Yawn

With their accuracy it'll take 11,000 just to hit anything other than the ground.

I love the thought of secondaries (at the ammo dumps) in the morning!

The Iranians are begging us to attack them. Therefore, we shouldn't. If Tehran warned us not to wear pink tutus, I'd take the whole family down to the next big sale at the local Ballet Supply Warehouse.

Not sure about your analysis John. Iraq '91 was a different situation than Iran today. Remember the lesson of Millenium Challenge '02 -- out high-tech network-centric warfare doesn't work against opponents committed to waging highly asymmetrical warfare. Let's say we do start bombing key C2 sites, what's to stop them from taking a page out of Van Riper's book and broadcasting orders from minarets, or using motorcycle messengers. Might not be as efficient, but it'll get the job done. The other thing the Israeli experience in Lebanon two summers ago showed was that targeting missile launch sites can be incredibly difficult when they're distributed and hidden properly.

Look, I'm not saying that we can't beat the Iranians, just that it wouldn't be nearly as simple as Iraq '91 was.

Define "beat." You going to ride a motorcycle from Tehran to your missile sites? That's a 10 hour ride for some. By that time....

boom.

Anyway, you're thinking though. Nothing wrong with exploring all avenues. But remember, it's not whether or not the messages can arrive...it's when the arrive. And if there's still a rocket unit left to receive the message when they get there.

I'm guessing the C2 "system" for this contingency is something like a set of orders that read "if you hear a number of large booms and don't know what they are, fire the rockets."

On a slightly different note, If I was a commander engaged in COIN operations not too far from the border I think I would find it a little difficult to focus for a day or two while the post-game of an AF foray was working itself out.

John,
Iran's missile sites are going to be much tougher to hit than Iraq's scuds were in '91. Look at how much trouble Israel had in Lebanon targeting rocket sites, and they have every bit as advanced fire-tracking radar as we do.

If we can't hit their dispersed 11,000 rockets, then a 10-hour delay waiting for a bike messenger is not a problem for them, and as Jim said they probably have standing orders if they hear booms. There's also a much simpler way to organize things: if you don't hear a countermanding order, fire your missiles at midnight. That way, our knocking out their communications nodes actually provides the order to fire.

The Iranians won't fight us how we want them to fight us.

Also, the fact that nobody's looking at what we learned in MC '02 five years down the road is scary. Why the hell are we basing carriers in the Persian Gulf when we *know* that they are extremely vulnerable in heavily traficked enclosed waters? It's ridiculous.

The carriers being in the Gulf is a political move. Its been pointed out for yeears that you'll know the US is going to hit Iran when the carriers leave for open water.

And I'm only worried about the Iran's "advanced missles" which are not nearly as concelable as the Katyushas they gave to Hezbollah. The Kats are lucky to hit a city, a forward operating base will be tough. Plus the range in Iran/Iraq dwarf the Isreal/Lebanon barrages. Their various balistic missles have the range and (allegedly) the accuracy to do damage to regional targets, but they'll be lucky to survice their opening salvo. I think you've already predicted their fire plan: wait for C&C to go off air, fire at pre-planned target and then evac before the counterstrike. The Iranians know this is all show. Their conventional military won't stand up any better than Iraqs. But it plays well as Bravado.

It's not the Iranian rockets I'd be worried about. It's the millions of Iraqi Shi'ites that our troops are in and amongst. A real Shi'ia uprising would present a bad situation for us.

Our lifeline in Iraq is the road that runs north from Kuwait. Cut that and we'd be in a real pickle.

The Iranians don't (and won't) play by our rules, John. Interdicting C2 might be a nice USAF term, but in reality it would probably be irrelevant.

rockets and cannons? cannons? I dont know anything about the military or their weapons so when I think of cannons, I think of Civil War cannons. Could he really be talking about those cannons?

Funny thing is, is that after they fire their "11,000" rockets they wont have any left and then G.W. will go and kick the shit out of them.