And Sometimes Why
Looking for the Reason, Automakers in Reverse
In The New Yorker, Susan Glasser goes over some of the reasons we’ve been given that America launched the Iran war. “In the two and a half days since Donald Trump unleashed a new war in the Middle East, the President and his Administration have come up with an astonishing array of different, even contradictory, rationales for the American military attack on Iran. By my count, and I’m sure I’ve missed a few, these include outright regime change, assistance to the oppressed peoples of the Islamic Republic, stripping Iran of ‘the ability to project power outside its borders,’ stopping future Iranian-sponsored terrorist attacks while exacting revenge for past ones, preëmptive action against an imminent Iranian threat to attack U.S. forces, preëmptive action to block Iran from building ballistic missiles that could hit the U.S. mainland, and preëmptive action to stop the Iranian nuclear program that Trump had, as recently as last week, claimed was ‘obliterated.’ Many of these explanations are based on false premises; some already seem to have been abandoned.” Can Donald Trump Win a War with Iran If He Can’t Explain Why He Started It? I touched on this issue in yesterday’s edition, where I argued that Epic Fury looks a little more like Blind Fury. Among the most preposterous reasons given for launching an attack when they did was served up by Marco Rubio, who explained that the US had to strike Iran before Israel did—because an Israeli pre-emptive strike would have put troops in the region in danger, so the U.S. was cornered into striking first. This could be one of the more gutless falsehoods ever spewed by buck-passing men famous for spewing them nonstop. Has Bibi been pushing for the US to strike and reduce the threat posed by a regime as determined to destroy Israel as it was to violently squelch dissent among its own citizens? Yes. Were there a lot of other voices across the region (including Saudi Arabia) lobbying Trump to make a move? Yes. But a government that spent months building up forces in the Middle East, changing its defense department name to the Department of War, and tough-talking its lethality, can hardly pass the buck and say, our ally made us do it (even though Let’s the blame the Jews can be a convenient reflex among this crowd). No, this is Trump’s war. Don’t take my word for it. Take his. He was none too pleased with Rubio’s assessment. “If anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand. We were having negotiations with these lunatics, and it was my opinion that they [Iran] were going to attack first.”
+ The broader issue remains. It’s still unclear to everyone from the American public to top Congressional officials exactly why we attacked now and what our ultimate goals are. Just today, Trump told reporters: “I guess the worst case would be — we do this, and then somebody takes over who’s as bad as the previous person… That could happen.” Are we watching a war unfold or waging one? I suppose if you have no clearly defined goals, you can always claim any outcome as a victory. Maybe we can rephrase The New Yorker headline: Can Donald Trump Lose a War with Iran If He Refuses to Explain Why He Started It? Let’s hope that the actual outcome is something other than a worst case.
+ Apparently, a lot of different people have a lot of different motivations. According to indie journalist Jonathan Larsen: U.S. Troops Were Told Iran War Is for ‘Armageddon,’ Return of Jesus. “A combat-unit commander told non-commissioned officers at a briefing Monday that the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that Pres. Donald Trump was ‘anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth,’ according to a complaint by a non-commissioned officer.” (Editor’s note: If true, holy shit...)
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The Latest From The Fronts
“Israel stepped up airstrikes on Iranian missile launchers and factories Tuesday, and Iran retaliated against Israel and across the Gulf region, disrupting energy supplies and travel. As explosions rang out in Tehran and in Lebanon — where Israel said it struck Hezbollah militants — the American embassy in Saudi Arabia came under drone attack.” AP: Israel steps up airstrikes in Tehran, as Iran widens its response across the region.
+ NYT (Gift Article): Iran’s Strategy: Expand the War, Increase the Cost, Outlast Trump. (One of the biggest questions moving forward is how countries in the region that have become the targets of Iran’s missiles and drones will react. Iran is betting they’ll push Trump to stop the war. But they could also join the fight.)
+ Middle East war could be decided by who runs out of missiles or interceptors first, analysts say.
+ Iran war heralds era of AI-powered bombing quicker than speed of thought. And about those Pentagon software vendor pronouncements. US Military Using Claude to Select Targets in Iran Strikes.
+ “When FBI Director Kash Patel fired a dozen FBI agents and staff last week for their role in the classified documents investigation of Donald Trump, he targeted an elite counter espionage unit that investigates threats from foreign adversaries and specializes in Iran.” (No one at the hockey game could have warned him about this?) And a reminder of The Intern in Charge: Meet the 22-Year-Old Trump’s Team Picked to Lead Terrorism Prevention
+ Here’s the latest from BBC, The Guardian, Times of Israel, and NBC.
3
Driven to Distraction
Maybe, instead of self-driving cars we needed to invent self-driving automakers. “They have been whipsawed by tariffs. Chinese carmakers are breathing down their necks around the world. Self-driving taxi companies like Waymo are changing the very nature of transportation. Software has replaced horsepower as a key selling point. Sales are flat almost everywhere, and profits are declining. How U.S. carmakers cope with this pivotal moment will determine whether they survive as global players or slide into irrelevance, becoming niche manufacturers of pickups and sport utility vehicles that only Americans buy. The early indications are not promising.” NYT (Gift Article): US Automakers Risk Being Reduced to Niche Producers of Gas Vehicles.
4
Mushrooming Proliferation
“To be free, one must be feared. To be feared, one must be powerful.” So said French President Emmanuel Macron as France Floats Nuclear Deployment Across Europe.
5
Extra, Extra
Contributing to the Delinquency of a Minor: “A Georgia father was found guilty on Tuesday of ignoring warning signs and allowing his son unfettered access to an assault-style rifle that prosecutors say the teenager used in a deadly school shooting.” Man Who Gave His Teen a Rifle Is Guilty of Murder After School Shooting.
+ Strike That, Reverse It: “The Trump administration indicated on Tuesday that it planned to renew its defense of executive orders that it had leveled against law firms, a sharp reversal a day after asking a court whether it could abandon the fight.” (Someone didn’t like the press coverage of the first decision.)
+ Cancer Trend: “Colorectal cancer rates in people under 65 are surging, with nearly half (45%) of new diagnoses occurring in this age group, up from 27% in 1995. At the same time, colorectal cancer rates are falling in people 65 and older.” Rectal cancer rates are rising in U.S., driving an increase in illness in younger adults.
+ Mortgaging, The Future: “If you’ve secured a loan and you are closing on a new home in the near future, congratulations. You’ve taken part in an essential middle-class rite of passage—and you’re one of the lucky few.” Annie Lowrey in The Atlantic(Gift Article): The Disappearing American Mortgage.
+ Plus None: Donald Trump Says He’ll Attend This Year’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner, Ending His Boycott. (No self-respecting journalist should attend a Correspondents’ Association Dinner with Trump there. Nothing about any of this is a laughing matter.)
+ A Cozy Getaway: Mark Zuckerberg’s $170 Million MansionBuy Breaks Miami Price Records. Very related from yesterday’s edition: The Hole World in Their Hands.
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The Bottom of the News
“Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses are a privacy nightmare, with footage of naked people, sensitive information, and violent acts captured and seen by Meta’s AI and an army of employees.” What privacy? As expected, Meta Ray-Bans are a privacy disaster.
I thought you might be interested in a piece written by Bob Rae who was Canada's Ambassador to the United Nations at one point. The piece is not long, but one of the paragraphs (#5)REALLY explains what Trump is all about.
Many years ago when I was Interim Leader of the Liberal Party I had discussions a couple of weeks apart with Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Peres of Israel. They did not travel together. Mr Netanyahu gave me a strong lecture about the existential threat from Iran being more important than the issue of two states and the rights of Palestinians, a message he has continued to repeat. He made it clear that he was prepared to “go it alone if necessary” in bombing Iran to deal with the nuclear threat. When I raised this approach with President Peres he said “so we bomb Iran on day one. What happens on day two ?”
President Obama clearly decided that he would rather negotiate a deescalation of Iran’s nuclear plans, with the monitoring support of the UN agency responsible for monitoring nuclear activities around the world, the IAEA. In his first term President Trump blew up those efforts, and allowed Iran’s nuclear capacity to grow dramatically. A few months ago, the US and the Israelis joined in an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, and they were declared “obliterated”.
Apparently an obliteration only lasts for a while, but in addition to an obliteration of Iran’s nuclear ambitions is being added another objective, announced with due decorum (baseball hat) from Mar a Lago by President Trump - “regime change”. But only regime change from a great distance and a great height. It will, according to the Trump doctrine, be up to the people of Iran to “rise up” and change the regime. 30,000 Iranians have been killed trying to do just that.
Both Mr Trump and Mr Netanyahu have domestic tails to wag. That might explain the impulse. But in a world where consequences matter, it is hard to see through this current fog of war the “plan”. No one wants to see a nuclear armed Iran. But as recently as last week negotiations were underway in Geneva, with further “technical discussions” planned for Monday. There are many other ways of mounting effective pressure.
I am always reminded of the three rules of Roy Cohn, Joseph McCarthy’s acolyte and Donald Trump’s mentor. First rule is “attack, attack attack.” Second rule is “never apologize”. Third rule is “whatever happens, declare victory.’ We saw this strategy at work in the State of the Union speech. We shall see it again in this military adventure with the Israelis against Iran. Whatever happens in Iran, victory will be declared, just as it was in the last “obliteration”. Just remember that in the attack on Iraq, on land, sea, and air, hundreds of thousands died, and went on dying, in a brutal war. In the early days of that conflict, the US declared “mission accomplished”. That was untrue. The cost of that ill conceived attack is still being paid.
Canada needs to work effectively with many countries to ensure that sound policies are pursued in the interests of both peace and security. This is no time for “ready, aye ready”. This is not an argument about whether Iran is a dictatorship or a country that poses a serious challenge to the peace and security of the world. This should be a discussion about the most effective, and enduring, ways to achieve common objectives.
The conduct of foreign and military policy is not about listening to our “impulses” or our “instincts”. It is about constantly understanding the consequences of our behaviour, and what others can do in response to our own decisions. It is not about how we all feel on day one. It is about how we’ll feel as time goes on. As Shimon Peres said “so what happens on day two ?”