Thread by @AliaGvR

Reporting from inside Tehran #Iran from respected US-Iranian colleague:

"I've been watching the funeral procession for assassinated military leader Qassem Soleimani, killed on orders of President Donald Trump as he was arriving for a meeting with Iraqi authorities in Baghdad...

...there are some indications that do not bode well for American and Western interests, at least as they are currently perceived.

The Iranian response to the funeral was unexpected. President Trump stated that folks in Tehran would celebrate Mr. Soleimani's death. Hardly...

The number of mourners in Tehran was in the multi-millions, and overwhelmed all preparations for the funeral procession. Estimates of between 6 to 10 million in Tehran, with hundreds of thousands to millions in other cities where there have been processions (Ahwaz, Mahed, Qom).

...There was much sadness in the crowd and some anger. Unfortunately for Trump the assassination triggered a cultural concept very close to the center of Shia Islam: martyrdom. Indeed, Gen Soleimani is reported to have said that above else he would want to die as a martyr for...

...his country. President Trump gave him his wish, and perhaps now he might be wishing he hadn't.

We've already seen some immediate responses. Perhaps most important so far, the Iraqi national legislature has passed a measure calling for the US to leave Iraq.

...Trump is saying he won't go and that he will impose draconian sanctions on Iraq if they insist. He is also saying he won't leave until Iraq pays the US for an air base the US built there. Should the US be forced to leave Iraq, it would be a major development favoring Iran...

...It would give the Iranians a land line from Iran to the Mediterranean through Iraq and Syria.

Moreover, the drones used to assassinate Soleimani were launched from the massive US military base in Qatar. The Qatari foreign minister appeared in Tehran immediately after the...

...assassination, the purpose of which visit has not be publicly divulged. It seems he came to offer an apology for the Americans' actions, which may signal another crack in the US ability to project military power into the Middle East.

...Trump is altering the US role in the world in a manner that no one else could. He's presented to the world an unappealing view of a ignorant, stupid, schoolyard bully who's manifestly deficient. That caricature is being assumed to be the national characteristic of Americans...

...individually.

It appears that no leader personally can stomach the President, who apparently is the butt of jokes even in polite company.

...Trump's actions are disassembling and destroying the foreign policy apparatus that for decades allowed the US to bully foreign governments in the region; he has created blowback of EPIC proportions.

...It is going to be a difficult time: the region will have to find its own way without US support. But ask yourself: Is the world better off because of the invasion of Afghanistan 18 years ago? Of Iraq 17 years ago? And, by the way, how did that Vietnam thing turn out?

I think folks, even in the US, are finally realizing that even good intentions are not sufficient to justify the spillage of blood and squandering of money that the US has tolerated over the past 50 years or so."

[Note: this friend was an Interpol lawyer.]

End.