Consider two articles from a package on the Iran war published in the last two days by The Economist, a leading mouthpiece for the strategists of the City of London and the Monarchy (or what’s left of that):
On March 4, The Economist promoted the imperial scheme first floated by the UK’s Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney at Davos for the UK to herd the so-called “middle powers” together under its wing, in hopes of saving that could save their oligarchical system from disintegration. “In times of chaos, Europe is the muddled power the world needs,” it proclaims. Sure there are reasons to mock Europe ("a vegetarian in a world of omnivorous geopolitical rivals"), but “in a world in which chaos is becoming the norm, the relative sanity found in Europe is a kind of defiance.” Add in Japan, Canada, Australia and a few others, and “it has become fashionable to think of global ‘middle powers’ as offering a bulwark against chaos.”
The following day, however, The Economist’s “Leaders” column sounded a more worried note, under the headline “Donald Trump Must Stop Soon.” Trump’s “ill-considered conflict” in Iran risks global “chaos,” including in the world’s energy markets. Not that the Economist is opposed to taking out the Iranian regime; they worry that “the operation is failing to achieve its political goals.” For Iran, “to survive would count as victory for Iran’s regime. So far, it is succeeding,” it opines; Iran is “far from falling apart.”
The Economist professes concern about the strategy of fostering internal chaos inside Iran. “Roughly 40% of its 90m people belong to ethnic minorities, including Arabs, Azeris, Baluchis, Kurds and Lurs. The Arab spring showed how countries can fall apart,” it points out. But in this case, the US and Israeli strategy of backing Kurdish insurgents is “a reckless idea that could end up stoking Persian nationalism or civil war. Mr Trump may not care about this, but he could not ignore the effects spilling over Iran’s borders into the Gulf states, Iraq, Syria and Turkey,” it cautions.
London warns:
“Trump would do better to narrow his war aims. His goal should be to degrade Iran’s military capabilities and then stop.” Yes, that would leave the job only half-done, with Iran possibly continuing “to lash out for a while, reveling in its status as a symbol of anti-American resistance.” Likewise, if Iran “rebuilds its nuclear program, Mr Trump may have to strike again in months’ or years’ time… But it would be better for America to declare victory early than limp out of an unpopular war because of exhaustion....
“Trump has become rash in his second term. His opportunistic grabs for power whenever he sees weakness are dangerous.”
