Now that President Donald Trump has launched an illegal, unprovoked war of choice on Iran, the next question inevitably becomes: how does this end? Or, what are some off-ramps Trump can take to end it before the situation turns out of control? There are three broad scenarios; the first and most likely is that Trump continues this until he gets some sort of regime implosion and then declares victory, while also washing his hands of whatever follows.
This has been very clear in internal conversations: no one wants to take responsibility for the aftermath.
This is essentially the difference between regime change and regime collapse.
That’s why they didn’t want to do an Iraq War-style regime change where you are actively trying to install a new government.
If you do that, its track record becomes your track record.
Indeed, if the US manages to kill a lot of the different leaders of the current system, there could be some sort of an implosion.
Trump could declare victory even though you would likely have in that case severe instability, or potentially civil war.
Another scenario is that the Iranians continue to strike back and outlast Trump.
The Iranian onslaught would start to become too costly for the United States with casualty rates increasing (possibly even on the American side), inflation worsens, and global markets become destabilized.
And then the pressure on Trump internationally, from the American public, and from his own base would start to become so strong that he would have to look for an exit.
At that point, he may actually take the deal that was on the table: a deal that is better than what Barack Obama managed to secure, and that Trump nevertheless rejected.
He may take that and suddenly declare it a victory, saying: “Thanks to my bombing campaign, we achieved this.”....
