Bulletins and News Discussion from April 28th to May 4th, 2025 - Competent Fascism? - COTW: El Salvador

Image is from the Britannica article on CECOT, known as the Terrorism Confinement Center in English.

This megathread's topic is inspired by our lovely news regular, @Frogmanfromlake@hexbear.net, who talks often about the conditions inside El Salvador and gives nuanced and informative takes.

As the Trump administration continues to make foreign policy blunders that would make even the staunchest anti-imperialist accelerationist blush - and we are barely three months in! - it's interesting to compare and contrast his policies of incompetent imperialist and domestic management to the dictators in other countries.

Bukele is somewhat unique among fascists, in that he seems to not hide - and seems to even admit to - his evil, self-describing as the world's "coolest dictator". El Salvador has no particular shortage of prominent fascists in their history, but one major example is Maximiliano Martínez, who led the country over much of the 1930s and the early 1940s. He was responsible the deaths of many thousands of communists and indigneous people, and yet joined World War 2 on the side of the Allies and against the Nazis.

The comparisons between Martínez and Bukele - and, indeed, between Bukele and Trump - in terms of their impact on minority groups are slowly growing as world attention is being drawn to the country. The recent meeting between Bukele and Trump has shifted a spotlight onto El Salvador's crime policy; the internal conditions of El Salvador's prisons are genuinely monstrous. One gets a similar feeling as when reading descriptions of the conditions of Holocaust victims in German concentration camps. Trump has made statements to the effect that he want a similar crime crackdown inside the United States, and I certainly believe that he wants this (ICE is already just kidnapping people off the streets into vans), but his administration has been so chaotic and mismanaged that it's difficult to determine whether this will be an interest he rapidly drops in favor of some other hair-brained scheme.

Last week's thread is here. The Imperialism Reading Group is here.

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Big news from Iran, with the suspension of negotiations between the USA and Iran. Iran has unveiled a new Anti Ship Ballistic Missile (ASBM) called the Qassem Basir. This is the ASBM version of the land attack Haj Qassem ballistic missile, with a range of 1400km for the land attack version, Iran claims a range of either 1200km or 1300km for the anti ship version (conflicting information currently). Yes, these missiles are named after Qassem Soleimani. This is big news as the current longest range dedicated ASBM in the Iranian arsenal (and potentially Yemeni arsenal) is the Zulfiqar Basir, with a range of 700km, so we're looking at nearly double the range.
Qassem Basir ASBM variant:
View of the target in the bottom half of the image from the missile's electro-optical seeker:
Haj Qassem land attack original variant:

Now, the Zulfiqar, Dezful, and Qassem missiles are all part of the same family of ballistic missiles (which I will call the Zulfiqar family), in that they all use a Maneuverable Re-entry Vehicle (MaRV) of similar design, with Dezful and Qassem being ways to extend the range of the Zulfiqar MaRV, from 700km, to 1000km with Dezful, to 1400km with Qassem. With an ASBM version of Zulfiqar already in existence, it makes sense to use the Qassem as a longer range ASBM platform.
How this missile works and acquires it's target is similar to how other Iranian shorter range ASBMs work, and an extension of the Pershing-II concept (first ever MaRV equipped land attack ballistic missile). The missile is targeted at an appropriate re-entry point, near the actual or predicted location of a ship. During re-entry, the MaRV performs a "pull up" maneuver, then a "glide phase". During this glide, the electro optical seeker, likely an infrared camera, acquires it's target using image matching techniques (Iran calls this AI now, yes the AI mind virus is everywhere), and them plans a trajectory towards it, before performing a final dive to the target, ideally with an impact velocity above Mach 2.
The big breakthrough here is getting the seeker to survive the higher speed and higher altitude re-entry associated with longer range. The Zulfiqar Basir had a burnout and initial terminal velocity of over Mach 7, and the Raad-500/Tankeel of Mach 8. So that was the previous limit. The land attack Haj Qassem had a peak velocity of Mach 12. With the range being reduced slightly for the anti ship version, likely to reduce velocity to ensure survival of the electro optical seeker, peak velocity is likely not as high. But I'd guess a safe estimate is that the seeker can now survive Mach 10+ speeds, a noticeable improvement.
Iran has unveiled this very covertly, under the guise of a "new missile to target Israel and evade THAAD", but the Basir designation (means to see or perceive in this context, used for Iranian ballistic missiles with electro-optical seekers,), and presence of an electro-optical (likely infrared) seeker on the MaRV, tells a different story. This is an ASBM that works in the same ways as other Iranian ASBMs. Yes it can be used to strike land targets in Israel with higher accuracy in GNSS jammed environments (like shorter range Iranian missiles have done in the past versus US military bases, but now at long range versus Israel, solving the accuracy problem for long range Iranian ballistic missile attacks), but that's a dual use capability that could make a hypothetical "Operation True Promise III" counterforce attack more viable in future. The real question for now is, if Ansarallah/the Houthis in Yemen will get their hands on it.
This is a card that Iran has had up it's sleeve and is now being played, the question is, how will they play it. Exclusively for themselves, or will Yemen get it to strike US Navy warships. Without further modifications to increase range involving lighter payloads and suboptimal minimum energy trajectories, it's not viable to hit targets in Israel from Yemen (2000km range is needed for that), and I can't see the electro optical sensor surviving re-entry under those conditions.
4 minute long video is included in the article:
Iran unveils its latest ballistic missile 'Qassem Basir', May 4 2025
- This probably gets used as a negotiation chip. Give us a better deal or some.of these might fall off the truck in Yemen.
  
  There's a joke in here about missiles rolling of the truck to Yemen, and more F-18 rolling off of US aircraft carriers as a result, but I'm not a good enough comedian to do it.
  
  ~~Girl~~ Truman, you looks good, won't you back that ~~azz~~ ship up (another several hundred kilometers from Yemen)?
  You'se a fine ~~motherfucker~~ aircraft carrier, won't you back that ~~azz~~ ship up (another several hundred kilometers from Yemen)?
  https://youtu.be/KoHLOcsCJzQ
  
  I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
  yewtu.be
  inv.nadeko.net
  yt.artemislena.eu
  piped.video
  
  Publicly unveiling it on Iranian satellite TV definitely reads like a bargaining chip of sorts (the missile was tested on April 17th apparently). The clearest information we have on the US offer to Iran at the moment is from a Witkoff Fox News interview: restriction of Iranian uranium enrichment levels to 3.67% (current level is 60%), and some form of restriction on the Iranian ballistic missile program with regards to longer range missiles. This is a big middle finger to that second part, unveiling an ASBM in the medium range ballistic missile (MRBM) range category, 1000-3000km range. Also a missile with the potential accuracy for counterforce targeting at land targets at those ranges, which is the current biggest issue with Iranian MRBMs (Kheibar Shekan and Fattah-1 series). The Qassem is likely easier to intercept than those, but it's still a MaRV equipped ballistic missile, and if fired in sufficient numbers should be able to penetrate the Israeli air defence system.
  There are countermeasures that can be used against electro-optical seekers on cruise and ballistic missiles to protect high value targets (see smoke generators at Kerch bridge, the bridge that connects Russia to Crimea), but it's impractical to deploy then everywhere.
  
  I just don't understand why Iran would ever seriously consider these offers 😭 unless they're playing pretend, to buy time
  
  Because if Iran takes further steps to develop a nuclear weapon, it in effect acts as an open invitation for the USA to bomb Iran. Iran does not want that. So by leaving nuclear weapons as an issue open to negotiation, Iran hopes to extract some concessions (sanctions relief, aspects like the ballistic missile programme not being a part of the deal) using the bargaining chips of increased uranium enrichment and more missiles to extract these concessions.
  
  it's almost analogous to Israel's Nuclear Ambiguity doctrine. Don't outright smash the big red button, but seductively trace your finger around it to keep the big players in check without having to subscribe to the responsibilities or political risks of becoming an official nuclear power.
  
  Difference is Israel has nuclear warheads and ICBMs, and Iran does not. But good point on the ambiguity doctrine, that's very true.

773 comments