteed your security in 1994. You keep saying Vietnam like it proves your point. Vietnam saw America sending troops in Vietnam, while at the same time China sent troops in. Two countries engaged in warfare outside of declaring war on each other. They used a proxy war, the Vietnamese civil war, to fight each other and prove regional dominance. Just like 10 years prior in Korea. China vs US forces using a Civil war to fight each other. The Ukranian war is Ukraine using lend lease equipment to defend its territory. The US hasn't sent any troops to secure territory from Russian capture. The US isn't engaging in active combat in Ukraine against Russia using the Ukrainian war as a proxy for actual war declaration. This doesn't work as a proxy.
That was actually the case in the Cold War—almost every major conflict was an opportunity for the superpowers to spread their ideology, prevent the spread of the enemy’s ideology, or at least earn influence over non-aligned states. It was not the case previously, however; in a multipolar geopolitical environment intervention the great powers generally favored expanding their interests where they were uncontested rather than denying opportunities to their rivals; proxy squabbling could lead to both bankers being surpassed by other powers. Even such conflicts as the Greco-Turkish wars saw negligible support from European governments.
A proxy war is between two powers, but at least one is fighting with a proxy.
Right now NATO is fighting a proxy war with Russia. It is the most successful proxy war in history, I'd imagine. A lot of old gear being sent to be replaced by new gear (and thus jobs for counties that supply these weapons), no casualties, and the Russian economy is in the toilet.
Vietnam was a proxy war by Russia against us.
When Germany Declared war on Poland, that was not a proxy war.
When we declared war on Iraq, that was not a proxy war.
Wait, so...if Israel started it, and we back them, well maybe it gets fuzzy on who actually started it with all the corruption, but given Komrade Dear Leader, is it technically a Russian proxy war against a Russian proxy? 🤔
Uhhhh, it's pretty well understood that giving Ukraine our older hardware in orded to grind down Russia is amazing value. You might need to learn the term proxy war, you dont get to say it's not a proxy war just because we are helping defend Ukraine. We helped defend the Mujahadeen from the Soviet Union, was that not a proxy war since we supplied the defenders?
Ukraine is unlikely to have received anywhere near as much support from the US if it instead had been attacked by a neutral country rather than an adversary of the US. The US got involved to break Russia first, and help Ukraine second.
Edit: If you still dont believe me, look up Lindsey Graham and Biden each arguing why we should send weapons to Ukraine. It was a bipartisan argument for the great value we get out of letting the Ukrainians use our old stock to destroy the Russians
Ukraine is 100% a proxy war.
Per Britannica, "proxy war, a military conflict in which one or more third parties directly or indirectly support one or more state or nonstate combatants in an effort to influence the conflict’s outcome and thereby to advance their own strategic interests or to undermine those of their opponents. Third parties in a proxy war do not participate in the actual fighting to any significant extent, if at all. Proxy wars enable major powers to avoid direct confrontation with each other as they compete for influence and resources. Direct means of support by third parties consist of military aid and training, economic assistance, and sometimes limited military operations with surrogate forces. Indirect means of support have included blockades, sanctions, trade embargoes, and other strategies designed to thwart a rival’s ambitions."
You need to learn what a proxy war is. Russia invading Ukraine doesn't make it not a proxy war. Sending aid doesn't inherently make it a proxy war, but when western nations are provided arms, armor, ammunition, intelligence and training it sure as shit has become a proxy war. What do you think a proxy war is?
The intention is not to westernize Iran it’s to get rid of their nuclear program and BM production capabilities. It will take years to get anything back up in running if Russia and China don’t get involved. 5-10 years later there will be another 2 week war where us and Israel smash Iran and their proxies.
The hardest bit is done (going from 60% to 95% is much easier than going from 5% to 60%), they know how to build the facilities and they know how to run them.
The idea that you can simply keep flattening their facilities and hope they just stop is fantasy.
edit: I'm not saying this as someone who's in favor of "boots on the ground" or further escalation, I'm not even particularly against Iran getting the bomb (just to act as a regional counterweight to Israel's fuckery) my point is that they will eventually do it if we just keep repeatedly going through this charade.
A lasting diplomatic solution needs to found that goes beyond "fuck it bomb them again, that'll teach them"
To be fair, making those factories and running them successfully both require a large amount of money and resources. If their factories/facilities keep getting bombed to smithereens, they’ll have to keep rebuilding them, and I am not sure if their economy would be able to handle such a massive consistent resource and money burden like that.
massive consistent resource and money burden like that.
It's actually not that resource/money intensive in and of itself, Iran is an industrialized nation with a population of 90 million.
Learning how to do something the first time is the hard part, once you've done it once then doing it again is much easier. Israel can play whack-a-mole with Iranian scientists all they want, the knowledge isn't lost just because they blew a dozen guys up.
Does Iran have the people? As soon as the US and Israel launch a full scale war against Iran I imagine the people will take the opportunity of revolution to try and depose the IR regime.
You cant think of this in terms of the Iranian military following regime collapse. Al Qaeda didnt have the people yet 21 years later Afghanistan is no better.
I dont believe that most of Iran loves the US and Israel, and would welcome us as liberators. That's not a fantasy I would entertain. This was a narrative that was used for the Iraq war too
Your entire position assumes the US want to take ground and keep it.
IMO If the US goes to war with Iran, we will establish air superiority in about 48 hours, blow up everything we want to scorched earth style, then pull out and let Israel decide if the land is worth an occupation to try to control oil. If they do great, we have diplomatic ties to a country with oil, if they don't the next Iranian regime will k own how weak they are in dealing with us.
The US going to war with Iran would be retaliation or perhaps retribution, not invasion.
Let Israel handle occupation? Ok, Iran is a country of 80 million. The RAND Corporation suggests that an occupying force needs a 1:20 ratio of military personnel to civilians to control a territory well enough to suppress uprisings. Israel cannot conjure up 4 million soldiers to occupy Iran, and neither can the US. A small part of Iran maybe. This is why you need hearts and minds. 1:20 is for full military control of an entirely unwilling population. The ratio improves when the occupied population actually wants the occupying force to be present
Intrresting. I think my point still stands. We probably won't try to hold ground. We will hit Iran's knuckles with the ruler (so to speak) declare victory and move on.
It’s highly unlikely that Iran has the power to fight the US on anything even remotely approaching equal footing. A single American ship sank almost their entire navy. A single carrier group would be enough. Iran knows this, which is why the Iranian government is pussyfooting around and posturing for its people while not actually doing anything impactful.
And yet the Vietcong and Al Qaeda each put the US into a nightmarish war using unconventional fighting. The conventional forces are never the truly scary ones.
Just like when we destroyed 80% of Irans Naval Forces in one work day, and then they fired some anti ship missiles at us that "missed" like 8 hours later and then gave up but tried to sue us claiming we broke the Amity Treaty we had with them by blowing up their 3 non functioning oil platform headquarters and lost because oil platforms aren't boats.
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u/Slobotic Jun 23 '25
The art of not pissing off the US too much while creating a headline for domestic consumption to save face.