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.
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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.
Only idiots are excited about wars.
Sounds like the perfect time for Canada, Greenland/Denmark and Panama to launch their preemptive strike and ensure regime change and eliminate US WMD.
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.
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.
We need to fix the voting system. ALL pacs should be banned and campaign spending should be limited.
And again we see old incompetent white men starting another war.
A society goes to shit when old men start wars whose conflict they know they shall never fight in
Nice one.
Chicken Hawks who wouldn’t go when they were called, but will happily send everyone else’s children to die for their oil.
As soon as HitlerPig starts his war, he’ll call for a draft. There is no way my son will fight in a MAGA War.
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.
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Or 50x the chances for hijinx, depending on your angle.
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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.
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.
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.
Search “Altlantic Trident 25”
Yeah we’re gonna use like 1 tanker for that, 2 on a busy day. The 28 others are going somewhere else
Under rated comment— is planned excercise in Finland it seems although they don’t mention tankers so who knows
This is not part of that, these tankers are escorting fighters to the middle east
That article is talking about tankers deployed from their European bases.
read the article
“Over the past hours, at least 20 tankers took off from various bases across Europe—including Prestwick (UK), Morón (Spain), and Ramstein (Germany)—to support what can now be confirmed as a large-scale redeployment of U.S. fighter jets to the Middle East.”
~~Yes, and the OP article is talking about tankers going across the Atlantic. So these are two separate things. (Maybe related things, but neither article connects the two)
I personally found no source relating then, but I may not know what to search for.~~
Edit: I see now that the OP did list those as airbase where tankers landed after crossing the Atlantic.
Well, so much for peace talks.
When you are 0/2 why go for 3…
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.
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.
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
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.
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US is going to be bankrupt by the time he is done his second term.
I mean, that’s just on brand for him. If anything, he has shown a talent for bankrupcy.
Early 2000’s era nostalgia goin real hard
