Is it to be war on Iran? Part 5

Scope creep. I was supposed to end this series at Part 3 …

Reporting back for duty this morning after my weekend away from geostrategic chess, I found in my inbox an offer(ing) I couldn’t refuse. From the pen of Simplicius, it draws on game theory – with prisoner’s dilemma  recast as “‘traitor’s dilemma” – to map the psychological terrain on which this nightmare is unfolding.

Maybe you, like me, desire the defeat of a murderous empire. Maybe you, like me, privately or even publicly bewail at times the ‘timidity’ of those in its sights. Maybe even you, like me, give way in your secret life to fantasies of Iran getting its revenge in first by attacking the Gerald R. Ford en route, and hitting those assembled strike planes while they’re still on the runway and not once more raining death on brown skinned people in far off lands.

(OK, most Persians are as light-skinned as I am but the point stands.)

To we who grasp the extent of empire evil, such feelings are understandable but Simplicius has a response which personally implicates us. After invoking the analogy of captives who, on their way to their own execution, could – theoretically, if acting in unison – overpower their guards, he notes:

Most people—particularly anonymous online commentators—are driven by pure knee-jerk emotion and will always loudly favor the immediate risky reaction. But if they were ever put in the position themselves, where everything—including their lives—was on the line, they would likely find themselves hard-pressed to “pull the trigger”. They too would likely become docile in the face of their captors, and allow themselves to be quietly marched toward the gallows without resistance—because for humans it’s always easier to hope for more time rather than face the uncertain consequences of one’s own direct actions.

For extra impact that second sentence might have read, “including their children’s lives”, but we get the idea. Over to Simplicius then. Today he’s opted not to put out a teaser while keeping the bulk of his piece behind a paywall. The full piece is freely available.

The Strategic Dilemma At the Heart of Iran’s Struggle

Contradictory bouts of news and rumor continue to pour in surrounding Trump’s ‘imminent’ attack on Iran. The buildup is said to be the largest since the Iraq war, with various figures like ex-CIA operative John Kiriakou giving their renditions of ‘insider intel’ that Trump has already sealed the fated decision and is ready to roll heavy within the next 48 hours. Iranian officials, on the other hand, appear to signal that talks will continue into next weekend, and there are varied reports about deals gaining traction.

It’s clear that Trump has been wavering due to major second thoughts about a prolonged conflict. Multiple reports have indicated he may be leaning towards a “compromise” of limited strikes in order to coerce Iran into a deal, rather than risking an all out conflict which could end in humiliation.

Trump has told advisers he is leaning toward an initial strike on Iran in coming days to demonstrate they must agree to give up the ability to make a nuclear weapon, and that if diplomacy or any initial targeted attack does not lead Iran to give in to his demands to give up its nuclear program, he will consider a much bigger attack later in to drive Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other leaders from power, senior advisors have told The New York Times.

Wall Street Journal, February 22 2026

Before we get into the nitty-gritty, one thing should be said. Most people tend to always jump immediately into extremes when making predictions: either Iran will completely humiliate and destroy the US forces, sinking every aircraft carrier; or the US will totally level Iran, slaughter the entire leadership, and establish an Iraq-like dominion over the entire country.

In reality, when we analyze historical precedent we can see that neither often happens. Most commonly the case is that neither side commits fully, and a lot of messy, ambiguous damage is done from which both sides emerge as self-proclaimed victors. Trump prefers things “easy” and is likely to pull out of any kinetic conflict as soon as he’s able to grab that one shiny PR motif that gets him his victory laurels. For instance, should he succeed in taking out the Ayatollah or other senior leadership, he could immediately declare a win and wind down hostilities.

This is likely the main reason behind Trump’s refusal to even name objectives for the brewing conflict: there are no real pre-determined objectives, he’s intent on achieving anything at all that has the cachet of success so he can retroactively label it as the objective he had all along. This allows him to again annoint himself a “genius” for having achieved what he wanted. Should Iran’s leadership prove too difficult to root out, Trump may simply wait until the US hits some other juicy military targets which can be glamorously emphasized on TV, then declare those as having been the objectives all along, again touting victory and that “Iran’s nuclear potential has been destroyed”.

We know that Trump’s real motivation for the Iran strikes is not US’s own intelligence regarding some nonexistent Iranian potential, but rather the pressure from Israel. That means for Trump the main operative goal is to somehow satisfy his Israeli superiors and relieve the pressure, rather than achieving any one particular military objective. As long as he can give them a good “college try” and prove his loyalty with a thrashing of Iran, he may deem his debt paid and pull the plug. Israel, of course, will never be fully satisfied until Iran is entirely destroyed, but this is simply how the game works: Trump relieves pressure by striking Iran even if it doesn’t entirely satisfy Netanyahu. After some kinetic fanfare, Israel is left with less credible leverage of its own, particularly when Trump is able to twist headlines to “prove” how far his “devastating” strikes were able to set Iran back, which Israel would then be unable to credibly gainsay without directly challenging his narrative.

It should also be noted that some are convinced Tucker Carlson has just single-handedly saved Iran from destruction by outing Israel’s true plans in his interview with ultra-Zionist Mike Huckabee, US’s ambassador to Israel. Recall that Carlson was detained in Israel in quite unfriendly fashion as he’s been internally deemed a kind of enemy of the state for exposing Israel’s propaganda.

Simplicius refers here, via a story covered by the UK Mail newspaper, to an interview I’ve only seen fragments of. It runs to a whopping 162 minutes but shorts are easily found under such titles as Tucker shreds Huckabee. I mention it because Simplicius does, and because Carlson (like Charlie Kirk and Candice Owens) marks a significant shift in some American conservative circles away from uncritical pro Zionism.

In the interview, Huckabee implied to Carlson his belief that Israel is entitled to conquer the entire Middle East, as per its biblically chosen stature.

I’ve commented before, using this map, on how that belief – no less dear to Christian Zionist than Jewish Zionist hearts – aligns with US imperial designs:

The territorial aspirations of Israel’s religious Right, by no means confined to West Bank settlers who deem the bible a Deed of Entitlement which trumps international law, look for legitimacy to conflictual texts written between the 7th and 1st centuries BCE and collectively known as the Old Testament. Genesis 15:18-21, for instance, defines the land granted them by Jehovah (a self-avowedly “jealous God” with psychotic leanings and not above such collective punishment as visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation) as extending “from the brook of Egypt to the Euphrates“.

Gloves off in Gaza. February 8, 2025

This sent a firestorm of outrage throughout the Middle East, with the ministries of every major country writing an ‘open letter’ of protest:

The Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, UAE, Indonesia, Pakistan, Türkiye, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain, Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine, together with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the League of Arab States (LAS), and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) express their strong condemnation and profound concern regarding the statements made by the United States Ambassador to Israel, in which he indicated that it would be acceptable for Israel to exercise control over territories belonging to Arab states, including the occupied West Bank.

This outrage, many now believe, could have led to Trump rethinking a long-term military campaign against Iran—a longshot, sure, but a fairly rational thought, given that Carlson has now ‘shone a light’ on the true intentions behind Israel-US’s anti-Iranian campaign, with the endgame being the establishment of Greater Israel. Recall that think tanks have been pushing Iran’s total balkanization into smaller statelets after the Ayatollah’s defeat.

Also recall my long-standing contention that this potential coming attack amounts to Israel’s last chance against Iran, because after midterms wherein Trump could lose control of all Congress, he may never again regain the political capital to engage in such large-scale unilateral actions. This has now been confirmed by the regime’s most rabid psychopaths who openly admit that it’s their last chance to get Iran:

Some have credibly maintained that it would make no difference: Trump acts unilaterally with or without Congress, so why would it matter if Democrats control it after midterms? There’s no one exact mechanism that Democrats would “suddenly” be empowered to wield to stop Trump, per se. It’s simply that the mass amount of political pressure and leverage they would employ against him from that point forward could completely cripple his presidency, relegating him to a lame duck forced to fight exclusively off the back foot; this of course includes potential impeachment, and many other things. The simple critical mass of pressure against him would preclude any such major unilateral actions from being easily carried out ever again.

The scene set, Simplicius now turns to the game theory I spoke of. I’ll replicate here the sub header and opening words …

The Strategic Dilemma

There is a phenomenon that has been witnessed since the dawn of time. You’ve seen it yourself: an armed militant marches a line of captives condemned to die toward their execution. If all of them were to resist in unison, they would have a chance at overpowering the gunman. But instead they march on in docile submission to their deaths. There is something psychologically that paralyzes humans from acting in such circumstances despite the fact that inaction would bring even more certain death, while taking action stands at least some small chance of success.

Related to this phenomenon, there are many known game-theoretic dilemmas that lead people to make safe choices when hedging between risk and cooperative uncertainties, even if those safe choices open the possibility for far greater risks down the line …

… but for the rest you must visit Simplicius at his substack.

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