(This article was written by Peter Huessy and appeared in RealClearDefense. Blaming America First: Dangerous Waters Ahead)

When Ambassador Jean Kirkpatrick explained in 1984 that America’s severest foreign policy critics “always blame America first” she identified a narrative that continues some four decades later. At the time, there was often what appeared to be a reflexive anti-American bias in the criticism of President Reagan’s security policy. But critics had to sustain such a narrative as it enabled them to avoid a serious reflection on the security threats to the U.S., and wrongfully claim the threats were much of our own doing. Today, the false campaign to blame Israel for the Iranian conflict is a tragic repeat of what the Ambassador warned us to avoid.

Kirkpatrick knew the always blame America narrative was wrong and dangerous. With the dawn of the Reagan Presidency the United States faced major threats, all of which had grown significantly in the previous decade. Let’s review.

First was a reckless Soviet Union, often partnered with Communist China, engaging in major across-the-board arming of guerilla wars aimed at regime change. Although the Soviet conquest campaign centered in the third world started with the North Korean cross border invasion of 1950, it did not succeed. Thus, the switch to guerilla war in Indochina from 1959, Central America from 1958, and ironically culminating in the return to cross border invasion with Afghanistan in 1979.

Under Soviet direction, centers of state sponsorship of terrorism grew in Syria, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Cuba, Nicaragua, and Iran, along with terror agents such as the Palestinian Liberation Organization, Hezbollah, the FMLN, FARC, the Red Brigades, and Bidar Meinhoff gangs.

And during the decade of détente, nearly two dozen American allied governments fell to or were attacked by communist subversion.

After the 1980 election, the U.S. turned the tables. The U.S. went after Soviet terror states in Afghanistan, Grenada and Nicaragua and worked to defeat terror proxies in Columbia and El Salvador, as part of an economic war on Moscow that aimed to make the cost of the Soviet empire unsustainable. And for the first time since 1917, the free world took back territory from the communist empire with the liberation of Grenada in 1983.

The second major threat President Reagan faced was a massive Soviet theater nuclear buildup, including the deployment of thousands of nuclear armed SS 20 medium range ballistic missile in Europe and Asia, targeting both the Atlantic and Pacific allies of the United States.

The third major threat President Reagan faced was a parallel Soviet nuclear buildup of deployed strategic nuclear weapons from a few thousand in 1972 to over 10,000 by the 1980s, all under the SALT treaties of 1972 and 1979.

Treaties that gave the good arms control housekeeping seal of approval to Moscow’s buildup that had as its key purpose to coercively blackmail the United States and our allies to stand down in the face of Soviet aggression.

Nuclear weapons were the umbrella under which Russian third world aggression would remain in a sanctuary.

Here is where we come back to Jean Kirkpatrick’s 1984 remarks. How did the United States reverse the Soviet buildup of nuclear weapons and end the Soviet empire, including reversing its third world campaign of subversion?

Kirkpatrick explained that too many critics of U.S. policy blamed the United States for Soviet aggression and nuclear building. We supported dictators in Nicaragua, Vietnam, and Cuba, so why was it a surprise guerilla campaigns emerged to change governments? The U.S. funded NATO on the doorsteps of the USSR so why should we be surprised Moscow responded with the deployment of SS-20 missiles?

When the USSR empire came crashing down, there were three common explanations.

One was that the Kennan policy of restrained “containment” practiced by nine successive American Presidents brought down the Soviets, but nothing special from the Reagan White House. The idea of containment of Soviet aggression was originated by State department official George Kennan who coined the term in a long telegram from Moscow and in a subsequent essay in Foreign Affairs signed by “X.”

But Kennan himself disliked the term containment and often declared it did not describe what Kennan had advocated after the end of World War II. He opposed Truman sending American troops to defend Korea, and repeatedly opposed most of Reagan’s security agenda, most particularly the administration’s nuclear and missile defense modernization agenda.

The second narrative was that the collapse of the Soviet empire was inevitable, and again nothing special from President Reagan had any serious effect on the outcome. Again, the common narrative was that nothing America did had much to do with the outcome of the Cold War.

The third narrative was much the same but with a twist. It was not America but the Soviets themselves that ended the Cold War. The reforms of General Secretary Gorbachev ended the Cold War, and all that Reagan did was as one recent President claimed was to allow those reforms to take place without trying to extend the Cold War. In fact, critics often complained the Soviet Union would have collapsed even faster if the United Stats had not been so aggressive.

Reagan’s political opponents held that his aggressive foreign policy harmed U.S. security, particularly with respect to describing the USSR as an “evil empire, developing SDI and deploying MX missiles, arming the Contras and Mujahadeen Northern Alliance while saving Solidarity. To the blame American firsters, our adversaries had to take defensive actions to protect their own security. It was America that was at fault—having caused the outbreak of the Cold War and perpetuated its continuance.

This acute tendency too, as the Ambassador explained, always blames America as the key ingredient to carrying out an alternative strategy. If the United States and it’s supposed aggressive security policy was responsible for triggering bad Soviet behavior, then of course the removal of such U.S. security policy and its architect (Reagan) would magically change Moscow security policy to one far more benign. In short, detente would work.

The pillars of former Vice President Mondale’s 1984 campaign were to stop SDI, freeze the deployment of America’s Pershing and GLCM missiles in Europe, kill the MX missile, and end all military aid to the contras in Nicaragua and the government of El Salvador.

Hear the ironies are too delicious to ignore. A frequent object of leftist or progressive scorn during the decade of the 1970s was Henry Kissinger, who was in fact the author of the SALT nuclear agreement, the ABM treaty that eliminated missile defenses, the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam, and the entire edifice of the strategy of detente. All which President Reagan would seriously oppose.

But as Kirkpatrick pointed out, for the progressive left, if the origin of Soviet behavior was intrinsic to the very nature of Russian culture then of course a peaceful American security policy would be an invitation to the expansion of Soviet aggression, which is precisely what occurred during détente, from 1969 through the decade following.

In reality, when a dozen and a half nations slipped behind the Iron Curtain in little more than a decade, it hardly makes sense to then pretend at the end of the subsequent decade the USA and its allies abject failure to actually “contain” the Soviets led somehow to victory ending the USSR empire.

It is true that in 1980 after the invasion of Afghanistan the Carter administration announced that it had misinterpreted the Soviet embrace of detente and indeed had been mistaken by claiming the U.S. had to get rid of its inordinate fear of communism.

If simply changing U.S. foreign policy back to détente and restraint would induce a benign Soviet subsequent conciliatory security policy, then of course, progressive critics of President Reagan could justify their opposition to peace through strength, SDI, the full up modernization of American nuclear forces, the arming of the resistance in Nicaragua and Afghanistan, the take down of Grenada, and the arming of our nation state allies in El Salvador the Republic of Korea and NATO.

Similarly if today the turmoil in the Middle East was caused by America’s ally Israel, just as progressives assumed an aggressive USA policy caused the Cold War, then it’s simply a matter of preventing Israel from securing arms necessary to carry on its apparent too aggressive security policy. Stop Israel, stop the war. Peace blossoms!

Senator Sanders (I-Vt) thus can blame Israel for “genocide” in Gaza and pretend Hamas and Hezbollah are on the side of the angels. And consequently, Sanders can offer an amendment in the Senate to stop all USA arms sales to Israel, that received 40 votes, 39 of which were from the 45 member democratic caucus.

How simple Middle East security policy could be if we all simply “blamed Israel first” for “tricking” us into war against Iran. Like the make believe Cold War and the Soviet empire, ending the Iranian nuclear program, stopping the deployment of long range missiles, keeping open Hormuz, and ending proxy terrorism can be simply a matter of changing U.S. administrations.

We can all be for “peace,” need not take up arms against the genocidal regime in Tehran, because as critics claim, it is Israel and the USA that “chose this war” not an Iran that for nearly half a century has been at war with Western civilization.

Peter Huessy is a Senior Fellow at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington D.C. based foreign policy and defense think tank.

SITREP: IRAN CEASEFIRE DEADLINE

The fragile ceasefire brokered on 8 April between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran expires in less than 24 hours. What was intended as a two-week window for serious diplomacy has instead become a stress test that Tehran is deliberately failing. The regime has breached the terms of the agreement on multiple occasions since its signing. President Trump has publicly confirmed that Iran violated the ceasefire numerous times, and the operational reporting supports that assessment without qualification.

A United States delegation is en route to Islamabad for the next round of negotiations. Vice President J.D. Vance is expected to depart for Pakistan today to reinforce the American position at the highest level of the executive branch.

Pakistani Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar is pressing both sides to extend the ceasefire and is hosting the talks as a mediator working to keep diplomacy alive.

Iran is not at the table. Iranian officials have not confirmed their participation in today’s session and have provided no indication that a delegation is inbound to Islamabad. An empty chair on the Iranian side of the table, less than 24 hours before the ceasefire expires, is a deliberate signal of bad faith.

Tehran is treating this moment as a contest of endurance rather than a genuine diplomatic opening.

Regional intelligence sources assess that the regime believes it can outlast American patience, exploit the mediation process for time and international legitimacy, and walk away with concessions it has not earned through negotiation.

The pattern is familiar to anyone who has watched this regime operate for the last four decades. They stall, they violate, they deny, and then they repeat the cycle.

The seven weeks of conflict that preceded the 8 April agreement included kinetic exchanges and mounting pressure on the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint critical to global energy security. None of the underlying drivers of that conflict has been resolved. The odds of a lasting peace are fading with every hour that Iran continues to stall, evade, and refuse to show up.

Peace is not produced by hope or by press conferences. Peace is produced by strength, by verification, and by consequences that the other side finds credible. The Iranian regime has demonstrated, once again, that its behavior will not change until it is forced to change.

Until that shift occurs, a durable agreement is not within reach.

 

Trump should double down on “peace through strength” with immediate, targeted military, economic and diplomatic pressure rather than chasing another round of endless talks that are only buying the Iranian regime time.

Continue reading

We are now on the 24th day of active U.S. and Israeli strike operations against Iran. What began on February 28 as a coordinated campaign targeting Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, missile program, and military command structure has expanded significantly in scope and is now touching nine countries across the region.

CENTCOM has confirmed strikes on more than 7,000 targets inside Iran since February 28. The U.S. military has confirmed 13 American fatalities from Iranian counter-strikes across the region, with an additional six service members killed when a refueling aircraft went down in western Iraq.

Iran has responded by launching strikes across nine countries: Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Israel. Iranian missiles have repeatedly targeted the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet headquarters in Bahrain.

Iran’s military has declared it is prepared to close the Strait of Hormuz indefinitely and attack regional infrastructure if President Trump follows through on his threat to strike Iranian power plants.

Nearly 50 percent of global urea and sulfur exports and 20 percent of global LNG transit the Strait of Hormuz.

President Trump announced a five-day pause on strikes against Iran’s power grid, citing what he described as productive conversations and a positive tone from Iranian interlocutors. Iran’s Foreign Ministry immediately denied that any dialogue had taken place, calling President Trump’s characterization an attempt to lower energy prices and buy time.

The five-day pause buys time but does nothing to resolve the structural issue.

Bahrain has intercepted and destroyed 143 missiles and 242 drones since February 28. Saudi forces shot down 47 drones in a single day, including 38 within a three-hour window. Kuwait’s Mina al-Ahmadi refinery, one of the largest in the Middle East, was struck by Iranian drones, sparking a fire.

The Pentagon has requested an additional $200 billion for war operations. The cost to the U.S. as of March 19 was estimated at $18 billion. The conflict has been described as the world’s largest supply disruption since the 1970s energy crisis.

The five-day pause is not a ceasefire. It is a pressure valve. The Strait of Hormuz remains the decisive terrain, economically, strategically, and diplomatically. Iran understands this and is leveraging it. The administration is managing competing pressures: oil prices, allied cohesion, questions of congressional authorization, and an Iranian regime that has replaced Khamenei but has not collapsed.

The hard questions remain unanswered. What is the defined end state? What does a post-conflict Iran look like under whatever governing structure emerges? Who holds the ground, secures the nuclear material, and prevents the power vacuum from being filled by forces hostile to U.S. interests? What, if any information can be provided to the U.S. public about activation of Iranian sleeper cells inside the United States?

We can second guess all we want the decision for the United States to enter another war in the Middle East, this time in Iran. However, cutting to the heart of how geopolitical debates often get mired in rearview mirrors rather than what’s next, I want to break down the dynamics at play.

Why the Fixation on the Past?

People (policymakers, analysts, media, and the public) dwell on historical decisions for a few interconnected reasons, even as the current situation demands forward-thinking:

1. Accountability and Blame-Shifting: The Persian Gulf’s volatility, marked by Iran’s nuclear ambitions, proxy conflicts in Yemen and Syria, ballistic missile tests, and disruptions to shipping lanes like the Strait of Hormuz, stems directly from past U.S. and allied policies. Think the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the Iran-Iraq War (with Western backing for Iraq), the 2003 Iraq invasion that empowered Iranian influence, or the 2015 JCPOA nuclear deal and its 2018 withdrawal. These aren’t abstract history; they’re scapegoats. Critics on the left blame Bush-era neocons for destabilizing the region, while those on the right point to Obama-Biden appeasement or Clinton’s missed opportunities. It’s easier to litigate old choices than own new risks, especially in a polarized environment where admitting “we need to adapt” feels like weakness.

2. Lessons from History as a Crutch: The Gulf’s strategic importance (oil flows, U.S. naval presence via the Fifth Fleet in Bahrain, and alliances with Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Israel) makes every misstep feel existential. Past events like the 1980s Tanker War or the 2019 drone attacks on Saudi oil facilities are invoked to justify caution or aggression. But this often turns into paralysis: “We can’t trust diplomacy because of the failed Algiers Accords” or “Military action backfired in Iraq, so let’s not repeat it.” It’s a valid way to avoid repeating errors, but it crowds out innovation, like exploring new deterrence models or economic levers.

3. Institutional Inertia and Media Cycles: Bureaucracies in Washington, Tehran, and Riyadh are staffed by veterans of those eras, so institutional memory biases toward hindsight. Media amplifies these headlines’ love “what if” retrospectives (i.e., “How the Iran Deal’s Collapse Led to Today’s Crisis”) because they’re clickable and don’t require predicting uncertain futures. In 2026, with ongoing Houthi disruptions backed by Iran and potential escalations post-any recent incidents, this backward gaze distracts from evolving threats like cyber warfare or Iran’s alliances with Russia and China.

Shifting to Future Decisions:

The real imperative RIGHT NOW is ensuring a proactive strategy. The situation today (escalating Iranian enrichment to near-weapons-grade uranium, proxy militia attacks on U.S. bases, and Gulf states diversifying away from oil amid climate shifts) demands decisions that aren’t just reactions. Here’s what could (and should) be prioritized:

Strengthen Deterrence Without Endless Wars: Build on Abraham Accords momentum by integrating Israel-Gulf defense networks, perhaps with AI-driven early-warning systems for missile threats. Future-focused: Invest in non-kinetic options like economic sanctions tied to verifiable de-escalation, or cyber defenses to counter Iran’s hacking prowess.
Energy Independence and Diversification: The Gulf’s oil chokehold is waning with global renewables push. Decisions now could accelerate U.S. and allied transitions to alternatives, reducing Iran’s leverage from asymmetric warfare on tankers. Think incentives for nuclear power or green hydrogen hubs in the region.
Diplomatic Off-Ramps with Teeth: Instead of rehashing JCPOA debates, craft a new framework that includes ballistic missiles and regional proxies, enforced by a coalition including Europe, India, and even cautious outreach to moderates in Tehran. But this requires bold leadership willing to risk short-term backlash for long-term stability.
Countering Broader Influences: Iran’s ties to the Axis of Resistance (Hezbollah, Houthis, etc.) and partnerships with Moscow/Beijing are accelerating. Future moves: Bolster Gulf cyber resilience, support proxy countermeasures, and use trade deals to peel away Iranian allies economically.
In essence, the past obsession is human nature, comfort in the known versus the gamble of the unknown. But America is a leader who’s navigated these waters before, we know victory comes from decisive action ahead, not endless autopsies. If we keep debating yesterday’s calls, tomorrow’s threats will outpace us. There are clearly emerging and unknown threats that we must consider and be prepared to address when they raise their ugly heads. Let’s not fall into the traps of staring at our strategic navels, instead, think geo-strategically, long-term, and use common sense and then move rapidly to end this war.

Given current conditions, does Iran have a fallback doctrine (ie., a Strategy)?

Now that Iran has experienced some level of leadership decapitation and defeat of some components of their military, does Iran possess or follow a military doctrine that allied and partner forces should be aware of?

The short answer is YES.

Iran’s military doctrine in the face of leadership decapitation emphasizes resilience through decentralized command structures, rapid succession planning, and asymmetric warfare to ensure regime continuity and deterrence. This approach, often referred to in analyses as a “fourth successor” strategy, involves pre-designating multiple backups for key positions to prevent total disruption, making the system harder to fully dismantle.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) plays a central role, stepping in to consolidate power, stabilize institutions, and drive retaliation, potentially through collective leadership or hardline figures while a new supreme leader is selected via constitutional mechanisms like the Assembly of Experts or an interim council.

Key elements include:

Asymmetric Response and Escalation: Rather than conventional engagement, the focus shifts to missile strikes, proxy networks, and disruptions like targeting regional energy infrastructure or waterways to impose costs on adversaries without direct confrontation.

Recent examples highlight operations framed as “ferocious offensives,” prioritizing vengeance and regional destabilization over submission.

Institutional Intertwining for Survival: The regime’s architecture links the security sector (including the IRGC and Basij militia) with political, economic, and religious institutions, allowing quick adaptation but risking fragmentation if the security core weakens significantly.

This setup aims to maintain control amid chaos, with the IRGC often emerging as the dominant force in wartime transitions.

Deterrence and No Capitulation: Attacks are viewed as confirming external hostility, reinforcing the need for sustained asymmetrical tools and proxy operations to signal resolve, even if it leads to prolonged conflict rather than collapse (forms of asymmetry and attrition).

Historical precedents suggest this rarely leads to regime submission, instead fostering adaptation or internal power contests.

Overall, the doctrine prioritizes endurance and counterpressure over reform, with outcomes potentially ranging from stabilized hardline rule to protracted instability, depending on internal cohesion and external pressures.

Bottom line: Settle in for a sustained conflict. History, cultural and societal norms, political dynamics, ability to suffer, and the idea they are the “chosen” people are all elements that must be considered, along with many other factors.

Iran has crossed a significant threshold. Following confirmed strikes on banking infrastructure inside Iran, Iranian military sources are now threatening retaliatory action against US and Israeli financial centers across the region, with specific signals pointing toward tech sector targets. This represents a deliberate strategic shift from military-to-military engagement toward targeting civilian economic infrastructure, a move that places ordinary American workers, employees of major technology companies, directly in the crosshairs of a regime at war.

This escalation is not a sign of Iranian strength. It is the signature of a losing force making a desperate play.

Regimes that are winning wars fight on the battlefield. They do not threaten banks, financial centers, and technology campuses populated by civilian workers. The decision to escalate toward economic and civilian targets is a calculated gamble by Tehran, an attempt to generate enough global economic disruption and political pressure to force Washington and Jerusalem to stand down before the military situation deteriorates further.

It will not work, but it must be recognized for what it is.

Iran’s air defense architecture has been severely degraded since strikes began on February 28. Their missile and drone stockpiles are being systematically reduced. Proxy networks across Lebanon, Iraq, and Yemen are fractured or operating under significant constraint. The transition in the supreme leadership with Mojtaba Khamenei installed only days ago creates internal uncertainty at the command level. These are the conditions that produce exactly this kind of escalatory threat: loud, broad, and designed to intimidate rather than defeat.

Threatening US tech sector targets is significant for one specific reason.

It signals Iran is willing to accept international condemnation for targeting civilian economic infrastructure in exchange for the psychological and political impact of threatening American workers on American soil or in American-affiliated facilities abroad. That is a terrorism calculus, not a military one.

Iran is making a massive, desperate move because they are losing and they know it. The targeting of financial centers and technology infrastructure is designed to change the psychological terrain of this conflict when they can no longer change the physical terrain.

Desperation dressed as escalation is still desperation. Do not be deceived by it.

5th Generation Warfare at its most defined level