After 9/11, the George W. Bush administration tried to convince Americans that they were on the job. They tried to convince Americans that they were in charge and that they knew what they were doing. There was a familiar refrain: nobody could have known that they would use airplanes as weapons.
Of course, this old song assumed that Americans were naive. In reality, back in 1995, American intelligence discovered a laptop that was owned by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (mastermind of 9/11). The laptop contained information that Al Qaeda wanted to hijack twelve commercial airliners and blow them up over the Pacific Ocean. As an alternative, they would hijack a plane and crash it into CIA headquarters.
Three years later, in 1998, the CIA learned that Libyans associated with Al Qaeda were planning on hijacking a plane and flying it into a major US target. Then, in August 2001, Zacarias Moussaoui was arrested in Minnesota. He was trying to learn how to fly a 747 without learning how to take off or land. According to the Minneapolis field office, they thought he might be a terrorist trying to “fly something into the World Trade Center.” So it was disingenuous to say that the intelligence community had no idea that terrorists desired to hijack and fly a plane into American targets.
9/11 Redux
Now we are getting the same kind of rhetoric from the Trump administration. “Nobody could have known that Iran would try to close the Straits of Hormuz.”
This is what happens when you do not plan, when you fly by the seat of your pants. Since the Iranian Revolution in 1979, the American military/intelligence community has understood the strategic importance of the Strait of Hormuz. By now, every American should know that 20% of the world’s oil comes through this 21-mile-wide corridor on the western border of Iran. Countries like Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines import 70% to 90% of their oil, almost all of it through the Strait of Hormuz. India and Pakistan are also highly dependent upon oil coming through the strategic area.
As the price of oil skyrockets, the incompetence being displayed by Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense (War), is mind-numbing. We were told that the primary objective was regime change. Then, we were told that the primary purpose of the war was to eliminate the nuclear threat. (Of course, this did not make any sense: when we attacked Iran six months earlier, we were told that we had “obliterated” their nuclear program.)
Finally, we were told that Iran was developing an intercontinental ballistic missile that could reach the United States. Therefore, we attacked in order to eliminate their strategic ballistic missiles. In a testosterone-filled fact-free statement, Donald Trump stated that we would only accept unconditional surrender. Iran may be weakened, but there is no sign that they are ready to unconditionally surrender.
Following the same mistake that we made in Iraq, we are getting daily updates on how many targets we hit. Yes, the United States and Israel have hit over 11,000 targets in Iran.
Now, hitting specific targets is part of tactical planning. And tactics have to be part of an overall strategy. And the strategy has to be designed to accomplish a goal. Goal – Strategy – Tactic. That’s what those words signify. And the goal has to be designed to fulfill a specific purpose, such as stabilizing the global price of oil, making the world safe for democracy, or ending the religious strife in the Middle East. The purpose seems to be to prove that Donald J. Trump and Pete Hegseth are “large and in charge.”
But no one seems to be explaining our strategic goal. When we ask what our strategic goal is, we’re told we cannot explain it, or that doing so will tip off our enemies.
The problem is that we—no, not we, but they, Mr. Trump and Mr. Hegseth—have no strategic goal. We had no specific goal and no strategy to accomplish it. And now we have no exit strategy. We are walking around like Mr. Magoo, totally blind. Hitting targets is nice, but it doesn’t get us any closer to regime change or removing all the fissile material in Iraq or completely degrading their strategic missiles. To achieve these objectives, we need, dare we say it, boots on the ground.
