Marc Thiessen Thinks Trump Is One Quick Iran War Away From Winning the Iran War

Just gotta cross the "t"s, dot the "i"s, and do everything else

Image generated by Dall-E3, and you’ll enjoy it more if you don’t look at it too closely.

I don’t have a problem with an Iran War; I have a problem with this Iran War. In the ‘90s, I thought it would be cool if they made more Star Wars movies, and I learned important lessons from the disaster that followed. Specifically, I learned that any effort can fail if its leader is egotistical and detached, and Trump shows signs of being “the-worldn-needs-a-patois-speaking-slapstick-space-rabbit” levels of egotistical and detached.

Former Bush administration speechwriter and current Washington Post columnist Marc Thiessen loves this war just the way it is. He wrote a column on Friday showing a level of faith in President Trump that’s shocking-bordering-on-sweet — he’s like a 50 year-old who still believes in Santa. Thiessen draws on “well-placed sources” to announce that “the president is on the cusp of achieving all of the military objectives he has set.” Great transcribing reporting, Marc! Of course, a close reading of the article reveals that what’s contained in the word “cusp” is an entire Iran War that has not happened yet.

One way of interpreting the phrase “we are on the cusp of achieving our goals” is: “We have not achieved our goals”. After all, I’m arguably “on the cusp” of becoming a Spanish-language rap star — it just depends on how many events you’re willing to cram into the word “cusp”. Also, I detect weasel words in Thiessen’s use of the phrase “achieving all of the military objectives” — are “military objectives” different from “strategic goals”? The administration keeps trying to round the question of whether America’s strategic interests are being advanced down to the question of whether the military is kicking ass on the battlefield. But of course the military is kicking ass on the battlefield — that always happens. We didn’t lose Vietnam or Iraq on the battlefield: We lost because political leaders sought goals that no amount of ass-kicking could achieve. The American people are rightly asking “What do we get from this?”, and we’re getting answers like “We have destroyed 85% of Iranian air defense components.”

But, okay: Destroying air defense components could be a step towards a larger goal. And Thiessen uses a football metaphor to describe how close we are to achieving those goals (Hegseth seems to have issued a directive mandating that all metaphors be football metaphors). “We are at the enemy’s 20-yard line,” he says. Okay, got it — we’re close! But Thiessen then devotes the next several sentences to arguing that we are actually not close. “The final yards are always the hardest,” he warns, and then adds “What’s left are the most hidden, hardened and complex challenges.” Okay, so we’re at the 20 yard line, but we’re facing, like, the ‘85 Bears’ defense, and we have no time outs, and our quarterback has just been diagnosed with a rare blood disease. Are we fucking close or not, Marc??? What’s being communicated with this metaphor? It’s like he said “It’ll be more fun than an ice cream sundae at Disneyland! (Though I’m extremely lactose intolerant and Goofy once touched me inappropriately on Splash Mountain.)”

The main “complex challenge” to which Thiessen seems to be alluding is the seizure or blockade of Kharg Island. The island — through which 90 percent of Iranian oil exports travel — appears to be the linchpin of Trump’s plan. An unnamed source — who is possibly one of Thiessen’s sources — told Axios: "We need about a month to weaken the Iranians more with strikes, take the island and then get them by the balls and use it for negotiations.” And that’s at least a strategy, though the goals that the strategy seeks to achieve remain unclear.

But consider how breezily a boots-on-the-ground invasion of Iranian territory is being discussed. In the quote above, the words “take the island” are a three word clause in between Step 1 and Step 3. We just take the island — sounds neat! Can I come? Thiessen employs the same breeziness: He ticks off seizing the island as our “final military task”, like it’s grabbing milk on your way home from work. I’m obviously not able to assess the danger of an amphibious Middle East invasion — I’m not that kind of comedian. But people who know stuff describe the danger as somewhere between Grenada and Gallipoli, so…¯\_(ツ)_/¯. A hell of a lot of risk is contained within that “¯\_(ツ)_/¯”, and Thiessen takes as a simple given what is actually a dangerous unknown.

If we took Kharg Island, could we hold it? Won’t Iran know that we’re desperate to avoid that sort of dangerous, long-term involvement? And isn’t it a problem that Trump has made it clear that he actually wants Iran to pump oil — he’s letting them sell oil right now during the war! Strangely, both sides share a goal: Iran wants to sell oil for money, and Trump wants them to sell oil so that gas prices are low. This undermines Trump’s leverage, as does his constant habit of making threats and then not following through. But Thiessen doesn’t seem to acknowledge Trump’s credibility problem, and is even willing to base a strategy on reheated discredited threats from the recent past. He says the Iranian government will pay a heavy price if they suppress their people, but that’s the exact threat that didn’t work two months ago. He quotes the White House’s threat that if the Iranian regime doesn’t cave, Trump will “unleash hell”, but…aren’t we already “unleashing hell”? Isn’t this that; the war is called "Operation Epic Fury", which sounds pretty maximalist! What more is left — is this a “these go to eleven” situation? Thiessen doesn’t just have faith in unproven theories; he has faith in theories that have been proved wrong in the very recent past.

And Thiessen ultimately devolves into wishcasting in a remarkably pathetic passage. Here it is — the quote at the end comes from retired Army Gen. Jack Keane:

“In the next three weeks, the U.S. aims to eliminate Iran’s capacity for nuclear enrichment, offensive military action and military production; take control of the Strait of Hormuz and Iran’s oil; and set conditions for eventual regime collapse. If it achieves those goals, that ‘would be a stunning accomplishment by anybody’s definition, except the people that are ideologically opposed to anything that Donald Trump does.’”

Yes…”aims to”, “if”, and “would be”. Basically: “In the next three weeks, we will achieve everything that we have failed to achieve so far, some of which we told you would already be achieved by now, and some of which we claimed to have achieved a year ago.” Are you buying that? Marc Thiessen is! He retains his childlike faith in the team that steered us to this point, and now is now trying to goad the administration into replicating Homer Simpson’s strategy of extracting yourself from a quagmire by pulling with your face. And maybe it will work — I honestly, truly hope that it does! But the key word there is “hope”; Thiessen seems to believe it will work, which is extremely hard for me to understand.

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