Bombing Policy Out of the Desert

None of the analysts we heard this weekend argued about who is winning the war with Iran. They argued about how long the United States can afford to keep fighting it, and whether anyone in Washington could say what it is for.

A War Without an Objective

Anthony Aguilar, a retired Army lieutenant colonel speaking with Glenn Diesen, starts from the absence at the center of the campaign. There is no political objective and no military one, and in his account that absence explains the whole shape of a war of open-ended strikes.¹ His one concrete example reaches back to the fire the Navy reported aboard the Gerald Ford in the Indian Ocean: not a laundry-room fire, in his telling, but an Iranian strike that Washington could hide because no one was there to see it.² More important than any single hit is the arithmetic underneath: cheap Iranian drones against million-dollar interceptors, a trade the United States loses a little more each week as its magazines run down.³ He puts a number on it. The current posture of striking from a distance and defending the fleet can last perhaps ninety more days before Washington is forced into something riskier.⁴ Beyond that he sees a conflict that outlasts this administration and lands on the next president's desk, "Donald Trump's Ukraine," in his phrase.⁵

Mark Sleboda reaches the same conclusion from the naval side. The United States, he told Dialogue Works, has proven it does not have the military capability to stop Iran from asserting control over the Strait of Hormuz.⁶ Munitions, interceptors, the long supply line back to Diego Garcia: each is a constraint the Pentagon can count and Tehran can see. His reading of the Iranian leadership follows from that. The Revolutionary Guard has concluded that diplomacy with this administration is pointless and intends to wait out the term.⁷ For the week ahead he expects more of the same, continued strikes on tankers in the Strait and the Gulf of Oman and on American bases, until Washington does something different.⁸ He no longer weighs the two sides' accounts equally. What Iran has said has happened in this war, he argued, has tracked events more closely than what he calls the ridiculous claims coming out of CENTCOM.⁹

Steve Hanke supplies the economic half of the case. Sanctions almost never work, he said, and the Iranian population has responded to attack the way populations do, by rallying around the flag.¹⁰ Washington has exhausted direct sanctions and is moving to secondary ones on anyone who trades with Iran, which he calls a losers' game that will only harden BRICS cohesion.¹¹ Aguilar counts the interceptors, Sleboda the logistics, Hanke the sanctions. Three tallies, one balance.

Trapped by Their Own Command

Alexander Mercouris opened his broadcast with the Witkoff and Kushner mission to Moscow and dismissed it in an image: people trying to catch up with a train already powering away from the station.¹² He expects the effort to end in another failure.¹³ What Zelensky had described as a comprehensive ceasefire turned out, in the Kremlin's own announcement, to be a three-day halt on strikes against Kiev for the duration of the envoys' visit. "This is not a ceasefire," Mercouris said. "It is at most a pause."¹⁴

The battlefield is where his attention stayed. Near Volchansk in Kharkov region, roughly two thousand Ukrainian troops are encircled, and in his judgment Kiev could have withdrawn them and chose not to; now they will be lost.¹⁵ Svyatogorsk is confirmed captured by drone footage, and he expects the announcement of Liman's fall to follow.¹⁶ Southwest of Dobropolye, another village is days from falling.¹⁷ The pattern he draws across all of it is a command that will not order retreats in time, turning withdrawals into encirclements. "The soldiers here must feel that the Ukrainian command has both abandoned and betrayed them."¹⁸

Sleboda, from Moscow, independently reached the same verdict on the diplomacy: there is nothing Witkoff and Kushner can offer that Russia would accept while it believes it is winning.¹⁹ "There's no hope for the Kiev regime at the bottom of that box," he said.²⁰ Hanke, an economist with no stake in the military detail, said it flatly: "The Russians are winning big time in Ukraine. That is not reported."²¹

Does the Pivot Mean Anything Yet

The one genuine disagreement of the day concerned the world outside the two wars. Hanke read the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation's joint statement, signed by India among others, as further evidence of what he calls a pivot away from the United States, and he named Europe's vacuum, weak leaders and unelected institutions, as its driver.²² Sleboda was unimpressed. BRICS+ and the SCO expanded too fast, he argued, and now depend on consensus among fence-sitters, which leaves them unable to convert anti-American sentiment into action.²³

Aguilar sits closer to Hanke. Iran, in his view, is using the window before the next American administration to reshape the region's security architecture through the Saudi, Pakistani and Turkish defense pact, with the United States left as the outcast.²⁴ Diesen adds the structural point: Russia and China cannot afford an Iranian defeat, since an Iranian collapse would expose them both, which pulls them further into backing Tehran.²⁵ On one thing Sleboda and the others agree. Whatever the pressure on Washington, it is structurally impossible in American politics for a rupture to change US support for Israel.²⁶ The world may be realigning. The one relationship at the center of the war is not.

Sources

1. Anthony Aguilar, *Glenn Diesen* · The war has no clear political or military objective; "your military is simply bombing policy out of the desert" watch ▶ 1:45
2. Anthony Aguilar, *Glenn Diesen* · Says the Gerald Ford's reported laundry-room fire in the Indian Ocean was an Iranian strike the United States was able to hide watch ▶ 47:18
3. Anthony Aguilar, *Glenn Diesen* · Cheap Iranian drones against million-dollar interceptors; "the attrition calculus soon becomes in the advantage of Iran" watch ▶ 6:06
4. Anthony Aguilar, *Glenn Diesen* · The current stand-off posture can be sustained for at most another 90 days before a riskier strategy is forced watch ▶ 39:43
5. Anthony Aguilar, *Glenn Diesen* · The war becomes "Donald Trump's Ukraine," inherited by the next president watch ▶ 54:02
6. Mark Sleboda, *Dialogue Works* · The US "does not have the military capability to stop Iran" from exerting control over the Strait of Hormuz watch ▶ 14:06
7. Mark Sleboda, *Dialogue Works* · The IRGC considers diplomacy with the Trump administration impossible and will "wait out his term" watch ▶ 36:39
8. Mark Sleboda, *Dialogue Works* · Expects continued escalation this week: tanker strikes in the Strait and the Gulf of Oman, and strikes on US bases watch ▶ 36:52
9. Mark Sleboda, *Dialogue Works* · Iran's account of the war has tracked events more closely than "the ridiculous claims coming out of CENTCOM" watch ▶ 34:09
10. Steve Hanke, *Dialogue Works* · "Sanctions almost never work"; the Iranian population rallies around the flag under attack watch ▶ 6:25
11. Steve Hanke, *Dialogue Works* · Secondary sanctions on anyone dealing with Iran are "a losers game" that hardens BRICS cohesion watch ▶ 30:16
12. Alexander Mercouris, *Alexander Mercouris* · The Witkoff-Kushner mission looks like "people trying to catch up with a train that is already powering away from the station" watch ▶ 1:44
13. Alexander Mercouris, *Alexander Mercouris* · "I expect their latest diplomatic effort to end in another failure" watch ▶ 2:21
14. Alexander Mercouris, *Alexander Mercouris* · The three-day halt on strikes against Kiev is "not a ceasefire. It is at most a pause" watch ▶ 66:32
15. Alexander Mercouris, *Alexander Mercouris* · Some 2,000 Ukrainian troops encircled near Volchansk could have been withdrawn and were not; they are about to be lost watch ▶ 34:59
16. Alexander Mercouris, *Alexander Mercouris* · Svyatogorsk confirmed captured by drone footage; "soon we will get an announcement of the fall of Liman" watch ▶ 28:49
17. Alexander Mercouris, *Alexander Mercouris* · A village southwest of Dobropolye is about to be captured watch ▶ 18:28
18. Alexander Mercouris, *Alexander Mercouris* · "The soldiers here must feel that the Ukrainian command has both abandoned and betrayed them" watch ▶ 36:13
19. Mark Sleboda, *Dialogue Works* · Nothing Witkoff and Kushner can offer would be accepted while Russia believes it is winning watch ▶ 61:36
20. Mark Sleboda, *Dialogue Works* · "There's no hope for the Kiev regime at the bottom of that box" watch ▶ 57:11
21. Steve Hanke, *Dialogue Works* · "The Russians are winning big time in Ukraine. That is not reported" watch ▶ 35:00
22. Steve Hanke, *Dialogue Works* · The SCO joint statement, signed even by India, is "further evidence of what I call a pivot away from the United States" watch ▶ 1:29
23. Mark Sleboda, *Dialogue Works* · BRICS+ and the SCO expanded too fast and are paralysed by consensus among fence-sitters watch ▶ 68:03
24. Anthony Aguilar, *Glenn Diesen* · Iran is reshaping the region's security architecture through the Saudi-Pakistan-Turkey pact, leaving the US the outcast watch ▶ 36:31
25. Glenn Diesen, *Glenn Diesen* · Russia and China cannot afford an Iranian defeat; an Iranian collapse would expose them both watch ▶
26. Mark Sleboda, *Dialogue Works* · "It is structurally impossible in US politics to have a rupture that would change US support for Israel" watch ▶ 53:48

By Ruins Report, a daily synthesis of what our tracked analysts said, not original reporting. Every numbered claim is sourced, dated, and timestamped above.