The so-called Madman theory requires two things to work: a genuine belief on an adversary's part that the "madman" really will pull the trigger, and that the "madman" will stick to whatever bargain is struck afterwards. In both cases, the president shows he is utterly incapable of either. So the "madman" theory here is simply not at work. It didn't work for Richard Nixon, either, the case many think about when they think about this--the Soviets knew he was bluffing (just as the Russians and everyone else except the president's most loyal base know he is bluffing). I agree with you, Gabe, that the negotiations will tell the tale--but I'm willing to bet the Iranians will end up having some control over the Strait of Hormuz regardless. Our appetite for more attacks will lessen as the negotiations take place.
I recall standing in the desert in Iraq in 1991, listening to the countdown to the Gulf War ceasefire on both BBC shortwave and our armored division command net--the scale of destruction, from what we saw around us, was vast--but the core Iraqi ground forces were largely intact, even though they were retreating. I thought then that we should have gone one more day and really tackled the Republican Guard divisions. As we know, we bungled the peace in that conflict, giving Iraq the ability to move troops around by helicopter, which they promptly used on their own citizens to quell a revolt in the marsh land around the Tigris and Euphrates. We allowed them to keep much of their military intact--to counterbalance Iran, ironically. I thought then that we'd have to go back some day--and of course we did, though for all the wrong reasons.
I see the same things happening here: A desire to declare a quick and decisive victory based on an incomplete set of results. This takes nothing away from the brave men and women doing the fighting, but it does highlight how domestic political calculations, invariably short term, makes their sacrifices insignificant.
Today’s Fairytale of the War, Chapter 3: Once upon a time there was a little boy who yelled Fire! in a theater. He was bored. He saw with glee the chaos he caused.
But the resulting stampede caused injury. How could he know what would happen? asked his babysitter, BB Gunn. He's only seven. But someone must be held responsible for this horrible crime! yelled many in the town, so they punished the two ushers who failed to open the doors in time. Two weeks later, it happened again, this time in a school. This time, children died, and again, much of the town demanded accountability for the crime. But he didn't mean it, testified his friend Em B. Ess. Two female teachers lost their job. (They weren't very good at their jobs anyway). Two weeks later, he walked into a grocery store and opened his mouth to yell, but nothing came out. Terror ensued. And then he left. Planning is hard, but chaos is easy. The End
The Taliban didn't have an air force or a navy, and Trump threw in the towel on it four years ago. But now, when he talks about ordering mass destruction "for fun," he is being transparent about his growing villainy, and it shows that he has become very much emboldened about hogging the world stage, no matter how disgraceful his role in history will be as a result. This whole spiraling into chaos has got to stop somehow - the world can't continue to be subjected to it. Maybe if 51% of the world's population could join together in a meditative state, wishing as one that his head would explode...? We need a modern-day Thomas Jefferson to write a very clear and concise declaration of what Americans expect from their president, and we need virtually everyone in any position of visible authority to sign it: senators, congressmen, university leaders, CEO's, religious leaders, legit Nobel prize recipients, major newspaper editorial boards, retired generals, .... There has always been the phenomenon of the Ugly American, but now we have hauled off and elected the ugliest American as President and he is getting uglier and uglier by the day.
Is there no one willing to do more than just report on what I hesitate to call what are the facts? Seems like there's just a lot of hand wringing on both sides of the aisle, but no action. What actually can DJT actually do to any of those who should be speaking out. Do you hear me, members of Congress, among others.
He’s an unrepentant thug. People are right to be afraid. I never thought I would say this but I actually admire the bravery of MTG and Tucker Carlson for speaking out.
You will read lots of “analysis” today. Consider these points:
Trump won on some dimensions. He was able to threaten “annihilation.” Without saying nukes, he sent the message. The Republican leadership and members gave him a pass. Congress remained in recess. He proved again that there is no meaningful opposition in his own party. He proved once again that Democratic leadership is neutered, too.
Trump also got Netanyahu to agree to the two week pause. Israel will press on in Lebanon, but Iran’s destruction is paused. Basically, a shrug from Netanyahu, but something.
Trump got the markets to improve, if only temporarily. He gets to declare a win there. And, he gets to spend two weeks manipulating markets through social media posts.
He keeps his bromance with Putin going. Chaos works for both of them. Trump has a desire for chaos and he’s given himself at least two more weeks of it to keep the Epstein mess at bay. Everyone will be guessing and asking “what’s next?” That’s Trump’s turf.
He’s running out of runway and deep down he probably knows it. Just because resistance is not reported in the press doesn’t mean that he hasn’t been leaned on heavily. And what has he achieved that wasn’t better before he started this misbegotten war? Iran has been battered, yes, but in many ways it has come out of this in a better position than before the war. And it now realizes it has a cash cow in its control of the Strait of Hormuz. Make no mistake, that is not going away and will have a permanent knock on effect on the price of oil. In the meantime the US has used up a lot of ordinance that could be better used elsewhere and it has spent an inordinate amount of money, so much money that Trump has talked about cutting popular programs in order to pay for it. That’s not going to go down well with the electorate. I am also of the opinion that even if it had a nuclear weapon Iran would never deploy it. It would be used for leverage and would actually have contributed to more stability in the region. Look at India and Pakistan. Look at the survival of North Korea. The biggest threat Iran poses is not military but economic. It has a highly educated, very clever, technically skilled population and given the right circumstances could easily dominate the region financially and politically. What gets in its way is ideology. Let’s not let ideology get in our way as well.
“safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces and with due consideration of technical limitations.” I wonder if technical limitations might be because Iran has deployed some old-type contact mines which can drift to unknown locations.
The Madman Theory is deeply flawed as it relies on a belief that the madman in question will honor his commitments, which of course no real madman would or even could. Furthermore it’s only ever brought up to make sense of erratic behavior by a leader who has clearly lost his way. As far as I know there is no evidence in history that it has been successful deployed intentionally. In any case, whether he has deliberately appeared to be out of his mind or not, Trump has created mayhem best avoided. He has killed many people, destabilized the world economy and he has left his enemy battered but more powerful than ever. As far as I am concerned this whole adventure is a war crime. The Republican party has much to answer for and I believe they will be answering for it for a very long time. Unfortunately this is not wholly a good thing. Between the two parties I much prefer the Democrats, but with a weakened conservative counter force I fear they may very well run amok themselves, just in different ways. We are in for a very rocky ride.
MadMEN (plural) is more like it! All of them. Including the cheerleaders and silent ones in our Congress.
While it is good to analyze the "news" of the day and wait to make any judgements...why not exercise judgement and call out radically immoral behavior? (we can always let slightly immoral stuff slide, as we are not really ever sure of true right and wrong...but we are witnessing extreme stuff here).
trump is not playing 3D chess, he does what he does best: go with his feelings FIRST, whatever makes him feel most manly, macho, mighty that he thinks puts him in the best light, then react to the consequences when it goes awry by fumbling around to see what works NEXT to buy more time - if it resolves, he takes all the credit; if it doesn't, he'll push the blame, either a) no one told me this was supposed to happen, b) [insert name of individual or group, Democrat, General] caused this to happen, we had no choice but to undo THEIR mistake, and declare victory, success, solved the problem! Wash, rinse, repeat, screw the consequences, declare success, blame the bad on others - the trump doctrine.
Trump had nothing to do with this ceasefire. China stepped in behind the scenes to convince Iran to go along with a ceasefire because China buys almost all of Iran’s oil and has a vested interest in getting global trade moving again. Trump has no real plan for any of this and only works on magical thinking.
Is there a truce? Missles have landed since the announcement Nobody seems to be negotiating. Talking about a plan to begin negotiating isn't the same thing. I remember the Cuban Missle Crisis. That was scary enough and nobody was nuts. It came down to one Russian naval captain.
Today is a sad day for me. WUTP was my go-to source for news for many years and I felt that we were going to be in good hands because the new generation of independent news sources would be telling it like it is without bias. Unfortunately, Gabe has now descended to the same both-sides sane-washing that the traditional media used to help get an unqualified, age-addled, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual abuser (numerous other disparaging adjectives deleted) imbecile elected to president twice. I guess if it gets you published by the regime news media -- A.K.A. The Washington Post -- it's worth it. Congratulations.
The article claims that "Ultimately, the war will be judged on how much either country has gained relative to the status quo before it started: on Iran’s nuclear program, on sanctions, on the Strait of Hormuz. We don’t yet know where any of those negotiating points will end up, so it’s hard to judge the war’s success." This is not just lazy reporting, it's completely inaccurate. While there are some details that will are yet to be known, we can state with certainty that from the US standpoint the war is a failure. The US is weaker than before the war and Iran is stronger.
Iran now *knows* that not only can it close the strait of Hormuz but that it can also bring the world economy to its knees and there's nothing the US can do about it. It had been speculated that they could close the strait but that hadn't been demonstrated and it came as even more of a surprise (and not just to Trump) that they could do so even after being bombarded by the US and Israel for a month. This is a powerful ace in the hole for Iran in any negotiations.
The US sanctions against Iran have been lifted and as is pointed out in the article both parties are in agreement with that. Thanks to help from their allies Iran's drones and ballistic missiles attacks are improving their success as they learn from their mistakes in real world battle, rather than just simulations. In addition, rather than regime change, war with the US and Israel has increased the strength of the current regime and even improved the internal support for it as it stands against the evil invaders.
The US on the other hand has shown itself to be a paper tiger. It has spent the bulk of its explosive inventory and is still unable to bring a much smaller, poorer and weaker enemy to its knees. We have had to pull military resources from other locations -- notably South Korea and Taiwan -- which has left our traditional allies to fend for themselves. We have arguably committed war crimes and alienated most of our closest allies and strengthened Russia and China.
Our economy has been hit not just by higher oil prices but by an inexorable selling of US dollars causing interest rates on the national debt to skyrocket just as the bulk of our bonds are due and need to be refinanced. Prior to this war oil was traded in dollars in exchange for security guarantees (the petrodollar system). China is now getting involved through its partnership with Iran to create a petroyuan system. With tolls in the strait a distinct possibility (though admittedly that is one of the details to be worked out), that threatens the petrodollar system and will further depreciate the dollar in world markets. Pretty much all economists agree that even if the treaty were resolved tomorrow and the US wins all 15 points, things will get much worse before they can even return to the pre-war state.
Then there's the moral degradation of the country this war has caused. We killed a bunch of children on the first day of the war and the more we learn about that the worse it looks. We were in the middle of negotiating a treaty that looked like it had the possibility of ending Iran's nuclear program and in the middle of negotiations we hit Iran with a sneak attack. In 1941 we (I wasn't born yet, but I know people) were all appalled that those underhanded Japanese would attack us without provocation or declaration but at least negotiations had broken down well before the attack. We attacked Iran even though they were giving in on some of their demands!
The threat Trump issued on Easter is arguably a war crime even if it didn't get carried out, but it's not the only war crimes the US has committed under his leadership. We used to decry what Putin is doing in Ukraine as criminal, but now we have sunk even lower than Russian on the morality meter.
I could go on because there are many more ways in which the US his weaker than it was before the war, but I hopefully have made the point. We don't have to wait till the negotiations have ended to know whether the war was successful and any statement otherwise just plays into the hands of the Trump denialists. It's a sad day when I need to point this out to Gabe.
If the plan does not include a way for the U.S. to monitor the development of bomb grade uranium and long range missiles, this war will be a failure for the U.S.. Trump doesn’t care if the populace is unable to take the opening given to them to change the regime nor if Iran benefits from charging tolls for safe passage through Hormuz (so long as the tolls don’t increase prices that can be attributed to his administration.) If the Iranians don’t cave on the uranium/missile issues (I don’t think they will), the bombing campaign will resume.
The so-called Madman theory requires two things to work: a genuine belief on an adversary's part that the "madman" really will pull the trigger, and that the "madman" will stick to whatever bargain is struck afterwards. In both cases, the president shows he is utterly incapable of either. So the "madman" theory here is simply not at work. It didn't work for Richard Nixon, either, the case many think about when they think about this--the Soviets knew he was bluffing (just as the Russians and everyone else except the president's most loyal base know he is bluffing). I agree with you, Gabe, that the negotiations will tell the tale--but I'm willing to bet the Iranians will end up having some control over the Strait of Hormuz regardless. Our appetite for more attacks will lessen as the negotiations take place.
I recall standing in the desert in Iraq in 1991, listening to the countdown to the Gulf War ceasefire on both BBC shortwave and our armored division command net--the scale of destruction, from what we saw around us, was vast--but the core Iraqi ground forces were largely intact, even though they were retreating. I thought then that we should have gone one more day and really tackled the Republican Guard divisions. As we know, we bungled the peace in that conflict, giving Iraq the ability to move troops around by helicopter, which they promptly used on their own citizens to quell a revolt in the marsh land around the Tigris and Euphrates. We allowed them to keep much of their military intact--to counterbalance Iran, ironically. I thought then that we'd have to go back some day--and of course we did, though for all the wrong reasons.
I see the same things happening here: A desire to declare a quick and decisive victory based on an incomplete set of results. This takes nothing away from the brave men and women doing the fighting, but it does highlight how domestic political calculations, invariably short term, makes their sacrifices insignificant.
Most important, they can see that they have been fightingfor the profits of the Epstein class and not security of the nation.
Today’s Fairytale of the War, Chapter 3: Once upon a time there was a little boy who yelled Fire! in a theater. He was bored. He saw with glee the chaos he caused.
But the resulting stampede caused injury. How could he know what would happen? asked his babysitter, BB Gunn. He's only seven. But someone must be held responsible for this horrible crime! yelled many in the town, so they punished the two ushers who failed to open the doors in time. Two weeks later, it happened again, this time in a school. This time, children died, and again, much of the town demanded accountability for the crime. But he didn't mean it, testified his friend Em B. Ess. Two female teachers lost their job. (They weren't very good at their jobs anyway). Two weeks later, he walked into a grocery store and opened his mouth to yell, but nothing came out. Terror ensued. And then he left. Planning is hard, but chaos is easy. The End
The Taliban didn't have an air force or a navy, and Trump threw in the towel on it four years ago. But now, when he talks about ordering mass destruction "for fun," he is being transparent about his growing villainy, and it shows that he has become very much emboldened about hogging the world stage, no matter how disgraceful his role in history will be as a result. This whole spiraling into chaos has got to stop somehow - the world can't continue to be subjected to it. Maybe if 51% of the world's population could join together in a meditative state, wishing as one that his head would explode...? We need a modern-day Thomas Jefferson to write a very clear and concise declaration of what Americans expect from their president, and we need virtually everyone in any position of visible authority to sign it: senators, congressmen, university leaders, CEO's, religious leaders, legit Nobel prize recipients, major newspaper editorial boards, retired generals, .... There has always been the phenomenon of the Ugly American, but now we have hauled off and elected the ugliest American as President and he is getting uglier and uglier by the day.
Is there no one willing to do more than just report on what I hesitate to call what are the facts? Seems like there's just a lot of hand wringing on both sides of the aisle, but no action. What actually can DJT actually do to any of those who should be speaking out. Do you hear me, members of Congress, among others.
He’s an unrepentant thug. People are right to be afraid. I never thought I would say this but I actually admire the bravery of MTG and Tucker Carlson for speaking out.
You will read lots of “analysis” today. Consider these points:
Trump won on some dimensions. He was able to threaten “annihilation.” Without saying nukes, he sent the message. The Republican leadership and members gave him a pass. Congress remained in recess. He proved again that there is no meaningful opposition in his own party. He proved once again that Democratic leadership is neutered, too.
Trump also got Netanyahu to agree to the two week pause. Israel will press on in Lebanon, but Iran’s destruction is paused. Basically, a shrug from Netanyahu, but something.
Trump got the markets to improve, if only temporarily. He gets to declare a win there. And, he gets to spend two weeks manipulating markets through social media posts.
He keeps his bromance with Putin going. Chaos works for both of them. Trump has a desire for chaos and he’s given himself at least two more weeks of it to keep the Epstein mess at bay. Everyone will be guessing and asking “what’s next?” That’s Trump’s turf.
He’s running out of runway and deep down he probably knows it. Just because resistance is not reported in the press doesn’t mean that he hasn’t been leaned on heavily. And what has he achieved that wasn’t better before he started this misbegotten war? Iran has been battered, yes, but in many ways it has come out of this in a better position than before the war. And it now realizes it has a cash cow in its control of the Strait of Hormuz. Make no mistake, that is not going away and will have a permanent knock on effect on the price of oil. In the meantime the US has used up a lot of ordinance that could be better used elsewhere and it has spent an inordinate amount of money, so much money that Trump has talked about cutting popular programs in order to pay for it. That’s not going to go down well with the electorate. I am also of the opinion that even if it had a nuclear weapon Iran would never deploy it. It would be used for leverage and would actually have contributed to more stability in the region. Look at India and Pakistan. Look at the survival of North Korea. The biggest threat Iran poses is not military but economic. It has a highly educated, very clever, technically skilled population and given the right circumstances could easily dominate the region financially and politically. What gets in its way is ideology. Let’s not let ideology get in our way as well.
Dan: great analysis. I have to admit I admire the chaotic comfort zone (aka “what’s next”) Trump can live in.
“safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces and with due consideration of technical limitations.” I wonder if technical limitations might be because Iran has deployed some old-type contact mines which can drift to unknown locations.
Possible but doubtful. I think the Iranians are just hedging their bets. Nobody knows what other actors in this conflict might do.
The Madman Theory is deeply flawed as it relies on a belief that the madman in question will honor his commitments, which of course no real madman would or even could. Furthermore it’s only ever brought up to make sense of erratic behavior by a leader who has clearly lost his way. As far as I know there is no evidence in history that it has been successful deployed intentionally. In any case, whether he has deliberately appeared to be out of his mind or not, Trump has created mayhem best avoided. He has killed many people, destabilized the world economy and he has left his enemy battered but more powerful than ever. As far as I am concerned this whole adventure is a war crime. The Republican party has much to answer for and I believe they will be answering for it for a very long time. Unfortunately this is not wholly a good thing. Between the two parties I much prefer the Democrats, but with a weakened conservative counter force I fear they may very well run amok themselves, just in different ways. We are in for a very rocky ride.
MadMEN (plural) is more like it! All of them. Including the cheerleaders and silent ones in our Congress.
While it is good to analyze the "news" of the day and wait to make any judgements...why not exercise judgement and call out radically immoral behavior? (we can always let slightly immoral stuff slide, as we are not really ever sure of true right and wrong...but we are witnessing extreme stuff here).
trump is not playing 3D chess, he does what he does best: go with his feelings FIRST, whatever makes him feel most manly, macho, mighty that he thinks puts him in the best light, then react to the consequences when it goes awry by fumbling around to see what works NEXT to buy more time - if it resolves, he takes all the credit; if it doesn't, he'll push the blame, either a) no one told me this was supposed to happen, b) [insert name of individual or group, Democrat, General] caused this to happen, we had no choice but to undo THEIR mistake, and declare victory, success, solved the problem! Wash, rinse, repeat, screw the consequences, declare success, blame the bad on others - the trump doctrine.
Trump had nothing to do with this ceasefire. China stepped in behind the scenes to convince Iran to go along with a ceasefire because China buys almost all of Iran’s oil and has a vested interest in getting global trade moving again. Trump has no real plan for any of this and only works on magical thinking.
Is there a truce? Missles have landed since the announcement Nobody seems to be negotiating. Talking about a plan to begin negotiating isn't the same thing. I remember the Cuban Missle Crisis. That was scary enough and nobody was nuts. It came down to one Russian naval captain.
Issuing ultimatums is not negotiation or diplomacy. Coercion leaves one side smug and the other seething.
Today is a sad day for me. WUTP was my go-to source for news for many years and I felt that we were going to be in good hands because the new generation of independent news sources would be telling it like it is without bias. Unfortunately, Gabe has now descended to the same both-sides sane-washing that the traditional media used to help get an unqualified, age-addled, convicted felon, adjudicated sexual abuser (numerous other disparaging adjectives deleted) imbecile elected to president twice. I guess if it gets you published by the regime news media -- A.K.A. The Washington Post -- it's worth it. Congratulations.
The article claims that "Ultimately, the war will be judged on how much either country has gained relative to the status quo before it started: on Iran’s nuclear program, on sanctions, on the Strait of Hormuz. We don’t yet know where any of those negotiating points will end up, so it’s hard to judge the war’s success." This is not just lazy reporting, it's completely inaccurate. While there are some details that will are yet to be known, we can state with certainty that from the US standpoint the war is a failure. The US is weaker than before the war and Iran is stronger.
Iran now *knows* that not only can it close the strait of Hormuz but that it can also bring the world economy to its knees and there's nothing the US can do about it. It had been speculated that they could close the strait but that hadn't been demonstrated and it came as even more of a surprise (and not just to Trump) that they could do so even after being bombarded by the US and Israel for a month. This is a powerful ace in the hole for Iran in any negotiations.
The US sanctions against Iran have been lifted and as is pointed out in the article both parties are in agreement with that. Thanks to help from their allies Iran's drones and ballistic missiles attacks are improving their success as they learn from their mistakes in real world battle, rather than just simulations. In addition, rather than regime change, war with the US and Israel has increased the strength of the current regime and even improved the internal support for it as it stands against the evil invaders.
The US on the other hand has shown itself to be a paper tiger. It has spent the bulk of its explosive inventory and is still unable to bring a much smaller, poorer and weaker enemy to its knees. We have had to pull military resources from other locations -- notably South Korea and Taiwan -- which has left our traditional allies to fend for themselves. We have arguably committed war crimes and alienated most of our closest allies and strengthened Russia and China.
Our economy has been hit not just by higher oil prices but by an inexorable selling of US dollars causing interest rates on the national debt to skyrocket just as the bulk of our bonds are due and need to be refinanced. Prior to this war oil was traded in dollars in exchange for security guarantees (the petrodollar system). China is now getting involved through its partnership with Iran to create a petroyuan system. With tolls in the strait a distinct possibility (though admittedly that is one of the details to be worked out), that threatens the petrodollar system and will further depreciate the dollar in world markets. Pretty much all economists agree that even if the treaty were resolved tomorrow and the US wins all 15 points, things will get much worse before they can even return to the pre-war state.
Then there's the moral degradation of the country this war has caused. We killed a bunch of children on the first day of the war and the more we learn about that the worse it looks. We were in the middle of negotiating a treaty that looked like it had the possibility of ending Iran's nuclear program and in the middle of negotiations we hit Iran with a sneak attack. In 1941 we (I wasn't born yet, but I know people) were all appalled that those underhanded Japanese would attack us without provocation or declaration but at least negotiations had broken down well before the attack. We attacked Iran even though they were giving in on some of their demands!
The threat Trump issued on Easter is arguably a war crime even if it didn't get carried out, but it's not the only war crimes the US has committed under his leadership. We used to decry what Putin is doing in Ukraine as criminal, but now we have sunk even lower than Russian on the morality meter.
I could go on because there are many more ways in which the US his weaker than it was before the war, but I hopefully have made the point. We don't have to wait till the negotiations have ended to know whether the war was successful and any statement otherwise just plays into the hands of the Trump denialists. It's a sad day when I need to point this out to Gabe.
If the plan does not include a way for the U.S. to monitor the development of bomb grade uranium and long range missiles, this war will be a failure for the U.S.. Trump doesn’t care if the populace is unable to take the opening given to them to change the regime nor if Iran benefits from charging tolls for safe passage through Hormuz (so long as the tolls don’t increase prices that can be attributed to his administration.) If the Iranians don’t cave on the uranium/missile issues (I don’t think they will), the bombing campaign will resume.
TAW