An eerie quiet hangs over Ras Al Khaimah’s industrial port. Usually a thriving maritime hub of the United Arab Emirates, now ships stand docked and silent. Not far out along the hazy horizon, a backlog of hundreds of tankers have lined up in recent days, halted along a waterway flooded with danger.
Any vessel heading past Ras Al Khaimah out to the Arabian Sea must traverse the world’s most treacherous strip of water for shipping today: the strait of Hormuz. Just over 20 nautical miles from Ras Al Khaimah, two oil tankers heading for the strait were attacked by Iranian missiles this week, one catching fire.
It is one of the many consequences facing Gulf states as they are pulled deeper into a war that they did not start and had diplomatically tried to prevent.
For decades, Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar and Oman have allowed US military bases, infrastructure or access on their soil, and have been among the largest buyers of American weapons and technology. In return, the US has stood as the Gulf’s closest and most significant military partner and protector.
But now, Gulf states have growing concerns over the relationship, analysts say, after Donald Trump was seen to wilfully torpedo peaceful diplomatic negotiations in favour of starting a war in the Middle East.
The Gulf states and the Saudis didn’t start the war, but they have long been lobbying for an attack on Iran. They just didn’t want their military personnel in the line of fire. They’re either useless or, in the case of Saudi, too busy committing genocide against Yemenis.
Also in the case of the Saudis also useless. I think the only competent Arab states are Oman and Jordan. As I understand it Yemen is too fractured to really be counted one way or another, even I am tempted to add them to the list.
Those countries have been directly funding Donald Trump and are all littered with American bases. They are absolutely involved.
I met several US Navy servicemen when I was living there.
As someone who grew up in Dubai I want to tell them to go fuck themselves. They made their bed, now sleep on it.
I’d submit their beds were made using slaves.
And I hope they require a cloud connection and it is severed, meaning they will overheat and their angle will be uncomfortable.
I hate to say this but as a former US military officer I am 100% behind Iran. The Mango Mussolini started Operation Epstein Fury as a distraction and the buzzards need to come home to roost. I am sorry people are getting killed but Iran is not going to stop now that their leader and 180 little girls have been killed.
These “Epstein Files” are just a distraction from the real intent of what’s going on over there.
Protection for Petro dollar oil dies here. Trump is destroying American dominance on the world stage, it’s wild to see.
Petro dollar is worthless.
It’s been replaced with the pedo dollar, do try to keep up.
Maybe stop allowing America to use your country as bases to terrorize and control your neighbors?
They fucking love America. How do you think they can move $100 million cargo ships full of oil around on a daily basis!
You were talking about a bunch of dictatorships that use their Neighbor slave labor to suck oil out of the ground and concentrate trillions of dollars in the hands of a few people
Seriously tho 🤣 Iran bombed the fuck out of them and now they can’t sell oil. Sorry I can’t find my compassion for the petrostate dictators. May they lose all their ill gotten gains.
Let me cry crocodile tears and play the worlds smallest violin for the poor lil ole petrol states
So the middle east countries paid top dollar to get the US ‘president’ to do all the things they wanted, and he ended up screwing every single one of them. When you get in bed with trump, he will eventually shit the bed, and you will have to lie in it with him. You deserve the stupid choice you made.
They got in bed with a rational USA, and the USA shat out Trump and ruined the world.
Didn’t they give him a plane or something?
No they got into bed with Trump. He has mucho dinero from the Gulf nations.
The reason that every other US president has ruled out war with Iran is exactly because of this tactic. It takes a group of really ignorant, egotistical, and foolhardy leaders to melt through the layers of decision making that underlie such a course of action.
The more Trump screams on social media and Hegseth bully pulpits while whining about media coverage, the worse this war is going. Look for more avoidable Air Force and Navy incidents, more dead American soldiers, and a civilian bloodbath that will take decades to unravel the implications of.
Fuck the Americans involved in this war,nobody asked them to join the army and they’re aware who and why they are fighting for
Joining the US military is just signing up to murder brown people at the direction of the oil industry and war profiteers. Been the way for at least half a century.
“I was a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism”.
-Smedley Butler, 1935
That’s not very class conscious of you.
why
why don’t the rich join the army
In a society where higher education is paywalled, I can’t look down on people who use the military to get pass the paywall.
Then again, these are the same trolls killing migrants for trying to pursue a better life.
You would if they killed your daughter while she was at school
Fuck em. They can read, they know what this leadership is.
What if they signed up before the current regime came to power?
When Dick Cheney was making the world safe for Halliburton? Yeah, there’s no comfort there.
This goes way before the “current” regime https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_war_crimes
You think the US military was out there distributing flowers before Trump came along? They’re all scum.
If you want to debate foreign policy, great. But “othering” and dehumanizing an entire group of people isn’t a serious argument. It’s the Russia/GOP playbook.
And the fact this is so heavily upvoted says more about the state of lemmy than it does about the people you’ve never met, yet seemingly hate so much.
If you want to debate foreign policy
The fuck you want me to debate? There’s no room for debating the morality of US foreign policy (which is 99% evil), which should be clear to anyone not willfully ignorant. Therefore, there’s only one non-scum course of action to take, and that is to get the hell out. Their ongoing cooperation with the US war machine makes them scum.
But “othering” and dehumanizing an entire group of people isn’t a serious argument.
I never dehumanized US soldiers; I simply called them scum, for the same reason most people would agree WWII Wehrmacht soldiers were scum.
the people you’ve never met, yet seemingly hate so much.
Do I need to have met Hitler to hate him? What about Netanyahu? Maybe Putin is actually a good person under all the death and destruction?
Only possible valid defense.
I’ll cut a tiny bit of slack to the 9/11 sign-ups, it was harder to fact-check the various lies coming from the feds.
Not only that but if it wasnt for the US military then Russia would control Ukraine and would be advancing into Europe.
Or China would have already invaded Taiwan.
Or North Korea would control South Korea.
The problem here isn’t the US military. It’s the leadership.
But the foreign bots brigading lemmy want the US military weaker so those nations can advance their geopolitical goals.
Not only that but if it wasnt for the US military then Russia would control Ukraine and would be advancing into Europe.
Ah yes, tell us more about the USA soldiers fighting in Ukraine. Oh wait, there are none. Not a soldier, not a plane, not a ship. Well, not anything manned by any 'murican, but lots of USA arms sold to them, as well as lots of European arms.
Or China would have already invaded Taiwan.
The current war against Iran can give China a golden opportunity to invade, since USA can get bogged down significantly in the Middle East again. Go USA!
Not to mention that Taiwan is strategically important to a lot of other countries due to its “silicon shield”, being the single largest manufacturer of processors in the world. For a number of years now, an invasion could trigger an actual global conflict, even if, for all intents and purposes, such invasion came as another step in a “civil war”.
Or North Korea would control South Korea.
Nah, they may have a larger standing army and can definitely destroy Seoul within minutes due to the capital being less than 40km away from the DMZ, but they know that, without big help on their side, they can’t actually “win”. I doubt China would help them, since South Korea is an important market for them.
The problem here isn’t the US military. It’s the leadership.
Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Nicaragua, Colombia, Philippines, Iran and other countries would like a word with the “leadership”.
But the foreign bots brigading lemmy want the US military weaker so those nations can advance their geopolitical goals.
Oh no, why would people dislike the evil empire that has done a lot of evil and see it crumble? Clearly it must be bots working for the other countries!
That’s a leadership problem just like I said.
Every country has a military.
What exactly did the US military do to prevent Russia from progressing their invasion in Ukraine? If anything, this administration has done anything possible to allow Russia to progress, which despite their effort, they don’t seem to be able to on a larger scale.
Supply weapons, labor and funding and got European nations to do the same. This was before Trump became president.
You’re aware that this was not the military, but the USA as a country? The military does not get to decide how to spend money, or where to deliver weapons.
The existence of the US military is a prerequisite for the development and manufacturing of those weapons. The US military trained Ukrainians on weapons use and tactics and shared intel. Some even became contractors to join the fight.
Other than that it sounds like you agree with me that this is a leadership problem.
Every single one of you were buddy buddy with Trump to America’s detriment. I don’t give a single shit what happens to you.
The beatings will continue until America is great again. Apparently the strategy is to lower the bar on what “great” means by dragging the entire rest of then world down.
Are the Europeans learning the lesson?
right and when are they going to say “thank you”.
This is possibly the one thing that will get Cheeto to pay attention. OPEC oil boys getting mad
Not after he declares himself Acting President of Iran
You lie down with dogs, you get fleas.
If you don’t like being a target, get the US bases out.
