[arkensaw]

Trump casually talks about destroying the energy infrastructure, power plants, desalination plants etc. This is one of the most controversial things that the Russians do in Ukraine - attack the grid when it's cold to try and freeze people to death. To willingly deprive a country of 100,000,000 people of water and power coming into summer would surely be a war-crime.

[JumpCrisscross]

> This is one of the most controversial things that the Russians do in Ukraine - attack the grid when it's cold to try and freeze people to death

But the Russians have been doing it. Iran may have targeted an Israeli power plant. The precedent, unfortunately, is set.

[scott_w]

They have and Ukraine haven’t surrendered (nor do they look like they will any time soon), so I don’t see how it wit k a in Iran.

[JumpCrisscross]

> and Ukraine haven’t surrendered

Different goals. Carpet bombing to deny Iran access to its coast is maneouvre warfare. It’s tactical. Carpet bombing to force Kyiv to capitulate is strategic bombing. It has never worked.

[ImPostingOnHN]

You can't deny access to a coast that large with carpet bombing, especially in a mountainous terrain. It has never worked. You'd need tens to hundreds of thousands of boots on the ground to do that.

If you wanted to try it with bombs, it would take continual re-dropping of hundreds of thousands of bombs every few hours to cover (1600km * 8km) to keep people out, even assuming they have 0 shelter or cover.

[JumpCrisscross]

> can't deny access to a coast that large with carpet bombing, especially in a mountainous terrain. It has never worked. You'd need tens to hundreds of thousands of boots on the ground to do that

I think this is more an open question than “it has never worked.” Nobody has tried to area deny FPV-drone navigators. Bases on lines of sight and line channels, one could probably back out from transit paths to the places one would need to be to hit that target, and then ensure anything there is turned from psychology to biology before a critical moment. You couldn’t do this with smart munitions, and couldn’t along the entire Hormuz coast. But for critical junctures that our closest allies (minus Kuwait) need to export? The math seems feasible, if fundamentally untackled.

[ImPostingOnHN]

> I think this is more an open question than “it has never worked.”

I don't think so – we were talking about continually carpet bombing Iran to continually deny them access to a 1600km-long coastline. That simply has never worked. Not in Iran, not elsewhere to my knowledge.

> Bases on lines of sight and line channels, one could probably back out from transit paths to the places one would need to be to hit that target

That describes pretty much anywhere in the 7000+ square kilometers we're talking about. A drone doesn't need a runway. Anywhere you can fit a large pickup truck, you can launch a Shaheed drone.

> Nobody has tried to area deny FPV-drone navigators.

I'm not sure what you're saying here. Deny the area to Iran's FPV drones? If so, how? Use FPV drones to deny the area? If so, how? We're talking about continually patrolling 7,000+ square kilometers. The USA has never fielded such a system, and has no publicly known capabilities to do so.

[scott_w]

I don’t see how they’ll have different results, just because the aim is different. You just… take cover. Then come back once the planes fly away and continue what you were doing.

[pjc50]

Iran already had severe water problems. Attacking the water infrastructure would definitely cause huge civilian casualties. Israel is used to that. Not clear whether America is ready to go into the midterms with an official policy of US-flagged genocide.

[don_esteban]

There has been (I think) relatively minor hits. And Iran has retaliated in kind (see the latest hit on Kuwaiti desalination plant).

The thing is that while Iran's water infrastructure is vulnerable, the Gulf states are much more reliant on desalination ... and hitting them hard there would be a total disaster ... which Iran is capable of doing, but has so far refrained.

[JumpCrisscross]

> Attacking the water infrastructure would definitely cause huge civilian casualties

I personally think there is a wide barrier between electrical and water infrastructure. But given water infra has allegedly been hit already, it doesn’t feel like it’s off the table for both sides the way it once was.