Why nobody is talking about Iran?

[zazen]

The most basic stand on Iran is that the government needs to change (reform, not necessarily regime change) and that external actors shouldn’t intervene in counterintuitive un-ethical ways (sanctions or war) that only leads to hardening of the regimes posture under seige conditions and hardship / bloodbath for locals.

Confessions of a economic hitman:

Lesson learnt for 85% of the globe: participate in BRICS to hedge against this financialized imperialism that the US and West have monopoly over. 

OG Middle East expert:

Liberalising requires surplus, which require stability, which requires at least some coercive capacity to begin with. The West went through internal repression, elite consolidation and coercive state building - externalized much violence through empire, then domestically liberalized. They had slack to do so - which no longer exists for late developers in a post-colonial world. 

Countries start to deal with human rights and liberal values once they have the conditions for it after securing the human right of survival and stability. The West's very own actions get in the way, sabotaging that sequence. Intervention by empire used to be justified by the “white mans burden” and is now laundered through “democracy promotion”. The same countries being “helped” get judged by countries that themselves went through and are at the end of that developmental sequence.

Edited February 9 by zazen

[Elliott]

10 minutes ago, zazen said:

The most basic stand on Iran is that the government needs to change (reform, not necessarily regime change) and that external actors shouldn’t intervene in counterintuitive un-ethical ways (sanctions or war) that only leads to hardening of the regimes posture under seige conditions and hardship / bloodbath for locals.

Confessions of a economic hitman:

Lesson learnt for 85% of the globe: participate in BRICS to hedge against this financialized imperialism that the US and West have monopoly over. 

OG Middle East expert:

How do sanctions directly lead to bloodbath, north Korea is sanctioned, Russia, Venezuela.

 

If the u.s. was going to war, it would've/should've been the moment the strike group pulled up. That's been a week, Iran probably has a swarm of missiles, air defense, and drones moved into position and locked on them now.

Edited February 9 by Elliott

[zazen]

39 minutes ago, Elliott said:

How do sanctions directly lead to bloodbath, north Korea is sanctioned, Russia, Venezuela.

In-directly applying pressure to such a degree that once a threshold is crossed and people revolt we see crackdowns by the same regime that’s hardened by the same sanctions - causing them to act brutal to survive. We saw the culmination of that this year. Death counts anywhere from 5-30k+ - not sure what to believe but whatever the number its insane in such a short amount of days.

Russia is far more resilient to the sanctions because it’s ''too big too fail'' in a sense. It wasn't sanctioned until much later because EU depends on their energy - sanctioning them hurts themselves. Even when it was, it wasn't fully isolated the same way as Iran was.

Iran's been under sanctions far longer and far harsher so the pressures been built over time. They also don't have any exits / options for the people to migrate to as the regions either war torn or impossible borders to cross unlike Venezuela which releaved  a lot of the pressure - millions migrating into neighboring countries.

NK is a dystopia with fully locked down under a bunker mentality made for isolation. The people are tragically under total surveillance state control. No one can coordinate revolt. If a person steps out of line their entire bloodline gets affected and punished. Wiki, Yeonjwa: ''three to eight generations of a political offender's family can be summarily imprisoned or executed. Relatives are not told why they fell under suspicion and the punishment extends to children born in prison.''

What a shit hole - if there's one case of a country that deserves the entire world to rescue its people it would be NK but the fuckers have nukes.

Edited February 9 by zazen

[Elliott]

1 hour ago, zazen said:

In-directly applying pressure to such a degree that once a threshold is crossed and people revolt we see crackdowns by the same regime that’s hardened by the same sanctions - causing them to act brutal to survive. We saw the culmination of that this year. Death counts anywhere from 5-30k+ - not sure what to believe but whatever the number its insane in such a short amount of days.

The people don't have to revolt though. It's not poverty that's the overwhelming problem, it's just inflation, corruption, and abuse.

It seems to me to be Israeli agitators, and then the overreaction by the regime.

Edited February 9 by Elliott

[zazen]

5 hours ago, Elliott said:

It seems to me to be Israeli agitators, and then the overreaction by the regime.

Same - real protests hijacked by provocateurs as boasted about by Mike Pompeo etc.

Very interesting take from Turkeys admiral:

 

[Raze]

It’s insane to me the Iranian diaspora is still praising republicans and israel, in reality they’ve made their situation much worse.

The sanctions which israel lobbied for have crushed the Iranian people, and shrunk the middle class and caused brain drain which was the group most effectively opposing the regime with the resources for transition.

Trump then encouraged the protestors that he’d help them but just abandoned them.

Then due to the constant war threats the regime was able to get its military to unite and use that as a pretext to use massive amounts of violence to crush the protests claiming it’s a national security issue, and Pompeo and Israel gloating about using mossad agents just helps them with this narrative.

The reaction was far more violent than the 2022 protests and during those protests part of the military had refused to join in crushing them, indicating there was the possibility of splits.

Now Israel has just had Trump ramp up the sanctions even more and Trump is trying for a deal with the regime.

Israel is demanding Iran basically abandon any military power it has which they know they’ll refuse.

The fact that any Iranian diaspora wants a regime change war with Iran after everything that happened in Iraq, Syria, and Libya is insane. That would harm the Iranian people far more than the regime at its worst.

[Revolutionary Think]

 

[Atb210201]

Trump will definitely go for strike.

Maybe most likely in 17th of March to the 2nd of April.

That is the timeline for Persians new year.

I'm just making predictions here I don't know for sure but let's see what happens.

Edited February 10 by Atb210201

[Mohammad]

@Revolutionary Think

On 2/8/2026 at 9:11 PM, Revolutionary Think said:

For sure my parents are from Iran and I speak fluent Parsi. They came here to dumb Los Angeles, CA where there's nothing but, traffic and homeless people lol. I always wondered about going back but, there's no way in hell I would because I see almost every Iranian American that goes back is arrested for spying and then used as a bargaining chip for this piece of shit regime. So I can only really see Iran on video and not in person it's a real shame. 

About Trump ya there are practical and logistical concerns and life is not a video game where you can just push a button and it all changes. I'm guessing that if he were to do a limited strike with no plan then the regime would just go crazy launch a ton of missiles definitely at Israel and maybe at some of the Arab countries and if the right defenses weren't in place it would be a disaster and at the same time if not enough offensive capability wasn't in place either it wouldn't be enough for a strike to finish the job which would also be a disaster. If that was the case that fat idiot shouldn't have sent that message. There should've just been better cordination somehow with him and the protestors. I know people are thinking it gave the people of Iran hope and made then excited to go out into the streets but, these are human lives not chess pieces on a board I don't think that it's right. 

The thing about Trump is that he changes his mind on a whim like a fool and doesn't think about the day after and what kind of effect it has. During the 12 day war he said regime change is a good idea then immediately changed his mind and said it was too messy. One thing he did I think that was freaking terrible was when after the US got rid of the Fordo and Isfahan site (and one other hardened nuke site I can't remember maybe Natanz) was that he told Israel to STOP. Israel was also going to take out Khamenei and he didn't let it happen either. It's like he has a split personality. Unreliable douche! 

I really think that during 2022 the Iranian people really had a chance then we saw that go away. It's just so freaking annoying how this has all been working out. Like in 2025 during the 12 day war the Iranians could've came out on the streets too and then the regime would've really had it's hands full but, I think it's easier said than done and I'd understand why people wouldn't want to come out at a time of war. I think that the best thing was the US NOT getting involved in the 12 day war to hit those hardened structures especially Fordow. If that didn't happen Israel would've had the excuse to keep bombing the regime when it didn't have any air defenses until the regime was weak enough for Israel to do some kind of special operation to take out those places. Or even better if Israel didn't have the capability to take out Fordow and Natanz they could've just bombed the regime to non-existence so instaed of getting rid of the place there was just no regime to use it anymore lol. That would've been the optimal outcome in my perspective. Anyway I just hope these talks go nowhere and all that American firepower in the Sea doesn't go to waste and final removes the regime. I can understand the people too and their reluctance to go to the streets with these evil psychopathic barbarians and their Arab proxy friends patrolling it. I just hope the US, Israel (or any other country but, most of the Europeans seem to be cowards) can hit the repression centers and target the people doing the repression and then the people of Iran can finally get rid of these sh*t sucking Mother F**king assholes. I know I used harsh words but, that's the kind of words these mass murderers deserve. 

 

I agree with almost everything you said.

I was just outside, the regime performed a fireworks show because of the anniversary of their fucking revolution, and at the same time, everyone was shouting death to Khamenei from their houses and buildings! 

Hope you can visit Iran soon enough friend, I'm sure the big changes are on the way ❤

[Elliott]

34 minutes ago, Atb210201 said:

Trump will definitely go for strike.

Maybe most likely in 17th of March to the 2nd of April.

That is the timeline for Persians new year.

I'm just making predictions here I don't know for sure but let's see what happens.

How bad is the poverty now in Iran, people starving to death?

[Atb210201]

27 minutes ago, Elliott said:

How bad is the poverty now in Iran, people starving to death?

Not yet that bad.

But it's pretty bad, worse than most of the countries in the world.

But it might go that way someday if things continue this way.

Edited February 10 by Atb210201

[Revolutionary Think]

5 hours ago, Mohammad said:

Hope you can visit Iran soon enough friend, I'm sure the big changes are on the way ❤

Thanks stay safe out there. 

[Revolutionary Think]

@Mohammad are you getting all the news of the buildings blowing up and the regime blaming it on gas leaks?

[Karmadhi]

On 2/10/2026 at 8:53 PM, Atb210201 said:

Not yet that bad.

But it's pretty bad, worse than most of the countries in the world.

But it might go that way someday if things continue this way.

What do you think of the Shah?

I am curious to get an objective perspective from a fellow forum panelist that is from Iran and lives in Iran

[enchanted]

There was a 350000 person protest in Toronto? Also because the Gaza war is the hot new thing to yell at people around you on.