Iran War: Is it too soon to call it a “quagmire”?

This is a star-studded podcast from the Quincy Institute featuring Stephen Walt (my own favorite foreign policy scholar), Stephen Wertheim, Monica Toft and Quincy’s head an Iran expert Trita Parsi. (1)

Walt comments that he expects the Iran War “is going to have more profound consequences that the Iraq War did.” Let that sink in for a moment.

When the current Russia-Ukraine War started in 2022, I hoped as many people did that it could somehow be ended relatively quickly on terms that wouldn’t be disastrous for Ukraine. That didn’t happen. And now that war has gone on longer that that between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany of 1941-1945.

I would like to believe that could happen with the current Iran War. But Donald Trump is the American President. So if I had to forecast, I would guess it will continue until at least early 2029, when Trump leaves the White House. Because Trump’s regime has shown a staggering inability to practice any kind of normal diplomacy, much less any competent diplomacy.

One point that the panel discusses is the Trump Administration isn’t a dovish, peace-oriented manager of foreign policy. It’s basic orientation is the idea that the US can threaten, bully, and bomb other countries to do it the Trumpistas want them to do. It’s the real face of the so-called rightwing “isolationist” viewpoint, which is really just narrow nationalism and militarism.

Sidney Blumenthal recently did an analysis of how lost Trump clearly is over the Iran War. In addition to losing the war itself, of course. Trump has created a huge mess for himself, the US, and the world by his Iran War. And to get out of it in any kind of constructive way, he would have to have some minimal understanding of how the international system works beyond just using his position to extort bribes. And he would have to be able and willing to apply professional diplomacy to build the kind of arrangement that would be able to establish a stable, long-lasting peace. It’s especially difficult with Israel involved, especially since the current Netanyahu government clearly wants to turn Iran into a failed state they can bomb periodically without having to worry much about military retaliation. He writes:

By Easter morning, the 37th day of Trump’s Iran war, on 7 April, he had thoroughly terrorized himself. He ramped up his rhetoric to threaten genocide. His exit strategy was annihilation. “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,” he tweeted. …

The Genocide convention, article III, which the US has … ratified explicitly, punishes “direct and public incitement to commit genocide”. …

Robert P George, a professor at Princeton, a highly influential conservative legal scholar and political philosopher, and a pre-eminent figure in the Federalist Society, issued a statement: “I don’t see any way to interpret President Trump’s ‘prediction’ that ‘a whole civilization will die tonight’ as other than a threat to order the military to commit crimes against civilians. If he issues such an order, it will be the duty of military leaders to refuse to comply.” (2)

This is a serious mess. And the chances of the war being permanently settled during Trump’s term currently seem to be very close to zero.

And, as others have observed, Alfred McCoy has emphasized that Trump and Netanyahu’s war against Iran has given a geopolitical boost to China: “Oblivious to the dangers of war in a region [the Middle East] that is the epicenter of global capitalism, Washington is now proving ever more dangerously disruptive of the global economy, making China look like a far more stable choice for world leadership.” (3)

Notes:

(1) Grand Strategy Implications of Trump’s Iran Debacle: Is This the End of Primacy? Quincy Institute YouTube channel 04/23/25. <https://www.youtube.com/live/W8MKSO15fCI?si=T-ljTrI5sVz8NLb9> (Accessed: 2026-23-04).

(2) Blumenthal, Sidney (2026): Trump’s Iran fiasco has led him into the gravest territory. Guardian 04/11/2026. <https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/apr/11/trump-iran-international-law> (Accessed: 2026-23-04).

(3) McCoy, Alfred (2026): The Iran War and the End of the American Empire. Infomred Comment 04/24/2026. <https://www.juancole.com/2026/04/iran-american-empire.html> (Accessed: 2026-23-04).