The Iran disaster
There is obviously a good chance that the negotiations with Iran will not lead to a permanent settlement or even an end to the blocking of the Strait of Hormuz oil traffic. The clock is ticking and it sounds like in three or four weeks, much more devastating economic effects of the oil blockade will be making themselves felt.
Klye Kulinski takes an 18-minute look at what the White House is putting forward this week on the US-Israel War on Iran. (Note: Kyle often uses not-appropriate-for-the-office language, though not so much in this segment.) And gives us a disturbing glimpse at what a train wreck the Trump 2.0 regime is on war policy. (1)
This war is certainly a joint folly of the Trump Administration and the Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It is also the case that Israel has been pushing for the war. And Netanyahu himself has been doing so for decades. But Donald Trump is the President, and he bears full responsibility for his bad decisions. Kyle speculates plausibly that Israel, among other things, is exercising blackmail against Trump.
Netanyahu's Israel is following an aggressive policy against its Middle Eastern neighbors with the goal of making and maintaining itself the unquestioned regional hegemon there, with Syria, Lebanon, and Iran reduced to failed states. They are currently pushing to have the Sunni Islamist government in Damascus fight on Israel’s behalf inside Lebanon against the Iran-allied Hizbollah. in It is also pursuing an expansionist policy in line with the explicit from-the-river-to-the-sea policy of Netanyahu’s Likud Party and his current governing coalition, including a continuation of the overtly genocidal policies against Palestinians Israel has pursued since the October 7 attack in 2023.
But, reckless and illegal as much of that policy is, at least Israel is pursuing a goal that is in their perceived national interest. That doesn’t mean that it fully rational. It’s not. The Netanyahu version of Zionism is highly ideological and religious. It also has huge inherent risks for Israel itself, not least of which that its prospects are dependent on the military and diplomatic support of the United States.
But the current US-Israel war against Iran carries huge risks for America, as we see in the current blocking of the Strait of Hormuz. And the economic damage to the US and the whole world is already serious (2) and may very well get much worse. Whatever substantive benefit the US might in some ways take from this is very hard to perceive at the moment.
The Trump regime’s current stance is looking awfully like a deer-in-the-headlights paralysis. That’s a better metaphor than, say, “sleepwalking.” Because everyone can see the train running full speed down the tracks directly in front of us.
The Russia-Ukraine Forever War
The war that began with the direct Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has gone on for over four years. By all accounts, the lines of conflict between the Russian occupiers and Ukrainian forces have not shifted in really significant way since the failure of the Ukrainian counteroffensive in 2023. It’s still a war of attrition with Russian forces deeply entrenched in the four provinces (oblasts) of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson. The province of Crimea that Russia seized in 2014 has been subject to heavy and effective Ukrainian attacks. But the success of the Ukraine’s drone-based warfare against the Russian fleet in the Black Sea, Crimea’s significant as the main base for that fleet is largely nullified for the moment. Even in the unlikely event that Ukraine establishes full control of Crimea while the other four provinces are still largely under Russian control, it’s hard to see how that would much improve Ukraine’s position in the war over the other occupied provinces.
John Mearsheimer, who has been often-depressingly correct about Ukraine’s position in the war since 2022, has also been pointing to signals that Russia has been signaling that it may stage a direct attack on a NATO country to pressure Europe (and the US, which is still providing some support for Ukraine) to limit its support for Ukraine.) How serious are they about the hinted threats? It’s hard for the public to know. But it’s not an entirely frivolous one. And though the Europeans are generally pretty hawkish in their rhetoric and have been hailing the Ukrainian strikes deeper into Russian territory, we have to hope and assume that they are paying close attention to their options for response in such a case. Because Ukraine is not part of NATO. Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania are. As overused as the word “credibility” is in foreign policy debates, any direct Russian military attack on a target inside the territory of a NATO ally really would mean that the Western response would provide an important test of the alliance’s credibility.
Mearsheimer has recently been emphasizing that the US position in relation to Iran is remarkably weak. But he has also been saying that the Russians have been very slowly advancing on the front lines inside Ukraine recently. (3) The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) has been doing daily updates on the military situation in the war.
And their recent updates seem consistent with Mearsheimer’s, like that he gives toward the end of this recent interview, which also discusses the Iran War. (4)
The German academic journal Osteuropa has also been keeping a war diary of the Russia-Ukraine War. While it tends to put an optimistic face on Ukraine’s prospects, they also reflect the view that of Russia making very slow progress in the war of attrition in Ukraine in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson. A July 1 update finds:
Overall, the Russian army is thus continuing its summer offensive despite Ukraine's successful air strikes on the supply lines in the rear area. This is certainly possible because it has set up camps in the area close to the front that Ukraine has not yet discovered. Ukraine has also not yet succeeded in eliminating Russia's strategic bomber fleet, which continues to cover the Ukrainian army's offshore positions with a carpet of heavy glide bombs. The situation at the front remains tense. Ukraine has not yet outdone all of Russia's trump cards.There has also been a confusing spate of discussion recently about the supposed success of Ukraine’s drone strikes deeper inside Russia and the alleged weakness of the Russian economy. It’s generally true of humanity, despite our long history of armed conflict, that most people would really prefer not to have wars. And that ordinary people gripe about the deaths and lesser inconveniences that come with wars. There are exceptions, of course, like our Secretary of “War” Pete Hegseth. But fortunately, most people are not drooling warmongers, despite the reflexive support that people tend to give wars being waged by their own country, at least in the early weeks of a conflict. (The majority disapproval in the US of the Iran War from its beginning on February 28 on is a dramatic exception. Maybe even an anthropological exception.)
Russia's military bloggers are showing themselves to be extremely concerned about the situation of Moscow's troops in this area [in the Zaporizhzhia oblast]. They fear that they could not only have to give up the positions they took in January 2025 at the price of thousands of soldiers killed, but also lose Vasylivka [also in Zaporizhzhia], which has been controlled [by the Russians] since March 2022. (5)
But Russia is also having a military-Keynesianism moment, with boosted military production contributing to generally low unemployment. There are reports of shortages and hardships, but I find it hard to evaluate their significance for the Russian war effort. And Russia does have a far larger population and economy than Ukraine’s. Ukraine has understandably touted its success in striking targets in Moscow and St. Petersburg, including war-related infrastructure like oil refineries. And Ukraine’s partisans in the West seem to be convinced that those attacks are increasing public discontent against Putin’s government.
Of course, Russia is also bombing civilian centers in Ukraine, too. And Ukraine is still carrying on the war into its fifth year.
It’s really a remarkable thing how much faith so many pundits and people who generally should know better have in ability of attacks on civilian areas to “break the will” of the civilian population. Bombing from airplanes began in 1912 during the First Balkan War and was practiced by both Germany and Britain in the First World War.
After the war, an Italian named Giulio Douhet wrote a book called Command of the Air (1921), which was extremely influential on airwar theorists in the interwar period, in which he expressed faith in the effectiveness of deliberately bombing civilian targets on breaking the will to resist of the enemy’s civilian population. One could even say a religious faith:
A people who are bombed today as they were bombed yesterday, who know they will be bombed again tomorrow and see no end to their martyrdom, are bound to call for peace at length. It may be two weeks, two months, or six months, depending upon the intensity of the offensive and the stoutness of the people’s hearts. [my emphasis] (6)Bombing to destroy the morale of enemy civilians was known as “morale” bombing during the Second World War. Now it is more commonly described as a “punishment campaign.”
The effect predicted by Douhet of such campaigns has never happened. (7) There was even experience already from the First World War to indicate that was a false hope. British and German civilians did make demands on their government after such attacks: demands to provide better protection from such attacks and to retaliate in kind on the enemy side. Seeing one’s neighbor wrecked and your neighbors and family members killed and wounded by enemy bombing doesn’t tend to make people eager to surrender to the side that dropped the bombs, even if they hate their own government for whatever reason. They also have maximum incentive to cooperate actively with their neighbors and their own government for civil defense purposes.
Without pretending to be thoroughly familiar with the war reports, it’s hard for me to imagine that the long-range Ukrainian bombing inside Russia is substantively affecting Russia abilities to fight along the front lines of the war of attrition.
Notes:
(1) Iran GHOSTS TRUMP As White House PANICS In War Briefing To Congress! Secular Talk YouTube channel 07/01/2026. <https://youtu.be/2yh4r8BFQsM?si=5zgMEY7aCxCM7Oug> (Accessed: 2026-07-02).
(2) The Iran War Broke The American Empire. Owen Jones YouTube channel 06/21/2026. <https://youtu.be/L_ucoGhwxCs?si=-XBHH9iemS_af2Q6> (Accessed: 2026-07-02).
(3) Mearsheimer DIRE WARNING On Russia/Ukraine. Breaking Points YouTube channel 06/23/2026. <https://youtu.be/Q-AiLUd4E8Q?si=ZnwQ1uclV1etSkD1> (Accessed: 2026-07-02).
(4) Prof. John Mearsheimer: Making Sense of Iran’s Victory Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom YouTube channel 06/30/2026. <https://www.youtube.com/live/XtINoZon8as?si=HGHWeDztZIcr-xA3> (Accessed: 2026-07-02).
(5) Mitrokhin, Nikolay (2026): Wechsel der strategischen Initiative. Osteuropa 07/01/2026. <https://zeitschrift-osteuropa.de/blog/wechsel-der-strategischen-initiative/> (Accessed: 2026-07-02). My translation to English.
(6) Douhet, Giulio (2019 [1921]): Command of the Air, 245. Maxwell Air Force Base: Air University Press. (1921 Reprint of 1921 edition)
(7) See: Pape, Robert (1996): Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Davis Biddle, Tami (2002): Rhetoric and Reality in Air Warfare: The Evolution of British and American Ideas about Strategic Bombing 1914-1945. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
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