What's happening in Iran?

[InkaUtexas 24998]

4 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

It’s going to cause a problem but it gets a bit more complicated than that.  The facility has to be in use for a diplomatic or consular purpose. You can easily think of obvious examples where this doesn’t work. If the PRC constructed a small airfield next to its mission in say, Vancouver with the permission of the Canadians, and then started flying drone sorties from it against Seattle and proclaimed it was an inviolable facility that wouldn’t work as a defense. Even if Canada agreed, you can’t use a consulate as a military base to launch attacks. 
 

This is a grayer area of course, but revolutionary states in the Middle East have a history of playing in this gray zone. Plenty of terrorist attacks have been planned and launched from diplomatic facilities. The Libyans famously shot a protester in the middle of London from their mission.  The aforementioned BA bombings were planned and directed inside of the Iranian embassy in Argentina. 
 

You generally lose inviolability if a facility is used to break laws. The normal response is expulsion but in this case the facility is operating with permission of the Syrians. The presence of so many IRGC operatives raises the obvious question of what the facility really was— they weren’t doing visas or promoting commercial ties. 

Don't agree. That is why we have cold sites.

So want to talk about the US mission and other groups in Berlin during the Cold War?

Iran will hit back. Where? Won't be a mission. It will be a soft target. That is what they do.

[956 Worldwide 34032]

Berlin was an interesting case because for much of the time it was a legally occupied city and the mission answered to the U.S. general in control of the occupation zone. 
 

There’s a zone of shenanigans under diplomatic cover as well as responses and this is for sure on the upper end of the “fafo” spectrum for both sides given the activities and tensions.
 

The Russians used “consulates” across Eastern Europe for all sorts of bullshit and after Ukraine some countries got fed up and just announced that the facilities were to be vacated and returned to the municipalities because they weren’t being used properly. That’s the standard way of dealing with this, but it’s also true that if they get a foothold in one country they use that to do illegal shit all across the region. It presents a big problem when they go beyond standard cloak and dagger stuff and real civilians get killed. 

 It appears like this building itself was attached to the broader compound and had some legit purposes. 

My sneaking suspicion is that these guys were most likely moved into the building because Israel had been blowing up IRGC meeting points all over Syria and Damascus and this was a bid to try and protect them.  Hezbollah stated that one of its people was killed in there as well. 

[InkaUtexas 24998]

I agree they were using it. Mischievous and Churlish.

Um and no on Berlin. Dad was in the 77th. They reported to the deputy chief of station, not DOD, for operations. Oh well, lets start fucking up Diplomatic places around the globe.

[FartingMonk 3604]

Benghazi was just as legit as those places in Syria.

[956 Worldwide 34032]

3 minutes ago, InkaUtexas said:

I agree they were using it. Mischievous and Churlish.

Um and no on Berlin. Dad was in the 77th. They reported to the deputy chief of station, not DOD, for operations. Oh well, lets start fucking up Diplomatic places around the globe.

Mission Berlin reported to the U.S. commanding general until 1974, when we recognized East Germany. In Berlin the Mission even had occupation authorities when it came to approving important municipal roles.  MPs and not Marines guarded the facility. 
 

 

[statsman 5356]

18 minutes ago, FartingMonk said:

Benghazi was just as legit as those places in Syria.

Take this political opinion to the cloak room

[FartingMonk 3604]

2 minutes ago, statsman said:

Take this political opinion to the cloak room

Not a political opinion.  We ran missions out of there.  That's not an opinion.  

[InkaUtexas 24998]

18 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

Mission Berlin reported to the U.S. commanding general until 1974, when we recognized East Germany. In Berlin the Mission even had occupation authorities when it came to approving important municipal roles.  MPs and not Marines guarded the facility. 
 

 

Notice who I referenced. I have the pellet gun used to piss off Russian troops on the wall. The Embassy was in Bonn. DON'T FUCKING BLOW UP DIPLOMATIC LOCATIONS.

Oh, and in El Salvador they hit my moms window with a RPG-7. RSO armored the embassy so much it collapsed in the 1986 earthquake.

Brah, been there.

[statsman 5356]

1 minute ago, FartingMonk said:

Not a political opinion.  We ran missions out of there.  That's not an opinion.  

Spell out your comparison. Are you comparing Ambassador Stevens to the Iranian RG commander?

[statsman 5356]

4 minutes ago, InkaUtexas said:

Notice who I referenced. I have the pellet gun used to piss off Russian troops on the wall. The Embassy was in Bonn. DON'T FUCKING BLOW UP DIPLOMATIC LOCATIONS.

We once had an embassy in Iran. Do you know why we don’t anymore?

[FartingMonk 3604]

4 minutes ago, statsman said:

Spell out your comparison. Are you comparing Ambassador Stevens to the Iranian RG commander?

We ran CIA missions out of Benghazi.  Ambassador Stevens is not the comparison to the RG commander but those CIA dudes probably did just as crazy shit as the RG commander.  

[bolverk 29121]

11 minutes ago, InkaUtexas said:

Notice who I referenced. I have the pellet gun used to piss off Russian troops on the wall. The Embassy was in Bonn. DON'T FUCKING BLOW UP DIPLOMATIC LOCATIONS.

Oh, and in El Salvador they hit my moms window with a RPG-7. RSO armored the embassy so much it collapsed in the 1986 earthquake.

Brah, been there.

This one?

U.S. EMBASSY HEAVILY DAMAGED IN ARMED ATTACK IN SAN SALVADOR
UPI
March 26, 1981

Gunmen attacked the United States Embassy today with rocket-propelled grenades and submachine guns, extensively damaging the building, an embassy spokesman said. Leftists claimed responsibility for the attack, the fourth this month.

No one was injured in the incident, Howard Lane, the spokesman, said. The attack was carried out by 12 men, one of whom fired the handheld grenade launcher from a parking lot across the street while the others fired submachine guns at the building in an apparent diversion, according to Mr. Lane.

They also threw a hand grenade that blew up under a car parked near the embassy in another apparent diversion, he said. Leftist guerrillas from the Popular Liberation Forces, claiming responsibility for the attack in phone calls to radio stations, said that it was in retaliation for United States military aid to the Government and ''against the Salvadoran people's fight.''

Mr. Lane said that both United States Marines and Salvadoran policemen guarding the bunkerlike embassy in northern San Salvador had opened fire on the gunmen who staged the attack.

Mr. Lane said that no one was injured inside the building but that a rocket that hit the building had destroyed a 20-foot window and most of its concrete frame on the front side of the embassy's third floor. The blackened area around the hole was pockmarked with bullet holes.

Mr. Lane's official communique on the incident said that it was ''the fourth attack in three weeks.'' Only three attacks had previously been reported in March -the mission was swept by gunfire from passing cars on March 4 and again on March 17 - but embassy sources said that journalists had not noticed another incident earlier this month, the firing of ''several shots'' at the embassy.

[atomheartbevo 89123]

12 minutes ago, statsman said:

We once had an embassy in Iran. Do you know why we don’t anymore?

Something about Ben Affleck making a sci-if movie there, and pretending to be a Canadian or something, and smuggling some Canadians out.

/Gen Z

[InkaUtexas 24998]

22 minutes ago, bolverk said:

This one?

U.S. EMBASSY HEAVILY DAMAGED IN ARMED ATTACK IN SAN SALVADOR
UPI
March 26, 1981

Gunmen attacked the United States Embassy today with rocket-propelled grenades and submachine guns, extensively damaging the building, an embassy spokesman said. Leftists claimed responsibility for the attack, the fourth this month.

No one was injured in the incident, Howard Lane, the spokesman, said. The attack was carried out by 12 men, one of whom fired the handheld grenade launcher from a parking lot across the street while the others fired submachine guns at the building in an apparent diversion, according to Mr. Lane.

They also threw a hand grenade that blew up under a car parked near the embassy in another apparent diversion, he said. Leftist guerrillas from the Popular Liberation Forces, claiming responsibility for the attack in phone calls to radio stations, said that it was in retaliation for United States military aid to the Government and ''against the Salvadoran people's fight.''

Mr. Lane said that both United States Marines and Salvadoran policemen guarding the bunkerlike embassy in northern San Salvador had opened fire on the gunmen who staged the attack.

Mr. Lane said that no one was injured inside the building but that a rocket that hit the building had destroyed a 20-foot window and most of its concrete frame on the front side of the embassy's third floor. The blackened area around the hole was pockmarked with bullet holes.

Mr. Lane's official communique on the incident said that it was ''the fourth attack in three weeks.'' Only three attacks had previously been reported in March -the mission was swept by gunfire from passing cars on March 4 and again on March 17 - but embassy sources said that journalists had not noticed another incident earlier this month, the firing of ''several shots'' at the embassy.

No, we came in later. FMLN and their groups would shoot at it all the time. And the Embassy was in Downtown, not north.

[atomheartbevo 89123]

1 hour ago, InkaUtexas said:

Iran will hit back. Where? Won't be a mission. It will be a soft target. That is what they do.

Maybe use the Houthi?  I don’t see how they can do something directly against Israel, but they can try and pressure their allies.  Hitting the allies in Iraq or Syria just gives those allies an open season to hit more Iranian assets.  Using the Houthis to fuck with shipping, or worse, hit an American ship, seems  a little less risky.

[DigglerontheHoof 20635]

12 hours ago, Sawbonz said:

I had this T-shirt when I was 9

I had a t-shirt w/ this image during the hostage situation

[bolverk 29121]

US braces for retaliation after attack on Iran consulate — even as it says it wasn’t involved

WASHINGTON (AP) — Shortly after an airstrike widely attributed to Israel destroyed an Iranian consulate building in Syria, the United States had an urgent message for Iran: We had nothing to do with it.

But that may not be enough for the U.S. to avoid retaliation targeting its forces in the region. A top U.S. commander warned on Wednesday of danger to American troops.

And if Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent broadening of targeted strikes on adversaries around the region to include Iranian security operatives and leaders deepens regional hostilities, analysts say, it’s not clear the United States can avoid being pulled into deeper regional conflict as well.

The Biden administration insists it had no advance knowledge of the airstrike Monday. But the United States is closely tied to Israel’s military regardless. The U.S. remains Israel’s indispensable ally and unstinting supplier of weapons, responsible for some 70% of Israeli weapon imports and an estimated 15% of Israel’s defense budget. That includes providing the kind of advanced aircraft and munitions that appear to have been employed in the attack.

Israel hasn’t acknowledged a role in the airstrike, but Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said Tuesday that the U.S. has assessed Israel was responsible.

Multiple arms of Iran’s government served notice that they would hold the United States accountable for the fiery attack. The strike, in the Syrian capital of Damascus, killed senior commanders of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps for Syria and Lebanon, an officer of the powerful Iran-allied Hezbollah militia in Lebanon, and others.

American forces in Syria and Iraq are already frequent targets when Iran and its regional allies seek retaliation for strikes by Israelis, notes Charles Lister, the Syria program director for the Middle East Institute.

“What the Iranians have always done for years when they have felt most aggressively targeted by Israel is not to hit back at Israelis, but Americans,” seeing them as soft targets in the region, Lister said.

cont'd

Spoiler

On Wednesday in Washington, the top U.S. Air Force commander for the Middle East, Lt. Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, said Iran’s assertion that the U.S. bears responsibility for Israeli actions could bring an end to a pause in militia attacks on U.S. forces that has lasted since early February.

He said he sees no specific threat to U.S. troops right now, but “I am concerned because of the Iranian rhetoric talking about the U.S., that there could be a risk to our forces.”

U.S. officials have recorded more than 150 attacks by Iran-backed militias in Iraq and Syria on U.S. forces at bases in those countries since war between Hamas and Israel began on Oct. 7.

One, in late January, killed three U.S. service members and injured dozens more at a base in Jordan.

In retaliation, the U.S. launched a massive air assault, hitting more than 85 targets at seven locations in Iraq and Syria, including command and control headquarters, drone and ammunition storage sites and other facilities connected to the militias or the IRGC’s Quds Force, the Guard’s expeditionary unit that handles Tehran’s relationship with and arming of regional militias. There have been no publicly reported attacks on U.S. troops in the region since that response.

Grynkewich told reporters the U.S. is watching and listening carefully to what Iran is saying and doing to evaluate how Tehran might respond.

Analysts and diplomats cite a range of ways Iran could retaliate.

Since Oct. 7, Iran and the regional militias allied to it in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen have followed a strategy of calibrated attacks that stop short of triggering an all-out conflict that could subject Iran’s homeland forces or Hezbollah to full-blown war with Israel or the United States.

Beyond strikes on U.S. troops, possibilities for Iranian retaliation could include a limited missile strike directly from Iranian soil to Israel, Lister said. That would reciprocate for Israel’s strike on what under international law was sovereign Iranian soil, at the Iranian diplomatic building in Damascus.

A concentrated attack on a U.S. position abroad on the scale of the 1983 attack on the U.S. Embassy in Beirut is possible, but seems unlikely given the scale of U.S. retaliation that would draw, analysts say. Iran also could escalate an existing effort to kill Trump-era officials behind the United States’ 2020 drone killing of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani.

How far any other retaliation and potential escalation goes may depend on two things out of U.S. control: Whether Iran wants to keep regional hostilities at their current level or escalate, and whether Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s far-right government does.

Sina Toossi, a fellow at the Center for International Policy, said analysts in Iran are among those trying to read Netanyahu’s mind since the attack, struggling to choose between two competing narratives for Israel’s objective.

“One perceives Israel’s actions as a deliberate provocation of war that Iran should respond to with restraint,” Toossi wrote in the U.S.-based think tank’s journal. “The other suggests that Israel is capitalizing on Iran’s typically restrained responses,” and that failing to respond in kind will only embolden Israel.

Ultimately, Iran’s sense that it is already winning its strategic goals as the Hamas-Israel war continues — elevating the Palestinian cause and costing Israel friends globally — may go the furthest in persuading Iranian leaders not to risk open warfare with Israel or U.S. in whatever response they make to Monday’s airstrike, some analysts and diplomats say.

Shira Efron, a director of policy research at the U.S.-based Israel Policy Forum, rejected suggestions that Netanyahu was actively trying with attacks like the one in Damascus to draw the U.S. into a potentially decisive conflict alongside Israel against their common rivals, at least for now.

“First, the risk of escalation has increased. No doubt,” Efron said.

“I don’t think Netanyahu is interested in full-blown war though,” she said. “And whereas in the past Israel was thought to be interested in drawing the U.S. into a greater conflict, even if the desire still exists in some circles, it is not more than wishful thinking at the moment.”

U.S. President Joe Biden is facing pressure from the other direction.

So far he’s resisting calls from growing numbers of Democratic lawmakers and voters to limit the flow of American arms to Israel as a way to press Netanyahu to ease Israeli military killing of civilians in Gaza and to heed other U.S. appeals.

As criticism has grown of U.S. military support of Israel’s war in Gaza, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller has increasingly pointed to Israel’s longer-term need for weapons — to defend itself against Iran and Iranian-allied Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The U.S. is ″always concerned about anything that would be escalatory,” Miller said after the attack in Damascus. “It has been one of the goals of this administration since October 7th to keep the conflict from spreading, recognizing that Israel has the right to defend itself from adversaries that are sworn to its destruction.’'

Israel for years has hit at Iranian proxies and their sites in the region, knocking back their ability to build strength and cause trouble for Israelis.

Since the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas, one of a network of Iran-aligned militias in the region, that shattered Israel’s sense of security, Netanyahu’s government has increasingly added Iranian security operatives and leaders to target lists in the region, Lister notes.

The U.S. military already has deepened engagement from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea since the Hamas-Israel war opened — deploying aircraft carriers to the region to discourage rear-guard attacks against Israel, opening airstrikes to quell attacks on shipping by Iran-allied Houthis in Yemen.

It is also moving to build a pier off Gaza to try to get more aid to Palestinian civilians despite obstacles that include Israel’s restrictions and attacks on aid deliveries.

 

[The Dog 43599]

3yearletterman trying to start WWIII:

Translation : Can't afford carpeted bathrooms

@khamenei_ir

[atomheartbevo 89123]

On 4/4/2024 at 9:19 PM, The Dog said:

3yearletterman trying to start WWIII:

https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/05/politics/us-israel-iran-retaliation-strike/index.html
 

Quote

The US is on high alert and actively preparing for a “significant” attack that could come as soon as within the next week by Iran targeting Israeli or American assets in the region in response to Monday’s Israeli strike in Damascus that killed top Iranian commanders, a senior administration official tells CNN.

Senior US officials currently believe that an attack by Iran is “inevitable” – a view shared by their Israeli counterparts, that official said. The two governments are furiously working to get in position ahead of what is to come, as they anticipate that Iran’s attack could unfold in a number of different ways – and that both US and Israeli assets and personnel are at risk of being targeted.

[atomheartbevo 89123]

On 4/5/2024 at 10:04 PM, atomheartbevo said:

Senior US officials currently believe that an attack by Iran is “inevitable”

A week later and US officials are claiming that we are seeing Iran move long-range drones and cruise missiles around, possibly for a strike inside Israel, and Iran is talking shit publicly. Launching cruise missiles into Israel proper seems like it would start a new level of shit.

[LCHorn 2567]

I think it’s pretty clear the whole “we’ve got intelligence on what you’re about to do” is to act as a deterrent.  
 

I think I’m done fucking around with Iran.  The revolution has burnt itself out and they are essentially Russia but with more religion and melanin.  They’ll persist as an autocratic petrostate trying to export insurgencies as long as we allow it.  

Edited April 13 by LCHorn

[Schulz2.0 28657]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-68840881

[KYHorn 16741]

Ruh-roh. The Defense Minister was also on board.

 

"Raisi, 63, is a hard-liner who formerly led the country’s judiciary. He is viewed as a protégé of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and some analysts have suggested he could replace the 85-year-old leader after his death or resignation from the role.

Raisi won Iran’s 2021 presidential election, a vote that saw the lowest turnout in the Islamic Republic’s history. Raisi is sanctioned by the U.S. in part over his involvement in the mass execution of thousands of political prisoners in 1988 at the end of the bloody Iran-Iraq war.

Under Raisi, Iran now enriches uranium at nearly weapons-grade levels and hampers international inspections. Iran has armed Russia in its war on Ukraine, as well as launched a massive drone-and-missile attack on Israel amid its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. It also has continued arming proxy groups in the Mideast, like Yemen’s Houthi rebels and Lebanon’s Hezbollah."

Edited May 19 by KYHorn

[Parliament 14033]

“Accident”

[bolverk 29121]

Helicopter carrying Iran’s president suffers a ‘hard landing,’ state TV says without further details

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi suffered a “hard landing” on Sunday, Iranian state media reported, without elaborating.

Raisi was traveling in Iran’s East Azerbaijan province. State TV said the incident happened near Jolfa, a city on the border with with the nation of Azerbaijan, some 600 kilometers (375 miles) northwest of the Iranian capital, Tehran.

Traveling with Raisi were Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian, the governor of Iran’s East Azerbaijan province and other officials, the state-run IRNA news agency reported. One local government official used the word “crash” to describe the incident, but he acknowledged to an Iranian newspaper that he had yet to reach the site himself.

Neither IRNA nor state TV offered any information on Raisi’s condition.

“The esteemed president and company were on their way back aboard some helicopters and one of the helicopters was forced to make a hard landing due to the bad weather and fog,” Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi said in comments aired on state TV. “Various rescue teams are on their way to the region but because of the poor weather and fogginess it might take time for them to reach the helicopter.”

He added: “The region is a bit (rugged) and it’s difficult to make contact. We are waiting for rescue teams to reach the landing site and give us more information.”

Rescuers were attempting to reach the site, state TV said, but had been hampered by poor weather conditions. There had been heavy rain and fog reported with some wind. IRNA called the area a “forest” and the region is known to be mountainous as well.

Raisi had been in Azerbaijan early Sunday to inaugurate a dam with Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev. The dam is the third one that the two nations built on the Aras River. The visit came despite chilly relations between the two nations, including over a gun attack on Azerbaijan’s Embassy in Tehran in 2023, and Azerbaijan’s diplomatic relations with Israel, which Iran’s Shiite theocracy views as its main enemy in the region.

Iran flies a variety of helicopters in the country, but international sanctions make it difficult to obtain parts for them. Its military air fleet also largely dates back to before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

[BamaATL 16471]

A "hard landing" in conditions too foggy to reach sounds a whole lot like crashed into a mountain.  

[Schulz2.0 28657]

[Schulz2.0 28657]

Just now, BamaATL said:

A "hard landing" in conditions too foggy to reach sounds a whole lot like crashed into a mountain.  

Kobe!

[BamaATL 16471]

8 minutes ago, Schulz2.0 said:

Kobe!

I suppose there are two bigger questions:

1.  Do you play Learning to Fly by Tom Petty or Pink Floyd at the memorial?

2.  Do you get a discount for cremation services in a situation like this?  Just because the are bereaved doesn't make them fucking saps.

 

 

[South Austin 51776]

Just now, BamaATL said:

Do you play Learning to Fly by Tom Petty or Pink Floyd at the memorial?

I lean toward Petty for the “coming down is the hardest thing” line.

[Schulz2.0 28657]

 

 

 

[Da Fino 2676]

1 hour ago, Parliament said:

“Accident”

[Macanudo 12835]

Shit's about to get real.

[Kel Varnsen 8327]

[Bender Bending Rodriguez 1662]

As geopolitically convenient as this might seem, this seems like it actually could’ve been a human error accident with that dense fog. Also, what regime puts their top 4-5 officials on the same helicopter? Don’t top US officials travel separately for this exact reason?

[Dnaguy 11600]

1 hour ago, Schulz2.0 said:

Kobe!

Just amazing Surly right there.

Bravo sir.

Edited May 19 by Dnaguy

[Macklemore 2860]

Hope that son of a bitch is enjoying hell. Now Khamenei needs to die. This will reinvigorate the Iranian resistance. BTW, Farnaz Fassihi of the NYT is an apologist for the Islamic regime. She is widely disliked in the Iranian-American community and is a horribly biased “journalist”. She is associated with the traitor Trita Parsi of the NIAC who is a paid agent of the Islamic regime occupying Iran.

[B00M 6063]

Damn that fog looks THICC! can’t believe they were trying to fly through that. 

[Laxtonto 11880]

So how is it a hard landing when they can't get in contact with the craft afterward? That is a crash..

My guess is that it will come out that they crashed into the mountain, much like the Kobe Bryant situation, and it was tied to pilot error and poor weather conditions...

The tin foil hat contingent will say that  Mossad used their satellite-mounted directed EMP ray and used it to force the helicopter to crash in the mountains...

[YGIFS 19445]

Fucking space lasers.  

conspiracy shit aside, it does seem odd they would have so many high level officials on one helicopter given the weather.  I mean, people think Iran is some shithole country, but I'm guessing they have enough money to have TWO government helicopters.  

So, I rise now to inquire as to how we protest this, or is a thoughts & prayers thing, or counter-protest, or what's the move here?  

[bolverk 29121]

How integral is the office of the president in Iran to the country's overall governance? Iran's system of government has always seemed opaque and Byzantine. For example, doesn't the Supreme Leader pull most of the strings, and doesn't the presidency serve a mostly bureaucratic role in Iran? If that's the case, would his death be all that monumental?

Don't get me wrong; I'm sure it's a big deal, especially after considering who all may have also been on the helicopter. I guess what I'm trying to express is skepticism that this would be sufficient to discredit the government entirely (at least so long as Khamenei is in charge and a sufficient number of religious zealots continue to support the regime).

[dcar00 13963]

Isn't this the start of a Clancy novel?

I know this seems like a big deal but doesn't the ayatollah of rock n rolla just turn to 2 other guys and say "OK, you 2 are now president and foreign minister, you guys rock paper scissors for who gets to be president".

[Neonmoon 38126]

That’s a shame gif

[Schulz2.0 28657]

9 minutes ago, bolverk said:

How integral is the office of the president in Iran to the country's overall governance? Iran's system of government has always seemed opaque and Byzantine. For example, doesn't the Supreme Leader pull most of the strings, and doesn't the presidency serve a mostly bureaucratic role in Iran? If that's the case, would his death be all that monumental?

Don't get me wrong; I'm sure it's a big deal, especially after considering who all may have also been on the helicopter. I guess what I'm trying to express is skepticism that this would be sufficient to discredit the government entirely (at least so long as Khamenei is in charge and a sufficient number of religious zealots continue to support the regime).

Probably the biggest deal is that Raisi was seen as a potential successor to Khamenei.

[Armybrat 40576]

1 hour ago, BamaATL said:

I suppose there are two bigger questions:

1.  Do you play Learning to Fly by Tom Petty or Pink Floyd at the memorial?

2.  Do you get a discount for cremation services in a situation like this?  Just because the are bereaved doesn't make them fucking saps.

 

 

Extra virgin olive oil is used as the accelerant for their cremation.

[Parliament 14033]

39 minutes ago, Laxtonto said:

So how is it a hard landing when they can't get in contact with the craft afterward? That is a crash..

My guess is that it will come out that they crashed into the mountain, much like the Kobe Bryant situation, and it was tied to pilot error and poor weather conditions...

The tin foil hat contingent will say that  Mossad used their satellite-mounted directed EMP ray and used it to force the helicopter to crash in the mountains...

I'll allow it.

[Schulz2.0 28657]

 

 

[Laxtonto 11880]

 

FYI... open the tweet and hit translate.... 

 

[SimonBolivar 10805]

 

Might be some kind of Iranian Godzilla/Mothra situation.

[KYHorn 16741]

2 hours ago, Schulz2.0 said:

Kobe!

 

2 hours ago, BamaATL said:

I suppose there are two bigger questions:

1.  Do you play Learning to Fly by Tom Petty or Pink Floyd at the memorial?

2.  Do you get a discount for cremation services in a situation like this?  Just because the are bereaved doesn't make them fucking saps.

 

 

3. Which Surly poster will out their fetish on this thread?