It is most definitely a defense if you use the same logic the US does. If the US can seize oil tankers going to and from Cuba and Venezuela and attack fishing boats in the name of national security, then Iran can definitely blockade the Strait of Hormuz in the name of defense.
You would not call the the US enforcing a blockade as a defensive tactic. It is offensive, as is what Iran is doing. Defensive would mean defending ships navigating the strait.
Bullets shot from guns can be defensive and offensive depending on who's pulling the trigger and why.
The straight is exactly the same. Iran is blocking the straight to pressure the world to pressure the US and Israel to stop their aggression. It's completely logical, reasonable, and is really a defense strategy.
The US blockading the straight is an offensive move to try and force Iran to... actually it's completely unclear what the US wants Iran to do. We just attacked them because of some imaginary threat cooked up by Israel.
How are you going to discuss geopolitics here if attempts at explaining the stalling of the U.S. and Russia to defuse the conflict are censored.
Instead, the "Israel controls the world" narrative, repeated incidentally by many Western and pro-Russian outlets on Twitter and YouTube is the top comment.
So probably this censored comment is correct but outside the Overton Window.
> The meek recent Senate protest means nothing. If the elites didn't want the war, the House and the Senate would have 2/3rd majorities to stop it.
Yesterday’s AIPAC-driven ouster of Rep. Thomas Massie should tell you why no one is trying to stop this and who these “elites” you speak of answer to.
> The IRGC wants the blockade for self-preservation among its own population to show it is resisting "The West".
They are not showing off. They are actively and successfully resisting “The West”. Which could only sustain 5 weeks of active hostilities, got nowhere, hurt its position in the ME severely, but still cannot concede. Which brings us back to the root cause.
Of course if Israel is willing to take the blame because its reputation is at an all time low anyway, the Trump administration will happily use it as an excuse for being dragged into the war.
Yeah, i definitely had nothing to do with him accusing his party of protecting pedophiles and repeatedly voting with the left to block Trumps agenda. It must have been the jews.
In legal terms, one would call this a "statement against interest". If a politician says he does not care one bit about the welfare his constituents, it is reasonable for those constituents to take him at his word no matter how untrustworthy he is. It only hurts him if we believe it.
Iranian negotiators probably shouldn't believe him, because it's not against interest in that context. There probably just aren't any on Hacker News.
Correction: Trump probably isn't even a liar, but a bullshitter. A liar, at the very least, understands whatever he's saying is not true; a bullshitter doesn't care at all about the relationship between his words and the truth, he just makes noise.
