I Wondered Before Why Not? Now It’s Even More Glaring
There are reports that among the bombs dropped on Iran in the very first round of this current attack were some dropped on Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s personal residence. Pictures of a devastated compound surrounded by other buildings not hit make clear it was a specific target. Further, the foreign minister of Iran, Abbas Araghchi, was asked by reporters if the Ayatollah and the President were still alive. “As far as I know.” Which causes one to at least wonder whether this was a, “Get out of the way. We’re going to bomb your house now” kind of thing or an actual assassination attempt. (Fast breaking news. Yes, the bombing did kill the Ayatollah. Evidently it was not a, “get out of the way we’re going to bomb your house” thing. The impulsiveness and fall-out from that would need a whole other piece.)
Just last month Russian President Putin claimed Ukraine had tried to use drones to bomb his residence. Turns out it wasn’t true but that got me to wondering why we hadn’t. Or why we hadn’t helped Ukraine do that. In an attack to steal territory, apparently driven almost entirely by the leader of the attacking country, why not inflict some direct damage on the properties and economic interests of that leader themselves? Since Putin brought it up I wrote a piece wondering about that very thing.
Now with our having bombed the Ayatollah’s residence it raises the question all the more. Even with as much trouble as Iran has frequently been to its neighbors they are not currently invading any neighbor and trying to expand Iran’s borders. They are not dropping bombs on civilian areas, as Putin has been doing for years now on Ukraine.
I could come up with some speculations on why not, and so could you, but something fundamental comes through, clearly, regardless of the details. Trump just really, really, wants a “victorious warlord” feather in his cap and wants to show, in his own mind, what a tough guy he is, and he sees Iran as a chance to do that. Helping Ukraine succeed? Not so much. He really wants to stick it to the Ayatollah. Putin? Not so much.
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