Hit Iran Hard
Earlier on Fox News, I discussed the latest on Iran and argued that President Trump should order a resumption of general war against Iran. Talking points below.
Intransigent Iran
Trump has bent over backward to give Iran’s rulers a chance to remain in power by recognizing freedom of navigation and giving up their nuclear weapons program.
They have not acceded. Now it is time for the pain train.
It is hard to assert that the ceasefire is still intact. They are shooting at our naval vessels. We are shooting back. They are also attacking our allies like the UAE—second only to Israel in standing with us against Iran—with ballistic missiles. We appear to be in a state of low-intensity conflict.
Two of my rules for PR: When in doubt, tell the truth; and if you must lie, tell plausible lies. Statements from the War Department about the ceasefire and other recent developments break these rules.
Explanations for the on-and-off-and-on “Project Freedom” to reopen the Strait (P.S. we need better operation names like the ones from WWII) are starting to sound like the “Five O’Clock Follies” from Saigon. It seems like the War Department has botched this and was generally unprepared for the closure of the Strait. Did they mislead the President?
There is a long history of adversaries failing to understand the determination of the USA. Even after Nixon took office in 1969, he had to escalate severely against North Vietnam in order to get a peace agreement. Hanoi then, like Tehran today—and Europe and the mainstream media—was hoping for political change in the USA that would give it respite.
Only after Operations Linebacker I and Linebacker II in 1972 did the North Vietnamese get serious about negotiating. A year later, Nixon fulfilled his promise to end our participation in the war and get our POWs out.
It is likely that Trump will have to resume hostilities. He should target the Iranian energy industry, which will weaken the regime and help U.S. and allied energy industries, especially with OPEC on life support and a potential glut after the war.
However, the top immediate U.S. tactical goal should be a “blue carpet” of allied aviation and naval forces that reopen the Strait by negating any threat, or potential threat, in Iran that can affect the Strait.
The President should be blunt in addressing the American people, saying we had hoped for a quick resolution, but this will take time and we have the upper hand. Wars almost always last longer than projected. Two years and $2 trillion might be a good guess to bring the regime to heel or create a failed state that cannot act externally. Of course, it is impossible to put a price on the U.S. and allied casualties that resumed combat will incur.
Rhetorically, Trump’s method of using optimism and the perception of momentum to push an agreement across the finish line has served both him and the USA well. But now is the time for reality. Trump should now under-promise and over-deliver. Let Iran see the consequences, not just hear about them.
If we are short on resources, now is the time to hand European security over to the arrogant moochers of Europe and relocate U.S. forces and materiel from there to the Gulf for the war.
Regime Change in Iran?
We cannot predicate policy on an uprising in Iran—nor has Trump done so, although he has expressed hope for a revolution. Maybe it will happen, maybe it won’t. It’s in the nice-to-see category, but cannot be a requirement for victory.
Believing that any people can be made democratic, and that they will then be our chums, is a cherished and admirable view held by many Americans. Sometimes it has worked, as in Japan, and sometimes it has not, as in Iraq.
Iran has no democratic tradition. There is a first time for everything, but democracy is hard. It is also difficult to predict. Even those who were certain European communism would collapse did not predict the timing of revolutionary events there in 1989 and 1991.
This concept of a “democratic peace,” especially when espoused by neoconservatives, often rhymes with Marxist theory of historical inevitability, albeit with a different outcome. But in reality, events don’t just happen. People make them happen.
A coherent plan to help the Iranian people free themselves from their despotic regime is long overdue. But we should realize our limitations.
For Senator Lindsey Graham, who is great at bumper-sticker slogans, suggesting that we arm dissidents is a long way from designing and implementing a serious plan.
Flooding Iran with Starlink terminals might be a better start. Dissent movements, like any political campaign, thrive on information.
The CIA is pretty much out of the business of political warfare, except against Republican presidents, so I have no confidence it would choose the right group to arm in Iran.
Previous arguments to arm Kurdish groups demonstrate the knee-jerk nature of some of these proposals. The regime can only be overthrown by the Persian majority in Iran.
We can hope that Iranians overthrow their regime and take steps that, over the long term, will make that more likely. But it cannot be an assumption of near-term war policy.
The State of Nukes
Iran’s enriched uranium probably exists in the form of uranium hexafluoride, or UF6. When UF6 is not being run through centrifuge cascades for further enrichment, it is typically stored in sealed cylinders. At room temperature and ordinary pressure, UF6 is a solid, not a gas.
Either these cylinders have been ruptured, in which case some or all of their contents may be dispersed, contaminated, or chemically degraded, or they have not. Either the material is recoverable, or it is not.
Trump should demand that our $100-billion-per-year intelligence bureaucracy give him a straight answer on the state of this UF6.
If the UF6 is still usable, the U.S. and our allies need a plan to render it unusable.
Trump should also seek an agreement with Israel and the Gulf states that any attempt by Iran to acquire, assemble, or start centrifuges—or any other part of the nuclear fuel cycle at any site or any time—will lead to the use of military force.
The U.S. conventional posturing in the region is now over. Iranians kicked you all out of the region, and your carriers and destroyers are parked way off, hundreds of miles in the Arabian Sea. Can't even get anywhere near it. Have to fire their missiles from the standoff ranges.