Thoughts on the Iran Situation

What are we doing?

Last year I wrote an essay called “Inshallah, Field Marshall Trump Shall Drive the Blob Into the Sea” where I expressed quite a lot of exuberance about the first week of the Trump administration, comparing his flurry of action to a blitzkrieg assault and expressing my optimism for US foreign policy based on a number of personnel choices. I suspect I had a bit of a case of “senshōbyō” (victory disease) or "siegshysterie" (victory hysteria) that tends to infect people after a string of smashing victories which gave me some rose tinted glasses.

I have been meaning to revisit that piece in light of the rather wild first year of Trump 2.0 that seems more like a decade. I was waiting, in part, because I wanted to see what happened with the Iran situation, and it seems it was wise to do so. I am still contemplating what to say about that piece, in part because it seems that the framework I was operating in was to some degree incorrect. It seems that in some sense Trump has transcended the previous restrainer vs blob primacist paradigm. So, while I was wrong, the manner in which I was wrong was not what I had thought possible at the time.

In the meantime, I have a few thoughts on the current war.

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The war just started and lots of things are very unclear. Perhaps one of the most unclear things is what exactly the objective of this war is.

Various people in the administration have said vague things about Iran’s nuclear weapons program, talked about its conventional weapons industry, its navy, terrorism, and IED production. I watched Pete Hegseth’s press conference on Monday and found it perfectly clear as mud, not helped by his annoying combative stance with the press, which may be warranted at times, but in this situation just seemed like blatant evasion and deflection.

Perhaps the “clearest”, a word I use loosely here, response came from the White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt when she responded to Matt Walsh’s criticism/confusion about the situation.

“So far we’ve heard that although we killed the whole Iranian regime, this was not a regime change war. And although we obliterated their nuclear program, we had to do this because of their nuclear program,” Walsh posted on social media on Monday morning.

“And although Iran was not planning any attacks on the US, they also might have been, depending on who you ask. And although we are not fighting this war to free the Iranian people, they are now free, or might be, depending on who seizes power, and we have no idea who that will be. The messaging on this thing is, to put it mildly, confused,” concluded the Daily Wire host.

Leavitt replied the objectives were:

Destroy the Iranian regime’s missiles and raze their missile industry to the ground.

Annihilate the Iranian regime’s Navy.

Ensure the regime’s terrorist proxies can no longer destabilize the region or the world and attack our forces.

Stop them from making and using IEDs or roadside bombs, which have gravely wounded and killed thousands and thousands of people, including many Americans.

Guarantee that Iran can NEVER obtain a nuclear weapon.

Preventing this radical regime and its terrorist leaders from threatening America and our core national security interests is a clear-eyed and necessary objective.

This all makes little sense to me in terms of how it will be accomplished.

1. In particular, the missile comments are befuddling. Hegseth said something in his presser to the effect that Iran was building up a shield of conventional weapons to protect their nuclear weapons program when they rebuild it.
   
   These missiles, combined with Iran’s drone program, which, I would point out was at the cutting edge when the Ukraine War started to the point that Russia imported large numbers of them and then began to churn them out in droves domestically under license, are Iran’s main way of defending itself. The idea that they would give this up is rather ludicrous. They would be completely and absolutely at the mercy of the US and Israel.
   
   But also, unlike a nuclear enrichment program, a conventional weapons industry is not really something that can so easily be wiped out. Short of de-industrializing Iran, aka bombing it back into the Stone Age, I have no idea how razing the missile industry to the ground is somehow a long term solution to anything.

2. Regarding the navy, it is my understanding that the true naval threat that Iran poses stems from small craft and drones, not its surface fleet, which was always likely to be quite vulnerable in the confines of the Persian Gulf anyway. And such a threat is not easily sunk due to its small and dispersed nature.

3. Iran’s proxies across the Shia Crescent plus Yemen seemed to be pretty beaten down over the last few years. But it is not clear how their threat would be totally eliminated. The failed bombing campaign against the Houthis in Yemen demonstrates this. Also, if the air war against the Houthis failed, how would an air war against the much better equipped Iran be likely to succeed?

4. Stop IED production? What? IEDs can be made in someone’s garage. This seems like just a red herring to draw association to US soldiers being killed in Iraq. We couldn’t stop the production of IEDs even when we had hundreds of thousands of troops in Iraq. Just nonsense.

5. Again, other than wrecking Iran and turning it into a Mad Max-style wasteland, I have no clue how any state could be prevented from acquiring a nuclear weapon for all time.

6. How was the regime threatening America and what core national security interests were at stake?

I just have no idea what the end goal is here. There is a lot of talk about the Iranians rising up. That has not yet materialized, and there is not one single incident in history where a bombing campaign led to regime overthrow. Firebombing German and Japanese cities failed to achieve this. Usually, such bombings rather inspire a rally around the flag effect, and there was some evidence of this during the 12 day war last year. It seems that identifying one’s political movement to an outside state bombing your country, especially if that state is Israel, is not a recipe for popular success. (Notably, this association with foreign powers is part of the reason why liberalism is essentially dead and discredited in Russia, see this EJW piece.)

I doubt Trump is paying him much heed, seeing the way he brushed off the Venezuelan political exiles, but the exiled Shah-pretender is of course trying to rally support and claiming that the people are ready to act. On the other hand, Trump has said a lot about this being the time for a popular uprising, so who knows.

To that, I would point to Machiavelli:

And it does not appear to me to be foreign to this subject to discuss among other matters how dangerous a thing it is to believe those who have been driven out of their country…

It ought to be considered, therefore, how vain are the faith and promises of those who find themselves deprived of their country. For, as to their faith, it has to be borne in mind that anytime they can return to their country by other means than yours, they will leave you and look to the other, notwithstanding whatever promises they had made you. As to their vain hopes and promises, such is the extreme desire in them to return home, that they naturally believe many things that are false and add many others by art, so that between those they believe and those they say they believe, they fill you with hope, so that relying on them you will incur expenses in vain, or you undertake an enterprise in which you ruin yourself.

A Prince, therefore, ought to go slowly in undertaking an enterprise upon the representations of an exile, for most of the times he will be left either with shame or very grave injury.

Is the entire operation relying on the hope that people will just swarm to the streets and overthrow the hated government? That seems fanciful.

People like John Hulsman have noted that revolutions generally only succeed when mid-level elites in key government departments, specifically those with access to weapons and armories, switch sides and crack open the stockpiles and hand out weapons. There is no evidence of this happening as of now.

On the other hand, younger Iranian people are very secular and atheism is running rampant throughout the literal revolutionary theocratic state, which is quite an irony. But, even if the youth don’t rally around the flag very much without elite defection it seems any revolution is not going to have much success.

The other issue with regime change assumes that the Iranian regime is the main source of problems, rather than clashing security interests that exist separate from regime type.

This is where Israel comes in. Would Israel be fine and happy if Iran magically transformed into a Western-style constitutional monarchy overnight? No, it would not. Because Iran’s capabilities would only increase, not decrease as time went on. Iran would become more wealthy and likely be buying lots of advanced weapon systems from America. This means that its power potential would increase, not decrease.

Israel seems to prefer that its regional neighbors fall into one of two categories. Pliant US vassal, or weak dysfunctional wreck. But even the vassal status is not really a long term guarantee for Israeli security because there is always the danger that the US might dramatically retrench from the region and stop bribing everyone to play nice with Israel.

The gulf states are wealthy and can buy expensive advanced weapon systems from the west. They have power potential that could be unchained in the event the US leaves.

In contrast, weak states are much better for Israel. Syria used to be a relatively advanced state with sophisticated weapon systems and at one point a nuclear program. Now Syria is weak, dysfunctional, and has no strategic weapon systems at all. One commentator sarcastically put it that once Syrians built rockets and now they are cavemen who look up at the metal flying birds in awe.

Similarly, Iraq was once a strong and powerful state with advanced weapon systems, a nuclear program, and ballistic missiles. Now it is dysfunctional and weak. Lebanon is in the same boat.

It is unclear to me what Trump is really hoping to accomplish, but it seems that Israel’s goal is to turn Iran into a similarly weak/failed state. Some sort of Mad Max-esque civil war with cannibals running around beheading people would be ideal, I suppose. That would ensure that Iran would be unable to develop and possess long range weapons capable of striking Israel, let alone have a nuclear enrichment program.

Here is where I am especially confused, though. The strikes on Iran do not seem to have any chance of achieving that. Civil war doesn’t seem likely to break out. If anything the regime might be strengthened by the rally around the flag effect combined with the removal of the ancient and reportedly stubborn Supreme Leader. Younger blood seems likely to help shake things up and better adapt to the changing world. Is this not clear to the Israelis?

Is Netanyahu just playing for more time domestically to stave off problems regarding corruption allegations etc? I suppose that in the event this war achieves little he could argue that he must remain in power and keep Israel in a permanent state of crisis. I really don’t know.

However, it does seem clear that the war has only accelerated the already growing anti-Zionist/anti-Israel and in some cases flat out antisemitic feelings among younger Americans. When I asked a young blue collar acquaintance how his many Trump-supporting coworkers at the factory feel about the situation he replied “Oh everyone at work hates Israel, so they won’t be happy about the war”.

Israel’s days of relying on US support are counting down. Within 10-20 years I suspect the power of the domestic Israel lobby will be nothing compared to what it is today. Israel will have to learn to live with that new reality. This might be why Netanyahu has been saying he wants Israel to not be reliant on any US weapons or aid by ten years from now.

This looming reality also incentivizes Israel to use the US to turn as many neighbors as possible into stone age Syria before time runs out. There is speculation that Israel will turn to Turkey as the next great threat after Iran is dealt with. Former Israeli President Bennett claimed a few weeks ago that “Turkey is the new Iran”.

Turkey being a NATO member and hosting US nuclear weapons would certainly complicate its Mad-Maxification, though.

Where Things Are Going

The future is, of course, radically uncertain. But a few things seem to be more or less clear.

1. This war cannot drag on in its current form very long. American stocks of munitions are very limited. Both offensive weapons and defensive interceptor stockpiles have been drained over the past few years and we are now apparently searching under the metaphorical couch cushions around the world to scrounge up THAAD interceptors etc. from places like South Korea.

2. At this time it is not possible for the US to deploy significant boots on the ground to attempt Iraq 2.0, and we would have a lot of advanced warning if that was the case. In both the Persian Gulf War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq the US and its allies spent months building up troops and supplies in the region before launching offensives. Armies in combat require vast amounts of supplies to keep them in the field.
   
   As far as I am aware, there is zero evidence of any such buildup in the region. We would be seeing mass deployments that could not be covered up. Tens of thousands of troops, huge mountains of supplies. None of that is happening.
   
   Additionally, in both of those previous wars we saw the call up of reserves and the activation of National Guard units. Nothing like that is happening at all.
   
   Keep in mind that Iran’s population is roughly 3.6x larger than Iraq’s in 2003, and its land area is roughly 3.7x larger with very different terrain. Iraq is mostly deserts and plains, contrasted to Iran’s mountains and plateaus. This would be Iraq on steroids and require a major effort.
   
   Trump cannot, at this time, actually send in any large amount of troops for an invasion. The troops aren’t present and neither is the huge logistical network needed to sustain them. Obviously special forces insertions are another matter, but that is not Iraq War 2.0.
   
   If Trump went completely nutty and decided to initiate the buildup it would be very clear and we would see it months in advance. And the initiation of hostilities would likely fall right around the mid-terms. It would be political suicide and the end of MAGA and the complete obliteration of Trump’s legacy.

3. So how will this end?
   
   Despite the talk from the admin about not wanting to put a timeline on operations, and Trump’s absolutely laughable claims that there is "virtually unlimited supply of these weapons. Wars can be fought 'forever,' and very successfully, using just these supplies”, material realities will put a hard limit on the pace at which attacks can continue and the degree which America can defend practically the entire Middle East with our dwindling stock of interceptors.
   
   In the words of Mises, “Wars can only be waged with present goods”.
   
   What happens then?
   
   It seems the best case scenario is that Trump announces a unilateral cease fire and declares that all the vague objectives were met and this was a great victory, a victory like you wouldn’t believe, they tell me they never saw a victory this stunning and complete etc. etc. etc. having not really accomplished anything but further destabilizing the region, annoying his base, getting Americans killed, and wasting boatloads of money, in addition to all the death and destruction in the region.
   
   This scenario seems most likely to me since there really isn’t much else that can be done. We can’t invade anytime soon and we can’t bomb Iran into submission. Though, on the other hand, Iran might not want to go along with that until it has exacted enough damage on the region to make the US and Israel think twice before pulling such a stunt again.
   
   I suppose it is possible that a coup is all engineered and waiting to go and all this crazy talk is just a feint, but that strikes me as unlikely. It also strikes me as unlikely that a revolution will be breaking out, though that is also possible.
   
   I would add that things might go off the rails if somehow Iran were to get a lucky hit on a carrier or somehow sink some other warship. That would make it very difficult to declare a ceasefire and victory without seeming weak. Trump has made comments about escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz with the US Navy, which would make such an event much more likely.

4. All in all, even assuming the best case scenario, this is a depressing situation that I am trying to wrap my head around. Is this primarily the result of Israel’s influence? A lot of young people online certainly seem to think so, renaming Operation Epic Fury (which is an extremely idiotic and cringe name that sounds like a teenager came up with) to Operation Epstein Fury. I don’t know, but Netanyahu’s constant communication with Trump and visits to the White House certainly don’t help lessen that impression. Neither does the lack of any clear US interest in trying to accomplish whatever vague ill defined objectives have been announced.
   
   I would also note that Marco Rubio literally said that Israel was going to attack with or without us, and since Iran would then attack our bases in retaliation we needed too join the attack too. If true, this is yet another humiliation inflicted on the US by Israel. Who is the empire and who is the vassal in this relationship?
   
   Trump of course directly contradicted this, because it makes him look pathetic and weak, which is what happened last year too. Something that has been noted by young people.
   
   Was this all a case of Trump himself having a bit of “Siegshysterie” himself after Venezuela and Netanyahu was just happy to help the idea of another stunning victory along? Does it stem from the Boomer obsession with Iran over the humiliation of the embassy hostages?
   
   The situation would be more understandable if there was some sort of very clear objective. There is not, at least publicly. Announced goals are vague and hard to quantify. I still do not know what the conditions of victory are.
   
   This is ultimately all a distraction from the pressing domestic issues that the majority of Americans really care about. Trump risks blowing up this domestic agenda and his legacy by this foolish foreign meddling on the other side of the globe. Trump needs to end this as quick as possible and get back to the home front.