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'This War Is Dumb as Hell': Military Historian Assesses Trump's Disaster in Iran
"Every day this war goes on makes both the United States and Iran weaker, poorer, and less secure."
Mar 25, 2026
Even as President Donald Trump signaled this week that he'd like to quickly wrap up his unconstitutional war with Iran, some experts are warning that the president has put himself in a situation with no easy way out.
Military historian Bret Devereaux, a teaching assistant professor at North Carolina State University, published a lengthy analysis of the war on Wednesday in which he described it as a failed gamble that Iran's regime would simply crumble in the face of a well-executed series of aerial strikes.
Devereaux said that this was highly unlikely given the nature of the Iranian regime, which is structured to maintain itself up and down the chain of command if one or even several of its leaders are killed.
And now that it's very clear that Trump's gamble of overthrowing the regime hasn't paid off, Devereaux wrote, he will be at the mercy of events beyond his control.
"Once started, a major regional war with Iran was always likely to be something of a 'trap,'" he contended, "not in the sense of an ambush laid by Iran—but in the sense of a situation that, once entered, cannot be easily left or reversed."
While Iran's response to the strikes carried out by the US and Israel in June 2025 was relatively tepid, Devereaux said, once Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that the goal of their latest operation would be regime change, the Iranian government took the extraordinary step of shutting down the Strait of Hormuz, sending global energy prices skyrocketing.
It has been this threat to shut down the strait, as well as the massive difficulty and cost it would take to occupy a nation of 90 million people, the historian continued, that has kept every US president for the last five decades from launching an invasion of Iran.
At the same time, he continued, Trump cannot now simply walk away while leaving Iran with the ability to take the global economy hostage whenever it pleases.
"The result is a fairly classic escalation trap: Once the conflict starts, it is extremely costly for either side to ever back down, which ensures that the conflict continues long past it being in the interests of either party," he wrote. "Every day this war goes on makes both the United States and Iran weaker, poorer, and less secure but it is very hard for either side to back down because there are huge costs connected to being the party that backs down."
Summing up his argument, Devereaux declared, "This war is dumb as hell."
Devereaux's analysis was echoed by Ilan Goldenberg, senior vice president and chief policy officer at J Street, who wrote in a social media post Wednesday that the US and Iran appear to be caught in an escalation trap, as exemplified by the Trump administration's recent decision to send more military personnel to the Persian Gulf.
"The much more important story right now isn’t diplomacy—it’s the thousands of US troops being mobilized and moving toward the Middle East," he wrote. "That movement strongly suggests preparation for further escalation, with Kharg Island emerging as the most likely target. For any objective observer, the likely Iranian response to a US move on Kharg is obvious: escalation, not capitulation. Tehran would almost certainly respond by expanding attacks on energy infrastructure across the Gulf."
Goldenberg added that "the most plausible off-ramp" will involve Trump simply declaring victory while leaving the regime intact and with vague promises to not produce a nuclear weapon, although he said that likely wouldn't come until after more escalation and destruction.
"Better to accept this likely outcome today rather than six months from now," he advised.
In a Wednesday analysis published at Liberal Currents, University of Illinois political scientist Nicholas Grossman cast doubt on Trump's ability to simply wash his hands of the Iran conflict and walk away.
Part of the issue, said Grossman, is that Iran simply might want to keep inflicting economic damage on Trump to make him think twice before launching a future attack on the regime.
"In hard power dynamics, this is the strongest position the Islamic Republic has ever been in, the most leverage they have over the United States since the 1979-80 hostage crisis," Grossman wrote. "Iran is likely thinking of longer-term security. If they can endure more US-Israeli bombing—and the war so far indicates that they can—then they can increasingly establish their ability to crash the global economy, a deterrent even the United States must respect."
Given that Trump is unlikely to want to be seen as a "loser" for simply accepting Iran's control of the strait, Grossman concluded, "that points to stablemate or escalation, more death and destruction, and a global economic disruption that will be bigger than many currently expect."
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'Facts Don't Matter to Greenblatt': Khanna Hits Back After Attack by ADL CEO
The California Democratic lawmaker slammed Jonathan Greenblatt as "a Trump apologist who attacked Obama's nuclear deal, defends Elon, and is basically a shill for the Trump administration and Netanyahu. Sad to see."
Mar 17, 2026
US Rep. Ro Khanna on Tuesday hit back at Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt after he accused the California Democrat of enabling antisemitism.
As reported by Jewish Insider, Greenblatt accused Khanna (D-Calif.) of using an antisemitic dog whistle when he blamed "neoconservatives" for President Donald Trump's decision to launch an unprovoked military strike against Iran.
Greenblatt also slammed Khanna for appearing on the podcast of Hasan Piker, a critic of Israel whom the ADL chief described as "one of the most virulent, outspoken antisemitic influencers in the world."
ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt tells 2026 Never is Now conference that it's "anti-Semitic" to blame Israel for the war on Iran that Israel started.
He accuses Sen. Chris Van Hollen of anti-Semitism for blaming "AIPAC" and slams Rep. Ro Khanna for blaming "neocons" and saying he's… pic.twitter.com/3MpTxFiSwE
— Chris Menahan 🇺🇸 (@infolibnews) March 17, 2026
In addition to going after Khanna, Greenblatt attacked Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) for accusing the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) of being "un-American" during an address at a conference hosted by J Street, a liberal Zionist organization that in the past has clashed with AIPAC.
In a social media post, Khanna accused Greenblatt of being a partisan shill with a history of overlooking antisemitism from his political allies in the Republican Party.
"Facts don't matter to Greenblatt," Khanna wrote. "He is a Trump apologist who attacked [former President Barack] Obama's nuclear deal, defends Elon [Musk], and is basically a shill for the Trump administration and [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu. Sad to see. He has zero respect among any House Democrats anymore."
Shortly after this, Khanna responded to a social media post from AIPAC and suggested that the group merge with Greenblatt's ADL.
"Greenblatt you've sucked up enough to Trump you can probably get the merger approved in this administration," Khanna wrote.
Matt Duss, executive vice president at the Center for International Policy and former foreign policy adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), took note of Khanna's defiant reaction to Greenblatt's attacks and argued it showed how much clout the ADL had lost in recent years under his leadership.
"There was a time when the head of the ADL saying this about two prominent Democrats would’ve mattered," he observed, "but Greenblatt has effectively marginalized himself with exactly this kind of reckless slander."
Drop Site News reporter Ryan Grim also argued that Greenblatt had made himself irrelevant by so aggressively hitting critics of Israel with charges of antisemitism.
"Has anyone been worse at his actual job than Jonathan Greenblatt?" he wrote. "If he wants to be an advocate for Likud in DC, he should just do that. Be direct. This thing where he weaponizes concerns about antisemitism to boost Likud is outrageous and also not working."
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Progressive Jews Decry ADL 'Mamdani Monitor' for Conflating Israel Criticism With Antisemitism
The head of one group decried the ADL's "disproportionate attention on left-of-center activists’ views on Israel while failing to apply the same scrutiny to the Trump administration."
Dec 23, 2025
The heads of three left-leaning US Jewish groups on Monday admonished the Anti-Defamation League after the controversial watchdog once again conflated criticism of Israel with antisemitism in its latest report on New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani and his transition team.
The Anti-Defamation League noted approvingly in its updated "Mamdani Monitor" that "at least 25 individuals" in the democratic socialist's transition team "have a past relationship with the ADL or partner organizations, or a history of supporting the Jewish community."
The group also appreciated that "Mamdani's team can and will respond appropriately" to actual incidents of antisemitism, pointing to last week's resignation of Catherine Almonte Da Costa, Mamdani's former director of appointments, following the revelation of antisemitic social media posts she published in the early 2010s.
However, the ADL said it remains "deeply concerned" by Mamdani's statements and actions, highlighting what the group claimed were "many examples of individuals who have engaged in some type of antisemitic, anti-Zionist, or anti-Israel activities and/or have ties to groups that engage in such activities" among the mayor-elect's transition team appointees.
"These activities include spreading classic antisemitic tropes, vilifying those who support Jewish self-determination in their ancestral homeland, seeking to undermine the legitimacy and security of the Jewish state, and more," the ADL said, adding that "at least a dozen transition committee appointees expressed support for the anti-Israel campus encampments in the spring of 2024."
The Mamdani Monitor also noted that "at least 20% of the 400-plus appointees have ties to anti-Zionist groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), which openly glorifies Hamas’ October 7 attack... Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), a fringe group that advocates for the eradication of Zionism and demonizes Zionists; Within Our Lifetime (WOL), a New York-based radical anti-Zionist organization... and others."
Asked about the report during a Monday press conference, Mamdani said, "We must distinguish between antisemitism and criticism of the Israeli government."
“The ADL’s report oftentimes ignores this distinction, and in doing so it draws attention away from the very real crisis of antisemitism we see not only just in our city but in the country at large,” he continued. “When we’re thinking about critiques of Zionism and different forms of political expression, as much of what this report focuses on, there’s a wide variety of political opinion, even within our own 400-plus transition committee.”
Critics say the ADL's claim in the update that it "has long distinguished between legitimate criticism of Israeli government policies and antisemitism" is belied by not only the Mamdani Monitor's language, but also its own significantly expanded definition of antisemitism and antisemitic incidents, which include protests against Israel’s US-backed genocidal war on Gaza.
Jamie Beran, CEO of the progressive group Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, said in an X thread that "we were disappointed but not surprised to see today’s ADL report continue their conflation of criticism of the Israeli government’s actions with antisemitism" and the group's "favoring of Trumpian tactics over bridge building and its prioritization of fearmongering over the safety of American Jews and our neighbors."
Beran continued:
The ADL of today seems to have three interests: keeping their right wing megadonors happy, protecting the current Israeli government’s violent far-right agenda by conflating criticism of Israel with antisemitism, and cozying up to [US President Donald] Trump to stay close to power.
None of this fights antisemitism. Their McCarthyist Mamdani Monitor is the first of its kind because the ADL chose not to deploy a similar tactic when their bedfellows offered Nazi salutes, hired and pardoned neo-Nazis, and continued to openly spread dangerous antisemitic conspiracy myths.
"If the ADL truly wanted to fight antisemitism—like we do every day—they would actually confront it at its roots and how it works alongside all forms of bigotry, not instrumentalize it for an unpopular political agenda that has nothing to do with Jewish safety," Beran added.
Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of the liberal Jewish group J Street, also rejected the ADL's "continued conflation."
“J Street continues to be deeply concerned by the ADL’s ongoing use of its so-called ‘Mamdani Monitor,’ which goes well beyond combating antisemitism and too often conflates legitimate political speech with hate," Ben-Ami said in a statement Monday.
Ben-Ami asserted that there is "something deeply wrong when major Jewish leaders and institutions focus disproportionate attention on left-of-center activists’ views on Israel while failing to apply the same scrutiny to the Trump administration and MAGA leaders, whose blatant antisemitism and ties to white nationalist movements pose a clear and dangerous threat to American Jews."
"Our communal institutions should fight antisemitism consistently and credibly, wherever it appears—not selectively, and not in ways that inflame fear or deepen division," he added.
Another liberal Jewish antisemitism watchdog, Nexus Project, also decried the ADL update, which it said "repeatedly blurs the line between antisemitism and anti-Zionism."
J Street among the groups supporting the Antisemitism Response and Prevention Act (ARPA), legislation introduced last week by US Reps. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), Becca Balint (D-Vt.), and Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) in the wake of the Sydney Hanukkah massacre.
According to Nadler's office, the bill "clearly states that it is against the policy of the United States to use antisemitism as grounds to pursue ulterior political agendas, including attacks on educational institutions, suppressing constitutionally protected speech, or any other enforcement of ideological conformity."
ARPA stands in stark contrast with the Antisemitism Awareness Act (ARA), which was introduced in 2023 by Reps. Mike Lawler (R-NY), Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ, Max Miller (R-Ohio), and Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) in the House of Representatives and Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) in the Senate.
The bill would require the Department of Education to consider the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) Working Definition of Antisemitism when determining whether alleged harassment is motivated by anti-Jewish animus.
The ADL has pushed a wide range of governments, institutions, and organizations to adopt the IRHA definition, which conflates legitimate criticism and condemnation of Israeli policies and practices with anti-Jewish bigotry, and forces people to accept the legitimacy of a settler-colonial apartheid state engaged in illegal occupation and colonization, ethnic cleansing, and genocide.
House lawmakers overwhelmingly approved the legislation last year; however, the bill remains stalled in the Senate.
Zionism—the settler-colonial movement for the reestablishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine—is being rejected by a growing number of Jewish Americans due to the racism, settler-colonialism, illegal occupation, ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and genocide perpetrated by Israel and rooted in claims of divine right and favor.
Jewish-led groups like JVP, IfNotNow, and Jews for Economic and Racial Justice (JERJ) have been at the forefront of pro-Palestine demonstrations since the start of Israel's war and siege on Gaza, which have left more than 250,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing; 2 million others displaced, starved, and sickened; and most of the coastal strip in ruins.
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