Cogito Ergo Non Serviam
Trump Will Escalate or Surrender
tTonight, Donald Trump will adddress the nation and the world at 9 pm Eastern Daylight Time. The White House has said it will be a major speech about Iran. This is probably something he should have done a month ago to prepare the American people for the war he and Benjamin Netanyahu started. He has only two options at this point, and it is likely he will announce which path he will take when he speaks. By the same token, this is Donald Trump, and he may try to have it both ways (he cannot). Either he will announce that the US is going to put boots on the ground (at least on a few of the Gulf islands) or he will announce that America is winding up its war. That will leave the theocrats in power and in control of the Strait of Hormuz. This path is called surrender. And aptly, he is making this announcement on April Fool's Day.
Boots on the ground can mean a lot of things, from dropping a brigade of paratroopers into downtown Tehran (almost a metaphysical impossibility for success) down to grabbing an island or two to make it look like the US is still winning. This journal accepts the analysis of Malcolm Nance, a former Navy Intelligence guy and an active commentator on global TV. He says that the likely scenario is to take a few small islands in the Gulf (Greater and Lesser Tumb as well as Aub Musa – all taken from the UAE by the Shah in 1971). There is a possibility of capturing the Iranian oil facilities on Kharg Island to cripple the regime economically. Also, there is a chance the president will be foolish enough to try to secure the Iranian highly enriched uranium or the Khorramabad Underground Missile Base.
Executing on one of these does not preclude him doing the others as well. And this journal has no doubt at all that the US forces and any allies would be successful in taking the islands in the Gulf and Kharg Island. Entering Iran proper, though, suggests a Desert One kind of outcome, where an American rescue force trying to liberate the hostages in the US embassy in 1980 resulted in a complete failure and loss troops.
What the president and Secretary of Defense Kegsbreath do not seem to understand is that it is much harder to hold ground than it is to take it. This was one of the myriad mistakes the administration of Bush the Lesser made. When told by General Eric Shinseki that 500,000 troops would be needed to hold Iraq after defeating the Iraqi Army, the administration took the view that the general was wrong, so wrong he was fired. America bled for years afterwards from an insurgency for which it had made no allowance. It is interesting to note that Iran is more than three times the size of Iraq, and so it is not unrealisitc to suggest taking and holding Iran would require upwards of 1.5 million. The US military has just 1.33 million active service members.
What one expects if the US escalates is the capture of the islands in question followed by significant loss of life when the boobytraps are set off and when the drones and missiles come flying in. Thus far, the US has lost 14 service members, a small fraction of what losses could look like when the counter-attack on the islands comes. There is no place to retreat.
Alternatively, Mr. Tump might decide that the war is won (he had claimed victory several times) and that the US is going home. This would probably leave Iran in control of the Strait of Hormuz, and that will make Iran stronger than before. It will also annoy the Gulf States and Israel. One must remember that Israel is in it with no intention of stopping any time soon. It is almost certain that the US will not be able to disengage as easily as the administration thinks.
One must always be careful in predicting what Mr. Trump will do because most of the time he does not know what he is doing or how to achieve his ends. Frankly, he is a stupid man with little ability to foresee consequences of his actions. That said, this journal wagers he will announce some kind of escalation with a hypothetical off-ramp that no one will take because it is imaginary.
The decline under the Trump administration continues to accelerate.
© Copyright 2026 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.
|
|
|
