Will K. Back (11:11)
Here's what the right is the right favors military action against the regime, not concessions. Some on the right are skeptical that revolution in Iran will succeed on its own, the Wall Street Journal editorial board wrote. The deal in Iran is regime change. Before June's 12 day war, Mr. Trump gave Ayatollah Ali Khamenei two months to dismantle his nuclear program. The supreme leader refused, so Jerusalem and Washington did it for him, burying Iran's nuclear material deep underground. Concessions now on the enrichment of nuclear fuel, if the regime is even willing to make them, are far meaningful. Tehran presumably would demand sanctions relief in return, but that would help the regime shore up its power with more money to fund repression. What message would that send to the Iranian people after so many risked their lives to protest? There is a better way for President Trump. Help the protesters topple the ayatollah and his enforcers. Don't crush the Iranian people's hopes. Give them the confidence to keep pushing against a regime that has no answer but bullets to any of their problems. If Iran's revolutionary regime falls, the whole region gets better. China and Russia lose. The third spoke in their axis of US Adversaries. Iran's regime and its proxies are at their weakest and its people are waiting. Mr. Trump has forged his opportunity and this is his moment to seize it. In the free press, Niall Ferguson explored the myth of revolution in Iran. True restorations are few and far between, but in each case these restored regimes were fragile and ephemeral. The harsh reality is therefore that most counter revolutions fail. That was true in the Vendee in 1793-1796, when the devout peasants opposed to the new regime in Paris were slaughtered by the revolutionaries. It was true in the Russian Civil War, when the white armies ultimately failed to oust the Bolsheviks from what had been St. Petersburg. I passionately wish it could be otherwise. The images of slaughter in Iran, of the corpses in body bags strewn contemptuously on the ground, are agonizing to contemplate for the people in Iran. I have little doubt it would be far preferable if the genial Mr. Pahlavi could resume his father's peacock throne with the support of the United States and its allies. If President Trump can do anything at all to impede, if not destroy, the Islamic Republic's massacre machine, I wish Godspeed to those who received the orders to strike. Now here's what the left is. The left says that striking Iran could backfire and escalate the conflict. Some compare Trump's strategy in Iran to President Bush's in Iraq. The Bloomberg editorial board argued it will take more than bombs and missiles to fix Iran. It is impossible to know Whether the US President will carry out his threats to strike Iran, how the regime might retaliate, or what the long term fallout would be. What's sure is that neutering the threat posed by Iran and encouraging a better future for its people will take more than bombs and missiles. Assassinating Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei might unify the regime rather than bring it down. Destroying missile factories and air defense sites would aid US allies in the region more than Iranian protesters. A sustained air campaign would likely be required to shake the foundations of the government, risking retaliatory attacks on Israel and shipping in the Persian Gulf. Meanwhile, the US should offer incentives, including the possibility of sanctions relief, to those willing to break with the regime. Leading civil society figures have united around a demand for a new constituent assembly so Iranians themselves can decide what form of government they want. The US should back their efforts. There's no quick solution. Regime change now would almost certainly result in a military led dictatorship, which might only redouble efforts to build a nuclear bomb. Whatever the president's objectives, helping Iranians find a better future will be the work of months and years, not days. In the Los Angeles Times, John Duffy said the US military strategy in Iran feels eerily similar. If this sequence sounds familiar, it should. In late 2002 and early 2003, the US followed a similar path. Military power accumulated faster than political clarity. The administration cited shifting rationales for invading Iraq first terrorism, then weapons of mass destruction, even regional stability, while promising that speed and overwhelming force would secure American interests. Our failure was never seriously articulating how force was meant to shape what came next politically. Two decades later, the circumstances are different, but the failure is unmistakable. The broader consequences of using force as the default tool of statecraft extend well beyond any single strike. Repeated military action taken without clearly articulated objectives erodes US credibility and weakens the connection between American demands and American American restraint. This is not an argument for passivity. It is an argument for seriousness and accountability. If the administration believes military force is necessary, it owes the American public more than movement and threats. It owes a clear explanation of what it is trying to achieve, why military force is appropriate, and how success will be measured. And now here's what international writers are saying. Some writers abroad say the first round of negotiations signals some progress, but a near term breakthrough is unlikely. Others say U.S. bombing and broad sanctions would only strengthen the Iranian regime. In Al Jazeera, Mohanad Saloom wrote Iran, US talks bought time, not a deal. Iran had previously insisted on communicating with the US only through Omani intermediaries crossing that barrier even partially suggests both sides recognize the limits of indirect talks. Once bargaining becomes technical, the fundamental dispute over what the talks are about remains unresolved. Iran won the first procedural battle, the venue moved from Turkey to Oman, regional observers were excluded and Arachi claims only nuclear issues were discussed. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said before the talks that the agenda needed to include all of those issues. If the second round begins with the same fight over scope, it will signal that even the basics remain unsettled. If Washington continues to layer new economic penalties between rounds of talks, Tehran will treat it as evidence that diplomacy is performance rather than progress. The most probable short term outcome remains neither breakthrough nor war, but a managed deadlock in which both sides maintain maximal public positions while avoiding steps that would make future talks impossible. In practice, this is a pause sustained by caution rather than a settlement anchored in confidence. For the broader region, the distinction matters urgently in the free press, Haviv Gore suggested the Iranian regime is stronger than we think. We have to understand that we cannot defeat a catastrophe tolerant regime by increasing the level of catastrophe. Blunt, broad based economic punishment won't work. Mass bombing campaigns that spark an even small scale rally around the flag effect would be counterproductive. The Islamic regime doesn't derive legitimacy from prosperity or peace, so Iran getting even poorer won't undermine it. This would only cause the public to suffer while the state uses scarcity to tighten control. And giving the regime an external enemy would only enable a more aggressive crackdown domestically. Nothing would shore up the internal sense of regime legitimacy faster than a foreign adversary. The Islamic Republic is very good at finding such adversaries whenever it's threatened domestically, and Western policy must avoid giving it one. A regime willing to mass murder its own people on its way down cannot be bombed out of existence. It must be delegitimized. All right, that is it for what the right, left and international writers are saying. Now let's get into my take. Since nationwide protests broke out in Iran in December, the realities on the ground have stayed pretty much the same. The Ayatollah is still in power, the US hasn't carried out any military operations, and the Iranian economy remains in freefall. When we covered the protests in early January, I wrote that Iran's government seemed to be on its last legs, but I doubted that this would be the moment it falls. I based my conclusion on a few the regime would violently crack down on protesters, Trump wouldn't intervene with military force, and the protests wouldn't have enough power to overcome the State violence on their own. So far, that's almost exactly what has happened. But I'm not taking a victory lap here. For one, conditions remain intolerable for the Iranian people, and that's not a good thing. Second, the regime's predictable brutality has likely resulted in thousands of deaths and even more arrests. And third, the situation could still change quickly. After all, President Trump has proven difficult to predict in Iran. For all the prognosticating in the US and abroad, I don't think anyone really knows what President Trump will do. In fact, I suspect the president himself hasn't made up his mind. But as I take stock of the situation today, my feelings about US Intervention have changed. I now think we're more likely to attack Iran than not. Before diving into what changed my mind, I want to steel man the argument that strikes against Iran are still unlikely. First, the US May have missed its window to respond. The reports out of the country are harrowing. Human rights groups estimate that over 6,400 protesters were killed and over 51,500 arrested during the demonstrations, with an additional 11,000 deaths under review. Some Iranian officials have put the number of dead closer to 30,000. The regime's brutality had its desired effect. The mass demonstrations have abruptly subsided. While Trump could still authorize an attack, he can't aid protests that aren't happening. Second, President Trump has, in several instances, backed down from conflicts that he initially escalated, usually by accepting a minor concession and trumpeting it as a diplomatic win. This happened last year when he backed off imposing tariffs on Mexico and Canada in return for tepid commitments. More recently, it happened again when he touted a, quote, framework of a future deal on Greenland, then eased up on his public rhetoric about the US Acquiring the island by force. Now the same dynamic could be playing out with Iran. At the height of the demonstrations in January, Trump publicly aligned himself with the protesters, even strongly implying that US military support was imminent. On January 2, he said the US was, quote, locked and loaded and ready to go if Iran killed protesters, which, of course, it did. On January 10, he posted, quote, iran is looking at freedom perhaps like never before. The USA stands ready to help. On January 13, he wrote, Iranian patriots, keep protesting. Take over your institutions, adding, quote, help is on its way. No such help materialized. Instead, the Trump administration has undertaken negotiations with the regime. These talks could stretch out for more weeks before Trump walks away with a purported breakthrough agreement that doesn't meaningfully address the regime's abuses or its nuclear program. And third, Trump has a pragmatic reason not to attack. He's attempting to see through phase two of a tenuous ceasefire in Gaza and negotiate a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia. Iran is a factor in both of these conflicts, and the president might decide that switching focus to ousting the Ayatollah would set back these higher priority goals. So if this argument presents a strong case against US Strikes, why have I changed my mind from one month ago? Well, for one, I don't think the U S Iran talks are progressing in a way that will yield any kind of face saving agreement for both sides. While Trump has described the meetings as productive, neither side seems willing to budge on the core issue, Iran's nuclear program. Since President Trump pulled out of the Obama era nuclear deal, progress on a new agreement has been fleeting. Even after we bombed Iran's nuclear facilities, nothing I've read or heard so far suggests to me this moment will be any different. Simultaneously, all the pieces are now being assembled to carry out strikes. The president has already sent one aircraft carrier strike group to the Middle east, and he's reportedly preparing to send another. A similar buildup preceded the Maduro operation in Venezuela, and Trump's second term has demonstrated a pattern of quick, decisive military intervention. For all his balking on trade threats, Trump has carried out swift action in Venezuela, Nigeria, Yemen and Iran itself already in just his second term. Unless U.S. and Iranian officials can achieve a breakthrough in the next couple of weeks, which I doubt, I think we're headed down a similar path. Lastly, the unfolding events in Venezuela have changed my thinking since I said that decisive military action wasn't a viable response for Trump to the protest crackdowns in Iran. Since we last covered Iran on January 7, we've learned a lot more about the Trump administration's strategy in Venezuela. The administration hasn't pursued a maximalist intervention strategy, opting instead to recognize Maduro's vice president, Delsey Rodriguez, and work with the existing government instead of supporting an opposition figure like Maria Karina Machado. Whether or not this strategy is correct, it still offers a blueprint for possible US Action in Iran. Not only could Trump supplant Ayatollah Khamenei with another figure from the Ayatollah's inner circle, as he did with Maduro, he could also follow the same playbook with seeking to control Iran's oil reserves. Obviously Iran isn't Venezuela, and repeating that strategy here is not as simple as a cut and paste. But as the smoke has cleared from the Maduro operation, I think Trump could look to that approach in Iran. To be clear, my view on possible strikes hasn't swung wildly in the past month, and I think there's still a strong case that the US Won't attack. But the combination of unproductive negotiations, the military buildup in the Middle east, and the emerging US Strategy in Venezuela leads me to think that some kind of operation is now more likely than not. A lot can still change, though. President Trump is unpredictable, like I said, and his decision making often seems to be dictated by sudden whims or the opinion of the last person he talked to. In foreign policy, this trait is an asset and a liability, keeping both adversaries and allies on edge. In Iran, this means developments we can't anticipate could alter the range of outcomes in the days and weeks ahead. Whatever happens, though, I'm frankly growing weary of this foreign policy approach. Just over a year into Trump's second term, global tensions are only mounting, even in light of ostensible breakthroughs like the Gaza ceasefire deal. Isaac has written before about how Trump looks at the world stage like a CEO looks at his competitors, and that framework feels especially relevant to his approach in Iran. In business, volatility can be an effective tactic. Losses are absorbed by markets, shareholders and balance sheets. But in international affairs, volatility can mean regime collapse, refugee crises, and mass death. Treating geopolitical rivals like corporate adversaries may produce short term leverage, but it overlooks the fragility of the people caught in between. I keep returning to the thousands of Iranians killed for the crime of protesting their government. That's not the Trump administration's fault, but we should ask whether its strategy of tactical volatility is helping achieve short or long term gains for ourselves or the Iranian people. Right now, I think the answer is no. And whatever path Trump takes, I worry that more disorder will follow.
