And then the Iranians got real real mad, and then the Iranians fired ballistic missiles at a US base in Iraq and kinda missed on purpose but not really, and The Troops stationed there were unscathed but got brain damage from being so close to the blast, and then it turned out the US and Iran were communicating through a Swiss back channel to arrange a "proportionate" counter-response to each other, and then Trump tweeted that everything was fine, and the libs got mad he didn't immediately invade Iran over what amounted to Havana Syndrome for The Troops and then everything got buried over COVID?

That was pretty fucked up when you think about it

EDIT: Oh YEAH -- AND THEN the Iranians got real paranoid and on high alert and ended up shooting down one of their own airliners on accident the same day, in a sick sort of mirroring of the USS Vincennes incident

  • Rixuyo [any]
    ·
    2 years ago

    Do you have a source on that back channel arrangement? First time I hear of it.

    • Straight_Depth [they/them]
      ·
      2 years ago

      The first I read it was on the Guardian and the BBC -- I cannot for the life of me find the articles that mentioned this, but this NYT retrospective does mention the Swiss diplomatic channel the two countries used to talk to each other in the aftermath of the strike:

      But the United States also sent secret messages through Swiss intermediaries urging Iran not to respond so forcefully that Mr. Trump would feel compelled to go even further. After it did respond, firing 16 missiles at bases housing American troops without hurting anyone as a relatively harmless show of force, a message came back through the Swiss saying that would be the end of its reprisal for now. The message, forwarded to Washington within five minutes after it was received, persuaded the president to stand down.