Yanquis and Kikes twat the Mad Mullahs

So it finally happened: the MM ran out of patience and decided to twat the MMs, though this was perhaps a little late for the tens of thousands already killed by the regime. There is of course a vast backstory on all this, see for example Reflections on recent events in the Middle East, but perhaps recent events in South America are also relevant.

Ilya Somin thinks Donald Trump's Iran War is Unconstitutional and he is likely to be correct, in principle. However both House and Senate have rejected stop-the-war resolutions, and the armed forces are obeying their commander, so there is no practical constraint¹. And as long as nothing terrible happens - a large number of USAnians killed, or the price of petrol staying high for too long, the horror - I doubt the public cares enough to matter.

I'm in favour of this war, at least, when compared to all other practical courses of action or inaction. Diplomacy was obviously a waste of time, no matter how many highly paid high status elites it kept in lucrative employment. I opposed the Iraq war at the time, by actually bothering to go and protest, but I think far too many commentators are too ready to relearn the lessons of the last war: blah blah quagmire blah vague objectives blah and so on. Richard Hanania suggests that Killing bad people is an achievable goal that the US is good at and probably has positive effects on the world. We should do it more often, and do much less of many other aspects of foreign policy, and that seems reasonable. The most likely outcome is a weakened Iran, left with essentially no missile stockpiles or production facilities for same, and less capacity to export terrorism. The good outcome is the MMs get overthrown. The bad outcome is... I dunno: we take out some more schools, a pile of Iranian drones get through and destroy major infractructure and kill piles of Yanquis, and we retreat in confusion? Perhaps you, dear reader, can think of a plausible bad outcome; da meeja certainly hasn't presented any. Note how convenient it is that the Ivans are stuck in the quagmire of their own creation and are far too weak to cause any mischief.

Doing all this in violation of international law is something I covered in Reflections². But I'd add that coming from the lawyer-heavy UK, where nothing can be done, I feel that the time has come, if not to kill all the lawyers, at least not to leave them in charge.

It becomes ever more obvious to me - as I think I said in Poling Pales - how central the Iranian poison is to the problems of the Middle East and how much better off the region - and of course even more so the people of Iran - would be, if they just settled down to tend their own garden.

Updates

I expect things to continue to evolve...

2026/3/10: The Economist tells us that "Donald Trump must stop soon" and this is the kind of armchair-warrior stuff that is in a way amusing, in its combination of taking-itself-oh-so-seriously and total irrelevance. But it is a good source for the common complaint that Trump needs to "define what you want to achieve". I don't think that's true: the general direction is of course clear, and Trump has said that he'd like to end up with regime change, but I see no reason why that should be a firmly-fixed objective. If it turns out to be really hard, why should he really be obliged to keep pounding away? Continuing, "War aims direct the campaign" and this is true but pointless: the initial aim was to take out the top MM; then destroy Iranian military infrastructure, and so on and so forth; and these aims dictate the current actions, regardless of the final aims. "Strategically, his failure to say what Epic Fury is for is its biggest vulnerability" is bullshit.

2026/3/13: The Iranian regime has been the number one threat to peace and stability in the Middle East for years. U.S. forces continue to try to fix that, by pushing them into the number two spot. Well, that's how I read it on a first pass. Meanwhile, Brent crude is hovering around $100 per barrel, which is regrettable. I think the Yanquis should, and likely will, do something about that. Mostly, twatting the bits of Iran likely to attack shipping.

2026/3/16: The US-Israeli strategy against Iran is working. Here is why (by Al-Jazmagi).

2026/3/18: It’s getting to the point where if you’re an Iranian official and Israel hasn’t killed you yet it’s a bit insulting.

2026/3/23: the YK's are still bombing stuff, but the MMs or their agents are still flinging stuff back, though at a reduced rate. Most importantly, the Straits of Hormuz are not seeing a lot of traffic, leading to... volatility in the price of oil; cue panic from the meeja³. Personally, I go for the MMs running out of ammo before much longer, but perhaps that's an ill-defined time period. Let's say within a week.

2026/3/25: the Economist is sad that markets aren't melting down in the way el Econo thinks they should.

Refs

* The Scientists Who Declared War on Half of America.

* Labor Freedom Is the Best Explanation for the US-Europe Income Gap.

* Cruising to Dubai.

* Liberty Justice Center Files Lawsuit Challenging Trump's Section 122 Tariffs.

* Wealth of Nations: This masterwork is turning 250. It’s needed now more than ever; 250 Years Later, The Wealth of Nations Still Has Lessons To Offer the Political Class; Smith and Jefferson at 250.

* Media Can’t Hide the Truth About Gracie Mansion Bomb Attempt.

* The Anti-War Argument Is Actually a Pro-War Argument: One does not wait to attack an irrational actor while it gets more powerful.

* War and Oil. With nice futures charts.

* Judge Concludes Grand Jury Subpoena to Fed Had Improper Purpose.

* Gulf states press US to neutralise Iran for good as Hormuz crisis deepens.

* Praise is due to all who respect justice more than their position compels them to do.

* How to turn a price shock into inflation.

* The Ugly Path to Peace.

* Miscellanea: The War in Iran - I include this as an unwise overly pessimistic take that I might analyse sometime.

Notes

1. See-also "Law Is Irrelevant to the U.S. Attack on Iran," by Prof. Jack Goldsmith (Harvard).

2. Another attempt to "defend" int'l law comes from Alex Tabarrok: but notice his confused defence: Per the Constitution, treaties are the supreme law of the United States. International law is not liberal wishful thinking it’s US law.

3. E.g. "Oil back above $100 a barrel..." from Auntie; note that was "Updated 35 minutes ago" and yet they hadn't updated the (false at that point) headline.