“Gulf states can no longer believe the United States can or will protect them from existential threats. And even as they are forced to openly cooperate with Israel in its war, they increasingly view it as a threat.” My new piece on the Gulf and the Iran war.
foreignpolicy.com/2026/03/05/i...
Excellent piece on the profound changes that the AI tsunami is bringing to social science research:
www.brookings.edu/articles/the...
So it begins.
How Mojtaba Khamenei volunteered to become the new Supreme Leader of Iran:
OK, just going to sit with my maul, stroke my beard, and watch the trolls on this one.
This is especially worrisome at a time when drones guided by AI or fiber optic cables cannot be jammed and are readily available.
Mentally unstable lone assassins have killed or come close to killing US presidents. Foreign governments are far more capable of this if they choose to do so.
Others have not necessarily been restrained by American forbearance — we know of foiled plots by Iraq in 1993 and Iran in 2024 to kill US presidents. But the killing of Khamenei does make it somewhat more likely there will be new attempts to kill US presidents and other leaders.
While there have been some gray areas — like bombing sites where Saddam Hussein might have been — the killing of Khamenei is the first killing of a top political leader by the US in recent decades.
The risk is that this sets a precedent others might follow.
While I am not sorry to see Khamenei go, the assassination of a foreign leader sets a dangerous precedent.
The US has an Executive Order dating back to Ford in 1976, and strengthened by Reagan in 1981, banning political assassinations by US personnel or with US help.
In international relations theory we call this chain-ganging,” ie, getting pulled into an ally’s war as if chained together at the ankle. As others have pointed out, there was a large element of this in WWI. See here:
www.jstor.org/stable/2538910
And here:
stephaniehuesler.com/2019/12/15/h...
Goldfinger: I plan to destroy Fort Knox with a nuclear weapon, and gold will go up to $5400 an ounce.
Bond: Why don’t you just convince the President to start a war with Iran without any NATO or Congressional support? Same result.
G: . . .
B: . . .
G: This mofo is crazy let’s laser him in half
Very good rapid reaction by @professormusgrave.bsky.social
One caveat: we don't really know whether a country like Iran is a paper tiger until it's tested in war. Maybe it will collapse. Still would be bad.
musgrave.substack.com/p/an-unpopul...
These are maximalist aims. A country is at its most dangerous backed into a corner facing an existential threat, which Trump appears to have unleashed. What is the off-ramp from the escalation ladder here? 2/ www.nytimes.com/2026/02/28/w...
Disappointed and saddened by DOD decision to end decades of mutually beneficial collaboration between our nation's military officers & our civilian universities and think tanks. A loss for both communities with negative long-term implications for national security and civil-military relations.
Like Chellabi, any effort to install Pahlavi, especially on the back of bombing by the US and Israel, is likely to fail.
The US has made the mistake in the past of trying to install exiled leaders who talk a good game about democracy.
See, for example, Ahmed Chellabi in Iraq:
www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1...
Pahlavi has been in exile in the US and does not have an insider’s feel for the opposition in Iran, nor the legitimacy of having shared their suffering.
He would also face divisions among Iran’s repressed ethnic groups, the Azeris and the Kurds.
Among many other challenges for the Iranian opposition (see previous thread) there is no opposition leader who commands wide legitimacy and experience in either governance or fighting a civil war.
Many people have focused on Reza Pahlavi, the Shah’s son, as a possible opposition leader. But . ..
In sum while it would be great to see the brutal Iranian regime disintegrate this is not likely to be a fast or easy process even with US and Israeli bombings.
The US can supply weapons to the opposition but that will take time and the IRGC will likely be interdicting supplies as it will stay in charge absent US forces on the ground
The murder of thousands by regime forces only deepened the simmering fury of Iranian citizens, but even with US bombing only the government forces have weapons and training.
Jack Goldstone’s research is also relevant here: elite defection is a nearly necessary condition for successful revolution.
For all the economic troubles Iran has had, even after humiliation by the US and Israel and a massive public uprising, there was no elite defection.
Both dilemmas are clearly evident in Iran:
—the IRGC is huge, well-armed, and recently showed its willingness to kill thousands to keep its privileges
—Iranians despise their government but any leader beholden to the US and Israel would also lack legitimacy
Downes notes two key dilemmas:
—decapitation still leaves the military and security apparatus in place, often resulting in civil war
—leaders installed by foreign powers cannot meet the demands of both their people and their foreign backersh
The historical record of foreign-imposed regime changes (FIRCs), like the one Trump is trying in Iran, is not good.
Alex Downes studied 120 FiRCs since 1816 and found the foreign powers rarely succeeded in their goals:
www.amazon.com/Catastrophic...
Was hoping for some good SOTU snark here but evidently all the snarky people were also hoping the other snarky people had the stomach to watch the SOTU
An excellent article on my new book in National Defense magazine:
www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/202...
Ipsos ABC Wa Po poll shows tariffs are nearly as unpopular as inflation (64% vs 65% disapproval).
Looks like more people now understand that a tariff is a tax.
Trump contributed to up to 30,000 killed and 300,000 wounded by encouraging and then abandoning Iranian protesters. Khamenei was as ruthless as Trump was feckless.
Like US in Hungary in 1956, Trump is Roosevelt in reverse: big talk, small stick.
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/04/o...
Congratulations on a well-deserved honor!
As a Grawemeyer Award winner you are joining very distinguished company — all the way back to Keohane, Jervjs, and Gorbachev!
