A new… form in warfare

After nearly a month of “Epic Fury” against Iran – and no off-ramp in clear sight – your Eyewitness gotta echo brother Marvin Gaye’s cry of “What’s going on”!! The Iranians show no sign of throwing in the towel – as most thought they would after a few weeks! Without tooting his horn (too loudly!!) he must remind you, dear reader, that he’d predicted that “this would not end nicely and quickly”!! But the reason he offered was the national psyche of the Iranian people – who being predominantly Shia – consider sacrifice as salvation!! The Battle of Karbala in which the rightful leader of the Muslim ummah and his small force were brutally massacred, is ever present in their memories to motivate them to fight against overwhelming odds!!
But what we see unfolding is changing the very nature of warfare and national security – as we know it up to now!! Right up front we see that “buying security” by huddling under the umbrella of even a hegemon has now been thrown out of the window!! That’s what the Gulf states and the Saudis had done by allowing the Yanks to establish military bases – as launching pads for attacks on Iran – “the common enemy” since 1979!!
But the Iranians have shown that – unlike the case for centuries – defense is now faaaar more expensive than offence!!  With drones and missiles costing in the thousands and anti-missile batteries running into the millions, the term “asymmetric warfare” has taken on a whole new meaning!! Iran can keep on producing 10,000 of its Shaheed missiles per month with all of the US bases in the Gulf states within their range and even if a fraction gets through its “game over!!”. Not so incidentally, the word “shaheed’ means “martyr”!!
The Iranians are showing that they are willing to accept the Israeli and US pounding – knowing they can give as good as they can get!! Yesterday your Eyewitness saw a private Chinese company offering a hypersonic missile – the YKJ-1000 – with a sticker price comparable to that of a luxury sedan!! We’ve seen how easily these missiles can pierce even the vaunted Israeli Iron Shield – which bleeds the latter by millions daily!  Can you imagine what strategic advantage this now give an underdog?? The mobile launchers for the YKJ-1000 resemble common shipping containers and so can be deployed virtually anywhere!! Guyana should be looking to source these immediately!! That should give Delcy something to think about!!
The other new development in warfare is the normalizing of assassinations. Nobody even bats an eyelid at learning that the head of a country was assassinated along with his entire top echelons!!
This should give some leaders pause!!

…line against reparations
With the 1000th anniversary of the arrival of enslaved Africans to Essequibo beiung observed, local activists are ratcheting up their demands for reparations. Unlike most other countries making the call, our worthies are demanding reparations against the Guyanese state. As such, they can be accused of “double dipping” since they’re also supporting the demands against the European states – here Netherlands and Britain – that committed the abominable act!!
There was a revealing vote a couple of days ago in the UNGA on the resolution moved by Ghana declaring the transatlantic slave trade the gravest crime against humanity and calling for reparations. The vote in the 193-member world body was 123-3, with 52 abstentions. Argentina, Israel and the US were the three members voting against, while the UK and all 27 members of the EU were among those abstaining.
The US insisted it “does not recognize a legal right to reparations for historical wrongs that were not illegal under international law at the time they occurred.”
Game on??

…anti-sanction avenue?
WIN’s partisans are making a big deal about the CCJ hearing Mohammeds appeal – and pausing the local hearings. What’s new?? Sanction Man always said he was going there – and as the CCJ said, it’s part of our system to deliver justice!!