Apparently, losing less than the rest of the world is winning. 
Trump’s Resolve on Iran at 60 Days
“The President hasn’t folded under pressure, but more military strikes may be necessary,” says the board.
It’s as if Iran won’t strike back, and more bombing will fix things.
Please consider Trump’s Resolve on Iran at 60 Days
President Trump on Friday repeated his determination to blockade Iran until it agrees to nuclear concessions and reopens the Strait of Hormuz. He added a threat to resume military strikes, and he may have to follow through on that threat to get an outcome that is a strategic victory.
Iran’s regime is “choking like a stuffed pig,” Mr. Trump told Axios on Wednesday regarding the blockade’s effect, “and it is going to be worse for them.” Operation Economic Fury is squeezing Iran’s financing, and to avoid shutting-in oil wells, the regime is scrambling for any junk storage it can find.
The President is under pressure to give up on his war aims, and give him credit for standing firm. He’s also right to reject Iran’s demand that he end the U.S. blockade. This would be the third time Iran has teased Hormuz to win U.S. concessions; it reneged both previous times, as the closed Strait is its only real leverage.
When Iran runs out of oil storage, it will have to stop production, causing permanent damage. Reliant on imports, Iran also faces a gasoline crisis—which is politically combustible. While Trump critics say Iran can hold out forever because it withstood sanctions in the past, the situations aren’t comparable.
The other concern is that Iran will respond by resuming attacks on its neighbors’ oil and gas, sending prices even higher. But Americans would suffer less than the rest of the world, including China. This would give Mr. Trump a card to play when he visits Beijing this month. Treasury’s warning to Chinese banks linked to Iran’s oil trade also increases Beijing’s incentive to help reopen the Strait.
Mr. Trump deserves credit for staying the course when so many around him are losing their nerve. Germany’s Chancellor boasted about America’s “humiliation” in the Gulf, a remark he may come to regret. Democrats in Congress are hoping for Mr. Trump’s failure in Iran, as if that wouldn’t also be America’s. Many Republicans are also heading for the tall grass, as they worry about gas prices and the coming elections.
Worse is the whisper campaign sowing doubts from inside Mr. Trump’s own administration. Damaging leaks about U.S. munition stocks surfaced in this paper and the New York Times on the same day last week.
This week the Atlantic reported that Vice President JD Vance is asking serious questions about the war, as if he’s the only strategic thinker around. Mr. Vance has positioned himself as a skeptic from the war’s beginning, perhaps to stay on the good side of MAGA’s antiwar faction. This is a bad look for a supposedly loyal Vice President, and it doesn’t help with public support.
The war isn’t a failure, but it could be if Mr. Trump settles for a bad deal. Iran’s nuclear program was devastated in June and hit again in March, but some important targets remain. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and dozens of senior officials have been killed, leaving Iran with less-experienced replacements, a Supreme Leader in hiding and a divided junta.
These columns have supported the war on the assumption that the President wouldn’t start a conflict he doesn’t intend to win. If the war ends with real Iranian concessions, or the U.S. forcibly opens Hormuz or seizes Iran’s enriched uranium, Mr. Trump and the GOP can enter the midterms with a better story to tell.
“The War Isn’t a Failure”
That one line by the WSJ editorial board tells you all you need to know. Recall the board was once against this war but now embraces the expansion of it.
The war is a total failure on every front (inflation, splintering of allies, loss of global respect, budget deficits, squeeze on farmers).
But we now rationalize these losses by defining winning as “suffering less than the rest of the world.”
By the same logic, bombing Libya was a success, and the US should have stayed in Afghanistan and Vietnam.
The Journal notes damage to Iran’s well. “Iran Is Squealing Like a Pig“. Lovely. That damage will be permanent. The damage in the region will be permanent as well. It’s not just Iran who will be capping wells.
The longer this goes on, the more damage will occur, and the higher price for oil, gas, fertilizer, aluminum and everything else that passes through the strait.
The war is a total failure. The sooner we admit the truth, the sooner we avoid another Vietnam, Libya, Afghanistan, or Iraq setup.
Hegseth Testimony
In Congress this week, Pet Hegseth, the appropriately named “Secretary of War”, admitted we totally destroyed Iran’s capability to build a nuclear weapon.
Hegseth rationalized the war was necessary because Iran wanted to build a weapon. It was quite an amazing pretzel Hegseth became.
Mattis and Dunford Contradict Trump
Please recall that Trump’s own top general and Secretary of Defense in Trump’s first term admitted in Congress, under oath, that Iran was honoring the terms of Obama’s deal.
- Testimony (October 2017): Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Mattis said, “I believe that [Iran] fundamentally [are] in compliance with its nuclear deal”.
- Contradicting Trump: Mattis, a career hawk, advised that staying in the deal was in the U.S. national security interest, putting him at odds with President Trump’s public criticism of the agreement as an “embarrassment”.
Iran only began stepping back from JCPOA limits (e.g., higher uranium enrichment levels, reduced IAEA access) after Trump unilaterally withdrew in 2018 and reimposed sanctions—not before.
This sequence is well-documented in IAEA reports and international statements that include Trump’s top general and Secretary of Defense.
New York Times October 3, 2017: Mattis Contradicts Trump on Iran Deal Ahead of Crucial Deadline
General Dunford testified at the same hearing alongside Mr. Mattis, and while he did not take a position on the Iran deal, his description about whether Tehran is violating the accord was at odds with the administration’s talking points. He said Iran “is not in material breach” of the agreement and that it had “delayed the development of a nuclear capability by Iran.”
Trump’s First Term Flashback
- Trump’s US State Department: Iran honoring the terms.
- Trump’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff: Iran honoring the terms.
- International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA): Iran honoring the terms.
- Arms Control Association: Iran honoring the terms.
- All US European allies: Iran honoring the terms.
- Every other signee of the accord: Iran honoring the terms.
- Trump’s top general Gen. Joseph Dunford: Iran honoring the terms.
- Trump’s Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis: Iran was complying with the terms of the 2015 Iran Nuclear Deal
Iran did not resort to building a nuclear weapon until after Trump tore up the deal.
And now here we are.
Let the Bombing Resume?!
The board seems to have forgotten a big lesson. Iran retaliates. Recall this war was supposed to be over in 3-5 days. It’s now day 60.
Damn the consequences, let the bombing begin. If Trump does, Iran may very well bomb every desalination plant in the region. One successful strike will cause the biggest water shortage in history.
As a side note, Trump needs approval from Congress after 60 days to do what the editorial board wants.
The War Powers Resolution of 1973 (also known as the War Powers Act) is a federal law designed to limit the U.S. President’s ability to initiate or escalate military actions abroad without Congressional approval. It requires the president to notify Congress within 48 hours of committing troops to hostilities, authorizing a maximum 60-day engagement unless Congress declares war, authorizes an extension, or is unable to meet.
But who cares about the law?
Not Trump or the board. Trump makes ridiculous excuses that the peace talks interrupted the 60 day limit, while the board simply looks the other way.
Chiding Vance
Vance agued against the war. So did Rubio and top military leaders. Unfortunately, Trump listened to his feelings, his son-in-law, Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, and a pack of lies from Netanyahu.
I would advise the board to please admit who was right.
Instead, the board mocks Vance noting “Vice President JD Vance is asking serious questions about the war, as if he’s the only strategic thinker around.“
At least someone is thinking. The board is incapable. It can’t even think 6 months ahead to the midterm elections.
WSJ and Fox write Trumps script and are his handlers and mouthpiece.
Both owned by the largest media company Newscorp.
It is almost a rule with me that any editorial must be a lie, even if I haven’t figured out exactly how it is trying to deceive me yet. So I don’t know if having the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal on my side is good yet.
Beyond that, it seems to me that America in this war (counting Israel as part of America) is trying to do what Russia is trying to do in the Ukraine war: keep from being threatened by nearby missiles.
The Americans wanted to build missile sites threatening Russia from the Ukraine: the Russians decided that they couldn’t tolerate it.
The Persians were on the verge of developing advanced missiles that could have dropped all kinds of nasties on Jerusalem: the Israelis decided that they couldn’t tolerate it. Whether the nasties included regular atomic bombs, or just “dirty bombs” doesn’t matter, so the issue of whether the Persian atomic program had been adequately disrupted is not relevant.
Maybe the Israelis should learn to try and get along with their neighbors
I don’t think Middle Eastern people in general are like that. I think they just want to kill each other.
It helps to have prosperity if you want to have peace. If there is more for everyone, there is less reason to fight over the scraps. I think Trump’s longer-term strategy, given what he has said about Gaza, is to make the place prosperous so that there won’t be so much incentive to fight.
I’m not endorsing the expropriation of Palestinian farmers by Israeli settlers.
Your assumption that every editorial is a con job is substantially more skeptical than my view of them. A chacun son un
For at least the last 25 years, Israel and the US have been the primary instigators of military operations, which Iran then responds to. Otherwise, Iran has mostly been trying to mind their own business, other than rhetoric.
I think that ignores the Houthis, Hezbollah, and Hamas…the war seems to be a huge blunder, but let’s not act like the Iranians are a bunch of choirboys here.
The Tucker Carlson interview on NyTimes is telling. It is clearly Israel first policy.
This theocratic war is nothing but a war against freedom and independent global enterprise.
Pakistan has nucs and starving populations on the horizon. India is closer to starvation and 1.3 billion are at risk from the crop shortfalls in Thailand, Vietnam and India.
Israels war directly reduces the food supply for 3 billion people.
None of this ends well… Gaza grows – everywhere Israel goes…
The last line of the editorial says it all : “. the GOP can enter the midterms with a better story to tell”
They know the pigs are going to get slaughtered during the midterms , and that its getting harder and harder for them to make up stories (propaganda) to keep Trump in the drivers seat – the Iranian plan all along.
Why anybody with half a brain listens to the WSJ plutocratic propaganda machine is beyond me
This article proves that the Iranians are in the drivers seat and Trump has really f’d up worse than ever, what a mess
Don’t worry he’s gonna TACO eventually
The war is a total failure on every front
This is not true.
MICC always win.
Another winner is US shale industry.
Netanyahu always win.
Anyone that says an oil well will be permanently damaged from being shut in doesn’t know a bit from a water barrel.
Superannuated neocons.
Taking the country into a war of choice on behalf of a foreign nation without consulting congress is treason. I am not a constitutional lawyer. Just my opinion.
For the other side – let take the Five points one at a time.
Inflation – Inflation is not bad once you consider deflation(Depression). The real issue is stagflation and demand destruction. No one wants to talk about this because Stagflation is not sexy. Two truths to think about. Inflation is a monetary phenome. The cure for high prices is high prices.
Allies – Is Nato really an ally or a leech when they continue to make themselves more vulnerable with an insane energy policy by destroying their nuclear plants and buying their energy from a dictator. Trump warned them. This conflict has demonstrated that Nato is impotent and can not help open the strait and the US is the only power in NATO. NATO should have been disbanded when USSR fell apart. The reason for its existence went away but it exists just like any good government program. When you buy a friend – they are not a friend.
Global Respect – Real politic is transactional. China learned again that they are very venerable and they lost cheap oil. USSR and Chinese weapons are shit and can not stand up to the US weapons. The Arabs are learning that Iran is their enemy. OPEC is falling apart. The Saudi need the US to protect them. Europe is impotent to secure the strait. Iran’s latest missile can reach Europe. European socialist imported Syrian and Africans and are now beholden to their small political block. Does anyone want to talk about all the Iranian princelings in Starmer’s UK?
Budget Deficits – The return on investment is greater in missiles than in social programs. The real question is do you want to support defense contractors or fraud in democratic states where they get a cut.
Farmers – Most US farmer bought the inputs to this year’s crop in December and January. Anyone that did not is switching from corn to soybeans. Hint: Soybeans do not require nitrogen fertilizer. US corn is not used for food but to feed animals and make ethanol.
Leaders are lonely because they think ahead of the crowd. Who could have thought that in 4 years – Panama Canal, Iran, Cuba, Venezula, China will all be more freindly to the US because we stood up and used our power.
So you’re arguing for extortion and robbery.
BINGO!
Trump says US navy like ‘pirates’ while seizing a ship in Iranian blockadeUS president says ‘we took over the cargo, took over the oil. It’s a very profitable business’
The countries you mention are more friendly by virtue of extortion. Ie. They have to be. None of those countries have the back of the US. The US has no friends today except Israel and with Israel as a friend you don’t need enemies. Nobody has Trumps back. who helped when Trump asked for help with the Iran war? It was crickets.
Why? Because Trump has treated the rest of the world like shit. The US may be powerful but not so powerful that it does not need allies and Trump has alienated everyone.
Now other countries have to think is this going to be over in 3 years or are the US idiots going to elect yet another moron? Is congress going to get its act together? Is the rule of law still alive in the US? Is there going to be a revolution? Will their be an orderly transfer of power? Will the US finally choke on its debt?
In a lot of ways the Iran war has revealed that the emperor has no clothes. A backwards country like Iran has stopped the US in its tracks.
A lot has to go right before the US will ever regain its position as the leader of the free world. I am thinking not.
Trump maybe didn’t cause this situation entirely but he sure hurried it along.
R
E
S
P
E
C
T
Find out what it means to me!
They know what Israel and Murdoch want.
Israeli media bias is legion
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/telegraph-and-politico-owner-says-journalists-must-support-israel-or-resign
Current US Intelligence Opinion regarding Iran nuclear efforts:
Gabbard Says Iran Did Not Rebuild Nuclear Program After 2025 Strikes, Contradicting Trump – Time Magazine, March 2026
https://time.com/article/2026/03/18/tulsi-gabbard-iran-nuclear-trump/
Trump, Gabbard Comments on Iran Nuclear Capability – June 2025
“The IC continues to assess that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and Supreme Leader Khamenei has not authorized the nuclear weapons program that he suspended in 2003.”
https://www.factcheck.org/2025/06/trump-gabbard-comments-on-iran-nuclear-capability/
Thanks
Also promised no long range missles.They surely can be trusted. It wasn’t as imminent as the poliburo says but it was a matter of time before they had a nuke and surely would have used it.
Yeah, after Trump ended the JCPOA.
Like breaking a contract to buy your truck and then crying that you don’t deliver the truck.
Anyone trusting a radical Islamic extremist regime is delusional. Sure you all go with that.
They certainly don’t TACO as much.
In other words, you have no evidence.
Iran wasn’t building long range missiles until Trump ended the JCPOA. Trump’s own CIA could find no evidence that Iran was enriching uranium beyond what was permitted by the KCPOA.
BUT Trump is an Israeli puppet, a pathetic little cuck.
I read (look it up yourself) that the long range Iranian missile could reach Israel fully loaded but could not reach Europe or Diego Garcia with any warhead on board. Iran’s longest distance missile could only be long distance with an empty tube like a hobby rocket.
Judging by the JCPOA it’s evident that Iran is honorable America is not.
They don’t even need missiles. They don’t even need full nuclear capability.
They could just detonate a dirty bomb that they smuggled into Israel and spread radioactive dust (although some would drift into Iran also, since the world winds blow west to east). Or put a dirty bomb on a boat off the coast of Manhattan and destroy Wall Street.
They could. Funny, we are daily assured that they are crazy and seek Armageddon, but Iran has not done so, in spite of Iranian missiles regularly getting through the “Iron Dome”.
Why, it’s almost like the lies you spew are lies….
Gabbard is full of crap, which is why Trump keeps her locked up and silent.
Trump is President. He presumably knows far more than you and any articles in support of your beliefs that you can dredge up. The US Intelligence agencies have been wrong more often than right.
Better to deal with a threat preemptively, says I.
So the 16 different US Intelligence and Defense Agencies that developed this analysis are incompetent and you know better. I stand corrected.
AGAIN, the President is elected to make these decisions. If you are unhappy, then you need to wait until you get to vote again.
By that logic, the world should deal with the US.
The idea thaf Trump now is an intelligence analyst as well as a Persia expert is a laugh.
Trump as a human being would be funny if it wasn’t so insanely horrible.
86/47 yeah FU DOJ
No other war was authorized by Congress.How did afghanistan , iraq and vietnam become relatively infinite?
WPA allows Congress to appropriate money for military action without formally declaring war. It reduces political fallout to include military action spending in a bill with lots of things voters want.
False. Congress authorized the use of force in all three of those cases.
Always the whining!
Trump made the right choice, listening to the people he believes in. The WSJ is correct. Trump must stay the course.
You think the small amount of economic pain Americans suffer due to this war is meaningful? Consider yourself lucky that you are not living in Iran!
Good piece. And likely the only kind of “peace” we’ll get!
I believe “Iran did not resort to building a nuclear weapon until after Trump tore up the deal.” IS correct – and documented too.
ON losing less than Europe supposedly being winning I used to have a realted similar credo: “Less bad is not a defense.”
Please document your belief that Iran is building a nuclear weapon. There is no evidence for this, only Trump’s constant, ignorant, bloviation turning propaganda into conventional wisdom.
Well, Trump’s the president and you’re not. So all you can do is spew BS on internet blogs, loser. 🤣
By that logic, Iraq must have been chock a block with WMDs. The president said so.
Amen, Mish! Warmongering is the word for the abject WSJ.
“But we now rationalize these losses by defining winning as “suffering less than the rest of the world.”
By the same logic, bombing Libya was a success…”
The US has already lost this war of choice–or rather of whim. And worldwide recession (and indeed starvation in the poorest countries) will be one major result of the Netanyahu/Trump war. Present GDP cannot be generated with 20% less energy and fertilizer.
As far as the neocons are concerned, Libya was a success.
Iran did not resort to building a nuclear weapon until after Trump tore up the deal.
This statement is incorrect. Iran has not, and is not building a nuclear weapon. At least they were not until Trump recently attacked them. This is not my sole opinion, it is the consensus Intelligence Estimate of all US Defense and Intelligence Agencies.
After Trump foolishly reneged on the agreement that Obama painstakingly negotiated, Iran gradually increased uranium enrichment to about 60%, far below the 90+% needed for a weapon. Nor did they take any steps to weaponize uranium.
This nuclear excuse is a complete canard being used by Trump to justify his aggression, just as Natanyahoo has been using it for the past 30 years. This war is about Zionist delusions of grandeur / entitlement that God chose them to rule the Middle East, nothing more.
“This war is about Zionist delusions of grandeur / entitlement that God chose them to rule the Middle East, nothing more‘
Israel has found a way to solve this ‘problem’:
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-pour-730m-propaganda-gaza-genocide-iran-war-turns-it-pariah
They must be experiencing diminishing ROI on their purchase of US Presidents and Congresspersons and need to diversify.
“These columns have supported the war on the assumption that the President wouldn’t start a conflict he doesn’t intend to win.”
It sounds as if the WSJ supports any conflict that we can win. That is a very illogical method of determining support. There are lots of countries that we could attack with that criterion.
I would support a war that we couldn’t win if it was just.
The war on Iran is a disaster for everyone. The tariff war on the rest of the world is a second disaster. The alienation of our allies is a third.
Trump’s confrontational style is a disaster. You can’t bully your way to prosperity.
The foremost disaster is the Usonian elector who voted for this turd not once, but twice!
I am a WSJ subscriber (print + online).
I read the B-section first, then the A-section.
I usually do NOT read the editorials.
No need or any real Iranian concessions…
the Trump administration and their propaganda channels are fully capable…
of making up the stories they want to tell.
The one constant in the WSJ Editorial Board is that they are Israel First in all things.
Israel’s #1 desire in Iran is to keep the US engaged there, so that is what the WSJ EB will say is the best policy.
And the problem with this is?
I would have no problem with that bias if they would simply disclose to readers that the Editorial Board is bought and paid for by Israel. But then they would be less effective at persuading readers, so they hide that fact and pretend they are being objective.
This is not unique to the WSJ. CBS is now owned by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, the largest single contributor to the IDF. He is also in the process of closing the deal to buy CNN. Even though he is American, when he uses the term “we” to describe a nation, he is talking about Israel, not the US.
The foreign TV news networks are much better than American ones in providing objective international news. France 24, Deutsche Welle, BBC, and Al Jazeera all have excellent 24/7 English-language news networks and news websites.
Amazing what a small country and its people can do when they put their mind to what they want.
Meanwhile, you and the other ilk hang out on the internet, picking your noses and toejam, while accomplishing nothing of any note, except to whine about your betters.
Rupert Murdoch is a virulent Zionist and his wife is jewish…how is this a surprise?
Certainly not the same WSJ once run by the Bancroft’s.
I couldn’t find a WSJ story reporting on this brutal attack on a nun by an Israeli man, motivated solely by the fact that she is catholic
https://www.timesofisrael.com/police-arrest-man-suspected-of-attacking-french-nun-at-jerusalem-biblical-site/
I’ll see your Israeli man attacking nun story and raise you this
https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/allegations-abuse-israeli-detention-facility-sde-teiman-1792763
Evil
Don’t get arrested and you won’t have any problems. [shrug]
So if a Biden Administration were to arrest trumpers, you’d be cool with that.
Indeed, it was a very fine and credible publication under the Bancroft’s. Murdoch pisses in everything he touches.
It’s worth pointing out that polling shows a 60% majority of American Jews are opposed to the war in Iran, so pointing out his wife as being Jewish doesn’t support your argument.
Link?
68% of American Jews back the US-Israel war against Iran, survey finds
…straight from the Home Office
https://www.timesofisrael.com/68-of-connected-american-jews-back-the-us-israel-war-against-iran-survey-finds/
Israel quadruples propaganda budget to $730 M as it loses global ‘war for hearts and minds’
https://x.com/TheCradleMedia/status/2050489776982163788
And Iran is filled with virulent Muslims.
If the WSJ does not offer a what customers want then the WSJ will not survive. By offering the article MISH reports, the WSJ either knows that’s what subscribers want or is testing the waters by measuring feedback from subscribers.
chatGPT query below. WSJ clearly knows what its PAYING customers want.
I assume that Mish also knows what his audience wants, although none pay here, which is why he continues the foot stomping, turn red, hair-pulling TDS approach that so many of his posts exhibit..
I’ve been a long time reader and admirer of the editorial page of the WSJ and, especially, Barrons. I haven’t always agreed but thought they were well worth reading.
Except on defense policy.
They’ve never seen a dollar that couldn’t be better spent on bombs. Never have they seen a war, or a supposed threat, that wouldn’t benefit from more dollars.
It seems that even now, they’re advocating for a radical expansion of the navy,. including a new carrier group. Something that’s enormously expensive, especially for a government that is essentially bankrupt.
What’s worse is that they’re still fighting World War II. Carriers aren’t the thing any longer. Drones are.
But hey! Drones are cheap and we can’t have that.
It would not surprise me a bit to wake up one morning and read about our carriers being sunk by some new drone they weren’t at all prepared for.
I feel bad for the guys that are stuck on those big targets.
Human sacrifices collateral damage if not part of the plan or contractual tribute to be paid. Loosh generation for the satanists’ masters.
Well, they would spin it as some kind of kitchen fire that went out of control. LOL
That sounds like “friendly fire”!
“advocating for a radical expansion of the navy,. including a new carrier group”
Trump Says U.S. Navy ‘Like Pirates’ in Enforcing Sea Blockade of Iran. https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/trump-says-u-navy-pirates-140341163.html
US/NATO (Bankrupt) – Pirate World As Trump Declares – “It’s a Very Profitable Business – We’re Like Pirates” !
No ‘Audit’ Of Ft Knox Gold Reserves Yet.!
Lock Her Up (2016) – NO ONE At The Top Gone To Jail/Prison Yet!
Turns out the Ft Knox stuff isn’t up to snuff
Ft. Knox Full Of Impure Gold Unfit For International Transactions
https://www.zerohedge.com/precious-metals/ft-knox-full-impure-gold-unfit-international-transactions
Trump simply says the quiet part out loud.
Pretty funny that I’ve been confronting JoJo with the fact that Trump is basically a robber and extortionist. Now Trump himself admits it.
You know WHY?
They are part of MICC.
MICC is unbelievably large.