The fatwa against nukes was as I see it just a shield for them to build up the infrastructure to make one if they had to, thing is they lack the balls to push to the end. As far as I know Iran still has nuclear latency but for the life of me i cant figure out why they dont just push to the end yet.
That's what we all thought until a certain chain of events started to happen. Personally, I lost hope when Iran agreed to sign the JCPOA. The JCPOA made it clear to me that Iran was not going to build nukes. I still had some hope left out of extreme optimism, but when Trump pulled out of JCPOA and they killed Soleimani and all Iran did was a symbolic retaliation, I realized there would be no Iranian nuclear weapon.
The problem with Iran's nuclear program right now is that our fissile material has been buried deep under Natanz and Fordow. Not only it is next to impossible to access it on short notice because of high radiation in there, also with 24/7 satellite surveillance and the US air superiority over Iran, but even if we do, we still lack critical components of a nuclear weapons program, most importantly a uranium conversion facility. And that is based on the assumption that Iran is already in possession of a working design, which could very well be false.
Building up an airforce under sanctions is almost impossible, Russia backed out of giving their planes, China flat out rejected them and obviously no Western or Westernpuppet state like Pakistan would wanna deal with the repercussions. Drones and missiles was the only possible solution for projection but I agree they shouldvve focused more heavily in air defences rather than just mOuNtAiNS and absorbing blows.
The sanctions started to bite in 2006 onwards. When the Iraq-Iran war ended, Iran had 17 years to rearm itself and invest in R&D. Russia itself sold Iran RD-33 engines during the presidency of Khatami. But most importantly, why did Iran get in this mess in the first place? Well, because Iran decided to invest in a useless nuclear program while chanting "Death to America" and "Death to Israel" every Friday.
Forward defence was a good strategy but it all fell apart with Bashars fall. it still is smart if you look at it. If israel wasnt distracted by Hamas within and Hezbollah at its borders this war would be a whole lot different.
I have said it before, and I will reiterate again even if people don't believe me or laugh at me, but this whole October 7 thing was carefully planned and executed by the US, Israel, Arabs and Turkey to drag Iran and its network of militias into a regional war.
When people here were cheering October 7, I told them that Hamas did it because Turkey and Arabs wanted to go after Iran and we were the primary target. People, of course, laughed at me and I know it's a conspiracy theory but I haven't changed my mind about it one iota since then.