Dem
47
GOP
53
Maybe this is premature, but it could be very important, so it is worth a few words. One of Donald Trump's main campaign themes was no more forever wars. He certainly wasn't going to start any new ones and was even going to end the war in Ukraine on Day 1. We are now on Day 400 and last we heard it was still going strong with no end in sight.
For the America Firsters among his supporters, that's bad enough. Another self-inflicted war would be even worse.
Yet Trump seems to be inexorably moving toward starting a new one—with Iran. Americans often love miniwars that
can be won in a day or two with no loss of American life. Ronald Reagan knew that, hence his invasion of Lebanon and his
bombing of Libya. Secretary of Defense War Pete Hegseth also loves that kind of war so he can cosplay soldier,
castigate fat generals, and persuade himself that everyone loves him. Wars that go on and on with many Americans being
killed and maimed are much less popular. Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan come to mind here.
Trump's underlings have been negotiating with Iran about having them stop developing nuclear weapons. This has been going on for months, with no progress. Seems Iran wants the bomb and is trying hard to make one. Trump wants to stop them. Deadlock here.
So, Trump has ordered the Navy to send warships to Iran. On the left below is the map as of last week. Additionally, the carrier U.S.S. Gerald R. Ford and its complement of destroyer escorts is on the way. Military experts say that it will be mid-March before all military assets are in place. Trump could pretend to negotiate until then and strike when all the ships and planes are at their destinations.
If war comes, it won't be like Venezuela, where a pinpoint strike grabbed the leader by surprise. Iran has been running military exercises for weeks and expects to be attacked. It is also a much bigger and more powerful country than Venezuela. It has short- and medium-range (conventional) missiles that can hit U.S. bases all over the Middle East. Iran has over 600,000 active-duty military and another 350,000 reservists.
Iran also has an unusual and powerful weapon: the Strait of Hormuz (see above right). That is the region shown in the red oval above in the map on the left. It is not an accident that two destroyers are sitting there. The navigable channel is only two miles wide in each direction, but one-fifth of the world's oil and liquified natural gas passes through the Strait. Iran could close the channel with shore-to-ship missiles—at horrendous environmental cost—by sinking tankers. Oil prices would go through the roof and cause economic chaos in the West, China, and elsewhere. The Iranian navy has been running drills in the Strait of late. Closing the Strait would hurt Iran since its only source of income is oil, but if the ayatollahs felt in danger of being overthrown, they could shut it down. In fact, they could block shipping by merely announcing that they would sink any oil tanker trying to run the blockade. Would Exxon or any other oil company risk losing a $100-million ship, and inflicting the environmental damage a direct missile hit could cause, even with a U.S. Navy escort? Probably not.
The U.S. has far more firepower than Iran, but Iran's strategy would not be to kill more Americans than America could kill Iranians. That's impossible. Its strategy would be to make the war so painful for Trump (dead soldiers, an economy in tatters, the prospect of Democrats winning 50 House seats and 5 Senate seats, etc.) that Trump would be forced to stop the war and accept a nuclear Iran. The Joint Chiefs know all this of course, but since when does Trump listen to experts when his gut is available for advice?
On the other hand, Trump is so unpredictable that Iran has to take into account the possibility that he would pull the trigger and launch a full-blown war, with the goal of killing millions of Iranians, destroying Iran as a functioning country, and causing regime change, something many Iranians would welcome. This is a game of chicken on a previously unimaginable scale.
It is also a political gamble on an unimaginable scale. If Trump could pull it off, permanently destroying Iran as a (nuclear) power, and doing it all without losing many American lives or creating many terrorist attacks, he would be a hero and Republicans would probably win the midterms. On the other hand, if it all went south with plenty of damage to Iran but at the price of multiple Navy ships being sunk with thousands of sailors dying, the economy in chaos, and the Dow down 20,000 points, Republicans in R+10 districts would go down to defeat in droves and Trump would be impeached and maybe even convicted in Jan. 2027. Either of these scenarios, and maybe some others, are possible. (V)