As readers who have been following Israel’s attack on Iran and Iran’s response so far have likely worked out, things are not working out according to Israel’s plan, save perhaps the getting the US involved part. We’ll give some more detail below, but Iran appears to now be able to interdict most Israeli strikes, save ones from inside Iran, which Simplicius claims are mainly from Iran’s dissident group MEK, with Israeli assistance. By contrast, many and perhaps most Iran missile strikes on Israel seem to be getting through. Keep in mind, Iran is not even using its best kit, since it is mainly using older missiles to get Israel to deplete its defense stocks.
Pretty much everyone discussing what Trump might do next throws up their hands as a result of his apparent belief that radical inconsistency is a source of power, plus his tendency to say what is expedient, no matter how fantastical.1 But even by Trump standards, he’s gone into extreme self-contradiction over a very short time frame, as Larry Johnson recounts.
Trump is now making hedged statements, that it’s possible that the US will enter the conflict. His actions say that even more so. Johnson flagged this sighting:
Since making sense of where Trump is going from what he is saying is futile, is it possible to make informed guesses of what Trump will do based on the TACO? Remember, the reason Trump chickens out is that he’s taken a course of action that depends on raw force to get done, with no apparent planing, much the less consideration of whether it could produce the desired outcome (such as tariffs magically brining back US manufacturing). But he is often met with superior power, witness China deploying its control of “raw earths” that the US, particularly its military, keenly needs, and so so backs off.
But we also must note that Trump has not yet shown that he can make orderly retreats. He often keeps probing his opponents and trying end runs. This refusal to make a graceful reversal when faced with serious and likely insurmountable obstacles looks to be ego driven, as opposed to based on assessment of whether continued arm-wrestling will work.
So we’ll recap the war situation as best we can infer it and then turn to the various pressures on Trump for and against war with Iran. Yes, Trump may attempt some half-pregnant finesse but it is hard to think he could take that very far.
A big caveat: the actual trajectory of the conflict matters less than one might think in terms of Trump’s decision on whether to join Israel in the war. . Even though “reality” will eventually prevail, that oddly matters little in this momentous decision. If the true the state of the war mattered, we would have pulled plug on Project Ukraine no later than its failed super duper counteroffensive, nearly 24 months ago. Similarly, the fact that Iran already demonstrated that it could overwhelm Israel air defense and hit high-value, well-protected targets accurately, as in Iran possesses escalation dominance ex Israeli nukes, seems not to have mattered in this calculation.
At best, the Israelis and US, like the US and EU with their “shock and awe” Russia sanctions, seem to have convinced themselves they could deliver a crippling blow to Iran with their initial salvo and induce a regime overthrow. So far, there is no evidence that Israel has a plan B beyond getting the US committed. If Israel does not back off, it is looking at a protracted conflict, which does not remotely favor them.
Apparent State of the Conflict
Even Western sources are confirming that the war situation has developed not necessarily to Israel’s advantage. Notice the top of this account by Daniel Davis, showing how many Iran incoming volleys are landing. Davis, even though generally pretty good, is sometimes too reliant on US contacts, which results in him often being slow to recognize that negative reports about US opponents often are greatly exaggerated; here some of his statements, like Iran’s air defenses having been destroyed, are incorrect.
More corroboration:
Iran’s retaliatory strikes are more powerful than expected
– Why is there a tendency in the West to underestimate opponents? Iran’s “regime” would collapse, Russia could easily be defeated and their economy is weak, China cannot innovate, etc.
– These assumptions are not the… pic.twitter.com/vQQYOZn1DO
— Glenn Diesen (@Glenn_Diesen) June 15, 2025
Nearly all missiles Iran fired in this wave were 20-30 year old models, but watch the single newer-generation missile that struck Haifa. Then watch the electricity go out.
Wait until Iran empties its old stockpile. Then things will get more interesting for the genocidal regime. pic.twitter.com/OJnggRZhPW
— Seyed Mohammad Marandi (@s_m_marandi) June 14, 2025
Even OilPrice is confirming that Israel’s Haifa Oil Refinery Damaged in Missile Strike. However, as Alexander Mercouris reiterated in his talk yesterday, oil and gas facilities are both very study and also large sites, so isolated attacks won’t do irreparable damage. It takes a sustained campaign to achieve that. Consistent with that, even Bloomberg is pointing out that the much-ballyhooed (and impressively explosive) strike on Iran’s South Pars gas field has yet to achieve much:
Israel temporarily knocked out a natural gas processing facility linked to the giant South Pars field, Iran’s biggest, in an attack on Saturday, and targeted fuel storage tanks during strikes as part of its campaign against Tehran’s nuclear program.
Simplicius in a June 15 post similarly showed the impact on to Iranian missile sites nuclear facilities to be minor:
Take Tabriz facility for instance, one or two small buildings were ‘damaged’:
Natanz—a gigantic facility, as can clearly be seen—saw a few power transformers and a substation receive slight to moderate damage:
If you took Fathers’ Day off from the news, you may have missed independent media corrections of the early claims that Israel had destroyed Iran’s air defenses. Later reports indicated that the air defense system was hit by a cyber attack, not a physical attack. Israel had reportedly believed that the network would be down for days, giving Israel plenty of time to blow up critical targets. But the Iranians apparently got their system back to more or less normal operation in ~ 10 hours.
And significant number of the hits Israel did make in Iran were on decoys:
🇮🇷 Is Iran tricking Israel into attacking decoys?
Answer: yes.
🔘 The Israeli regime carried out air strikes against what it believed to be Iranian ballistic missile systems and radar installations. However, most of the targets were decoys. Note that there were no subsequent… pic.twitter.com/G4ykyoCcwW
— Sprinter Observer (@SprinterObserve) June 14, 2025
❗️FAKE RADARS
Press TV explained that Iran used radar decoys emitting fake signals.
Israeli drones mistook them for real targets, wrongly believing radar defenses were destroyed.
This led Israeli jets deeper into Iranian airspace – three F-35s allegedly downed.
4/6 pic.twitter.com/ouEYtPERLQ
— Sputnik (@SputnikInt) June 15, 2025
There does not yet seem to be independent confirmation of the claim that Iran shot down three F-35s and even captured a pilot. But from the US vantage, even one F-35 lost is too many. They are very expensive, fragile fake stealth bombers that we’ve conned many of our allies to buy. They are so electronics-laden that all that buzz makes them detectable. A military porn colleague reports we’ve never flown them over territory with as much as a S-200 system, not Syria, Iraq, or Ukraine.
Update 8:00 AM EDT:
“Operation Save Israel’s Ass”.
It seems Israel is on the ropes and Iran is ready to deliver the knockout blow. Entire West is now mobilizing to save the illegal colony. https://t.co/OkfcrrEmVE
— SIMPLICIUS Ѱ (@simpatico771) June 16, 2025
The Forces on Trump: To Whom Will He Chicken Out?
Simplicius presents a measured take of what Trump’s options, but this presumes sanity, something we have not seen much in evidence in Trump’s trade war or with Project Ukraine:
It all depends on Trump’s decision—but if he chooses not to enter the war, then Israel’s strikes will peter out after a few days, and both sides will likely seek de-escalation, with both declaring ‘major victory’ to their respective home audiences. Israel will fabulate a series of objectives that were ‘completed’, and that will be that. Afterwards Israel’s domestic situation will deteriorate rapidly as no one will be convinced that Israel ‘won’ anything, or did any serious damage to Iran.
But if the US enters, then either all hell can break loose and Iran fulfills its promise to close the Straits of Hormuz, potentially sending the world into an economic tailspin, or—to appease his Israeli handlers—Trump flashes a ‘devastating’ show strike then declares the Iranian nuclear sites as “obliterated” and immediately pulls out to begin a new de-escalation regime with Iran.
I have it as 70/30 chance that saner heads prevail in the US with Trump electing to not enter the war, and things go the way of the first option, but we’ll see how it develops.
There is reason to see 70/30 as optimistic.
Let’s look at the forces operation for versus against the US joining Israel in a more or less undeniable way (there is also the question of what Iran does if the US gets more actively involved that intel and weapons and little green men and tries to pretend otherwise, but we’ll put that aside for now).
Pressures on Trump to join Israel. Most of these are obvious, and there are overlaps among these groups, but to recap:
The Israel lobby
Big Zionist donors, starting with Miriam Adelman
Warmongering Congresscritters (note that their belligerence exists independent of Israel, which if anything makes them more dogged)
Hawkish talking heads, such as Mark Levin and Sean Hannity
The military-industrial complex
The CIA, which is joined at the hip with Mossad
Media reports that Iran is hurting, which implies that entering the war would not be that big a risk. Nothing like being hoist on your own propaganda:
Pressures to find a face-saving escape:
Mr. Market. Mr. Market, here either the stock or oil market, could push Trump into a fast retreat. Recall that Treasury bond upheaval led Trump to a big walkback on his “Liberation Day” tariffs.
However, so far, investors are bizarrely unconcerned, so until they start voting with their feet, they will not serve as a check on the war juggernaut. For instance, from Nigel Green of deVere, in their latest e-mail titled “Markets ‘dangerously complacent’ amid Iran-Israel tension”:
The world is watching a direct confrontation between two major regional powers, and yet markets are treating it as background noise.
This isn’t resilience, it’s a mispricing of risk. Investors are leaning into a narrative that no longer fits the facts.
Even though oil prices have already jumped, they too do not seem to be adequately pricing in risk. Remember that Trump is very keen to keep energy prices down, so oil about $90 a barrel or even $80 would register with him. Yet despite the worried-seeming headline, the Bloomberg piece Oil Traders Brace for Turmoil as Iran Crisis Imperils Supply, includes some awfully cheery assumptions:
Despite US sanctions, Iran remains the third-biggest producer in the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries…. it’s unclear whether the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries could offset a severe and prolonged outage in Iran, which pumps around 3.4 million barrels a day.
The attempt alone could put the energy infrastructure of the Saudis and the United Arab Emirates into the cross-hairs. After Riyadh backed Trump’s earlier crackdown on Tehran during his first term, its critical oil-processing installation at Abqaiq was blown up by the Houthis in 2019…
Fears over the Strait of Hormuz are probably excessive too, [Vandana] Hari [founder of Singapore-based energy consultancy Vanda Insights] added. Such an extreme step would cut off Iran’s own export route and alienate its biggest customer, China.
“Iran has never actually blocked the channel despite many threats to do so down the years and I don’t expect it will do so now,” she said.
Lordie. First, Iran has not faced this level of threat since its 1980s wor with Iraq, so simple extrapolations seem dubious. Second, if the US were to or threatens to enter, Iran could quite reasonably point out to a pissy China that if it were to this war, dream if much of its oil would continue to go to China.
Third, Lloyds’ list, which knows a thing or two about maritime risks, disagrees:
Any conflict between Israel and Iran would likely render the Strait of Hormuz closed to shipping, BIMCO’s chief safety and security officer Jakob Larsen said….
Any clash between the two “would be of the greatest concern to shipping in the Middle East Gulf and adjacent waters”, Larsen said.
“While the most likely scenario might not directly impact shipping, any attack will have a certain potential to escalate and impact shipping, as well as implicate military forces of other countries operating in the area, including the US.
“A full-blown armed conflict between Israel/the US and Iran would most certainly effectively close the Strait of Hormuz at least for a period of time and drive up oil prices.”
Security sources have pointed out that there is currently no direct threat to shipping, but in a region where situations can escalate extremely quickly, mariners are being urged to exercise caution when transiting though the Middle East Gulf and surrounding waters.
One wonders what it would take in the way of threat display by Iran to get insurers to refuse to insure tankers in the Gulf. Could it do something less than an actual closure (say by mining or having ships bristling with weapons at the Strait) to scare insurers enough so as to have them do the dirty work?
The Pentagon. Under Biden, the Pentagon often opposes State (and one assumes the spooks too) on various escalatory measures in Ukraine and prevailed some of the time. The Pentagon would be acutely away of the US materiel shortage, particularly of Patriot missile, and the F-35 weaknesses in combat.
China hawks. They have been lobbying to an end to Project Ukraine to save firepower for China. They will feel the same way about burning up weapons over Iran.
MAGA. Voter views normally are irrelevant, but Trump is vulnerable. His approval ratings have been on a downward slope and are still at a low level for a President so early in his time in office. Importantly, the Republicans have only a one-seat majority in the House. MAGA, as in young pro-Trump young men, were critical to his victory. In many key states, they went door to door to persuade men of all colors to support Trump.
There’s been some unhappiness among the former Trump faithful about being on the receiving end of DOGE spending cuts, particularly among vets. But that does not being to compare to the ire over Trump repudiating his anti-war promises. We’ve seen on Twitter and heard even from readers how many Trump 2024 supporters will abandon the Republicans if he goes to war with Iran. Mind you, they don’t have to vote Democrat or independent. They just need to stay home in large enough numbers.
The Daily Mail confirms:
To win re-election last November, Trump had to build a coalition of powerful allies across media, politics, and business.
Now, some of his most vocal public backers are distancing themselves from some of the president’s biggest moves, including right-wing media mogul Tucker Carlson…
In a Friday newsletter post for his own media outlet – The Tucker Carlson Network – Carlson and his team wrote ‘This Could Be the Final Newsletter Before All-Out War.’
‘On Thursday, Iran’s president threatened to ‘destroy’ any country that eliminates his government’s nuclear facilities,’ TCN wrote….
Trump’s winning November coalition also heavily featured populist conservatives, may of whom consider Steve Bannon – a former Breitbart editor and a chief White House strategist from Trump’s first term – to be their ringleader.
Bannon, who also has built his own media empire around his War Room podcast, noted during a Friday episode of the show that he believed the Israeli government was attempting trying to pull America into a war with Iran, saying they ‘want us to go on offense’ against Tehran….
The intra-MAGA split on foreign policy appears to be far-reaching, even extending as far at the leadership at the Pentagon itself.
Semafor reports that the nation’s top military officials have competing visions about how involved America should be with Israel.
Israel’s low tolerance for pain. Even if this video (view here) is very much cherry-picked as far as damage to Tel Aviv is concerned, Israelis are not at all used to being on the receiving end of what they dish out over the region. They have a glass jaw:
And while waiting to see what Trump will do, remember: the US has no treaty with Israel.
Update: 8:00 AM EDT: We have featured some tweets in comments that claimed that Pakistan was prepared to take aggressive action to support Iran if necessary. While the specific claim in one about Pakistan air support seems to be an open question, this would seem to confirm the general thesis:
⚡️🇮🇷🇵🇰I didn’t believe this story when it surfaced yesterday, but Iranian National Security Council member Mohsen Rezaee apparently confirms that Pakistan told Iran it would NUKE Israel if Israel dropped a nuke on Tehran: pic.twitter.com/WRtcemyVHe
— SIMPLICIUS Ѱ (@simpatico771) June 15, 2025
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1 For instance, the normally fabulously cool Chas Freeman went way outside his normal register on the subject of Trump. From a recent Dialogue Works:
I have to say I think his modus operandi, his customary approach to things uh is bullying and nobody has really called his bluff. We’re seeing in the United States what I now what I would call a pre-revolutionary situation. That is to say the popular dissatisfaction is so widespread, anger at the administration’s abuses of its authority is so intense, the concern about the the rule of law disappearing is so large the unhappiness with the malignant narcissism and megalomania of the president is enormous. Saturday, tomorrow we will have a parade in Washington as I mentioned and there will be hundreds of demonstrations against the kind of extravagance and glorification of a personality cult that it was that it’s intended to evoke. So I think Americans domestically have some of the same questions that foreign leaders do: how do you deal with this man, how do you deal with his administration?
We’ve just seen in California in Los Angeles Christine Noem, the Secretary of Homeland Security, conduct a press conference in which the United States senator attempted to ask a question and was muscled out of the room and handcuffed and dragged off by her security people. This is an abuse that we’ve never seen we’ve never seen anything like this in the United States.
So I think a lot of people are wondering what it is that we have achieved by with this administration and whether we can in fact tolerate it. You know it’s not just the enemies of the United States who are perplexed. Vladimir Putin you know must be wondering well well you know what can I do with this man. As you said you know he claims he knew nothing about the Ukrainian attack and yet clearly the American involvement in that had to be considerable if only through the intelligence agencies. How can he, how can he trust Mr Trump? …
I noticed that um actually the recent negotiation with the Chinese on tariffs, sanctions and export controls was very inconclusive. Essentially it’s comically vague. There’s nothing uh very specific in it. The Chinese have agreed to issue export licenses to selected buyers for rare earths for on a six-month license basis. So clearly they don’t trust the Trump administration to keep its word. And they’re holding their leverage in reserve.
We have a problem uh you know with the Chinese. You on the one hand we ask, well, “Please sell us rare earths,” a main purpose of which is to build weapons to kill the Chinese. You know you could understand why they might not be enthusiastic about that.
So I think there is a general crisis of confidence and credibility for the Trump administration when it’s not just abroad it’s at home as well
