Joe Kent
@joekent16jan19 · Public intellectuals, authors & commentators
Joe Kent is a retired Green Beret and former director of the National Counterterrorism Center.
The Houthis’ rapid advance is just the beginning of the blowback effects we are now going to face as a result of our counterproductive policies in the Middle East & because of this senseless war in Iran. The Houthi’s ability to capture key terrain and strategic ports along the Red Sea coast speaks to not just their military capabilities but also to their ability to gain support from tribes far from the traditional Houthi strongholds in northern Yemen. This is very significant—these tribes are predominantly Sunni, while the Houthis are Zaydi Shias. Yemen is a tribal region—deals among rivals are frequently cut before or during battles, and even then those alliances can be murky. Now, however, the Houthis are fighting alongside the IRGC as a member of the axis of resistance against the Saudis, the U.S., and Israel. This has given them far more popular support than a standard tribal deal or a military victory ever could—not because Yemenis support or particularly care about the Iranians, but because especially during times of conflict, we go tribal. It’s human nature. The Yemenis have witnessed what the U.S.-backed Saudis have done to their people and what the U.S. backed Israelis have done to the people of Gaza, & see how the Iranians are fighting back after the U.S. & Israel attacked them. Now, they’re uniting against their common enemy to fight back. The U.S.’s war in Iran & simultaneous backing of the Saudis’ war in Yemen, along with our government’s support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza, have given the Iranian Islamic revolution a massive boost that has reached far beyond Iran. As our war against Iran drags on we will see more of this, especially in Iraq, Lebanon & potentially Bahrain. Our own policies and interventions abroad are encouraging radicalization, which will in turn inspire blowback terrorism here in the U.S. This is a destructive self-licking ice cream cone and it’s going to get more people killed. President Trump and his advisors know better, and know that ending our foreign entanglements now is in the best interest of the American people. The question is whether they have the moral courage to do it.
The purpose of any system is what it does, not what it claims to do. Currently our bases & troops in the region primary function is to provide Iran targets to shoot at. Pulling our troops out removes leverage from Iran, if they stay, Iran retains the leverage.
Our current strategy, striking Iranian ships & military targets while applying sanctions, is more likely to cause a mass casualty event which compels us to escalate than it is to open the SOH or bend Iran to our will. It’s Sisyphean—Iran has proven for 47 years that it can & will endure sanctions, and since our launching of this war we’ve been unable to exact a victory via military action. With this strategy, the only path forward is escalation. And that’s exactly what both the neocons in the U.S. and the hardliners in Iran are hoping for. POTUS has indicated that he does not want this to happen, but it’s also clear that he doesn’t want to leave without a “victory.” What is not being explained to him, however, is that the longer we leave our troops & ships within striking distance of the Iranians, the more risk we assume that we’ll end up taking more casualties, which will force him into the expansion of a war he wants out of. We need to reset the terms of the deal by removing our troops & ships from the region. This takes away Iran’s ability to drag us back in. Only then can we realistically use economic leverage to get the SOH open without risking a disastrous escalation & the expansion of this foolish quagmire.
Because we left our ships & troops in the region Iran has the ability to strike us in an effort to change the dynamics of the war to their advantage. We should deprive them of targets (our ships & troops) and funding. If our goal is to move from conflict to economic pressure, then our ships & troops within range of Iranian missiles give Iran the ability to move the conflict back to a kinetic war that keeps the flow of oil from SOH restricted— putting economic pressure on us, with the risk of U.S. casualties. We should remove our ships & bases now before Iran gets lucky & kills more Americans, sucking us back into a war of attrition. All our efforts should be on making the economic strategy effective or reentering the MOU to end the war.
Trump can will this into existence by pulling our troops out now, throwing them a massive victory parade & never mentioning Iran publicly again other than saying “it’s over, we won.” Then use quiet diplomacy & economic means to get the oil flowing through the SOH.
Our bases have become missile & drone magnets that we have to empty whenever conflict resumes—making them a strategic liability, not an asset. At this point, the true purpose of our troops in the Middle East is clearly to serve as human trip wires. They’re essentially bait, sitting as targets for the Iranians to shoot at so POTUS can then justify escalating the war. He is choosing to lock us into the escalation trap. Getting our troops safely out of Iran’s reach—now, before any more Americans get killed—increases our leverage by limiting Iran’s options, while preserving our most sacred resource: our sons & daughters in uniform. The issue is not whether our warriors are willing to fight—I know firsthand the calling, and I’ve witnessed countless embodiments of the warrior spirit & acts of immense sacrifice for love of country. To fight when called upon is the warriors’ duty, and they take it very seriously. But it is OUR duty to ensure they are only sent into harm’s way when it is in our vital national security interest. Using our troops as human trip wires is not in our vital national security interest. Get them out now.
We just struck targets on Lark Island, Iran will respond. If we want to control the escalation cycle & not have the war accelerate we must get our troops out of the region. If Iran gets lucky & kills U.S. troops we will be sucked back into the war on Iran’s terms. Troops out. Limit risk. Focus on economic pressure & diplomacy.
RIP Aaron Holleyman KIA 30 AUG 2004 taking the fight to the enemy, near Khutayiah, Iraq. Aaron was a true warrior & great friend to everyone he met. We went to the SFQC together & signed into 5th grp together, Aaron was a great dude. DOL brother. We will never forget you. https://t.co/JQpTZR3Uy7
The neocons are trying to normalize the concept of using a nuclear weapon in Iran. And as neocons always do, they are not even considering the 2nd & 3rd order effects of destructive ideas they advocate for.
We are teetering at the edge of major escalations in both our war against Iran and our proxy war against Russia in Ukraine. An unanticipated event could easily spark a major incident that would have catastrophic consequences for our nation & the world. The tragedy of both these conflicts is that neither was necessary nor embarked upon for the sake of our national interest. Instead, the deeper we get sucked into chaos, the clearer it becomes that foreign lobbies & defense contractors have effectively captured our leaders, while the needs & wellbeing of the American people are flagrantly dismissed. Right now, we have an ever-shrinking window of opportunity to end both conflicts, but it will take aggressive diplomacy and an honest & unapologetic revision of our own national security apparatus to achieve it. In the Middle East, the Israelis remain dominant in driving our operations & policies. In Ukraine, our own intelligence & defense establishment created a behemoth to absorb all of the funding & career development that had previously flourished for them on the battlefields of the GWOT. Ending the Israeli influence & military/intel industrial complex’s grip on our policy—at every level—is the fight we must have right now if we are going to avert disaster. President Trump needs to look at who he’s surrounded by—who he’s taking advice from, who got him into these messes—and make major changes now, before it’s too late. I discussed all of this with Tucker:
Fighting WWII was in our vital national security interest. Russia views their war in Ukraine as being in their vital national security interest. Fighting Iran may be in Israel’s vital national security interest, but America fighting Iran for Israel isn’t in our vital national security interest.
By signaling to Iran that we won’t strike them until after the midterms while simultaneously increasing sanctions on them, we’re essentially begging them to hit us so we have a justification for returning to the unpopular war. The purpose of a system is what it does. Pull our troops & ships from the region and focus on economic pressure. Stop gambling with American lives— escape the escalation trap.
These all sound like Iranian problems, we should focus on American problems. We should retract our failing empire to save our beloved Republic. https://t.co/rR6sQ6yNTo
If the purpose of the “economic D-Day” is to shift the conflict from one of kinetic pressure to one of economic pressure, then our troops & ships remaining in the region simply present opportunities for the Iranians to strike and drag us back into the kinetic phase. They’re sitting ducks. The Iranians & Houthis have demonstrated that they have the capability to hit our ships. Unlike our bases, personnel can’t be evacuated from the ships—any successful hit will likely result in a mass casualty event that gets more troops killed and subsequently pulls us back into the escalation trap. Israeli surrogates like FDD and other neocon advocates for the “economic D-Day” & the blockade are keenly aware of this risk, and still they press on, encouraging action that will drag the U.S. back into the war they want. The real power potential of this “economic D-Day” lies in the secondary sanctions imposed on nations doing business with Iran, because it means the most potent part of the operation requires zero military assets—which is why we should deprive Iran of the opportunity to shift the war back into a phase that favors their capabilities. The goal needs to be ending the kinetic phase—to control this we need to get our troops & ships out of the region. I personally don’t think sanctions work at this point & ultimately harm our status as the world’s reserve currency holder— but sanctions are better than getting sucked further into this disastrous war.
The Iranians will likely respond to the sanctions by attacking our bases and/or ships in the region. The Iranian hardliners prefer a military conflict because they believe striking us is their only true deterrent & a kinetic war keeps their people rallied around the regime. We should deprive them of this option by pulling our troops from the region. Pulling our troops out limits our risk & provides the sanctions the time to have their desired effect. This will also allow President Trump to say he won the military fight, now it’s all economic/diplomatic and the war can slowly fade from the daily news cycle. Once that happens a quiet arrangement can be made to get the oil flowing from the SOH ahead of the elections in November. But the sanctions won’t work if we get sucked back into an escalation cycle— break the escalation trap by pulling our troops out.
To effectively implement President Trump’s economic campaign, we need to get our troops out of the Middle East—now. We’re seeing indications that President Trump’s plan could ultimately work—if the reported statements from President Pezeshkian and Parliament Speaker Ghalibaf reflect the regime’s views, POTUS is on the right track. Their candor in expressing concerns about the impact that economic warfare will have on the Iranian people is significant, as is their pushing for more negotiations and, if not a deal, at least a return to the MOU. Conversely, the IRGC hardliners argue that there is no deal to be had with us, and instead the only path forward is some form of escalation against the U.S. By removing our troops, we deprive the hardliners of that counterargument—it effectively deprives them of targets and forces them to the negotiating table or back to the MOU. We should seize this opportunity immediately—before a missile or drone hits our troops & restarts the escalation cycle. We have to be lucky every time. Our enemy only has to be lucky once. Once our troops are out of harm’s way, we have the upper hand. We can then use sanctions relief & the unfreezing of Iranian assets as leverage to get the SOH open.
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