“This is not our war. This is a war of choice by the United States.”
So said Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Thursday, during an interview with a prominent American media outlet.
I’m both surprised and not that Araghchi’s still alive. Iranian foreign ministers pull double duty as regime propagandists, and this is a dangerous time to be chief propagandist for the Revolution.
On the other hand, the foreign minister typically isn’t required to traffic in the most potent strain of regime bombast, which is the purview of the IRGC high command and, of course, the Supreme Leader.
Araghchi’s a diplomat, not a military figure or a cleric. If you start assassinating diplomats and politicians (real ones, I mean, as distinct from people like Ismail Haniyeh, who are just militants in suits), you might as well declare everyone in Iran a legitimate target. Even, say, school girls.
In lengthy remarks to NBC, Araghchi hinted at the prospect of a US invasion. “It is clear that the US has failed to achieve its main goal, which was clean, rapid victory,” he said. “Now they are talking about, you know, plan B. And I believe plan B would be an even bigger failure.”
I’m not sure who’s talking about “plan B,” nor was it immediately obvious that Araghchi’s allusions to a ground invasion were based on anything other than speculation, but if he’s not just speculating, and the Trump administration is indeed considering such an escalation, it’s incumbent upon me to state the obvious: The IRGC, even in its dilapidated state, wouldn’t be the pushover that the Iraqi military was in 2003.
Don’t get me wrong: It’d still be a walkover in the context of major-state warfare. Iran’s hopelessly overmatched technologically and the Marines would go in with the US and Israel having established complete air superiority. The outcome would be a foregone conclusion.
But “getting there’s half the fun,” as the old adage goes. This would be a serious fight, and before they were inevitably subdued, dismantled and destroyed, the IRGC would send a lot of US Marines home in bags, to put it bluntly. So, let’s hope Araghchi doesn’t know something the rest of us don’t.
On that happy note, Trump on Thursday said it should be up to him, at least in part, who succeeds Ali Khamenei, and that under no circumstances can it be Mojtaba.
“Khamenei’s son is a lightweight. [He’s] unacceptable to me,” Trump told Axios, before sending SNL‘s Cold Open writers back the drawing board with the following real-life quotable: “I have to be involved in the appointment, like with Delcy.”
It’s impossible to satirize that. You can’t pastiche second-term Trump. He’s his own caricature. This is a US president referencing his own two-month-old operation to kidnap the leader of a foreign country in the course of insisting on the right to choose the new leader of another country he’s currently bombing, and whose old leader he helped kill just last week.
Do note: The fact that Trump’s apparently resigned to there being a new Supreme Leader at all arguably suggests failure. The idea was (or should’ve been, from the perspective of near-term stability) to remove the clerical layer in Tehran, along with the top military command structure, affording middle-ranking IRGC officers an opportunity to establish an interim junta. Instead, we’re debating the next Ayatollah.
On the battlefield, the US is increasingly focused on knocking out Iran’s mobile missile launchers, so the IRGC’s dispatching more and more drones, some of which accidentally crashed in Azerbaijan Thursday, injuring four and prompting a stern warning from the country’s president.
Tehran continues to insist it isn’t targeting anyone other than US personnel in the region and Israel, a contention I mostly believe. But melees are by their very nature unpredictable. Now, we have two incidents in two days of Iranian projectiles showing up in places they shouldn’t be (Azerbaijan on Thursday and Turkey on Wednesday).
Speaking of things showing up where they aren’t welcome, Kurds toting CIA-gifted small arms may be poised to invade Iran from the northwest with possible air support from the IDF. This project — handing out 9mms to Kurds with the hope they’ll cause trouble for the regime in Tehran — isn’t new, but now it’s news, with an “s.”
Although Karoline Leavitt claimed Thursday that Trump doesn’t know anything about this, roping in the Kurds for a fight is standard operating procedure for the US military. America has a long-running political-security partnership with the government in Erbil (and thereby with the Peshmerga), and the US famously relied on the Kurds in Syria to help dislodge ISIS from Raqqa.
According to multiple reports, the US and Israel are angling to use the Kurds as bait. If the CIA and Mossad can instigate an insurgency and Kurdish fighters invade Iran across the border with Iraq, American and Israeli warplanes can incinerate IRGC units on their way to the fight.
Trump apparently held multiple phone calls this week with Kurdish officials in Erbil in a bid to gauge interest in supporting cross-border operations by Iraq-based Iranian Kurdish fighters.
Needless to say, Recep Tayyip Erdogan won’t be enamored with that idea. Anything that involves arming and supporting militant Kurdish groups is anathema in Ankara. In that context, it’s worth noting that the Kurdish community hasn’t forgotten Trump abandoned them in October of 2019, when The White House allowed Erdogan to slaughter YPG units while establishing a “buffer zone” between Turkey and war-ravaged Syria.
Meanwhile, in Lebanon, the death toll from a renewed Israeli bombing campaign against the remnants of Hezbollah’s military is approaching 100. The IDF issued new evacuation orders, Beirut’s in a state of chaos and Israel’s preparing to invade southern Lebanon for the second time in two years.
If you’re not laughing by now, check your pulse. This is the furthest thing from funny in a “ha, ha” sense, but it’s positively riotous from a “Jesus Christ, what a mess” perspective.
My guess is that Trump’s “four or five weeks” timeline on ending the fighting will prove optimistic.
The president’s 4 or 5 day timeline may prove to be on a par with those who told Putin that they would be marching into Kiev within 48 hours.
Amazing to me how many will continue to negotiate and cut deals with Trump since all deals have to be viewed only through his self-serving and convenient lens. A deal’s only a deal if he says so, and thus never final or binding. This applies broadly – whether militarily, commercially, economically, or politically – and is buttressed by his proven track record of deceit, lying and prevarication, his convenient memory or forgetfulness, his lack of principles, his one-way insistence on loyalty, and his laser focus on enriching himself and cobbling together some sort of personal legacy.
It was one thing when he was just playing around and wasting our money by the frigate load, but now lives are at stake. And we’ve got two guys who spend a good part of every day at their respective hair and make up stations calling the shots. The greatest generation has given way to the vainest Administration.
I wonder whose head will roll for telling Trump to lead with “4 or 5 days”. Hegseth, Caine, other?
I also wonder what the Gulf States are telling Trump in private. Are they asking him to TACO before more Iranian missiles/drones hit them, or are they urging him to stay the course since if the regime survives it will be even more of a threat?
As far as most investors go, I’d guess if they saw a path to containment of the missile and drone threat to tankers and energy infra within a few weeks, they wouldn’t care too much what further chaos lies ahead for Iran because, well, horizons are short. I think there is in fact such a path.
This seems like a humongoid trading windfall for the Gulf States. I’m sure they’re smashing the bid in futures and booking much wider margins than they otherwise would collect. If the straits remain closed, it’s Force Majeure and they book out their trades @ market. That’s potentially a loss, but not likely a big one. If they can actually deliver because the US navy is running escort duty, it’s money in the bank. It’s like holding cash in a bubble: a free ATM put, only in this case you’re holding bottled up crude/LNG/LPG and Donald Trump is standing guarantor for delivery. The only question is how much unsold length they were sitting on. I have zero insight into how the gulf states manage risk, but if it’s just vanilla delta hedging, then the persistent elevated vol regime suggests they have a lot of room to maneuver.
Of course, this only works if they can actually move product in the end. If the straits stay closed for 6 months (or hell, 6 weeks), that’s a problem.
“ In that context, it’s worth noting that the Kurdish community hasn’t forgotten Trump abandoned them in October of 2019, when The White House allowed Erdogan to slaughter YPG units while establishing a “buffer zone” between Turkey and war-ravaged Syria.”
We’ve hung the Kurds out to dry more than once and I’m sure they remember them all. But they can’t resist taking a shot to see if this time they succeed. There are plenty of different factions, too, so each one wants his turn.
A Presidential mind is a dangerous thing to lose!
Optimistic by a thousand years. The best I can tell is that war in the Middle East has been ongoing for at least 4 or 5 thousand years. Why would anyone stop now. Sad that humans in large groups have the mentality of angry 7 or 8 year old boys.
The 1980s Iran-Contra debacle acquired a number of pet names. The one I liked the best was “Iran-a-muck”.
Reuters is saying that US Treasury is granting waivers to buy crude from Russia. India is 1st. Someone is mixing their metaphors…
Iran-a-muck, sort of a catchy phrase.
It never ceases to amaze me that the folks who complain about government spending have no problem throwing billions of dollars at things like this. The American military is extraordinarily expensive, the equipment we use costs 10X what our opponents are spending, the munitions are more like 100X. Yet, here we are using this extraordinarily expensive stuff to try to solve problems that either A. don’t actually exist or B. require much less expensive solutions. And yet, we got to this place because voters were, in some part, upset about the Federal government wasting taxpayer dollars. The last time we decided to invade the Middle East, we spent several trillion dollars. I don’t see how it doesn’t at least reach that same level this time, and for what, $150 oil?
I still think the TACO trade is on here. Trump can’t stand to have oil spike like this during a midterm election year. He will make up some BS on how he successfully took out Khamenei, de-escalate, and leave the country/region in a total mess.
“JCWAM” – go ahead and acronymize it, you’re going to be using it a lot in upcoming articles.
Recall trump’s boasts that he ended, what, 8 or nine wars? I think he’s started more than that in just the last week, so he’s barely even, now. And the most recent, the 2026 edition of the Iran-Iraq war… just, wow, that is not a grenade that I would have chosen to pull the pin out of. Iran might be in a tough spot, but the supermajor fields of southeastern Iraq are conveniently close for drone attacks.
It’s simply unfathomable that the US military has so badly misjudged the risks here (forget the administration). A couple pointers folks may not already have in mind:
– Shaheds can be carried by 4 guys and launched from the back of a pickup truck.
– They can be assembled in about 150 sqft of space in any garage, shop, school, bakery, warehouse. The US military is still blowing up factories and tunnels. They’re missing the point.
– re: Navy escort in the Gulf: Iran has about 1000 miles of Gulf-facing coastline. That’s longer than the entire front line in the Ukraine war. We’re suddenly going to provide drone defense across all of that on an “oh, by the way” basis? When we don’t even have the right weapons?
– Russia has had free reign to devastate Ukraine for 4 years now and the ‘result’ is that Ukraine’s planning to produce 7 million drones this year. Iran, with zero hierarchy, will be able to keep the Gulf closed indefinitely without even trying. The closest timer on their side is that grain supplies start becoming an issue in a couple months, but that’s not going to end a war.
Incredible incompetence.
My attempt at an optimistic outlook on defense against Iran’s Shahed drones:
– Shaheds are easy targets, 100 mph, no evasive maneuvering, targeted to fixed location, trackable by radar.
– Can be downed by fighters and by fast attack helicopters, Ukraine was even using machine gunners on light aircraft.
– Can be downed by anti-aircraft guns, can be downed by C-RAM and CIWS, also by ground-based heavy machine guns.
– Can be downed by interceptor drones, Ukraine has started making $5,000 “Stinger” interceptor drones and UK is helping expand production, I guess no shortage of helpers and money now.
– Plenty of expertise in Shahed defense in Ukraine, reportedly ready to be flown to Gulf.
It seems that the US and Gulf states can assemble a layered defense very quickly. Outer ring is fighters and helicopters, the Gulf states have plenty and they just need to stop shooting down US planes by mistake. Next ring is AA guns, not sure how many the Gulf states have (air defense missiles get all the press). Inner ring is C-RAM, whether mobile C-RAM on vehicles/trailers or shipboard CIWS, and machine guns. All of this should be available now or can get there in days not weeks. Then in weeks not months, Stinger interceptor drones can arrive in meaningful numbers, along with more AA and C-RAM and more attack helicopters. Key energy infrastructure and bases can, I think, be effectively defended against drones in quite a short time, now that the US has realized its omission.
As for tankers and LNG ships, Gulf states can use their air and naval assets to find and sink IRGC attack speedboats or mine-laying boats (Iran only has “boats” now, the “ships” are gone) and anything else they don’t want operating in the Persian Gulf/Strait of Hormuz (“fishing boats”, etc). The US will be hunting missile launchers and radars with, perhaps, extra emphasis on coastal Iran. I believe the standard Shahed drone is not a threat to a moving target, not sure how many optical guidance-equipped Shaheds Iran has. Pay the carriers 10X or 20X normal rates with insurance backstopped by governments (ahem, why the US taxpayer instead of the Saudi or UAE taxpayer?) and enough will take the chance.
My best guess is that the threat to shipping and infrastructure will peak in the coming week then decline.
Tehran continues to insist it isn’t targeting anyone other than US personnel in the region and Israel, a contention I mostly believe.
Id push back on that – if you are hurling drones at Cyprus and Gulf state hotels sounds like you are more interested in regional chaos by targeting anything and everything you can hit and calling it “accidental”
Not saying thats a bad strategy other than “everyone is going to hate us after this”
I think some of those drones may be targeting hotels occupied by US personnel.
That said, I do think Iran is deliberately targeting its neighbors in hopes they will pressure the US to end the war. I am guessing (with very little knowledge, admittedly) that this is going to backfire on Iran.
Also, it sounds like decisions have been increasingly delegated to individual regions or even individual units as part of Iran’s strategy to survive decapitation, so at some point it may be hard to tell what is strategy and what is not.
Not that it excuses anything, but both the US and Israel have been pretty comfortable carrying out extra-territorial attacks against targeted leaders and enemies without the permission of the “host” country of the operation. Meanwhile in Gaza, Israel has attributed most civilian deaths to Hamas’ operating in civilian areas, and razing has been upgraded from a special to the permanent menu.
So it seems like there aren’t any rules any more. Hegseth just came out and said as much, and looks like Iran is also on board with that. Once we’re all great again, I hope there are some of us left.
“My guess is that Trump’s ‘four or five weeks’ timeline on ending the fighting will prove optimistic.”
I honestly think four or five months would be optimistic now.
I think the whisper is September . . .
. . . and there are reports of Trump musing about ground forces . . .
. . . which seems politically unthinkable but Trump seems less and less restrained by what voters, even his voters, want. Tariffs being exhibit 1. Maybe in April 2025 he thought MAGA would love “Buy American”, by February 2026 he knew they don’t (love it, or buy it) but he’s doubling down anyway.