What are we doing there? - Iran

Update: I have configured the email to come from "geoff@sweatyspice.com" instead of that long ghost.io address. If you have filters set up, you may (ok will) need to adjust them.

A lot of VSP[1] are arguing that the most likely scenario is that Trump tires of the conflict, and that all the unintended and unplanned contingencies begin to make him sour on the conflict that he will pull the military out, declare victory, and then go off to the next thing (Shield of Americas anyone?)

But I am not so sure that this can be the case. Oh sure, Trump has never cleaned up a mess before, and he (and the whole MAGA coalition) is utterly shameless. There are no "Pottery Barn" rules in the current Republican party and administration.

And whilst Trump can – as the Commander in Chief of the military forces – order the retraction of all forces and termination of all hostilities, leaving the mess for others to deal with, it is not likely that it will be that easy.

Still, I hear smart people like JVL at The Bulwark argues convincingly that the pain at the pumps, and the negative publicity of dead soldiers is detrimental and pulls out (the first time ever, amirite?) leaving a chaotic middle east, with lots of our (soon to be former) regional allies upset as fuck that they are getting drone strikes in downtown Dubai and Doha. Still I think this is what the man-child with impulse control issues does, because that is who that fucker is.

But the toothpaste is out of the tube, and the strife will continue, and Israel will continue to pester Iran, but Israel is unable to complete their mission without our help.

Israel has a population of about 9.6M, and Iran's population is about 90M. It is impossible for Israel to do more than destroy things and kill individuals/groups. They do not have enough men under arms to occupy and effect a regime change. And frankly, they don't care about Iran becoming a solid neighbor, citizen of the region, and a trustable ally. Utter chaos and a failed state is A-OK for them, as long as they don't have enough resources to attack Israel.

But, in case you didn't notice, something happened over the last week. Gas prices are up a lot. From a week ago Friday, they are up $0.50, a bit over 10%. And that is just starting. Sure, we are mostly independent of the world suppliers, but that doesn't mean that we aren't affected by swings in the price per barrel, and as of now, that price is up about 30%. This should tell you that more pain at the pump is a' coming.

And the chaos that Iran is inflicting in the "stable" middle east countries, places that have spent the last 40 or so years building a reputation for being safe for expats, for tourists, and for business. That veil of safety is now pierced bigly.

The US pulling out will not restore that sense of calm.

Then, there's Israel. As mentioned, they aren't big enough to fully occupy and build a new government, but they do have the resources (largely provided by the US) to attack and attack enough of the infrastructure, and to kill enough of the lower power clusters to keep Iran in a bad state. They do not care about Iran being safe or sane, all they care about is eliminating the risk to Israel.

But we should care. Because a failed Iranian state would be muy no-bueno, it will cause disruption in energy markets, in financial markets, and lead to more stochastic terror originating from that area.

And we, the American consumers and citizens will suffer. Trump may not care, but we do.

What is the end state?

I am a product manager, and early in my nearly 3 decade career, I learned to ask "what does success look like?". Whether it was a VP telling me to do something that I deep down knew would not go well, or when I was contemplating a major initiative, this mantra has been a north star of guidance. Because if you can't define what success looks like, I mean put it on paper, frame it and hang it on a wall, then you are beginning a quagmire.

And the one thing we've learned in the 8 days of this war, a war that the administration did not rally the population around, did not justify it clearly, did not plan for how Iran would respond (clearly, they didn't realize that the threat of drone activity would threaten oil tankers traversing the strait of Hormuz, and the inability for the flag carriers of those ships to obtain insurance, essentially shutting down the flow of oil through the strait) and their belief that just firing a lot of high dollar pyrotechnic munitions would bring Iran to bear, these chucklefucks should have had their heads examined.

And then Friday, Trump said that he would only accept complete and unconditional surrender from Iran:

At 8:50 yesterday morning(ga: Friday), President Donald J. Trump posted on social media: “There will be no deal with Iran except UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER! After that, and the selection of a GREAT & ACCEPTABLE Leader(s), we, and many of our wonderful and very brave allies and partners, will work tirelessly to bring Iran back from the brink of destruction, making it economically bigger, better, and stronger than ever before. IRAN WILL HAVE A GREAT FUTURE. ‘MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN (MIGA!).’ Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP”

As Alex Leary and Vera Bergengruen of the Wall Street Journal observed, the demand for unconditional surrender was quite a shift from Trump’s original promise to the people of Iran that the future is “yours to take,” or even his early claim that he was hoping to knock out Iran’s nuclear facilities. Trump’s shift highlighted that there appears to have been very little planning for what would happen after U.S. and Israeli bombs began to rain on Iran.

(From the 3/7 edition of Letters from an American)

We have heard the "Iranian people will rise up" and "The IRGC will surrender their arms", and many other fantasies. Now it is the full scorched earth WWII solution, a full and unconditional surrender. One has to assume that Trump watched some WWII documentaries and latched on to that. But I don't think he realizes what that entails.

After WWII, the allies occupied and controlled both Germany and Japan, and built up the insitutions from the ground up (some more successfully than others, a lot of ex-Nazi functionaries were ensconced into postwar government positions). That is a level of commeitment that I am 100% certain that Trump and his MAGA squad are not willing to do. Not only would it take probably more than a million soldiers on the ground (we would certainly need to reconstitute the draft to get a large enough force) to keep the peace and to facilitate this effort, but I am also 100% certain that Israel will not be interested in this building.

Tucker Carlsen is a terrible waste of skin, but one thing he is right about is that there is no appetite amongst my fellow citizens to go down this path.

The FT has a piece: "America chose this war – and must now choose how to end it" that is a thoughtful analysis. It lays out that there are two types of wars, those of necessity (aka Ukraine defending themselves against the Russian aggressors) and wars of choice. The US/Israel action is the latter.

The debate over whether the Trump administration and Benjamin Netanyahu’s government in Israel were right to have launched this war when they did is raging. It will (and should) continue long after the guns are silent. But the question now is: when and how should this war be brought to an end?

The argument for America continuing the war is to further reduce Iran’s military capabilities and to bring about a less radical leadership. The problem is that military efforts face the reality of diminishing returns and interfere with the emergence of a coherent leadership willing and able to end the fighting. The prospects for regime change leading to a democratic Iran are poor.

Meanwhile, the costs to the US and to President Donald Trump are mounting: dead service members, attacks on allies in the region, shortages of defensive systems, spiking energy costs, falling stock markets and poll numbers — not to mention the weakening of Washington’s ability to deal with the Chinese threat in the Indo-Pacific and the Russian menace to Ukraine and Europe.

In short, whether this is 4 weeks, 40 weeks or 400 weeks, this is a war of choice, and there will be tradeoffs that will be needed to end, and weighing of outcomes.

Do you trust any of these bumblers to do any rational things?

Iran’s new leaders — whoever they turn out to be — will also have reasons to end the war: to preserve what’s left of their military and economy, to consolidate political authority and ensure the country stays intact. However, Iran may hold off until the US is asking for peace in the hope of striking a better deal. They would have to answer the same questions as the US regarding their security policies and sanctions, and declare what they would require to allow tankers to start moving freely again through the Strait of Hormuz in a way that insurers deem safe. 

If all this sounds familiar, it should. Ultimately, both sides will have to return to the issues that led to war in the first place. The question is when: it only takes one side to start a war, but here it will take all three to end it.

Trump may declare victory, and take his toys home, but remember, Iran has a say, and the resources to be thorns in the sides of many players, from the other Arab states, to Israel, and to even the US.

Hang on Baby Jesus, it's gon' get bumpy.

Notice that I didn't even mention that Putin and the Russian intelligence orgainzations sharing targeting data with Iran, allowing them to take out two THAAD installations at $1.2B a pop. That's gotta hurt, and all those MAGA fuckwads who are all in on Team Putin can go fuck themselves sideways with rusty chainsaws.

1 - Very Serious People