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According to the mainstream media, leftists, and Trump critics (which are 90 percent all the same people), the U.S. military’s precision drone strike on Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani could lead to catastrophic world war.

“Extremely dangerous and serious” is how Jeremy Corbyn the UK’s leader of the Labour Party (who recently lost in a humongous landslide election there) put it.

Ok, so we probably pissed off Iran — no surprise there. But if they decided to go head-to-head with the U.S. in battle, would it be a fair UFC bout?

Yeah, no.

Let’s look at the stats.

 

Granted, actual confirmed numbers are hard to come by, but according to Business Insider, here’s how the military forces stack up, according to estimates.

The U.S. has just over 2 million personnel compared to around 900,000 in Iran. So they’ve got a lot of boots comparatively, but we’ve got a helluva lot more stuff.

Iran has a total aircraft strength of 509 compared to 13,398 for the U.S. We’ve got 2,363 fighter aircraft. They have 142.

We have 24 aircraft carriers. They have….zero.

Business Insider’s stats come from Global Firepower, an organization which annually puts together a proprietary “Global Firepower” index for 137 countries. Their calculations take into account 55 different factors to come up with the ranking.

 

Their factors:

Don’t rely solely on the total number of weapons available, but also focus on weapon “diversity” – ok, that makes sense but it just feels like SUCH a buzzword right now.
> Consider total available manpower.
> Don’t take into account nuclear weapons, but countries suspected of having them get a bonus. (so that’s kinda weird, because if you DO have nuclear weapons and actually use them, you could make everything else a moot point, right?)
> Consider whether or not the countries are First, Second or Third World (arguably subjective?)
> Look at geographical factors, resources and other logistical supply considerations.
> Don’t penalize landlocked nations for lack of a standing navy, but naval powers are penalized if they don’t have “diversity.” (Again).
> Give NATO allies get a bonus because they theoretically get to share costs.
Consider financial stability.
> And the final amusing one: current political/military leadership is NOT taken into account.

 

So based on this calculation, the United States is far and away NUMBAH ONE. Iran is…14. No offense to Italy, but ITALY ranks higher than Iran (at number 11).

The top three powers are the U.S., Russia and China, and according to the Power Index ranking, they’re not far apart.

So the question isn’t whether the U.S. could totally whup Iran’s butt from a military firepower standpoint; the question is, would Russia and/or China want to help the Iranians along? And can they afford to?

Here’s another way to look at this problem. According to Investopedia, the U.S. has a GDP of $20.5 trillion. China is second at $13 trillion. Russia is only $1.6 trillion. Iran? $439 billion. That’s about the size of…Maryland.

We’ll soon find out what’s most important to America’s foes.

 

 

 

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