And Iran would use them if they got them - mutually assured destruction is not a hinderence to fanatics.
NK and Iran are different animals. NK has nukes for regime survival and deterrence. They don't have a founding ideology that calls for the complete destruction of Israel, and they are deeply rooted in martyrdom.
To support your belief you have to accept the Iranian government is rationally thinking entity, who places the same Western values on human life.
They aren't and they don't.
I
think (guess) you are wrong here, all the analysts I watch say Iran is acting very rationally and it's the US that isn't or else they wouldn't have started this in the first place. Iran could have destroyed Israel during the 12 day war. It could destroy Israel now, with just the missiles, if they were suicidal. Imagine if they shot their whole arsenal of missiles towards Israel. You don't think so? Israel begged Trump to come in during the 12 day war because Iran was "destroying" them and Israel told Trump they would use nukes if he didn't help them. The Ayatollah had a fatwa against nukes, saying it was against Islam since they are so indiscriminate and their use obviously threatens human existence on the planet. I totally believe the fatwa was serious because many nuclear experts have said Iran has been just days away from nuke capability for many, many years now but evidently they didn't want to do that. Even US intelligence said they didn't have a nuke program since, what, 2003? As Tulsi testified. I see Israel as threatening human existence on the planet. Israel has the Samson option:
The Samson Option (Hebrew: ברירת שמשון, romanized: b'rerat shimshon) is a deterrence strategy of massive retaliation with nuclear weapons as a "last resort" against any country whose military has invaded and/or destroyed much of Israel.
"We possess several hundred atomic warheads and rockets and can launch them at targets in all directions, perhaps even at Rome. Most European capitals are targets for our air force. Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: 'Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother.' I consider it all hopeless at this point. We shall have to try to prevent things from coming to that, if at all possible. Our armed forces, however, are not the thirtieth strongest in the world, but rather the second or third. We have the capability to take the world down with us. And I can assure you that that will happen before Israel goes under."
— Martin van CreveldWhat worries analysts is that their stance may have changed now with the new Ayatollah, that they may think they have no option left other than to make a few nukes as deterrence. I do acknowledge that they embrace martyrdom. Before the 12 day war the nuclear scientists said they knew they could be killed at any time, "what can we do? we live as normal, if we are killed things will go on, there is a new generation after us." I posted a video where a scientist said that.* The current political leadership, for example the current president, have said that he has no fear of death, he knows they are vulnerable since they are so exposed. For me this is pretty admirable, they are very ballsy and warrior-like and even "masculine."
*Edit. Here's the video of a killed nuclear scientist
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I said Iran has been very tit-for-that and they have said they never attack first, only responding to US and Israeli attacks and then only proportionately so as not to climb up the escalation ladder too fast. Now after Netanyahu's meeting with Trump where Netanyahu said it was the best meeting ever Iran shot missiles against Jordan "unprovoked" and Trump said it was a "surprise attack." My read: Iran
wants Trump to attack. They obviously feel a full scale war is now in their best interest. Among other things I'm guessing they want to deplete the munitions so there's absolutely none left of the precision missiles, and then there's the oil situation which will become catastrophic very soon. They are goading Trump, do something rash, act on emotion, let's go! LOL
Increases in gas prices can produce increases in estrogen levels for some folks.
Analysts I watch say gas prices are very important to most Americans. One said that through his travels that has been the main topic of discussion when gas prices have increased during this conflict. That it's so important it can cause total societal upheaval and mayhem if it increases beyond a certain point. Though Trump said he doesn't care about American's economic situation. Compare this to what other societies are willing to endure, for example the Iranians. I did see a blurb right now where Israel thinks Iranians are close to starting protesting against the regime, among other things because they have 90% inflation.
Iranians are more likely to make nuclear weapons now than before the conflict according to many or most analysts. The capability and stock of the nuclear material can't be destroyed by conventional weapons from above. It's said the only way is to have special forces go into the mountain or mountains to put explosives inside. So I'm still thinking nukes will probably be used at some point LOL, and especially if the US and Israel escalate wildly which will make Iran destroy the gulf and world economy.
