greggerypeccary wrote on Jun 10
th, 2026 at 3:54pm:
Not sure where you have been for the last few months, Mr Wood, but the US has already lost this illegal war.
And lost it in a huge way. Huuuuuge!
Nonsense, creep.
For those who say that he has thrown in the towel – that Iran has “won” – I’d offer two observations.
First, it is an odd sort of winning a war when your adversary eliminates your navy, air force, most of your air defence capability, large swathes of your stock of missiles and drones along with the industrial capacity to produce them, not to mention two or three levels of your top leadership, all within a matter of days.
...
Trump held Iran’s head underwater for six weeks. He pulled it up and let it sputter while he offered the mullahs an off-ramp. But Secretary of State Marco Rubio, responding to the press, is right. “The idea that somehow this President, given everything he’s already proven he’s willing to do, is going to somehow agree to a deal that ultimately winds up putting Iran in a stronger position when it comes to nuclear ambitions is absurd!”
Indeed. Trump is waiting impatiently while the Iranians prance and posture. The IRGC tried laying some mines in the Strait of Hormuz and: pow! The US took out the boats involved and destroyed a surface-to-air missile battery in Bandar Abbas that was targeting US warplanes. “These were defensive strikes,” a US spokesman said. “They do not indicate the ceasefire is over.”
What they do indicate is that Trump is serious about his terms. First, the Strait of Hormuz is an international waterway, not Iran’s territorial property. Shipping must be free to travel through it. Second, Iran cannot be allowed to develop a nuclear weapon. A codicil to that imperative is that Iran must relinquish or destroy (under supervision) its approximately 900 pounds of highly enriched uranium. Third, Iran must stop funding terrorist proxies in Lebanon, Gaza – and elsewhere.
....
Opinions differ about the resilience of the Shia regime in Iran. I suspect that, like most totalitarian regimes, it presents to the world a seamless carapace of bluster. But the strength of that shell is deceptive. Once a few cracks appear, it may quickly shatter. I suspect that the catalyst for the process of disintegration will be provided not by bombs or blockades but by a stunning shift in perspective. On May 25, Trump took to Truth Social to reveal a plan that places the problem of Iran in a much wider field. He began with a nugget of sugar wrapped in a leaf of warning. “Negotiations with the Islamic Republic of Iran are proceeding nicely!” he wrote. “It will only be a Great Deal for all or, no Deal at all – Back to the Battlefront and shooting, but bigger and stronger than ever before.”
One of the signal diplomatic achievements of Trump’s first term was the Abraham Accords, a series of agreements that normalised relations between several Arab countries and Israel. The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain were the first to join. Now Trump is proposing that membership in the accords be mandatory, and that signatories include not only countries such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Pakistan, Turkey and Egypt, but also Iran. “The Abraham Accords,” Trump noted, “have proven to be… a Financial, Economic, and Social BOOM, even during this time of Conflict and War.”
To say that Trump’s proposal is bold is to vastly understate the case. The hostility toward Israel in that part of the world is deep and abiding. One commentator reported that Trump’s ultimatum, made on a phone call in May, was met with silence. “The Arab leaders were so thoroughly stunned by the audacity of the request that Trump actually had to break the silence with a follow-up: ‘Are you still there?’”
What Trump has just done is to weave a net that binds the signatories not just to Israel, but to one another. Iran’s Supreme Leader has warned that within 15 years, Israel will cease to exist. It seems more likely that Trump’s intended extension of the Abraham Accords would create what Republican lawyer Mehek Cooke called “an accountability trap for the Gulf states, and Iran walked right into it.” You have probably noticed that the price of oil is plummeting while the market is on fire. This is what Trump calls winning. Cooke added: “If Iran violates the deal, the Gulf states aren’t just silent bystanders anymore. They’re co-signatories of the broader peace architecture. The political cost of looking away just went from zero to enormous.”
Roger Kimball
Kimball is much more insightful than CNN or your phalanx of TDS bozos like Pakman, creep.
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