Do you believe that Iran bombed the oil fields of Saudi Arabia??

[kentuck]

I'm not sure although it does appear to be the case.

Who else would have that type of technology?

Although the orders may not have come from the Iranian government, there are independent rebel groups throughout the region that have loyalty to the ayatollahs.

It was quite a daring attack.

Trump says he is going to impose more sanctions. I don't know that I would believe that? I think he might do whatever the Kingdom might ask him to do?

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. The real question is what is to be done about it.

Seems to me the problem is between Saudi Arabia and Iran. Let them sort it out.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

47. Exactly my thoughts

Plus, Trump sold them a bunch of military equipment. Let them slug it out. What is our interest there?

[Initech]

48. I feel like Saudi Arabia is the worst country in the world.

They can go eat a bag of shit for all I care. But yeah, let them and Iran sort it out. We do not need to intervene.

[underpants]

2. No but their proxies did

Houthies

[FBaggins]

3. Yes

Directly or through Houthi rebels, I'm not sure... and whether it was the national government or a rogue group... also not sure.

[Amishman]

4. Yes, it seems pretty conclusive

The flight paths of the missiles rule out it being Yemeni rebels, as does the amount of intelligence gathering needed to be able to know the structure of the sites missile defense systems and how to evade them.

[5X]

9. i haven't seen any published flight paths, only statements by un-named officials.

[Amishman]

33. All the impacts were on the north side and Kuwait confirmed the missiles flew over them

CNN has the details

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2019/09/17/middleeast/saudi-attack-iran-base-intl/index.html

Missiles all hit from the north and Kuwait confirms the missiles passed over them.

The missiles the Houthi have would have difficulty reaching the site with a straight path, and definitely not enough range to make the described approach.

[lame54]

54. Who fed you this shit?

[Amishman]

59. CNN

From my other response:

CNN has the details

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2019/09/17/middleeast/saudi-attack-iran-base-intl/index.html

Missiles all hit from the north and Kuwait confirms the missiles passed over them.

The missiles the Houthi have would have difficulty reaching the site with a straight path, and definitely not enough range to make the described approach.

[uponit7771]

5. No, after the NDI refusing congress request and the air force spending tons of dough at Trump ...

... bug infested resorts I believe there are too many MAGAts in the government right now.

[Thyla]

6. Not really

But beyond that I really don't care.
Fuck them.

[RainCaster]

7. NO! This is Saudi's problem anyhow- we must stay out of it.

Those oil rich bastards can fight their own battles, we do NOT need to get into this at all.

[brush]

8. Just as we supply weapons to Saudi Arabia we have no control over how SA uses them.

Iran accordingly has no control over how the Houthis, who claimed credit for the oil field attacks, uses the weapons supplied to them by Iran. After all, SA is waging all out war against them in Yemen and all bets are off. SA's oil fields are vulnerable to an attack by drones, which when you think about it, is unbelievable considering their value and the millions of dollars in weapon security invested in protecting them.

US-supplied fighter planes and other measures however can not detect the low-flying drones used to carry out the attacks. Come to think of it, much of the world's infrastructure installations are vulnerable to such low flying attacks by drones and we can be sure bad actors all over the world have taken note.

Of course trump and SA will try to prove the attacks originated in Iran but who can believe anything from trump who we know is lying when his lips are moving and Saudi Arabia who lied about killing journalist Khashoggi.

It could very well be a Gulf of Tonkin-type attack launched from within SA. Who knows?

[BlueMTexpat]

17. This.

Good summary.

[brush]

28. Thanks, BlueM. I think we've dodged a bullet on this as trump seems afraid of confrontation.

All he did in the Syria incident was leave a few bomb craters on an airbase tarmac. He blasted Kim as "Little Rocket Man" but subsequently became his BFF. He failed to deploy a naval blockade on Venezuela and called off the attack he threatened a month ago on Iran—and then there are the bone spurs.

[BlueMTexpat]

36. Fingers crossed

here!

[leftstreet]

42. +1

[old guy]

46. Works for me.

[gordianot]

10. Why didn't the Saudi's pony up some of those billions for air defense?

Keep American lives out of this mess but America does seem to be running a protection racket.

[GoCubsGo]

14. "Seem"?

America IS running a protection racket for the Saudis. They pay us, but it's our citizens who pay with their blood. Just like the first Gulf War, where we were paid to do the Kuwaiti's and Saudi's dirty work

[scarytomcat]

11. no

someone else took credit and they share a border with SA so drones could make it
a drone does not have enough fuel to fly from Iran to SA
if they did shot missiles they would have flown over our navy position in the area
did we go on alert at the time or were we involved?
we are trying to create a reason to bomb Iran

[marble falls]

12. I think American petroleum interests did it to gin up prices in a glut market.

[GoCubsGo]

13. I don't know, and I don't care.

All I care about is that the United States stays the hell out of the whole situation. I don't want our troops fighting Saudia Arabia's war for them. I don't care how much fucking money the US "could make" out of it, either. Let the Saudis fight their own goddamn battles.

[ooky]

21. Right on.

Not one American life should be lost over this crap. It is not our fight and we need to keep our military service members the hell out of it.

[karynnj]

15. There seem as more questions than answers

One big question is do we even know what happened? Was it drones? Was it missiles? Why did NONE of the attacks trigger the defense systems? Hitting 15 targets perfecting, with only one attack missing sounds unbelievably successful. Why was the Saudi response so restrained and value?

Beyond whether it was Iran, Iran assisted by the Houthis, or the Houthis alone, things seem strange.

[TexasProgresive]

16. Who else would have that type of technology?

Israel??

Who know what to believe in the age of Trump. I don't know if it is Israel but it sure would be a distraction form Bebe and Donald's problems.

I don't discount the possibility of conspiracy at high levels of intelligence and military groups as I am the son of two people who carried the secrets of their careers to the grave. Both had Top Secret and one Q level clearances. Professional military and intelligence people can keep secrets.

[2naSalit]

58. +1

[Takket]

18. I believe the story is complicated and confusing

And we’ll never really know the whole truth.

[Wounded Bear]

19. Nobody in a "leadership" position has any credibility...

They're all a bunch of lying assholes out to line their own pockets.

[TomSlick]

60. And THAT is the problem.

Sometimes it is important for the American people to be told important facts by the President and that the American people believe what they are told. At this point, we have been lied to so often we cannot believe anything the President says.

This lack of credibility is a serious threat to our security.

[Wounded Bear]

64. And the other "leaders" in the Middle East aren't much better...

I assume a skeptical position on any statements made in this brouhaha.

[TomSlick]

66. Roger, that.

The difference is that we need to be able to believe the US President. The fact we cannot is a national security risk.

[TheRealNorth]

20. I think there is a lot of things going on that we don't know

It's kind of inexplicable to me that Iran would do that right after Trump dangles a carrot on front of them. You also had Bolton's resignation, and then there is the National Security whistleblower complaint that is not being heard.

This shit is suspicious.

[ooky]

22. Unfortunately, the president is an outrageous liar.

Nothing he says can be believed.

[KG]

23. not just no but hell no. funny this happened right after the biggest iran warhawk lost his job.

[Wellstone ruled]

24. This is all about the Yemen

Shia's and who are and are not supporting the Saudi Wahhabi Clerics in Yemen. Our Oil Lobbyist have been directing our Military to be a player in this travesty.

Last week a story of 134 people being executed for crimes against the Saudi Kingdom most likely set off this attack. BTW,one of the people executed was a Saudi Royal Family Relative. Each and everyone in this group spoke out about the Corruption or the persecution of people by the Saudi Royal Family.

This is nothing more than MBS trying to take over the Saudi Empire and it backfired in attack on his pocketbook.

[sinkingfeeling]

25. No, I do not.

[hunter]

26. I don't care...

...except the flood of refugees when Saudi Arabia self-destructs is going to be horrific. Wahhabist immigrants wont be welcome most places, even within other Islamic nations.

I don't know if a soft landing is possible.

That's the only reason everyone is tip-toeing around this.

The world economy is not as dependent on Saudi oil as it once was and Saudi Arabia is wound up tight.

[TheRealNorth]

27. True

They have been teaching the kooky version of Islam (Wahabbism) for so long, god knows how much of their population has drank the Wahabbi kool-aid.

[Sneederbunk]

29. Interesting that this was a precision strike without human casualties.

As Inspector Clouseau would say: I suspect no one. I suspect everyone.

[tirebiter]

30. What I believe changes from day to day

What I know is the Saudis want us to make war on Iran so they don’t have to.

[machoneman]

31. What's really scary is the Pentagon stating we need to move slowly and cautiously. Why?

Some in the WH, Republiscums on the Hill and some lower level (less than the JCOS's) must be chomping at the bit to strike Iran. Having the JCOS release a statement saying let's be cautious must mean someone is pushing us towards a conflict.

[42bambi]

32. Something I found to be questionable this

morning was that on MSNBC or CNN they briefly showed a pile of burned out drone debris that was left after the Saudi strike; but, on a section of the drone there were ID numbers in english. If those were actually Iranian drones, wouldn't the ID numbers be in Arabic? I have looked for that photo and can't find it.

[karynnj]

35. uhm.... We USE arabic numbers - 0,1,2,3,4,5, ....

Really hard to do complicated mathematics with Roman numerals.

[hunter]

39. WTF? Iran is not Arabic and English is the predominant language of international weapons trade.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_language

I don't think visible markings on the remains of these weapons mean anything, especially if it was a false flag operation.

Any thorough investigation would have to go deeper.

[ellie]

34. No

[jayfish]

37. Maybe. But To What End?

it doesn't make any sense to me.

[moondust]

38. Would they risk starting a catastrophic war?

Are they dumb/crazy/desperate/whatever enough?

[gibraltar72]

40. Less evidence of that

than MBS killed Khashogi.

[TreasonousBastard]

41. I have no idea, but the apparently Houtis did bomb another Saudi field last month...

The Shayba field a few miles from the UAE border. No one seems to be disputing the Houti being behind that one.

Assuming Houti actually did it, the question is who gave them the idea and the equipment? Yemen is the surrogate caught in the middle between the Saudis and Iran, so it would seem Iran egged them on and supplied them.

But, look who else is in the area, and who else might have a beef with the Saudis, or who might use an attack on the Saudis for their own reasons. Off the top of my head, Egypt, Turkey, Kuwait, Qatar, Iraq, Israel and even Afghanistan and Pakistan have fingers in the pie. And Syria! Look at the fine actors in there-- any one of them would have no qualms about blowing up some Saudi oil fields to make a point.

Where are China and Russia in all this? Russians have their own oil to sell and the Chinese are always looking to buy some. Russians are now little better than bloodthirsty thugs but the Chinese are becoming very adept at sticking their noses in other countries' business to make a profit. Have they graduated to violence?

What I do know, is that we can't really believe anyone. This is the sort of thing that is the blackest of black ops and it could easily have been done by any one of the dozens of mercenary armies in the area. Remember that Bolton was pretty much running his own shop, and had the connections to hire someone for the job. He would have had no qualms about organizing this attack to get us into a war with Iran.

[Strelnikov_]

50. Of all the parties you list, Iran has the weakest motive

They have been using their ability to attack gulf petroleum infrastructure as a shield against attack, basically a hostage.

Once you have shown a willingness to kill the hostage regardless, the value of holding said hostage is lost.

Over-ambitious IRGC commander, possibly, but definitely an off the reservation op if it was indeed Iran.

[GeorgeGist]

43. Who else would have that type of technology?

I think it's obvious.

[WhiteTara]

52. Israel, SA & US

Bolton wanted war, Bibi wants distraction and SA hate Iran.

[Celerity]

44. either wat we need to stay the hell out of that vipers nest and stop carrying water for the Saudis

and Israel in their hell-bent mission to goad us into disastrously going to war with Iran.

[Joe941]

45. nope.

[kentuck]

49. MartyTheGreek (a newbie) had an interesting perspective....a false flag.

The Blue Wave of 18 was a bell weather moment and GOP knows it!

More recently a few other GOP squatters in the House are bailing out. I kinda sense that there's some back channel talk that there's gonna be a big reveal based on what's not happening...

I believe DJT and his favorite King or Prince from Saud just tried to pull off a false flag to ignite yet another ME war. I say that because when you look at the Oil Tank farm that was hit, for one that was chicken scratch! I've been to a few Fuel Farms in my life and those bigger tanks don't even look like 500K Gal, and that fake attack was in a remote end area of the bigger facility. Recall that there was a sudden 50% reduction in Saudi oil supply? Then what a day or two later suddenly restored? Read on...

If you wanted to hit the Sauds hard, would you not buckshot scatter your precision guided and/or drone weapons across the whole facility? Or, was that just a little corner of the Farm that was gonna get demolished anyway? Why were there no people, firefighters, clean-up crew in the scorched earth pics? Why the dramatic satellite smoke pic from the biggest tank?

If they got away with murdering Jamal Khashoggi, who knows what they will try to do? However, thus far I have a gut feeling the White Hats are winning against the real Dark State! If this latest whistle blower report reveals criminal cover-up this may be the beginning of the end and finally impeachment for the corrupt and compromised DJT administration.


https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=12473800

[blm]

51. No

[Mike Nelson]

53. I believe...

... they came from that direction. The countries involved are not adept enough to frame them - especially not the US with Crooked Donald in charge. But that doesn't mean the government of Iran sent them, either. We can't trust what the governments of Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the US say...

[democratisphere]

55. NO.

[doc03]

56. Can't believe anything that comes out of DC now

he even charges weather maps.

[floppyboo]

57. No. I would put $ on Wahabi revenge for bin Laden's son

I'm betting they aren't so keen on Jared and MBS sharing hit lists. EDIT: I got the tanker bombing date wrong.

[NewEnglandAutumn]

61. Twitter Banned me for this

I have been posting links to articles about Donnie's financial ties to Saudi Arabia and why the bombing is false flag operation and my account was suspended VERY quickly. I did not use any profanity, not threats etc etc just links to articles about how Donnie was bailed out several times and that we should not be dragged into another war because of the GOP. BOOM I'm out. This has happened 3 other times all when I post links to articles that are VERY unflattering to the GOP. Twitter has taken a side and it is NOT even close to the Democratic side.

[Buckeyeblue]

62. Somehow Russia is involved.

This is just my gut. That's why Trump is steering clear. Putin wants oil prices to go up. Who knows, maybe he is the SA prince are in cahoots.

I'll be honest, I'm not sure what to believe.

[Keg Stand]

63. Yes, but I think Saudi Arabia and Iran should have to settle this on their own.

I sure as hell don't want to see us go to war in defense of Saudi Arabia.

[customerserviceguy]

65. When it was a "drone" attack

I believed it was the Houthis. With cruise missiles, it's surely Iran. The sanctions are squeezing them, and they've gone from hijacking ships on the high seas to bombing the Saudis.

Not our fight, let them work it out, or not. I don't blame any US government official for pretending to suck up to the Saudis. There's probably an "Iron Dome" defense system to be sold here.

[DVRacer]

67. Linking two stories together

Wonder if the whistle blower overheard that this attack was being planned ahead of time. Maybe heard the go ahead given to another foreign government. Wanna reach for the third what country was holding an election just after the attack and its current leader is not polling well.
One thing I have learned is when it comes to the Middle East everything is connected somehow.

[notinkansas]

68. No

Dubya told some whoppers. This administration lies every day all day long.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

69. TrumPutin's regime cannot be trusted to ever tell the truth about anything

The only way to determine what is likely true is to follow the money, just as when investigating any criminal enterprise.