Month: March 2026

As I’ve noted before, Vance’s real job in the administration is to be the chief ideologist of MAGA. That is, he has to take Trump’s arbitrary and often contradictory impulses and reverse engineer them into a coherent whole. It’s a tough task.

Possibly even more than Trump himself, Vance has built his political identity around avoiding foreign wars and regime change. What will he say about Iran? Will he simply lie and say the Iranians were about to build and deploy an ICBM capable of reaching America? Will he say Middle East wars and regime change are ok if we just do lots of damage from the air and leave the country in a physical and political shambles, with no improvement in sight? Will he say the Israelis made us do it?

I can’t wait to hear the answer.

As I’ve noted before, the Iranian political system is based on a bargain: the Revolutionary Guards get impunity, lots of money, and a religious justification for their thuggish behavior, while the religious leaders get the street muscle they need to keep Allah happy. The deal, ironically enough, resembles the tax cut for reactionary social policy agreement that keeps the GOP reasonably united.

There has been a lot of speculation that Khamenei’s death will result in a shift of power to the thugs. I think that will happen, but only within the framework of the existing deal. That’s what happened to the GOP, where the Reactionaries now drive the train and the PBPs follow; don’t expect anything different in Iran.

The regime wants to survive and to inflict some face-saving damage on the two big satans. That’s it. It can always build more missiles after the current conflict is over.

The problem, of course, is that Trump has now committed himself to be Bibi’s lawn guy, so the war is likely to resume at regular intervals for the foreseeable future.

Pete Hegseth, the American Secretary of War, announced today that the attack on the UK would probably continue for a matter of weeks. When asked why the danger from the British was imminent, he explained that America was only finishing the war, not starting it; after all, the British had resisted our independence efforts in the 18th century, and had burned the White House in 1814.

Hegseth also indicated that the war was necessary to keep the UK from building a nuclear weapon. When he was advised by a reporter that the UK had possessed nukes for about 70 years, the Secretary of War accused the media of dealing in fake news and then stormed out of the briefing room.

War supporters acknowledge that things could go seriously wrong. Their argument essentially is that the status quo also had risks, and that the war at least creates hope for a better future.

But hope, as the saying goes, is not a strategy, and it is perfectly possible that the regime could have evolved into something more acceptable in the face of regime division and public pressure after the natural death of the Supreme Leader. If you respond by saying that is also a strategy based on hope, I would note that it at least doesn’t require a war.

No one outside of Iran—and not many there—is going to miss Ayatollah Khamenei. Nevertheless, the war is controversial for the following reasons:

1. Neither historical precedents nor common sense suggest that a meaningful regime change is possible without a ground assault and an occupation.

2. If, somehow, meaningful regime change does occur, there is no guarantee that it will improve conditions for the Iranian people or the rest of the world.

3. Since there was no imminent danger from Iran, and the cost of the war is likely to be significant, the Constitution demands that it be authorized by Congress. The war is just another power grab by an authoritarian who wants to show the world that he is the boss.

And the case for the war? For that, see my next post.

The Supreme Leader got the rousing sendoff he so desperately wanted yesterday. To live to his late eighties and to be a martyr! It doesn’t get any better than that.

Khamenei was an obstacle to a peaceful and prosperous Iran for decades. He oppressed his people, not out of spite or personal ambition, but because he thought it was God’s will. Now that he is out of the way, can we expect improvement?

Probably not. My hope was that he would die quietly in his bed as soon as possible, and that an open succession crisis splitting the elite would ensue. That is unlikely under the current conditions. The elite will probably rally around a hardliner, and nothing will change.