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The belief in "72 virgins" (not 52) is not a common belief amongst Muslim men. It's basically a Western misconception, likely inspired by a specific translation of Osama bin Laden's 1996 manifesto.

> and from there they can grind on for decades with no victory to anyone.

I see that as unlikely, at most they might try to temporarily secure the edges of the strait of hormuz with ground troops. Which is far a different scenario than operating 500 FOBs, huge airbases, and a giant greenzones in major cities like Iraq/Afghanistan or even Vietnam.

History is positively littered with examples of powerful empires embarking on a "quick" "easy" campaign then ends up taking years or decades.

I don't expect this administration to care about the Iranian people when it comes down to it, which is the only scenario they'd ever commit to something like that. They will likely only care about American objectives like destroying their navy/combat capabilities and make some deal with an IRGC leader to let them save face for an exit.

I thought it was 72.