Suzanne Maloney on Iran
A podcast recommendation.
For a sobering, but I think accurate, assessment of the war in Iran, I would recommend Ezra Klein’s interview with Suzanne Maloney from the Brookings Institution: Is Iran Winning?
Spoiler: the answer is more or less “yes.”
To cut to the chase, from the end of the interview (the bolded portion is Klein, the rest is Maloney:
Just thinking through our conversation here, if you imagine a world a month from now where the war is winding down or has wound down because America couldn’t bear the disruption to global energy, helium, fertilizer, supplies, etc.; the Iranian regime remains in place, controlling the Strait of Hormuz, probably charging different ships tolls to go through or making particular deals with different countries that benefit Iran in order to have safe passage through the strait — that feels like a war we would have lost. Is that wrong?
I think that’s correct. I don’t see a victory in real terms at the end of this crisis. We may be able to extricate ourselves without even more catastrophic human losses than have already been experienced. But there is very little evidence that we’re going to be able to come out of this war with a different regime in Iran with less control over the Strait of Hormuz.
And that is a very dangerous outcome for the long term — the wider implications of the United States having undertaken this action in a way that has alienated partners and allies in the region and all around the world, having effectively ceded huge financial benefits to the Russians and potentially ceded some diplomatic opportunity to the Chinese. And it’s not clear that President Trump is prepared to sustain American leadership or that even if he were, in the aftermath of this — what appears to be a catastrophic overreach and miscalculation with the attacks on Iran — that, in fact, the United States will be trusted to do that by countries around the world. It feels like a Suez moment in some respects.
There is also a key point at the end that Iran really has no reason to trust negotiations with the US. Trump tore up the JCPOA and then bombed Iran twice, whilst in the middle of negotiations. Hegseth may think that we “negotiate with bombs” is some kind of ruthless, warrior mentality, but it is more the stuff of schoolyard strategists.
See also her new piece in Foreign Affairs: The Third Islamic Republic.
Even worse, by joining Israel’s attacks on Iran’s nuclear program last year, the US has painted itself in such a corner that it doesn’t fully control its own strategic decisions anymore.
Every time Israel drops a bomb, Iran has to assume that the US will join the attacks at some point. Because that is a thing that already happened.
See also: Rubio says US struck Iran fearing it would retaliate for Israeli attack
Of course, this administration lies as easily as a normal person breathes, but Rubio’s remarks do reflect what ought to be rational assumptions from the Iranian perspective.
Bonus fun fact: the Israelis know (and knew!) this, too.
Good job, all around.
Distrust of the US will/has spread far beyond Iran. Years ago European advocates for rebuilding their own defenses independent of the US, were making the point that Europe couldn’t entrust its security to a handful of voters in Wisconsin.
For the indefinite future, the only agreements that other countries will make with the US are ones that are in fact, treaties and will go through the Constitutional ratification process. Given the current partisanship, it’s doubtful many will.
While a prez could break a treaty unilaterally, it will be a much heavier lift than and agreement entered into by a predecessor.
The GCC have allowed the U.S. to maintain bases on their territory based on the idea that the U.S. military would protect them. Now these bases make them the targets of Iran’s missiles and drones, and the U.S. is not much help. These bases have become much less welcome.
@Sleeping Dog:
Donny does not restrict himself to breaking predecessor agreements, he breaks his own.
As well, the conspiracy theory that US could [would!] have won Vietnam “if only” they didnt have ROE’s is conclusively disproven. Fun fact: The other guy gets a say, and they have bullets too.. in this case, missiles.
“Madman Theory” should be forever renamed “Agreement Incapable Theory”. It doesnt make people surrender to you, it just needlessly extends conflict bc everyone knows your word means nothing.
Any child who thinks for one millisecond that the US “won” every Vietnam battle is ignoring the over 100 pitched battles the US lost.
I do look forward to see what enterprising RW nutso creates the 2027 equivalent of the Bo Gritz grift POW/MIA which lasted for decades among the gullible.
Lost in all the self-absorbed American punditry is the enormous harm Trump’s war is already doing to hundreds of millions of people in poor countries in the Asia-Pacific. Papua New Guinea, I’m told by people who live there, is effectively out of fuel for vehicles. It’s in desperately short supply in the Philippines, and what’s available is unaffordable by most Filipinos. They live from day to day; there will be serious food shortages and a breakdown of everyday life.
No matter what the outcome of the war, the world will never be the same. NATO is dead, Europe is rapidly coming to see the US as a hostile power, and much of the rest of the world will increasingly look to China as a stable trade and national security (senior) partner.
Heckuva job, Trumpy.
@drj:
Strikes on the order of last year were short of all-out.
Within the limits of coercive military/diplomatic operations.
What really changed the situation was Israel going for a “regime kill” at the outset of this war.
That makes it existential for the regime; therefore their response was also going to maximal.
Which meant, obviously, striking the GCC and closing the Straits.
A “regime kill” course required full scale land war.
Which is why it’s been avoided.
And, obviously, the Isaelis knew that.
But Bibi is honeybadger.
And honeybadger don’t care.
Which is a bit of mistake by said honeybadger, but there you go.
Netanyahu is a clever tactician, but a strategist? Not so much.
One reason Ariel Sharon never rated him highly.
@Sleeping Dog:
The current European (including UK) governmental consensus is “De Gaulle was right. Dammit.”
How can any ally rely upon a US led by Trump, or for that matter Vance?
Or even a Dem who might get replaced by some sort of populist/nationalist 4 years on?
Or stuffed by a MAGA-publican Congress?
It’s now a cold reality that we must aim for full strategic autonomy.
And the polical consequence of that are likely to be majotr factor in European politics, going forward.
See, for instance the recent AfD call for removal of US bases from Germany.
Meloni in Italy refusing US use of Italian bases for USAF strike operations.
Farage in the UK tryting to quietly shuffle away from fidelity to Trump.
The recent MAGA and Vance assumption that the European right somehow owed fidelity to American right is rather mistaken.
Still less that Europeans in general, whether right, left, or centre, will put up with MAGA demands for deference to whatever their current, and rather incoherent, definitions of “Western civilisation” may be, and the assumed US leadership thereof.
General European view: beg pardon, but we haven’t gone through centuries of both culture and catastrophe to subordinate ourselves to the whims of a bunch of dimwitted evangelicals in southern Illinois.
@Ken_L:
This.
The impact on the poorer countries in Asia and Africa is already massive, and getting worse by the day.
Europe may be able to ride it out, but at serious cost. Also China, and possibly Japan.
Others are screwed.
Which worries me.
India and Pakistan may also be screwed; but they are both serious Powers, who may take serious steps to un-screw themselves.
The larger picture is, as you indicate.
Few, if any, countries can now consider the US as a reliable partner, or even a rational actor, that will take account of their interests.
The Atlantic Alliance is now just a zombie, shambling about and craving for brains.
One interesting thing is that the administration and the MAGA chorus are currently raging out about being betrayed by Europe/NATO.
And ignoring that the US Asian allies are also “nope” about sending forces to the Gulf, or about opinion polls re the US, both in allieas and neutrals.
The US predominant position both post-1945 and post -1990 was based on combining both military and economic Power and consideration of others interests.
A difficult, and often irritating, path for the US.
And one that sometimes got short-circuited by “anti-communist” paranoid coup-mongering during the Cold War.
But the basics of regard for others interests was there.
This does not seem to have affected US adminstration considerations about this war.
That will have consequences