Brett Wilkins Jun 16, 2025
Flight-tracking websites showed dozens of Air Force aerial refueling planes departing from military bases in the United States and heading to Europe on Sunday, fueling speculation of direct U.S. involvement in the widening Israeli-Iranian war.
Military-focused news sites reported that around 30 U.S. Air Force KC-135R and KC-46A tankers were identified by flight-tracking software in what The Times of Israelcalled an “unprecedented mass deployment” to Europe.
Sounds like the perfect time for Canada, Greenland/Denmark and Panama to launch their preemptive strike and ensure regime change and eliminate US WMD.
Only idiots are excited about wars.
If the shit hits the fan, I want too see every single fucking MAGA voter at a US Army recruiting office signing up for 11 Bravo, Grunt Infantry.
This would have to be the most unpopular war in US history and yet I think everyone Trump has surrounded himself with is telling him to do it.
We just want fucking healthcare and affordable housing.
Sorry, best I can do is 2 trillion more for Boeing, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and the like. They’re desperate man, they haven’t had a war for like 12 minutes, they need to be fed.
Zomg, Boeing planes being flown above enemy territory as surprise kamikazes (surprise to the pilots & crew).
Lockheed Martin did October 7?
Basically 9/11 truther style conspiracy nonsense going on here.
What?
It was a joke about how we have no money to spend on healthcare for the population, but we always jump to throw endless cash at defense contractors to supply the military…
Haha… good joke. I didn’t see your mention of healthcare in your previous comment.
It’s typical of conspiracy theorists to say “it was just a joke” when called out on their bullshit. You may go back to doing “your own research in the internet” now.
You have no idea what you’re talking about. Enjoy your weekend.
Best the turnip can do is a gold colored overpriced shit phone.
Not to worry, it’s made in china, shipped from china, and then people in detention centers will be forced by ICE to package it for that bonus fascism feel for those that believe it’s made in the US and and they’re getting a deal on the T-Mobile package that costs almost 2x other providers for the same service.
Other Americans just want fucking guns and affordable discrimination. It’s a sad day.
Best I can do is a Trump smartphone.
Be that as it may, we also only seem to vote for people that we know aren’t going to actually do what they say, except on the issue of immigration.
And human rights. Due process. Rule of law and respect the constitution. Less inflation. More progress on our environment. Rebuild some infrastructure. Invest in some technologies of the future rather than the past. Leadership that understands basic economics and actually the art of the deal
Don’t worry. You’ll get it if you can be drafted.
But don’t expect any medical treatment after your service if you’re a Democrat or unmarried: ‘Extremely disturbing and unethical’: new rules allow VA doctors to refuse to treat Democrats, unmarried veterans
They deserve medical treatment but what service destroying other countries?
The hell did you want me to call it then? “Military service” is a completely common expression to use, and it applies whether we like what they’re doing or not.
And before you get any bright ideas: no, I’m not American and no, I don’t support what their military does. This kind of completely pointless semantic wankery just really activates my almonds
And it will last you till your death (several days later).
Best we can do is give more people PTSD and then deny them disability or treatment for it. America loves dead soldiers, we can’t go too long without having a new batch.
Yeah. Unfortunately it’s been obvious to a lot of us for awhile that it would only come from the ashes of this country.
You had a chance at that in Zuck’s metaverse…
We just want fucking healthcare and affordable housing.
Trumps response is to offer army barracks and MREs, in exchange for you becoming cannon fodder in his delusional war games.
You don’t, because almost none of you vote for socialist candidates.
The media told them
Hillary is the most qualified candidate in historyonly Biden can beat Trump, because he appeals to moderates, where things like free healthcare and not locking immigrants in cages only appeals to far left loonies.The average American wants these things, its just we cant risk the Republicans winning so we have to run on the republican platform from 4 years ago.
None of which are socialist.
They are all systematically weaved out of the closed, private two-party system.
This is the truth.
Americans have shown where their priorities lie, time and time again.
God I hate Republicans.
Trump is absolute garbage on every single scale and stat, but it’s the republican voters who got us here. Fuck every republican voter.
Let’s not pretend that the Democrats wouldn’t also side with Israel
Not if the democrats keep electing the same type of candidate. The trouble began when they shoehorned in Hilary, would Bernie have ran in 2016 the world would be a better place.
Venture?
Bernie, autocorrected
Ah ok. Lol, for a moment I thought you might have meant Jessie Ventura
Lol. Whilst that would not have solved many problems. In retrospect I would’ve preferred that timeline.
Yeah, would still probably be an improvement on this one.
What got us here is the same two parties cycling in power for a century. If you believe war is red fault alone and that voting blue will change anything, you are part of the problem.
It’s really Democrats and independents who got you there. Unconvinced ones, though. Republicans did what they do, just enough Democrats and independents stayed at home.
If they feel safe leaving their homes, you’ve failed.
Hate is not going to get you anywhere.
Yes some of them voted for him but a bunch of them didn’t.
Stop being defeatist… inform yourself… look at the numbers. Look at the evidence. Get active.
If you’ve wondered why everything looks like a coup since he got in, perhaps it is because it is one.
https://lemmy.world/post/31401705
https://electiontruthalliance.org/
Edit: the upvote/downvote ratio on a comment like this shows how rapidly Lemmy is turning into Reddit. Nobody cares about the data, if you remotely sound like defending the GOP down the chute you go.
It’s your loss America. I’ll sleep fine as long as we don’t have electronic voting systems here.
It’s not that we don’t agree with you, it’s that your kinda acting like a dick. Change your tone and you might get a better reception.
And leading with “hate is not going to get you anywhere” and following it with more blame instead of action.
Find your local mutual aid group. Volunteer. Protest. Get involved.
following it with more blame instead of action.
I don’t see blame anywhere?
[you’re] kinda acting like a dick
I really don’t see it. I see only advice trying to help them get a healthier point of view. 🤷♂️
Change your tone and you might get a better reception.
This has literally the same vibe.
Edit: didn’t realize the response was a different user.
I’m not trying to convince anyone of something. I’m just telling why
you’rethey are being downvoted, and it’s not because of the content ofyourtheir post. I’d post differently if I were trying to make a sincere point.I’m not the one who made the “dick” comment…
I’m not trying to convince anyone of something.
You’re saying they should change their tone. 🤷♂️ Meh. Whatever you say.
Apologies, I didn’t realize that you weren’t the person that I originally responded to.
I’m not trying to convince them. I don’t give a fuck if they change their tone. I was only telling them why the post wasn’t well received.
Right, fair enough I guess. I just can’t see where exactly the dickishness lies. I don’t see a “tone” anywhere.
Spite can be a powerful motivator.
Edit: the upvote/downvote ratio on a comment like this shows how rapidly Lemmy is turning into Reddit. Nobody cares about the data, if you remotely sound like defending the GOP down the chute you go.
Many people just aren’t serious enough to take actions that are material beneficial. We want leftist ideas, but no one wants to form a party or vote for one.
So much for keeping the US out of war…
I can’t believe he’d just… Lie to us like we’re a court, Congress or himself or something.
I noticed you didn’t say anything about a wife/ex-wife
We don’t have to lie to those, we just put those into our golf courses ya ijit
There has never been a decade in the entire history of the US in which it has not been at war. Come to think of it, there are probably like 10 years total, over 250, where there was not direct military action. I think. Have not recently checked the spreadsheet I keep.
Something like 17 years total.
That means that for 222 out of 239 years – or 93% of the time – America has been at war. (We can quibble with the exact numbers, but the high percentage of time that America has been at war is clear and unmistakable.)
Machines gotta eat
And shareholders gotta profit.
There is no “and”. The shareholders are the machine.
Yes we are a shithole country
Trump wants to try for an illegal third term and he thinks that being in the middle of a war will help his chances. “Don’t change horses mid-stream” or whatever bullshit.
i mean that’s definitely what’s keeping netanyahu in power, and what makes him want to keep all of their wars going
so if it works for netanyahu it will work for trump
Slowing weapons production??? While there are still citizens to vaporize to manufacture consent for yet more war???
I didn’t call it, but there’s nothing quite like a war to distract the population from rampant decline at home.
This one is weird though, Iran is allied with Russia. Israel is allied with the US. Historically, this made sense.
But Trump and Putin playing war together would benefit both of them. It allows Putin to pull out of Ukraine because “Iran provided us much help and they need us now.” And it allows Russia to maintain the war economy. It benefits Trump because he wants to play war.
Neither leader would have any actual skin in the game, it’s just people’s lives that would never contribute in another meaningful way to their power.
I don’t like this. This is feeling more 1984 than 1984.
Edit: I like this even worse after I read the specifics of the KC-135R and KC-46A. Each can carry about 200,000 lbs of additional fuel. A single F-15E can hold 13,000 lbs internally. 30 KC-135Rs can refuel an entire F-15E 460 times. Israel has 7 KC-130H (60,000lbs) and 7 Boeing 707s (which is what the KC-135 was based on). This isn’t just escalation, this is staging for invasion.
The nice thing about Americans going to war is that it reduces the amount of dodge owners drag racing late at night. Silver linings.
yea its a distraction from all the protests, its really making him look bad, but he has the msms focusing on this instead, plus he was using the parade and the shootings as another distraction as well. right now the news practically ignoring the protests. using the. BANNER strategy, flood the MSM with so much crap its hard to focus on one thing. its also known as the firehose of falsehood which is a Russian strategy for propaganda.
Sounds like personal beef.
Before COVID, 2020 started off with Trump drone striking a foreign diplomat and nearly starting WW3.
It allows Putin to pull out of Ukraine
Why would Putin pull out of Ukraine? Russia is currently advancing and has a much better position in this war of attrition, and the more it keeps gaining, the better the “peace terms” will be in the end. Putin’s not fearing for his next term since elections in Russia are manipulated, the Russian economy is alive and well, and in military terms he’s in no hurry
Both Putin and Trump are approaching dead-ends in their current campaigns. This ICE stuff can’t end well for him with so many people out last weekend, and Putin is well stuck in Ukraine, as you say. Whilst they may not be personally interested in the future of Iran and them having nukes by itself, they may need this to save their skin, actually.
Ukraine could throw a wrench in their plans by simply not accepting whatever Putin offers. He’s then left with “stay out of it and stay in Ukraine” or “join Trump and risk Ukraine flanking into Russian territory”
Neither leader would have any actual skin in the game, it’s just people’s lives that would never contribute in another meaningful way to their power.
Cold War 2: now with more stupid!
Not to mention that this gives him a legitimate reason to invoke the alien enemies act, not that he needed them in the first place, but it will tie up the courts even further.
They hope Iran does something, that warrants NATOs article 5 to be triggered. Either the other Nato countries follow along, weakening Europe, or they don’t, which basically desolves NATO and thus, weakening Europe.
No one in Europe still counts on the US in case of an article 5 situation
Come on now, you don’t need to invoke some BlueAnon conspiracy to explain why the US would attack Iran; it’s been champing at the bit to do so for decades.
This is basic dictator playbook, problems in domestic politics, start a war and problems change to foreign policy.
Putin has done this multiple times now, and Trump is following up.
This is why I say Canada, Greenland, and Mexico are not safe. Added to the fact that all 3 countries have lots of resources the US needs.
Don’t forget panama
If the US ever try to take out the Panama channel it would fuck up bigly international commerce. Basically only the US military is going to use it because no insurance company is going to cover ships going through them, and without insurance ships can’t even leave port.
Not take out. Take over. And therefore control said trade.
Wouldn’t this cause catastrophic domestic problems though. I think the US would tear itself apart trying to go to war with either of those three. Greenland perhaps less-so but still incredibly distasteful.
They won’t defend their own democracy. They won’t defend mine.
Putin has done this multiple times now, and Trump is following up.
The United Russia party has had a chokehold on Russian elections practically since the day the USSR was dismantled.
There’s a lot more to their socio-economic dominance than Russia just starting new wars. RU controls the national media, they have deep roots in petrochemicals and finance and real estate, they’re mobbed up, they have control of the military across the officer’s corps, and they’re embedded all through local government.
Putin could be the biggest peacenik hippie in Russia and that party wouldn’t budge from its perch.
He’s doing these wars because he’s fascist. Not because he’s doing 11D politics chess.
Starting a war isn’t really 11D thing, it is more like “me big army, me attack” vibe. Even the orange orangutan can figure that one out.
Russia has two exports, fossil energy and war. They know nothing else.
Putin and his party are one and the same.
Russia has two exports, fossil energy and war.
Russia is the only country left with a functioning space program. Also, one of the few remaining virgin steel manufacturers, in large part thanks to their domestic supply of iron and cheap energy. And, like Ukraine, it is a major regional breadbasket (one of the knock on effects of the war has been a one-two punch to cereal exports into Africa and the Middle East).
They don’t have the manpower that China and India enjoy, so they never properly built up their high end service and manufacturing base, even in the Soviet Era. But the “Russia’s just an oversized gas station” line doesn’t hold up to any kind of close inspection.
60% of their export is fossil energy, it is a banana republic
60% of their export is fossil energy
China, India, and Turkiye have been ravenous in their demand for petrochemicals. These sectors have been growing at a breakneck pace.
it is a banana republic
Which large US business conglomerate is extracting fruit produce from Russia through armed occupation at below market rates?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_republic
“In political science, the term banana republic describes a politically and economically unstable country with an economy dependent upon the export of natural resource.”
They are so dependable on fossil fuel export that they try to sway all other nations to use fossil fuels and generate crisis on it to tie other nations closer to it’s only source of power in global market. Russia has less GDP than Italy. They are not super power anymore, and every nation should try to get away from their fossil fuels.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Fruit_Company
it came to control vast territories and transportation networks in Central America, the Caribbean coast of Colombia, and the West Indies. Although it competed with the Standard Fruit Company (later Dole Food Company) for dominance in the international banana trade, it maintained a virtual monopoly in certain regions, some of which came to be called banana republics – such as Costa Rica, Honduras, and Guatemala.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_republic#Etymology
In the early 20th century, the United Fruit Company, a multinational corporation, was instrumental in the creation of the banana republic phenomenon. Together with other American corporations, such as the Cuyamel Fruit Company, and leveraging the power of the U.S. government, the corporations created the political, economic, and social circumstances that led to a coup of the locally elected democratic government that established banana republics in Central American countries such as Honduras and Guatemala; No official apology has ever been done by any banana company or the U.S. with only the C.I.A. backed dictator of Guatemala apologizing in 2011
:-|
They are so dependable on fossil fuel export that they try to sway all other nations to use fossil fuels
Ah, Okay. I think I understand the problem here.
Everything you said is true of the GOP/American Right as well, and they do it the same way, through oligarchy, it’s just a matter of they having more time to ratchet it down where the US is just getting its official start, although it’s been working behind the scenes towards this for decades too
As if any USA president wouldn’t be doing the same thing.
Time to waste hundreds of billions defending israel while our infrastructure crumbles and our citizens still go without healthcare.
Again.
Gotta keep the Middle East under control so gas prices don’t get too high. Americans vote for low gas prices and then pretend to be upset about what needs to be done to keep them low. But y’all will keep voting for low gas prices, so it’s all hypocrisy.
Wasn’t Trump the peaceful dove?
Everyone knew he wasn’t going to be able to curtail democratic elections without the excuse of a war. This is on schedule.
Good thing states control the elections.
I mean, Trump just illegally deployed the national guard and the marines in California. He needed the state’s permission (which he didn’t get) to deploy the guard and deploying the marines is on a whole other level of illegal.
We’ve got an election in NYC right now, with a pro-Palestine Muslim threatening to upset Trump’s close friend Andrew Cuomo. Weird that nobody is claiming this election is being threatened by Trump, given that NYC has an enormous stock of Trump/Kushner accumulated capital.
What happens when the federal and state government disagree?
looks at US history book at 1860
👀
Or 50x the chances for hijinx, depending on your angle.
Unfortunately the republican run states will bend over whenever Trump tells them to.
That’s not true, they are protesting too.
I mean the republican lawmakers, not the citizens.
Not anymore. The SCOTUS ruled already that they must have their ballots approved by the Feds, and feds can overrule their ballots.
False
So, Donald wasn’t allowed to appear on the Colorado ballot, being an insurrectionist?
That’s a state issue, not a federal issue.
Donald Trump was allowed to remain on the Colorado ballot despite the challenge based on the 14th Amendment’s insurrection clause, because the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that states lack the authority to remove federal candidates from the ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
There is nothing about “approval” from feds, nor is there a process federally to approve such things. There’s courts. That’s it.
So, the SCOTUS ruled the feds control who is on the ballots in each state, right?
There is no such thing as a federal ballot.
I always thought Trump could curtail democratic elections without the excuse of war … by relying on a convenient terrorist attack instead.
Nah, a war in the middle east is normal. Nobody would accept a normal situation as justification to cancel elections.
No US president is a peace dove. Between supporting proxie wars to police actions to declared war, they all end up getting people killed by bombs.
No.
We had a lot of “I’m willing to make deals with anyone” rhetoric from the Trump campaign that low-info voters took to mean he was anti-war.
But the underlying Pentagon leadership hasn’t significantly changed between Biden and Trump (or Bush and Trump, for that matter). Its all the same neoconservative think tanks writing variations on Project For A New American Century for the modern government.
The idea that you were going to elect an anti-war president went out the window during the primaries. Vanishingly few federal office holders have shown opposition to attacking Iran. Less than what we had in 2003 against Iraq.
Everyone from Richie Torres to Mike Lee seem on board with a brand new Holocaust in the Middle East.
But the underlying Pentagon leadership hasn’t significantly changed between Biden and Trump (or Bush and Trump, for that matter). Its all the same neoconservative think tanks writing variations on Project For A New American Century for the modern government.
That isn’t congress or the president. Pentagon leadership doesn’t declare war. Congress has the power to declare war which hasn’t happened for some time and since then the president has basically done so, although arguable that it’s been a “formal” declaration of war.
This is what people voted for, up and down the ballot. US voters put Trump at the top and yes men in the house and senate.
Vote better next time, I guess.
Congress has the power to declare war
That they fully abdicated with the 2001 AUMF, which they keep renewing specifically so they don’t have to ever make these decisions.
This is what people voted for
The people vote for candidates, not policies. And they candidates they vote for routinely talk out of both sides of their mouths. NDAAs regularly pass with overwhelming bipartisan support, even as a super-majority of Congresscritters campaign against this or that component of them.
Vote better next time, I guess.
I was told to VOTE BLUE NO MATTER WHO because there is a Cheeto In The White House. If both major parties field pro-war candidates, what’s the move?
But the underlying Pentagon leadership hasn’t significantly changed between Biden and Trump (or Bush and Trump, for that matter).
That’s not strictly true. Trump purged a lot of leadership that was loyal to the Constitution rather than personally to him.
But your overall point about the war-hawkishness remains valid.
We need to fix the voting system. ALL pacs should be banned and campaign spending should be limited.
worry not. remember this is TACO Don… he’ll chicken out again
He also said if he was president there’d be no more wars, so this obviously totally super duperly cannot happen.
It’s not a war, it’s a special military operation.
Only for a day
This comment will age poorly if he don’t.
He openly calls service members suckers and losers. I dont know that he much cares whats done with them.
Yeah, it seems fairly impossible he’ll get fully into the war, and even lending a few bunker busters would be surprising when that’s risking a blowback on American forces.
I would guess that Trump is expecting Khamenei to cave, because that’s what he’d do. Most likely, he won’t, Trump will be confused, and this will drag on and on until a regional nuclear exchange is on the table.
Who is exchanging nukes in that? Israel and who else?
Reciprocal nukes like Trump’s reciprocal tariffs.
Iran or Iran’s splinter states. They have several bombs worth of uranium that’s almost ready.
I doubt the US would get involved, and nobody else is going to for sure.
That’s the same talking point we’ve heard for decades but even US intelligence reports have said the opposite, even earlier this year. I’m sure they could create dirty bombs but that only requires nuclear power plant waste.
No, we’ve heard they have some kinda enriched stuff, some centrifuges and could maybe someday have a bomb for decades. It’s a bit less theoretical now, they’ve been gradually enriching more and more since the US broke off the agreement:
In February 2023, the IAEA reported having found uranium in Iran enriched to 84%. The Iranian government has claimed that this is an “unintended fluctuation” in the enrichment levels, though the Iranians have been openly enriching uranium to 60% purity, a breach of the 2015 nuclear deal. In 2024, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian expressed interest in reopening discussions with the United States on the nuclear deal.
They have a significant amount, too, and if I were them I would be hiding it carefully in non-obvious places where it can’t be buried by an airstrike.
Hasn’t Iran been talking about ramping up nuclear weapons production since like the end of last year? I don’t think they’re actually a nuclear capable nation but I could see them posturing like they are
Posturing is what Iran does. They’ve done that at least since the early 90s. But US intelligence services have repeatedly come to the conclusion that Iran is not ramping up production, at least based on the briefs even from a few months ago earlier this year.
Early 2000’s era nostalgia goin real hard
A-10 movement always preceeds ground deployments. They moved those to Kuwait at the end of March. This has been coming for a while, its not an unplanned thing like it appears.
