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bawolff • today at 3:55 AM • 0 replies • view on HN

Its not obvious.

To be clear, im not predicting an imminent collapse.

However, countries win wars by projecting strength. Sometimes that is true, and sometimes that is bluffing. It is extremely hard to tell which is which from the outside.

We do know that Iran was looking shakey prior to this war, and that this war has taken a significant toll, especially economically.

Will that translate to something? idk. In many ways you would think that if it was going to, it would already have happened.

However i think sometimes westerners have a very america centric perspective. The costs being suffered here are pretty low for america. Price at the pump is slightly higher. America used up some of its interceptors. That is a pretty low cost. Sure american allies are getting pounded, which has long term impacts, but that is not something ordinary americans will feel. On the other hand Iranians are feeling huge costs, and the longer it goes on, the worse their bargaining position gets (e.g. people frak more, pipelines get built etc).

All this to say, i dont know what is going to happen, but the Iranian position is fragile, and gets more fragile with time. Anything could happen.