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Iran is a very complex society and generally defies Western and esp. US pigeonholing. I went to military school with some Iranians some of whom were later lined up and shot, some who were able to stay in the US and some who were ultimately taken from prison and ordered to save Iran from the Iraqi invasion and rebuild the Iranian military.
I have gone through this before several times. I told a leftist group many years ago that they were fantasizing at best and suggested running a war game/economic game simulation to evaluate possible outcomes at the time. IMO this is still the best move. However no one does it (not publicly at least).
The most that can be said currently is that Iran has successfully used asymmetric warfare to close two important waterways and has bloodied the US nose in the Middle East (which the US inadvertently helped the Iranians do when the US turned away from kinetic air defense weapons around 2000 and went all in on missiles for air defense based on the false assumption that the US would always be dominant in air defense on the battlefield and that kinetic weapons had no significant utility for the future).
The two waterways in question can be opened. The problem is that only one can be reliably opened under the circumstances but SA does not want to take the necessary steps to permit that. After the recent attacks by the Houthis on SA airports that may change. The Strait of Hormuz can also be rendered more safe but the US seems reluctant to engage in the naval operations to do so (and the naval operations that the current Know Nothing Occupant of the Executive Branch has outlined would lead to open defeat). It is not clear that the US really can secure the Strait of Hormuz militarily. Doing so partly would still eventually result in some US naval losses. The fact that no retired naval officer has discussed the outlines of a plan for clearing the Strait of Hormuz probably means that the US lacks some degree of command, control or sufficient munitions to execute such a plan with a high degree of certainty. And even clearing the Strait of Hormuz militarily will still definitely result in the loss of some shipping with the resultant degradation of the environment as well as resulting skyrocketing insurance costs.
Why didn't the Iranian people rise up? For 40 years the US has threatened Iran. The current murderous regime seems the safer bet overall. Change may still be possible from the ground up however through culture. But evaluating Iranian society from afar is like scrying at best.
The best that people can do for now is to acquaint themselves with what we see as reliable analyses of Iran from several international perspectives. Here is one from 2022 from the Marine Corps University Press :
I have gone through this before several times. I told a leftist group many years ago that they were fantasizing at best and suggested running a war game/economic game simulation to evaluate possible outcomes at the time. IMO this is still the best move. However no one does it (not publicly at least).
The most that can be said currently is that Iran has successfully used asymmetric warfare to close two important waterways and has bloodied the US nose in the Middle East (which the US inadvertently helped the Iranians do when the US turned away from kinetic air defense weapons around 2000 and went all in on missiles for air defense based on the false assumption that the US would always be dominant in air defense on the battlefield and that kinetic weapons had no significant utility for the future).
The two waterways in question can be opened. The problem is that only one can be reliably opened under the circumstances but SA does not want to take the necessary steps to permit that. After the recent attacks by the Houthis on SA airports that may change. The Strait of Hormuz can also be rendered more safe but the US seems reluctant to engage in the naval operations to do so (and the naval operations that the current Know Nothing Occupant of the Executive Branch has outlined would lead to open defeat). It is not clear that the US really can secure the Strait of Hormuz militarily. Doing so partly would still eventually result in some US naval losses. The fact that no retired naval officer has discussed the outlines of a plan for clearing the Strait of Hormuz probably means that the US lacks some degree of command, control or sufficient munitions to execute such a plan with a high degree of certainty. And even clearing the Strait of Hormuz militarily will still definitely result in the loss of some shipping with the resultant degradation of the environment as well as resulting skyrocketing insurance costs.
Why didn't the Iranian people rise up? For 40 years the US has threatened Iran. The current murderous regime seems the safer bet overall. Change may still be possible from the ground up however through culture. But evaluating Iranian society from afar is like scrying at best.
The best that people can do for now is to acquaint themselves with what we see as reliable analyses of Iran from several international perspectives. Here is one from 2022 from the Marine Corps University Press :