Well Trump seems to have got himself a major strategic defeat.

[Billy Brexit]

Killing a mid ranking diplomat when he was on a diplomatic mission is a breach of international law, and seems to have gained the disapproval of most countries in the world. It doesn't seem to have much benefit for the US either. It has pushed Iraq into the arms of Iran, and increased the influence of China and Russia in the area. It will also mean that the US won't get a look in when the new Iranian oil field is developed.

Another side effect is that the retaliation shows that Iran is able to send ballistic missiles onto precise targets, and the US does not have an effective defence system against them. The US could never defeat Iran, because the country is too large and mountainous, and it would never be able to occupy the country. Iran also has a very sophisticated cyber attack facility, and the US is vulnerable to this.

It seems that Washington has only one possible off-ramp at the moment, and that is to withdraw all its troops from Iran and Iraq, and this will weaken its influence in the Middle East.

[jackg]

Can the US even fire long range targeted missiles? I know they accidentally hit Mexico last time (and they had a big target - the sea)... The UK did the same with Africa too.

I don't think either can do well at this. It wouldn't be surprising if nothing happened, I don't thinl countries want to pick sides and considering it was done at an airport and near civilians we can probably label it as a terrorist attack...

I think this is all down to America wanting to destabilise the middle east and keep it that way much like it did with countries in Africa and South america. Although some of the blame still lies with England on France for the middle east being unstable. Clearly an attempt to keep the US monopoly on oil and anything else Iran might take from their economy.

[Jet Cash]

The interesting thing about this is the rocket attack response by Iran. The US is supposed to have extremely effective anti-missile missiles, yet these were not deployed,despite the fact that they received at least one hour's notice of the targets. All they seemed to do was to evacuate the areas. This leads one to believe that the response was carefully orchestrated by moderate politicians in Iran, Iraq and Washington. Whether this will be sufficient to deescalate the situation remains to be seen.

Another interesting result is the leaked letter of withdrawal. There are some who believe that this was created by Iran, and injected into the Washington computer network to demonstrate their cyber capabilities. The language of the letter seems to be consistent with this.