Without explaining the threat to American security or seeking Congressional approval, President Donald J. Trump has casually threatened to attack Iran and, maybe, follow up with a sustained war. In his record-long State of the Union address, he promised to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, but barely reserved three minutes to explain the buildup of American forces in the Middle East—the largest since the Iraq invasion of 2003.
Trump’s belligerence could throw the United States into another nightmare cycle of the wars that have bogged down America at least since 9/11. But a war with Iran promises to be even more expensive and less effective than the Iraq disaster. (The Brown University Costs of War project estimates the price of the Iraq war as approaching $3 trillion.) It also risks a broader conflict in the Middle East, and will be terrible for American democracy.
Yet as Trump builds toward war, the political debate in Washington has unfolded with an alarming detachment from reality, skipping past key questions about the justification for attacking Iran, and the dangers. It’s urgent that American lawmakers snap out of their trance, recall the catastrophic Iraq invasion, and stop their sleepwalk into another era of conflict that looks to be even more careless and destructive than the forever wars America began in 2001.
Trump said his “preference is to solve this problem through diplomacy,” but he’s activated the American machinery of war in the Gulf, even before hearing what Iran is willing to concede in negotiations. Enough is enough. War is not a gamble or negotiating pose: it’s deadly, creates unforeseen consequences, and is strategically destabilizing. There’s a reason why democracies make it hard to go to war.
War won’t resolve Iran’s nuclear program, or its troubling interference in Middle East conflicts. American allies in the region oppose Iran and still don’t want a U.S.–Iran war; they understand that the profound risks eclipse any short-term benefits. Congress needs to demand that Trump make a case for why it’s a critical national security interest for the United States to initiate war with Iran; then Congress must debate that case, seriously and in public; and finally, it must vote in a roll call so every American knows where their representatives stand on this matter of life and death.
Iranians Will Suffer—Even More Than Now
Iran’s leaders have committed horrors and atrocities. The regime has killed thousands of protesters in the last few months (estimates range from 7,000 to more than 30,000). Thousands of political detainees languish in Iranian prisons.
But odious as the Iranian regime is, an American attack—especially one that appears as haphazard as the one Trump is threatening—will have dire unintended consequences for the people of Iran. Countless civilians will die. If American strikes kill Iran’s current theocratic dictator, a plethora of groups, including factions of the current regime, will compete in the power vacuum. There is no guarantee that a better regime will succeed the current one—and the chaos could well create new dangers for the United States and its allies.
Iran hawks, who have pushed for regime change ever since the ayatollahs established a theocracy in 1979, think they have solutions to all of this. These congresspeople and lobbyists have spent years daydreaming about how America might try to install a friendly client government and manage the civil war that would likely break out after America assassinates Iran’s current leaders.
But as we saw with the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, an American regime-change war is unlikely to produce any positive change. Saddam Hussein, too, was a hated dictator, though with a weaker state and army. The war lobby of that era claimed that regime change would be smooth and quick. Yet the occupation dragged on for years, and a brutal civil war killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. It also incubated new threats, like the Islamic State, which was born in U.S. detention camps in Iraq.
Even today, the U.S. war in Iraq hasn’t really ended. An illegal war, on false pretenses, with no clear rationale or end point predictably suffered mission creep. With dwindling public interest and Congressional oversight, Operation Iraqi Freedom spawned declared military deployments in Syria, Jordan, and the Gulf, and undeclared special forces operations all over the Middle East. As recently as December, three Americans were killed as part of that mission near the meeting point of Iraq, Syria, and Jordan.
Secrecy and subterfuge have been part of the forever war strategy throughout. Today there are, at a minimum, some 2,500 American troops stationed in the Kurdish area of Iraq. The real number could be much greater—the U.S. government has a track record of misleading public accounting of deployed troops. The less the public knows about how many American troops are stationed in which combat zones, the easier it is for the forever warriors to engineer an Iraq sequel in Iran—and to expand the permanent war to Latin America.
But Iran is bigger, more politically complicated, and better armed than Iraq ever was. And the unintended consequences of attacking Iran will be, in proportion, much more complex and violent.
Wounding American Democracy
Trump’s threats to attack Iran aren’t just disastrous foreign policy. They’re also an affront to American democracy and the Constitution that will have serious domestic blowback.
Trump has not even bothered to make up reasons for attacking Iran, nor pretended to seek Congressional approval.
In the lead-up to the Iraq invasion, George W. Bush’s administration lied and used fake evidence to muster a modicum of domestic support, Congressional approval (albeit on a shaky basis), and tepid backing from portions of the international community. Still, its abuse of Americans’ trust—and the bypassing of the UN—had grave consequences for politics and democracy, which set the stage for today’s debacle.
Trump, in contrast, has not even bothered to make up reasons for attacking Iran, nor pretended to seek Congressional approval. His position seems to be that he will do it because, as president, he can. Congress long ago abdicated its Constitutional role as the sole power that decides when the United States goes to war. And Trump has gotten away with ignoring the doomsday warnings of experts, as his most aggressive moves have not yet triggered full-blown wars in the Caribbean, Venezuela, Greenland, Yemen, Iraq, and Iran (to name a few places where he has escalated). Nonetheless, Trump’s foreign policy is about as unpopular as the rest of this presidency, and lawmakers could still invoke war powers and impose effective oversight.
The effects on American democracy of a war launched on this basis will be an order of magnitude worse than the Iraq invasion. Reckless military intervention abroad profoundly damages democracy at home. Impunity, militarism, and violence aren’t finely tuned policy tools. They are measures of last resort, to be employed when core interests and liberties are under threat and all other approaches have failed.
Another Round of Destruction
Trump’s abduction of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro set a corrosive precedent for international affairs. At the same time, since it has not yet led to greater chaos in Venezuela, it also appears to have lulled many Americans into a false sense of confidence—or at least, passivity—about Trump’s military escalation. This is the classic Trump playbook: move so fast that the political order cannot keep up with the new norms and realities.
In Venezuela, Trump cut a deal to capture Maduro and leave the regime intact; it wasn’t a regime change war, but rather a hostage deal at gunpoint. An attack against the Iranian regime would be an entirely different matter. The regime will most certainly fight to the death to preserve its power. Again, the Iraq war is a better comparison, though the Iranian regime still commands institutions and some loyalty, and the state is far stronger than Saddam’s. Regime change in Iran will likely be much bloodier and more expensive.
And for what? The United States was able, through diplomacy, to prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon. Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal, which was working, only to then declare that Iran poses an urgent nuclear threat. And to hammer home the point that force cannot accomplish as much as diplomacy, Iran’s nuclear program is allegedly still a danger even after Trump dropped bunker-buster bombs on Iran’s nuclear sites in Operation Midnight Hammer in June 2025.
The president has proven uninterested in democracy (at home or abroad). And, in any case, America has never been able to spread democracy at gunpoint. Apparently, Trump has some more ambitious goal—but it’s not clear what it is.
It’s imperative to bring American decision-makers back to earth. The United States does not appear to have learned the most urgent lesson of the last quarter-century: regime change wars don’t work. Opening a new chapter of misery in Iran will be a harsher teacher than America’s last major illegal war. Congress should assert its Constitutional role: after a public airing of any evidence that Iran poses a direct threat to the United States that can only be addressed through war, Congress should hold a roll call vote.
It is certainly in America’s interest to limit the harm that Iran’s regime can cause, and use diplomacy and pressure to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.
None of that suggests that America should attack Iran unprovoked. War should be a last resort. Diplomacy isn’t just a preference; it’s the only reliable path to security.
Tags: War, Middle East peace process, iran
Attacking Iran Is a Guaranteed Disaster
Without explaining the threat to American security or seeking Congressional approval, President Donald J. Trump has casually threatened to attack Iran and, maybe, follow up with a sustained war. In his record-long State of the Union address, he promised to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, but barely reserved three minutes to explain the buildup of American forces in the Middle East—the largest since the Iraq invasion of 2003.
Trump’s belligerence could throw the United States into another nightmare cycle of the wars that have bogged down America at least since 9/11. But a war with Iran promises to be even more expensive and less effective than the Iraq disaster. (The Brown University Costs of War project estimates the price of the Iraq war as approaching $3 trillion.) It also risks a broader conflict in the Middle East, and will be terrible for American democracy.
Yet as Trump builds toward war, the political debate in Washington has unfolded with an alarming detachment from reality, skipping past key questions about the justification for attacking Iran, and the dangers. It’s urgent that American lawmakers snap out of their trance, recall the catastrophic Iraq invasion, and stop their sleepwalk into another era of conflict that looks to be even more careless and destructive than the forever wars America began in 2001.
Trump said his “preference is to solve this problem through diplomacy,” but he’s activated the American machinery of war in the Gulf, even before hearing what Iran is willing to concede in negotiations. Enough is enough. War is not a gamble or negotiating pose: it’s deadly, creates unforeseen consequences, and is strategically destabilizing. There’s a reason why democracies make it hard to go to war.
War won’t resolve Iran’s nuclear program, or its troubling interference in Middle East conflicts. American allies in the region oppose Iran and still don’t want a U.S.–Iran war; they understand that the profound risks eclipse any short-term benefits. Congress needs to demand that Trump make a case for why it’s a critical national security interest for the United States to initiate war with Iran; then Congress must debate that case, seriously and in public; and finally, it must vote in a roll call so every American knows where their representatives stand on this matter of life and death.
Iranians Will Suffer—Even More Than Now
Iran’s leaders have committed horrors and atrocities. The regime has killed thousands of protesters in the last few months (estimates range from 7,000 to more than 30,000). Thousands of political detainees languish in Iranian prisons.
But odious as the Iranian regime is, an American attack—especially one that appears as haphazard as the one Trump is threatening—will have dire unintended consequences for the people of Iran. Countless civilians will die. If American strikes kill Iran’s current theocratic dictator, a plethora of groups, including factions of the current regime, will compete in the power vacuum. There is no guarantee that a better regime will succeed the current one—and the chaos could well create new dangers for the United States and its allies.
Iran hawks, who have pushed for regime change ever since the ayatollahs established a theocracy in 1979, think they have solutions to all of this. These congresspeople and lobbyists have spent years daydreaming about how America might try to install a friendly client government and manage the civil war that would likely break out after America assassinates Iran’s current leaders.
But as we saw with the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, an American regime-change war is unlikely to produce any positive change. Saddam Hussein, too, was a hated dictator, though with a weaker state and army. The war lobby of that era claimed that regime change would be smooth and quick. Yet the occupation dragged on for years, and a brutal civil war killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. It also incubated new threats, like the Islamic State, which was born in U.S. detention camps in Iraq.
Even today, the U.S. war in Iraq hasn’t really ended. An illegal war, on false pretenses, with no clear rationale or end point predictably suffered mission creep. With dwindling public interest and Congressional oversight, Operation Iraqi Freedom spawned declared military deployments in Syria, Jordan, and the Gulf, and undeclared special forces operations all over the Middle East. As recently as December, three Americans were killed as part of that mission near the meeting point of Iraq, Syria, and Jordan.
Secrecy and subterfuge have been part of the forever war strategy throughout. Today there are, at a minimum, some 2,500 American troops stationed in the Kurdish area of Iraq. The real number could be much greater—the U.S. government has a track record of misleading public accounting of deployed troops. The less the public knows about how many American troops are stationed in which combat zones, the easier it is for the forever warriors to engineer an Iraq sequel in Iran—and to expand the permanent war to Latin America.
But Iran is bigger, more politically complicated, and better armed than Iraq ever was. And the unintended consequences of attacking Iran will be, in proportion, much more complex and violent.
Wounding American Democracy
Trump’s threats to attack Iran aren’t just disastrous foreign policy. They’re also an affront to American democracy and the Constitution that will have serious domestic blowback.
In the lead-up to the Iraq invasion, George W. Bush’s administration lied and used fake evidence to muster a modicum of domestic support, Congressional approval (albeit on a shaky basis), and tepid backing from portions of the international community. Still, its abuse of Americans’ trust—and the bypassing of the UN—had grave consequences for politics and democracy, which set the stage for today’s debacle.
Trump, in contrast, has not even bothered to make up reasons for attacking Iran, nor pretended to seek Congressional approval. His position seems to be that he will do it because, as president, he can. Congress long ago abdicated its Constitutional role as the sole power that decides when the United States goes to war. And Trump has gotten away with ignoring the doomsday warnings of experts, as his most aggressive moves have not yet triggered full-blown wars in the Caribbean, Venezuela, Greenland, Yemen, Iraq, and Iran (to name a few places where he has escalated). Nonetheless, Trump’s foreign policy is about as unpopular as the rest of this presidency, and lawmakers could still invoke war powers and impose effective oversight.
The effects on American democracy of a war launched on this basis will be an order of magnitude worse than the Iraq invasion. Reckless military intervention abroad profoundly damages democracy at home. Impunity, militarism, and violence aren’t finely tuned policy tools. They are measures of last resort, to be employed when core interests and liberties are under threat and all other approaches have failed.
Another Round of Destruction
Trump’s abduction of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro set a corrosive precedent for international affairs. At the same time, since it has not yet led to greater chaos in Venezuela, it also appears to have lulled many Americans into a false sense of confidence—or at least, passivity—about Trump’s military escalation. This is the classic Trump playbook: move so fast that the political order cannot keep up with the new norms and realities.
In Venezuela, Trump cut a deal to capture Maduro and leave the regime intact; it wasn’t a regime change war, but rather a hostage deal at gunpoint. An attack against the Iranian regime would be an entirely different matter. The regime will most certainly fight to the death to preserve its power. Again, the Iraq war is a better comparison, though the Iranian regime still commands institutions and some loyalty, and the state is far stronger than Saddam’s. Regime change in Iran will likely be much bloodier and more expensive.
And for what? The United States was able, through diplomacy, to prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon. Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal, which was working, only to then declare that Iran poses an urgent nuclear threat. And to hammer home the point that force cannot accomplish as much as diplomacy, Iran’s nuclear program is allegedly still a danger even after Trump dropped bunker-buster bombs on Iran’s nuclear sites in Operation Midnight Hammer in June 2025.
The president has proven uninterested in democracy (at home or abroad). And, in any case, America has never been able to spread democracy at gunpoint. Apparently, Trump has some more ambitious goal—but it’s not clear what it is.
It’s imperative to bring American decision-makers back to earth. The United States does not appear to have learned the most urgent lesson of the last quarter-century: regime change wars don’t work. Opening a new chapter of misery in Iran will be a harsher teacher than America’s last major illegal war. Congress should assert its Constitutional role: after a public airing of any evidence that Iran poses a direct threat to the United States that can only be addressed through war, Congress should hold a roll call vote.
It is certainly in America’s interest to limit the harm that Iran’s regime can cause, and use diplomacy and pressure to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.
None of that suggests that America should attack Iran unprovoked. War should be a last resort. Diplomacy isn’t just a preference; it’s the only reliable path to security.
Tags: War, Middle East peace process, iran