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An eerie quiet hangs over Ras Al Khaimah’s industrial port. Usually a thriving maritime hub of the United Arab Emirates, now ships stand docked and silent. Not far out along the hazy horizon, a backlog of hundreds of tankers have lined up in recent days, halted along a waterway flooded with danger.

Any vessel heading past Ras Al Khaimah out to the Arabian Sea must traverse the world’s most treacherous strip of water for shipping today: the strait of Hormuz. Just over 20 nautical miles from Ras Al Khaimah, two oil tankers heading for the strait were attacked by Iranian missiles this week, one catching fire.

It is one of the many consequences facing Gulf states as they are pulled deeper into a war that they did not start and had diplomatically tried to prevent.

For decades, Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar and Oman have allowed US military bases, infrastructure or access on their soil, and have been among the largest buyers of American weapons and technology. In return, the US has stood as the Gulf’s closest and most significant military partner and protector.

But now, Gulf states have growing concerns over the relationship, analysts say, after Donald Trump was seen to wilfully torpedo peaceful diplomatic negotiations in favour of starting a war in the Middle East.

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[-] wuffah@lemmy.world 35 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

The reason that every other US president has ruled out war with Iran is exactly because of this tactic. It takes a group of really ignorant, egotistical, and foolhardy leaders to melt through the layers of decision making that underlie such a course of action.

The more Trump screams on social media and Hegseth bully pulpits while whining about media coverage, the worse this war is going. Look for more avoidable Air Force and Navy incidents, more dead American soldiers, and a civilian bloodbath that will take decades to unravel the implications of.

[-] 20cello@lemmy.world 12 points 2 weeks ago

Fuck the Americans involved in this war,nobody asked them to join the army and they're aware who and why they are fighting for

[-] watson387@sopuli.xyz 8 points 2 weeks ago

Joining the US military is just signing up to murder brown people at the direction of the oil industry and war profiteers. Been the way for at least half a century.

[-] 5in1k@lemmy.zip 3 points 2 weeks ago

"I was a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism".

-Smedley Butler, 1935

[-] FartMaster69@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 weeks ago

That’s not very class conscious of you.

[-] stoy@lemmy.zip 0 points 2 weeks ago

In a society where higher education is paywalled, I can't look down on people who use the military to get pass the paywall.

[-] 20cello@lemmy.world 4 points 2 weeks ago

You would if they killed your daughter while she was at school

[-] teslekova@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 weeks ago

Fuck em. They can read, they know what this leadership is.

[-] stoy@lemmy.zip -4 points 2 weeks ago

What if they signed up before the current regime came to power?

[-] teslekova@sh.itjust.works 3 points 2 weeks ago

When Dick Cheney was making the world safe for Halliburton? Yeah, there's no comfort there.

[-] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 3 points 2 weeks ago

You think the US military was out there distributing flowers before Trump came along? They're all scum.

[-] credo@lemmy.world 0 points 1 week ago

If you want to debate foreign policy, great. But “othering” and dehumanizing an entire group of people isn’t a serious argument. It’s the Russia/GOP playbook.

And the fact this is so heavily upvoted says more about the state of lemmy than it does about the people you’ve never met, yet seemingly hate so much.

[-] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io -1 points 1 week ago

If you want to debate foreign policy

The fuck you want me to debate? There's no room for debating the morality of US foreign policy (which is 99% evil), which should be clear to anyone not willfully ignorant. Therefore, there's only one non-scum course of action to take, and that is to get the hell out. Their ongoing cooperation with the US war machine makes them scum.

But “othering” and dehumanizing an entire group of people isn’t a serious argument.

I never dehumanized US soldiers; I simply called them scum, for the same reason most people would agree WWII Wehrmacht soldiers were scum.

the people you’ve never met, yet seemingly hate so much.

Do I need to have met Hitler to hate him? What about Netanyahu? Maybe Putin is actually a good person under all the death and destruction?

[-] 20cello@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago
[-] mycodesucks@lemmy.world 0 points 2 weeks ago
[-] Soggy@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

I'll cut a tiny bit of slack to the 9/11 sign-ups, it was harder to fact-check the various lies coming from the feds.

[-] UsernameHere@lemmy.world -2 points 2 weeks ago

Not only that but if it wasnt for the US military then Russia would control Ukraine and would be advancing into Europe.

Or China would have already invaded Taiwan.

Or North Korea would control South Korea.

The problem here isn’t the US military. It’s the leadership.

But the foreign bots brigading lemmy want the US military weaker so those nations can advance their geopolitical goals.

[-] theolodis@feddit.org 2 points 2 weeks ago

What exactly did the US military do to prevent Russia from progressing their invasion in Ukraine? If anything, this administration has done anything possible to allow Russia to progress, which despite their effort, they don't seem to be able to on a larger scale.

[-] OwOarchist@pawb.social 6 points 2 weeks ago

It takes a group of really ignorant, egotistical, and foolhardy leaders to melt through the layers of decision making that underlie such a course of action.

Don't worry. They asked ~~ChatGPT~~ Grok if it was a good idea, and it said "You're absolutely right". And if the magical computer box that our entire economy now rests upon says so, it must be right.

[-] fizzle@quokk.au 5 points 2 weeks ago

I heard a commentator describe it as "victory disease".

Trump is in control of the largest and most sophisticated military in the world. He had a couple of one and done victories, its easy to see how he might start to feel over confident.

It was almost inevitable they would eventually pick a fight they couldn't win.

That said, going in with absolutely no plan-b was really, really stupid.

[-] Typhoon@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 weeks ago

They didn't even have a plan A!

[-] kunaltyagi@programming.dev 4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

They had a plan A: put the fear of god (aka USA) in Iran. This technique doesn't work on most teenagers (as well as most countries)

[-] mlg@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago

The most ironic thing is if they had bothered to set up a practical plan and stated war goal, the US could have invaded and captured Iran in a matter of weeks.

It just that the largest and most sophisticated military in the world is completely useless if you don't spin up and use its full potential, which you can't really do without troops on the ground and congressional approval (not the literal declare war sense, just public support).

Of course they can't actually justify a proper invasion (or a draft) without causing insane fallout in the US, so they used everything except ground troops which will accomplish nothing and get the US stuck in a forever war like Vietnam.

Even though China is facing eventual oil supply issues, they're probably looking at this thing like prime cinema as the US expends its military global dominance on Iran, which will solve their Taiwan plans for them.

[-] tyler@programming.dev 2 points 2 weeks ago

What victories have they had????

[-] fizzle@quokk.au 1 points 2 weeks ago

Venezuela and the last strike on Iran.

[-] tyler@programming.dev 4 points 1 week ago

Venezuela wasn’t a victory. And what strike in Iran is a victory? They killed 160+ children.

[-] FarceOfWill@infosec.pub 4 points 1 week ago

The stealth bomber hitting the nuclear lab under a mountain through the vent tunnels.

[-] fizzle@quokk.au 2 points 1 week ago

It doesn't matter whether you think Venezuela was a victory. Trump certainly does.

[-] GuyIncognito@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Germany in 1939: Poland has capitulated in a month. The Reich grows larger.

Germany in 1940: France has capitulated in a month. Our invincible troops march from victory to victory!

Germany in 1942: We've been fighting over this grain silo for a week now

[-] Arancello@aussie.zone 4 points 2 weeks ago

Unfortunately some of the civilians who will pay the price are on american soil. The sleeper cells have been woken and are planning a mass attack in one of nine american cities.

[-] AbsolutelyNotAVelociraptor@piefed.social 4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Their president has started this war and one of his first moves was to bomb a school full of girls.

Then he goes saying that they will hit them even harder and allows the nazi jews of israhell to bomb targets that are causing hell to the civilian population.

You'll have to excuse me if I don't share the thought that what you describe will be "unfortunate".

[-] starik@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 weeks ago

No. But this is not unfortunate, this is another consequence of having elected him.

[-] WanderingThoughts@europe.pub 1 points 2 weeks ago

By now, a president must come with a disclaimer. Just like with medicine. "May cause wars. May cause economic collapse. Read full program before voting. Discuss this with your representative."

[-] trublu@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 1 week ago

We had that. For fuck's sake, even The Economist, that capitalist tabloid rag, ran a cover story describing how Trump would ruin the economy, alongside an entire opposing campaign built around how he would ruin everything else that used the Republicans' own literature as reference. People were warned, people knew, they don't have any excuses.

[-] kreskin@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago

one of his first moves was to bomb a school full of girls.

a double tap, to kill the girls and then the first responders who came to save the survivors. Thats some straight up israeli level war criminality, but we did it directly this time. I think that is what Israel wanted-- us doing war crimes like they do so the world will have a hard time coming after them for it, and they can blame it all on the US from the start.

[-] DavorS@piefed.social 3 points 2 weeks ago

can you back that up?

[-] 20cello@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago

Unfortunately? You guys voted that shitbag

this post was submitted on 15 Mar 2026
104 points (98.1% liked)

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