John Law (14:00)
Alright, first up, let's start with what the right is saying. The right is wary of ground operations, but many say they may be necessary. Some warn that Trump risks repeating mistakes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Others argue Trump needs to better communicate the merits of a ground operation. In the Wall Street Journal, Matthew Continetti wrote, finish the job in Iran. The worst thing President Trump could do now is stop America and Israel's joint military campaign prematurely. Iran's command and control, air defenses, Navy missiles, drones, nuclear program and defense industrial base may be severely damaged, if not destroyed, but plenty of targets remain, Continenti said. Critics of Operation Epic Fury draw analogies with Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan in 2001 and Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003, but they should also study Operation Desert Storm in 1991. It was a remarkable campaign that left its central problem what to do about Saddam once the guns fell silent, unresolved. Mr. Trump could avoid this fate even as the White House pursues negotiations to end war with Iran. US Ground forces are moving into position near the Persian Gulf. Marines, special forces and paratroopers will give the president options. They can be used to secure Iran's stockpile of enriched uranium, open the strait and guarantee freedom of navigation, and fulfill his objective of ending the threat for the Islamic Republic, continenti wrote. The president must see Operation Epic Fury through to a successful conclusion and finish what he started. In the American Spectator, Jared Babin explored the missing definition of victory in Iran. We haven't won the war in Iran yet, as is demonstrated by their ability to launch missiles and drones against Israel, against ships around the Strait of Hormuz and against neighboring nations. President Trump has said that we have destroyed military facilities on Krag island, but the port, which sends out most of Iran's oil exports, hasn't been closed, babin said. So where do we go from here? It's pretty clear that we will have to deploy ground troops to really end the ayatollah's regime. About 5,000 more Marines and sailors are on the way to Iran. If the Marines are landed, their small force will not be capable of removing the regime without help from the Iranian people. If we are to truly end the regime, there will be a need to deploy many more troops there, perhaps thousands. Mr. Trump wanted to end our endless wars, but his action in Iran may take many months, even years to do so, babin wrote. But stop right there. We know from our experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan that we cannot engage in nation building in Iran, not in any form. When and if the regime falls, we should get the hell out. If, if we need to bomb the snot out of them again, so be it. In National Review, Noah Rothman suggested Trump's Nixon to China moment is boots on the ground. Trump did not ready the nation for the commitments he was making to the Middle east, nor did he solicit their support for the sacrifices that he would be expecting of them. If the war is destined to include a ground component, it would serve the president well to be honest about what the next phase could entail, rothman said. The president's allies are correct insofar as Trump himself has not been shy about deploying US Ground forces to hostile engagements, albeit with small footprints. But he's also spent the better part of a decade arguing that most all of his predecessors were reckless when sending US Forces off to fight dumb wars. Whatever else the public knows about Trump, they know that his instincts are to use ground forces sparingly and with discrete objectives, if at all. Even if most voters are immune to the president's powers of persuasion, such as they are, Republicans are listening. That's a base from which Trump can build a case for the American project in Iran, rothman wrote. Trump may prefer to stay his course, strike first and ask for the public's buy in later. Of all the many risks associated with deploying combat forces in Iran, that might be the riskiest of all. Alright, that is it for what the right is saying. Which brings us to what the left is saying. The left opposes boots on the ground, but many expect Trump to pursue that strategy. Some argue Trump is digging himself a deeper hole in the conflict. Others say any ground operation carries significant risk and limited upside. In the Atlantic, Thomas Wright explored the countdown to a ground war. The war has not moderated the Iranian regime, it has hardened it. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps now dominates Iran's internal deliberations to a degree unprecedented even Under Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran effectively controls the strait, and it knows that this control affords Tehran real leverage. Iran appears to have concluded that it is better positioned for a war of endurance than for a negotiated capitulation, Wright said. Trump could still choose to declare victory or even accept terms closer to Iran's position if he concludes that the alternative is a longer and more uncertain war. The deeper problem is that military operations, however successful tactically, cannot substitute for what the war is trying to achieve strategically. Trump launched this conflict believing that Iran was weak and that a short, sharp campaign would force a new leader to terms. The regime has proved more resilient and more capable of inflicting sustained damage on the region than the president expected, wright wrote. Trump has a long history of claiming victory in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. This may be the rare moment when that instinct serves the country, because the alternative appears to be doubling down on a losing strategy by launching a ground war. In Jacobin, Branko Market called potential ground operations an idiotic idea for an idiotic war. Ground operations are such a bad idea that it has united both card carrying members of Trump's hated Deep State, such as former Defense Intelligence Agency official and former NATO Suprem allied commander James Stavridis and some of Trump's closest political allies such as Nancy Mace and Matt Gaetz. In Opposition Market. It gets even more questionable when the mission turns to extracting Iran's enriched uranium, all 440 kg, roughly 970 pounds of it. Not only is this a massive quantity of material that is enormously difficult to access in the first place, given that it is stored in tunnels deep underground, but moving nuclear material around is an enormously logistically complicated process. Now think about every other aim this administration had when it first started the war and how miserably it has failed to achieve collapsing the Iranian state, doing Venezuela like regime change, or encouraging a grassroots Iranian uprising, even what progress they've made on destroying Iran's missile launching capability has stalled. Mark Heddick wrote, if the president is finding it harder to find a face saving way out of this mess now, you he will find it magnitudes harder if and when Iranian forces kill an even bigger number of American troops. In the New York Times, Nicholas Kristof wrote about the old man dreaming up wars for young men to fight. I'm in favor of a diplomatic path, but let's be honest, any deal would be a pretty bad one and would strengthen a brutal regime that oppresses its people and menaces the region. Because the diplomatic option is so unappealing, Trump seems poised to seize an even worse one, dispatching ground troops to invade Iran, Kristof said the United States has been unable to fully protect its own hardened military bases in the region at much greater distances from Iran, forcing soldiers to evacuate to hotels. If we can't protect our bases, how will we protect Marines dropped off on an Iranian island? The truth is that any seizure of Iranian controlled land would most likely lead Iran to retaliate by attacking energy infrastructure around the region. And more terrifying, desalination plants would provide the water on which some Gulf cities depend. With refineries out of commission, we could face oil and gas shortages for years to come, christoph wrote. For all the uncertainties, one truth I feel deeply from having seen war close Old men should not fix their messes by dispatching young people to die in unnecessary wars. Alright, let's head over to Isaac for his take.
