Listen, I don't want to say too much, but as many of you already know, I'm an ex-CIA assassin. After Nam, I was all torn up and needed something slower paced, so they shipped me out to the Middle East as a case officer. It seems that some of you really don't have a clue here, so I'll try be as concise as possible.
The goal of the US and Israel was always regime change; there never was a credible nuclear threat from Iran. The evidence for that can be found in the literature pre-JCPOA and in the JCPOA itself, along with the reasons given for the US withdrawing from it. For a more detailed understanding of the situation, study the history of our involvement with Iran post-WW2 and where it all fell apart after the revolution. TL/DR: had the revolution not happened, Iran would certainly be a nuclear power today – with US approval.
Jump to 2015, Iran signed the JCPOA - an important agreement between them and China, France, Germany, Russia, the UK and the US - which placed accepted limits on Iran's nuclear program in return for sanctions relief. Compliance was verified by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Director General even explicitly stated himself that Iran was implementing its nuclear-related commitments.
The IAEA issued repeated quarterly reports confirming that Iran stayed within enrichment limits (3.67%), stockpiles were below caps, and inspectors had access to declared sites. Even as late as 2018, the IAEA still reported that Iran was complying with the deal.
However, when Trump won in 2016, he vowed to end US participation in the JCPOA and said it was 'the worst deal ever negotiated' and could lead to a 'nuclear holocaust.' Why did he say this? Well, let's put aside his obsession with trying to 'shred the Obama legacy', which likely was a factor. Much to Israeli and the US neocon's dismay, the agreement did not include any commitment from Iran to change its foreign policy for a more favorable US/Israeli one. Nor did it cover Iran's non-nuclear ballistic missile program. Under pressure from the lobby groups who elected him, Trump then announces a new policy of 'maximum pressure' and withdrew unilaterally from the JCPOA in 2018, imposing crippling new sanctions on Iran and increasing the rhetoric to wipe them off the face of the Earth.
Why we are where we are at now is because (as parts of the current US administration have already admitted), Israel was planning to launch an attack now anyway to capitalize on the fact that Iranian proxies are weaker than before, and the current US administration has shown themselves to be completely unwilling to block any Israeli action or criticize them in any way. And the fact of the matter is that that along with the US and Israel already sharing the goal of weakening Iran's regional position, a weak Iran, whose oil and gas sales are guided by the US, means a weakened China (big win for the neocons).
Iran would have retaliated and hit US bases either way, so the US decided to join Israel rather than wait. And now we have US troops once again dying in the Middle East for reasons unbeknownst to the majority of idiots who voted for Trump in the first place, and two nuclear-armed genocidal regimes who have violated every international law going are telling the world that they had to act in order to prevent a 'dangerous' state from acquiring a nuke.
That's the certified Casserole Conspectus, so you can take that to the bank. Also, Coach is a LARPing faggot.
-Casserole
