President Trump understands he won’t be able to end this war without military achievement that at the very least prevents the Iranians from presenting themselves as having bent the Americans.
Eyal Hulata (former head of Israel National Security Council)
War is hell for many reasons, one of which is its inherent unpredictability. Nobody knows for sure what’s going on, especially “highly placed” government sources quoted by CNN and MS NOW. Last week, those so-called experts touted the superiority of America’s asymmetric enemies. By week’s end, the fake-news narrative had become the will of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard will trump the skill of the US military.
The Atlantic opined that “the Iran war started as a test of military capabilities and stockpiles, and the United States and Israel had the clear advantage, but the momentum of the now three-week war has shifted dramatically since Iran effectively shut the Strait of Hormuz.” An appropriate rebuttal to Pete Hegseth’s chest-thumping, but let’s get real: most of the folks touting asymmetric warfare have been dissing Trump for the last eleven years. Which is why I love my Twitter-X feed…
…because it’s filled with Iranians calling BS on the asymmetric-advantage narrative. My favorite is this: “it’s better to be the hammer than the nail.” My nightmare is this: “the regime is going to turn Tehran into Hiroshima.” I pray that last dude is not Nostradamus, but I’ll bet he knows the difference between a sh*thole country and the USA. Which is more than I can say for John Brennan, who said “I tend to believe Iran more than I do Donald Trump” (source: MS NOW). Really?
Brennan would have you believe the US cannot win an asymmetric war because 12,000 bombs and missiles have not weakened Iran’s public resolve. And despite losing his security clearance, he’d have you believe President Trump has no off ramp. I have no idea how and when the Iran war ends, but I don’t believe the past – Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan – are entirely predictive; not as proof that the rogue regime in Iran is destined to win.
What the wars in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan proved is that political problems, such as Islamic totalitarianism, require something other than military solutions. Vietnam is a great example. It was actually a war of independence, one of two dozen that occurred between 1945 and 1989 that added almost 100 new countries to the “post-colonial world” we know today. What I recall about Vietnam in the 60s was that it did not cross the threat threshold for the US to use nuclear weapons (in fact, the term “police action” came to describe it).
What I know about Vietnam today is that it is the largest source country for my company (total 2025 exports to the US: $153 billion) and that tourists (including my wife) now pay to visit the tunnels built by the Viet Cong guerillas. Because today’s Vietnam looks like an American ally, maintaining a “Comprehensive Strategic Partnership” with the US, I’d argue the super power abandoned its military solution, embraced an economic solution, and won the long game. This is, by the way, history repeating itself.
Go back to 1781, when Great Britain was the hammer and General Lord Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown. That defeat did not prevent the British Empire from becoming the largest empire in world history, and that victory did not result in the “rogue” colonies taking the war to England. Yorktown simply marked the end of major land battles and triggered negotiations that led to a robust commercial relationship between Great Britain and the newly independent United States.
With maybe five frigates, how would the Americans have even threatened the British? And why? The history of “rogue” states taking on super powers is not long on success. That’s doubly so in the 21st century. Look at Omar al-Bashir in Sudan (deposed), the Assad regime in Syria (exiled), Moammar Gadhafi in Libya (dead), Saddam Hussein in Iraq (dead), Nicolas Madura in Venezuela (imprisoned), and Slobodan Milosevic in Serbia (dead).
The odds-on lesson is that sooner or later, the super power and its allies will get you. Cuba, Iran and North Korea can proclaim their invincibility, but who believes that? And who now says the US did not prevail in Iraq, Syria, and Venezuela? Because their anti-American days seem to be behind all three.
The endgame for Iran is lost in the clutter of the President saying so much since he announced the attacks on Iran. His four goals laid out on February 28 should matter more than his flirtation with “unconditional surrender” that has so-called experts claiming he “has no off ramp.” Trump’s stated goals were (1) “destroy their missiles and raze their missile industry to the ground” and (2) “annihilate their navy” and (3) “ensure that terrorist proxies can no longer attack our forces” and (4) “ensure that Iran does not obtain a nuclear weapon.”
The President can now credibly claim the first two goals to be achieved, remind Americans the third goal was ongoing on February 28, and clarify that what he means by “unconditional surrender” is depriving Iran of nuclear weapons now and forever (AKA the fourth goal). Secretary of State Rubio said as much on Friday: “For these people to ever get nuclear weapons would be crazy. Look at what they’re willing to do with the weapons they have now. They hit embassies, they target hotels. Imagine if these radical lunatics had a nuclear weapon.”
Rubio is not wrong. Iran’s response to reports the U.S. might be prepping ground forces to root out its nuclear weapons and open the Strait of Hormuz came Sunday from Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, its parliament speaker, who said Iranian forces “are waiting for the arrival of American troops on the ground to set them on fire and punish their regional partners forever – we will never accept humiliation” (source: Fox News).
Hmm…never accepting “humiliation” is an odd demand after 70 high-ranking Iranian leaders have been killed (source: Euronews). I’m pretty sure that 70 dead leaders in 30 days means Iran is the nail. How long it can be hammered before its people rise up is anybody’s guess. The view here is that this is a new kind of war, for which looking backward does little to predict results. A bet on the side with drones is a bet against the side with AI. And – after the US military’s success in Venezuela – it should be obvious the big dog has learned some new tricks.
War is hell, and so is being a nail that’s getting hammered. And, when the choice is binary, I’d rather be a hammer than a nail.