Kharg Island is Iran’s primary oil export terminal in the Persian Gulf. Image: Johnson Space Center, Wiki Commons
Kharg Island is Iran’s primary oil export terminal in the Persian Gulf. Image: Johnson Space Center, Wiki Commons
Since Trump has painted himself in a corner he has to do something. The breadcrumbs of what he might do are already visible.
I am not a military strategist or anything of the sort. But the progression of events in Trump’s war against Iran is becoming more and more obvious. And that’s not a hopeful statement, given that vast trove of knowledge not in the possession of our “commander-in-thief.”
Anyone who has given even a cursory look at the military history of the last half-century should be able to see the warning signs. Let’s just say it outright. Quagmires. We’ve had a few long and bloody ones. And Trump has teed up the next one.
When John Kennedy was president, Americans were already in Vietnam. He had made the decision to get out. However he did not survive to see that decision executed. And we know what happened from there. Johnson escalated, Nixon and Kissinger expanded the war and we got our collective asses kicked to the tune of over 50,000 American dead as well as millions of Vietnamese civilians.
Reagan did a little “morale booster” of an invasion of Grenada just to show the world the we still had some soldiers that were capable to shooting people in a foreign country. And Daddy Bush launched the invasion of Panama to cart Noriega off to jail. And then ran his big operation to kick Saddam out of Kuwait—Irag 1.0.
Then of course came 9/11 and Baby Bush’s bombing and invasion of Afghanistan which went so well we were only stuck there for 20 years. And in the meantime, there was Iraq 2.0 and we all know how well that went after W’s big “Mission Accomplished” splash.
Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq. All massive miscalculations. All quagmires that resulted in massive losses of life and massive financial drains on the American and world economies.
And now we’ve got Iran. Thanks, Trump! There are distinctive similarities that can be drawn in these conflicts. The first is that none of these countries have been permanently conquered. The chief reason for this is their people. The Vietnamese had been fighting off invasions for a thousand years before we showed up after the French got kicked out. Afghanistan has resisted invasions back to the time of Alexander the Great. Saddam Hussein with superior military forces spent eight years trying to invade Iran before giving up, licking his wounds and invading Kuwait a couple years later.
To start, Trump decided to start his war with Iran in the middle of negotiations that were supposed to be working to limit Iran’s future nuclear capabilities—which he claimed to have already eliminated. This is of course the same sort of tactic the Japanese did in 1941—engage in negotiations with Washington while having already launched the attack fleet against Pearl Harbor. Aside from sleaziness of this action, the opening salvos of the war gave Trump a confidence boost since he took out the leadership of the country—including of course all the favored replacements for their Supreme Leader.
Trump ignored all the warnings that attacking Iran could lead to a widening conflict in the region. This very quickly became fact with Iran attacking all the allied states in the region and Israel taking it as an opportunity to re-attack Hezbollah in Lebanon.
But the biggest predicted result was what would happen to oil prices—they were going to rocket upward. Again, that came true very quickly. Everyone who could read a map predicted that Iran would take control of the critical choke point of the Strait of Hormuz. The only oil getting through the strait now belongs to Iran on its way to their biggest customer, China. And since Russia is happily sharing intel and targeting data with them, the Iranians are letting Russia’s shadow fleet tankers have passage. Everyone else is a target.
So now Trump is in an even bigger pickle. He has directly caused an international oil shock and almost every national leader is pissed at him—except Putin and Netenyahu, who are delighted. But since he has painted himself in a corner he has to do something. The breadcrumbs of what are already visible: he’s sending the Marines, possibly to try and take Kharg Island. Taking Kharg does not make a lot of sense since it is quite far from the Strait of Hormuz. But that’s just what the current rumor is. But since everything is a real estate negotiation with Trump, taking Kharg could be about a bargaining chip.
But as soon as a landing craft hits the beach and a Marine sets foot in Iranian soil, this conflict becomes an invasion. Even contemplating this kind of action shows an unbelievable lack of understanding of the problems these boys will be faced with. The ferocity Saddam Hussein was faced with when he tried to invade Iran will be nothing compared to what will rain down on the forces of “The Great Satan”—as we are known in Iran. If Trump and Hegseth manage to gain a foothold, it will be useless and the troops will be forced to spend all their time on defense. It won’t help oil shipping at all.
To effectively protect shipping, American forces would need to occupy the Iranian shoreline, not a remote island. This would require orders of magnitude more men than are already being sent. It would be the height of arrogant stupidity to think this could be accomplished. But then again, arrogant stupidity is the current White House core branding.
There’s even more that the Trump administration does not understand: how religion relates to war, especially in the Middle East. And this is evidenced by the Hegseth Pentagon pushing the idea that our troops are fighting a religious war. You can’t really get any stupider than that—well that might yet be soon disproved. As we are all aware, there has been a long tradition in Middle East conflicts of suicide bombing. These acts are carried out by religious zealots, often under the influence of heavy drugs, giving their lives to kill enemies of their religion. The bombers are convinced that they will become martyrs and go to a heaven surrounded by rivers of milk and honey and a plethora of virgins. What many may not be aware of is that this tradition began in Iran,
Over a thousand years ago a man named Hasan-i Sabbah founded the cult of assassins in the castle of Alamut, in the mountains near current Tehran. Hasan-i Sabbah established a version of the Islamic description of paradise. His men would roam the countryside, drug and kidnap young men and bring them to Alamut. These men would awake and find themselves in paradise, surrounded by opulence, food, beautiful women and be allowed to enjoy themselves a bit. Then one day one of these gullible captives would be brought in and told that a mistake had been made and they were brought heaven too soon. They would need to return to Earth and complete one more holy act, which would be killing some ruler or another and if they happened to be killed in that act, they of course return right back to their current surroundings. The young man would happily agree, be fed more hashish in his food and soon a local sultan would find himself missing his head as a crazed assassin leaped up out a crowd with a scimitar. The assassin would of course be cut to ribbons by the late sultan’s guards.
The methodology today is undoubtedly different—psychiatric drugs and pain-drug-hypnosis are used instead of hashish—but the results are the same.
And this thousand-year-old cultural tradition is what Hegesth’s “holy” warriors will be invading into should Trump be stupid enough the approve. And who thinks he won’t?
Beyond these points it is anyone’s guess. But it will undoubtedly be ugly and bloody.
Trump has created an apparently unsolvable problem on the other side of the globe. What can we do about it here? This leads right back to the same solutions I recommended in my other recent pieces. We need to remove him from office. Congress can do this. They have the Constitutional authority. But elements of the Republican Party have abdicated their rights and authority to Trump. We need to remind them that ultimately they answer to us and not the criminal in the Oval Office. Use the tool below to contact all your representatives, of either party. Daily if need be. Trump and all his collaborators need to be evicted from government now.
It is a bottom-line fact that Donald Trump is a convicted felon and sex offender. He is also working over time and expending treasure and lives now to keep national attention riveted away from his connections to another criminal, Jeffery Epstein. Like most criminals, he’s committing new crimes to cover up his old crimes. When are we collectively going to say, “ENOUGH!”
Marty Kassowitz is co-founder of Factkeepers. As founder of Interest Factory and View360, he brings more than 30 years experience in effective online communications, social media management, and platform development to the site. He is a writer, designer, editor and long time observer of the ill-logic demonstrated by too many members of the species known as Mankind. After a long history of somewhat private commentary on a subject he totally hates: politics, Marty was encouraged to build this site and put up his own analyses as well as curate relevant content from other sources.
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