The girls school bombed by US. A lot more of such crimes is coming if Trump & Hegseth aren’t stopped.

Trump knows which way the political winds are blowing. That’s why, according to the Wall St. Journal, he’s told his aides that “he wants to wrap up the conflict in the coming weeks.” He thinks he can reach a deal with Tehran. That is highly unlikely.

Trump demands
Trump has laid out 15 points for a deal. These include:

• dismantling of Iran’s nuclear facilities;
• handover of Iran’s stockpile of 50% eenriched uranium;
• limits on range and number of Iran’s missiles.

Iran demands
There seems virtually no chance that Iran can or will accept these demands. Instead, they have posed their own demands. These include:

• End to US-Israeli aggression and guarantees against future aggression;
• End to attacks on Hezbollah;
• Iran sovereignty over Straits of Hormuz;
• War reparations.

Negotiating a deal with Trump is not the playbook of the Iran leadership. Trump has sent 2,000 airborn troops towards Iran. Some may think he’s bluffing, but that is what some (including Oaklandsocialist) thought might be the case when he deployed troops towards Venezuela. It turned out that he wasn’t bluffing, and it is unlikely that he is bluffing this time either.

“Iran’s long game”
Iranian anthropology professor Narges Bajoghli wrote an article in Foreign Affairs entitled “Iran’s Long Game. “Decades of preparation are paying off,” she wrote. She explains that the current leadership has been trained and hardened through a series of wars, starting with the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-88. That was not simply a bilateral war; the US, the Soviet Union and the Arab states were aligned against Iran. So since then the Iran leadership prepared for a repeat of that state of affairs. They developed a “system of asymetric warfare borne of necessity.” They cultivated “non-state allies” such as Hezbollah. They expected attacks on the leadership and installed a decentralized command to prepare for it. They saw that the US had created a deal with the GCC states in which those states would allow the US to build military bases on their soil and in exchange the US would protect them. That deal is breaking down as Iran successfully attacks those states now. Bajoghli concludes, “Iran, with 35 years of preparation and a strategy calibrated to outlast rather than outgun, may be winning the war.”

But it would be politically disastrous for Trump to just end the war without even a fig leaf to cover a U.S. defeat. Doing so would strengthen all his opponents both within the Republican Party and among the Democrats. They would all say, “well, what did Trump get us into this mess for in the first place?” Even his supporters, such as the editors of the Wall St. Journal, would be outraged. So, everything he has set in motion drives him to Plan B, which is a limited invasion of Iran – either to Kharg Island to to Isfahan to seize the enriched nuclear fuel. Both will fail. Here’s why:

Kharg Island: much closer to Iran than surrounding states are

Kharg Island invasion
“Paul the Combat Vet” on his Combat Vet News lays out the apparently insurmountable logistics problems of seizing Kharg Island. He estimates that supplying 2500 US troops on Kharg Island would require sending 600 tons of supplies per day. That includes everything from water to clothes to food and beyond. That requires landing 3 C-17 air cargo planes per day on the island. “US bases [in the GCC states] receive notice [of incoming Iran air attacks] because attacks have to transit up to 100 miles to strike US bases in region,” he explains. However, “to hit Kharg Island, would take between 30 to 60 minutes to send a drone. We’re talking about almost no notice… It may be impossible” to unload in that time.” The alternative is to drop supplies from the air. An “airdrop – means the planes would have to fly low, which means they would be vulnerable” to anti-aircraft fire. Paul points out, the US requires a 100% success rate. All Iran needs is to hit once for there to be a huge furor here in the US.

So, occupation of Kharg Island would necessitate occupation of the Iranian mainland to prevent successful attacks.

Iran’s nuclear fuel is probably around Isfahan, but even that is uncertain.

Seizure of Iran nuclear fuel
The IAEA estimates that Iran has over 440 kg (132 lbs.) of 60% enriched uranium. Andrew Weber, who spent decades extracting weapons-grade materials around the world, writes: “It would be next to impossible for American and Israeli Special Forces to land in hostile territory and easily extricate or destroy Iran’s fissile material.” Weber explains that it tooks months of planning and then six weeks of on-the-ground troops to extract similar material from Kazakhstan where it was done with government cooperation. All the while, US and or Israeli troops in Iran would require being resupplied while under fire.

Maybe Trump and Hegseth envision this being similar to the Venezuela operation, which nearly ended in disaster (for them) since one helicopter was nearly downed. If it had been, then Trump and Hegseth would have had to send in additional troops to rescue those on the ground. In the case of Isfahan, it is virtually certain that multiple such operations would be necessary.

Therefore, short of an immediate and humiliating retreat, sending troops to either Kharg Island or the area around Isfahan would inevitably mean being drawn into an all-out invasion. The effects of that would be disastrous.

Environment
The environment has already suffered horrific consequences, and not only in terms of the poisoned air that Iranians are now forced to breathe. It is estimated that 5 million tons of CO2 have been added to the atmosphere in just the first 14 days of the war. But it’s not only that. There is a lot of marine life that is unique to or dependent on the Persian Gulf. These include Persian coral and the Arabian whale, both of which are already endangered species. They and a multitude of animal and plant life in Iran itself would be in danger of complete extinction.

War Crimes
Hegseth and Trump have made clear that they will pay no heed to the so-called “rules of war”, weak as those rules may be. The US and Israel have already committed war crimes, but an invasion would multiply and intensify them. It would mean an approach similar to Israel’s decimation of Gaza. At the end of the day it would leave an even harder and even more repressive Iranian regime or US and Israeli direct rule of the country.

It is hard to see a positive outcome of all this.

In the unlikely event that Trump is able to secure a negotiated settlement which he can portray as a win, this will strengthen him and his hyper military tendencies. It would also strengthen the hand of the Republicans going into the mid term elections. And Cuba would be next. For Iranians, such a settlement would leave the most hardened IRGC elements in control of the Iran regime, which would mean even worse repression in an Iran that is absolutely devastated in terms of its infrastructure.

Political consequences in U.S.
A partial invasion such as what Trump and Hegseth envision would have similar consequences, both at home and in Iran.

The further Trump goes, the more he will try to use the war situation to steal the upcoming elections. Plus, a partial or full invasion would probably mean even further capitulation of a large section of the Democratic Party leadership. “We must support our troops in harm’s way” would be their theme. The strongest opposition wold come from the extreme right Christian nationalists, led by Tucker Carlson and Nick Fuentes. These Nazi sympathizers and their crowd would be the main ones to benefit from an invasion. Much of the “left” has shown a tendency to align themselves with them, and this would go even futher.

Socialist left and U.S. working class
The moral and political collapse of the socialist left is an expression of the crisis in the working class. The only socialist group that really matters is DSA. They are completely compromised on the issue of Iran. In 2022 they published a statement on the Women Life Freedom revolution. That statement let the repressive and corrupt Iranian regime off the hook. DSA blamed US sanctions for the movement. DSA also expressed support for the “reformers” in the regime. That while members of the Iranian diaspora here in the SF Bay Area were chanting “our solution: revolution!” The rest of the socialist left is equally compromised. That crisis in the working class is not confined to the United States, but here in the U.S. the role of the union leadership is central. It is a lonely struggle, swimming against the stream, facing and acting on these facts, but what other choice is there?

The girls school bombed by US. A lot more of such crimes is coming if Trump & Hegseth aren’t stopped.