Posts
"Iranians were negotiating really hard to avoid a war. They’d actually offered a better deal than they’d signed off on in 2015. That was on the table and that, of course, is when America and Israel struck." Peter Oborne
"As we know, there is no state on the planet more ruthless, more murderous than Israel, so the idea that they would use nuclear weapons against Iran is certainly plausible. And I really worry about this scenario.” John Mearsheimer
"The most ultimately righteous of all wars is a war with savages, though it is apt to be also the most terrible and inhuman. The rude, fierce settler who drives the savage from the land lays all civilized man under a debt to him." Theodore Roosevelt quoted by Professor Norman Finkelstein in a very interesting new essay comparing the fate of the Cherokees and the Palestinians
"Many of the best of the backwoodsmen were Bible-readers, but they were brought up in a creed that made much of the Old Testament, and laid slight stress on pity, truth, or mercy. They looked at their foes as the Hebrew prophets looked at the enemies of Israel. What were the abominations because of which the Canaanites were destroyed before Joshua, compared with the abominations of the red savages whose lands they, another chosen people, should in their turn inherit? They believed that the Lord was king for ever and ever, and they believed that they were but obeying His commandment as they strove mightily to bring about the day when the heathen should have perished out of the land[…] There was many a stern frontier zealot who deemed all the red men, good and bad, corn ripe for the reaping." Theodore Roosevelt quoted in the essay
"Netanyahu said he's been waiting for this war for 40 years. He invoked 1 Samuel 15-'kill the Amalekites'-and said 'that's what we're doing today. Amalek is Iran. This is what the media is justifying. A call for genocide, straight from scripture, delivered by a prime minister." Tucker Carlson
“I have not been able to think out any solution to the terrible problem offered by the presence of the Negro on this continent.” Theodore Roosevelt
“You claim to stand with the people of Iran while you offer European bases to US killing machines. While you support Israel’s chemical warfare as they poison the air of Tehran with toxic fires and black rain, spreading cancers for decades. From Iran, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria and Iraq — your bombs never brought democracy and never will. They bring chaos. Death. Destruction. And the unbearable silence of children who will never come home.” Belgian MEP Marc Botenga of the (Marxist) Workers' Party
Conflict termination is a much bigger problem than the commentary on the Iran War suggests. There is a glib assumption that the Trump Administration can shift the goalposts on its war aims, Trump himself can apply his PT Barnum genius, and the US can walk away. Not so. As I have said many times, a world in which the US walks away while Iran still has the Strait shut and is still slinging missiles at US allies is a world indistinguishable from one in which the US has suffered a major strategic defeat. It is a world in which US allies in the region would have to ask Tehran for terms, and other major powers would have to ask nicely to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. This is to say, the US would first have to negotiate a deal in which the US backs off and Iran relents, too. Two problems with that. First, the perfidious manner in which Israel and the US kickstarted the Twelve Day War and this war, respectively, using negotiations as a cover for and aid to the opening decapitation strike, will make Iran leery of proposals to negotiate or promises made during negotiations. Secondly, Iran would undoubtedly seek reassurance that the US and Israel will not return for another bite of the cherry in six months or two years. And what guarantees can the US credibly offer? (Credible is the important word here: see Jerry Seinfeld's point regarding car rental reservations: "You know how to take the reservation, you just don't know how to keep the reservation.") I am struggling to think of any, but perhaps those with more historical knowledge might suggest something. It therefore seems likely that Iran would seek concrete steps rather than promises. These might involve a US withdrawal from the region, which would make an air war far more difficult to prosecute. Yet this would be political cyanide in Washington and Israel. This points to Iran having to continue the war to inflict really very serious economic pain indeed on the global economy in order to get to a position where its demands might be palatable. It also points to the US continuing the war to try its best to avoid a strategic defeat that would undoubtedly sink the Trump presidency (and all associated with it, including his party) and represent a massive strategic turnaround and loss of prestige for the US. In fact, it seems to me that Trump would likely increase his military risk appetite before he went down the road of giving Tehran what it wants. The only way to avoid this would be for the USAF to finally suppress Iran's capacity to fire missiles and drones and keep the Strait closed. Then, as @policytensor says, it could be turned into a 'one-sided war of punishment', even if regime change could not be obtained. But we do not seem close to that yet. The above attempts to give you the train of thought that leads me to believe that (1) the conflict termination problem is a much thornier problem than widely considered, (2) that the balance of probabilities therefore suggest a continuance for some time yet, (3) that this in turn means more economic and financial pain, and (4) oil, other commodities, and captial markets are still underpricing the risk.
[I cut out the first half of Policy Tensor's post.]It’s not like the Iranians have no plan to win the war. They are going to make Trump pay such a high price that future presidents, himself included, will think twice about considering the idea ever again. They know what they need to do to impose intolerable costs on Trump and the international community. They just need to keep Hormuz closed and sustain their attacks for long enough to politically cripple Trump. According to my calculations, Iran will be able to sustain fire and keep Hormuz closed for many months, if indeed not years. One day of oil above $100 and he resorted to panicked market diplomacy. This leads me to the thesis that while he may have high risk appetite, he does not have high pain tolerance. But we are playing Mercy here. The problem of Iranian security has been triggered by the joint Israeli-American proposal for a Middle East ruled by Israel. Iran’s security problem in the context of war termination, is to deter a future US-Israeli attack. Iran is all ears for solutions to this problem. But there is no one in the international system who has stepped up to solve this problem. Unless this problem is effectively addressed by the international system, I don’t see how Iran can be prevented from crashing the world economy.
[I cut out the first half of Policy Tensor's post.]It’s not like the Iranians have no plan to win the war. They are going to make Trump pay such a high price that future presidents, himself included, will think twice about considering the idea ever again. They know what they need to do to impose intolerable costs on Trump and the international community. They just need to keep Hormuz closed and sustain their attacks for long enough to politically cripple Trump. According to my calculations, Iran will be able to sustain fire and keep Hormuz closed for many months, if indeed not years. One day of oil above $100 and he resorted to panicked market diplomacy. This leads me to the thesis that while he may have high risk appetite, he does not have high pain tolerance. But we are playing Mercy here. The problem of Iranian security has been triggered by the joint Israeli-American proposal for a Middle East ruled by Israel. Iran’s security problem in the context of war termination, is to deter a future US-Israeli attack. Iran is all ears for solutions to this problem. But there is no one in the international system who has stepped up to solve this problem. Unless this problem is effectively addressed by the international system, I don’t see how Iran can be prevented from crashing the world economy.