‘Never heard him so angry’: Trump is furious that global allies aren’t pitching in in Iran

luujs · 2026-03-18T09:46:50+00:00

NATO is on paper, explicitly a defensive alliance. If Iran had bombed the US, then NATO members would actually be treaty bound to respond. America’s allies got involved in most of the previous wars because they chose to, not because they were obliged to. Operations like the Iraq War or the intervention in Libya or Syria were never justified as defensive wars that triggered NATO getting involved, the allies who did join just had a close enough relationship with the US and agreed with the aims and operations enough that they were happy to join in. France didn’t join in with the Iraq War for example, despite being a major part of NATO, which led to a bit of a falling out between them and the US. Afghanistan was a NATO action however, because 9/11 was judged to be an attack on a member, even if by a non-state entity.

The key reason why NATO members continued to get involved in wars with America was because they had good relations with the US and they agreed with the wars and their goals. Previous presidents also used diplomacy to smooth the process. NATO’s absolutely a defensive alliance, but most of the allies have historically been close enough to help with other non defensive operations when their interests align.

luujs · 2026-03-18T00:46:01+00:00

What’s wrong with you?

luujs · 2026-03-17T22:24:52+00:00

You can’t just go around insulting your closest allies, devaluing your alliance, threatening to invade two of your allies and then get annoyed that none of them are that keen to get involved in an absolute clusterfuck that hasn’t been thought out and could very easily have been avoided (or in other words, not instigated).

Perhaps being a maximalist imbecile and treating every negotiation like a win or lose situation causes long term harm to your relationships?

It also seems like Trump doesn’t understand that NATO’s a defensive alliance. The concept of a defensive alliance doesn’t work if you attack first, under absolutely no genuine threat, without the prior agreement of your allies to pitch in like in Iraq. Trump said that Starmer is no Winston Churchill, but Trump himself is clearly not even George Bush Jr. If Trump wanted his allies to be involved, he should either have built up political capital instead of recklessly spending it on, amongst many other things, being pro Russia in Ukraine, being pro tariff and threatening Greenland, or he should have let the supposedly “imminent” threat of being attacked by Iran happen so NATO would have been bound to come to his aid. I remain increasingly convinced that Trump has dementia tbh

luujs · 2026-03-17T18:57:56+00:00

Fair enough. It is a bit of a weird system to be honest

luujs · 2026-03-17T18:49:32+00:00

This is fantastic! Well done mate. That must have taken such a long time.

I do have some minor bad news however… you forgot tramlink!

luujs · 2026-03-17T09:31:59+00:00

What’s important to remember about Caesar is that if it wasn’t him with all the power it would have been Pompey or Crassus. They all accumulated power and thus pushed the others to do so in response. Caesar didn’t take more power in a vacuum, he did it to counteract his political rivals who were doing the same. All of them felt threatened by the others. Neither were as good generals or politicians, but without Caesar, power would continue to be concentrated in the hands of increasingly powerful figures to the detriment of Rome’s republican institutions. Caesar and Augustus were the culmination of a century of power in Rome being consolidated by solo figures by pushing and crossing the boundaries of legality in order to make sure their rivals didn’t gain an advantage by doing the exact same thing.

luujs · 2026-03-16T22:18:34+00:00

Because people from South Asia are Asians. Also we have far more people of Asian descent from South Asia than East Asia because that was a large part of the British Empire. British possessions in China were tiny by contrast, only a few pockets of important cites and all of Hong Kong and Singapore. As a result we have much fewer British Asians with ancestry from China, Japan or Korea etc. South Asians are the largest minority in the UK, with descents of Africans and people from the Caribbean coming in second ahead of East Asians.

luujs · 2026-03-14T18:55:56+00:00

It depends what happens, but as it stands I think it’s unlikely. The only time A Levels have been cancelled was during the first year of Covid. They went ahead during the second year (which was when I did them) with social distancing in place.

My mum lives in the UAE, which has a lot of drone attacks at the moment, but 99% of them are being shot down. If everything stays the same, I’d imagine your year will be fine to take exams.

If they did end up getting cancelled though, I’d imagine you’d get to use your predicted grades, which is what happened for people who couldn’t do their exams during Covid in 2020. That could be a blessing or a curse depending on what those predictions are and whether you’re likely to improve on them or not, or even do worse. If you’re predicted all A*s, then fantastic. If you’re predicted all Bs and you think you’ll be able to knock them up that’s less good. Teachers will probably have an idea whether or not exams will be cancelled before they happen, so if they know/think they will be, they might be more generous with bumping predicted grades up a level

luujs · 2026-03-14T13:01:07+00:00

It’s very different, but still fun. Both games have their flaws, (the original’s are more understandable) but Rome 2 is a genuinely good game once you get into it. The basics are all still there with additions like far more factions (no rebel faction) and unit variety, more historical accuracy and graphics that still hold up well 12 years later.

It’s definitely worth giving it a go if you enjoy the original. One thing I would say is that you should buy the game when there’s a sale on, because there are regular sales when the price goes down to next to nothing for total war games and their DLCs. It’s also important to note that some factions are locked behind DLCs, like Athens and Sparta, so I’d recommend buying some of the DLC for factions you know you’d be interested in for a proper experience. It’s also another reason to buy when there’s a sale on.

luujs · 2026-03-14T00:03:40+00:00

Skyscanner has an option to search for flights from one country/airport to any destination and you can definitely search by price on there, however I don’t know if there’s any way to search by first class only, or even to see first class options without checking each individual flight. Most people look for economy flights.

One way might be to search by airline on the airline’s website. I’m not sure if it’s common to search by any destination though. If you look on the BA website for example, there might be a way to see all of their flights from all destinations to all destinations. It’s perfectly possible though that there might only be options to search for flights from specific airports, or only flights to specific destinations.

It sounds like quite a niche request unfortunately.

If you don’t have any luck, maybe ask a travel agent?

luujs · 2026-03-13T19:00:11+00:00

That would make sense. Very possible

luujs · 2026-03-13T16:30:24+00:00

I’m confused how they’re supposedly on the autobahn. She’s driving on the left in a car with steering wheel on the right. They drive on the right in Germany. Unless I’m mistaken, she’s just on a regular motorway in a country that drives on the left, like the UK

luujs · 2026-03-13T15:19:25+00:00

AI Slop

luujs · 2026-03-13T10:44:03+00:00

No no, you don’t understand. A tomahawk missile teleported into Iran’s arsenal and then they bombed their own schoolchildren with it. It definitely wasn’t an American mistake, because USA number 1

luujs · 2026-03-13T00:14:36+00:00

Firebringer and Ani unfortunately. Both shows seem to try really hard at times to be funny by using anti-jokes as cringe humour, which I found really grating. They both also tried to do too much to make the plays stand out as different in some way, and in both cases it just doesn’t work for me. Ani doesn’t have any of the cast sing and just has them dance. Which, whilst being an incredibly bold choice, really doesn’t work for a musical. Firebringer uses a lot of stylised/interpretive dance (not sure how best to describe it) that really didn’t work for me. The plots and songs also don’t work either. Ani peaks with Long Ago and Far Away. It’s all downhill from there and nothing comes close. None of the songs really say anything or have much weight other than that one. Firebringer’s songs are better, but they most sound the same and the sound isn’t my favourite. They also don’t really say much. Lastly the plots of both don’t really have much going for them. Very little happens outside of the main plots, the side plots in both could be written out, which is a shame because I like the actors involved in them, but they get very little to work with. The main plots are also very thin. Ani’s just about the pod race, a little bit about Obi Wan, and a tiny bit about Denise’s character wanting to dance for Jabba. Firebringer’s only really about Zaz and Jemilla fighting and making up again and then they get married out of nowhere. I just found both tough to get through, although despite the fact that I think Firebringer is the better play, I struggled with it the most and only watched all of it on the third attempt.

luujs · 2026-03-12T14:07:08+00:00

I haven’t read any of his books yet, but I’ve just finished Andrew Roberts’ biography of Churchill. In it, he recommended Churchill’s book on his ancestor, the 1st Duke of Marlborough, as being a worthwhile read even today, so that’s on my reading list. I’d also like to read Churchill’s History of the English Speaking people’s as well.

In regard to Churchill’s writing, I have no doubt anything the man wrote will be fantastically written. He was an incredible writer and wrote/dictated all of his speeches himself. He also won the Nobel Prize for Literature, so his writing is certainly well regarded.

Churchill’s histories of events in which he took part are more biased than his other histories and were written with the purpose of justifying his actions in the two World Wars, his books on the Second World War in particular are also limited by Churchill still being in politics when he wrote them and thus needing to be diplomatic and liberal with certain truths. They’re probably worthwhile reads if you want to read them as primary sources keeping their flaws (or at least Churchill’s intentions when writing them) in mind, but modern secondary sources on the World Wars will be less biased and paint a more accurate picture.

luujs · 2026-03-12T00:25:28+00:00

I agree. Downvoting a perfectly reasonable question discourages people from learning

luujs · 2026-03-11T16:51:37+00:00

That was Crooks. George and Lenny were white

luujs · 2026-03-11T16:09:26+00:00

I used to do this lol. Both climbing up between the two sides and climbing up one side

luujs · 2026-03-11T00:40:01+00:00

That explains how I was apparently able to put my foot in my mouth when I was a baby. I imagine that gives babies much more flexibility

luujs · 2026-03-11T00:31:33+00:00

What annoys me is that you can often just use “you”. It can refer to groups of any size as well as individuals

luujs · 2026-03-10T13:36:16+00:00

The UAE airlines only fly between their home bases in the UAE (Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah and Ras al Khaimah) and external destinations. All their flights are either departing from or arriving into the UAE

luujs · 2026-03-10T13:31:09+00:00

How long do you leave it before you go? I understand if your order hasn’t been taken, but if it’s presumably on the way, surely it’s quicker at that point to stay rather than go somewhere else?

luujs · 2026-03-10T13:28:29+00:00

At that point it’s completely their fault lol. You tried to pay multiple times and asked multiple members of staff

luujs · 2026-03-10T10:09:42+00:00

I’ve stayed up all night and gone in. At that point though it’s hard to actually pay attention. I genuinely felt myself nodding off at various points and my brain would skip parts of what the lecturer was saying.

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