Jason LefkowitzIf this is true, Donald Trump has managed the unusual feat of going to war with another country and having them come out of it stronger than they went in
“Iran, despite the decapitation of its leadership, has dealt the United States a strategic defeat in the classical sense. It will end the war in a stronger position than when it came under attack. The United States will end the war in a weaker position than before it launched its war. The rest is details.”
I should state here that I'm not saying there is some better way out of the Iran War for the United States. I don't see one. For whatever reason, our military, the most lavishly funded in the world, is unable to prevent Iran from sinking ships in the Persian Gulf. The only military alternative is escalation, landing ground troops to try and push Iranian fires back out of range. That seems like an even bigger disaster in the making.
Trump cutting our losses is probably the best outcome that can be hoped for. But there will still be a price, and while the U.S. was alone in starting this war, it will not be alone in paying it.
AN/CRM-114@jalefkowit I’ll only add that diplomacy a nation is only as good as its word. The United States government is structurally untrustworthy on the timescale of years, thanks to its electorate; but now it cannot be trusted on the scale of days or hours.
Breaking off negotiations with a nation, explicitly to launch a surprise decapitation attack, is something that’s hard to recover from even with a regime change and mass executions