Geo-Strategy #8: The Iran Trap

Okay, let's start class. Let us summarize and review where we are so far in the story. There are three major interest forces that are pushing the United States towards war with Iran. The first is the Israel lobby.

Remember that the Israel lobby is composed of both Jewish interests as well as Christian interests. Representing the Jewish interests is something called AIPAC, and they have a membership of about They're very wealthy. There are many billionaires in this group, so this group has financial power. In fact, AIPAC is considered the second most powerful lobbying organization in the United States. The first is the pensioners, okay? There's about 30 million of them, and their lobbying organization is the most powerful, but AIPAC is second. But also in the Israel lobby are the Christian Zionists.

For example, the organization Christians United for Israel has 7 million people in its membership. So together the Christian Zionists and AIPAC are an extremely powerful force in government, and they want a war in the Middle East in order to advance Israel's interests. Also remember that is now addicted to empire, because empire represents easy money. All money has to be channeled through the US, and so there are many people in the US who basically make their money by speculating on money. For example, Wall Street. And that has made Wall Street extremely powerful right now in US politics.

And the third force is Saudi Arabia. Remember that in our discussion of Saudi Arabia, we learned that the major conflict in the Middle East is actually not between Israel and Iran, but between Saudi Arabia and Iran. For Israel, Iran is a security threat because it supports Hezbollah and But for Saudi Arabia, Iran represents a threat to its very Okay? So Saudi Arabia must resolve the Right?

Now, how these three forces manifest themselves is through Trump. Basically Trump is their champion.

There's a man named Jared Kushner, who is Trump's son-in-law. He's married to Trump's very daughter, Ivanka Trump. And Jared Kushner happens to be very good friends with both Benjamin Netanyahu, who is the leader of Israel, as well as Mohammed bin Salman, who is the leader of Saudi Arabia. Now, Jared Kushner's father, Charles Kushner, was a very prominent sponsor of AIPAC. In fact, when Benjamin Netanyahu comes to stay in the United States, he lives with the Kushner family. One night Benjamin Netanyahu had to stay in Jared Kushner's bedroom and Jared Kushner had to sleep in the basement.

That's how close they And Jared Kushner is friendly with MBS, the leader of Saudi Arabia. So for any that when Jared Kushner started a private equity fund, Saudi Arabia invested $2 billion. So for Jared Kushner, these three forces are able to exert influence on Trump. As we also discussed, it's very likely that Trump will become president of the United States again in November and he will pick Nikki Haley as his And that means that Nikki Haley will be the one in the Trump White House pushing for war against Iran.

As we discussed, Nikki Haley makes most of her money from the Israel lobby, the anti-Iran lobby. We know from the first Trump administration that these forces are able to exert tremendous influence on Trump, and the evidence is, one, Trump withdrew from the Iran nuclear that would have secured peace between the United States and Iran. Trump moved the United States Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in Israel, was a major which caused major friction in the Middle East. We also know that Trump ignored the fact that MBS killed a journalist.

We also know that Trump has been very friendly with Saudi Arabia. We also know Trump sponsored the Abraham Accords, which is trying to bring peace between Israel and other Arab countries and unite them against Iran. The last thing that Trump did, which is the most important, is that in January 2020 Trump ordered the assassination of General Qassem Soleimani, who is the leader of the Revolutionary Sorry, who was the leader of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. So from all this, we can suspect that in a second Trump term, war with Iran will be a major Right?

So is this clear so far? All right. Now, we also discussed that, even though there are these forces that want war with Iran, ultimately it is the US military that must implement this war. And if the US military refuses to go to then the war can't happen. So we discussed that unfortunately the US military is very different from what it was 30 years ago. 30 years ago the US military maintained very standard military doctrine. They maintained three very important principles that all militaries must maintain in a time of war.

The first is mass forces. B is avoid encirclement. And the third is protect supply lines. Now, the important idea is that when you fight a war like this, which is traditional warfare, you must have the consent of the public, because it is the public that sends soldiers, that provides money, that gives you political support.

In 2003 the US military changed its military doctrine to one of shock and awe. What shock and awe means is that you don't have to follow these three principles anymore. You can use air supremacy.

You also have technological And you also have special forces. This allows you to fight wars cheaply, quickly and decisively, so that you no longer need public local support for fighting wars. And as we also discussed, this created the idea of in the American military. So the American military, because of the 2003 war in Iraq, is confident that they can win any war, any place, against any We know that this doctrine is actually not true, and we know because of something called Operation Prosperity Guardian. A few months ago the Houthis, which are a rebel group in Yemen, started to attack ships in the Red Sea.

A lot of trade goes through the Red Sea, so the American military dispatched a massive naval force against the Houthis. Were the Americans able to defeat the No, they were not. So what are the Americans going to do about it? What can they do about the Houthis?

What's the solution to this problem? You have these pirates, the Houthis, going around and attacking these ships, which is affecting international commerce, and that's why inflation is such a huge problem right now in the world. So what is the American military going to do about this? What can they do about this?

The answer is nothing. The American military has no solution. Why? Because they don't have the forces necessary in order to undertake an operation against the Houthis. They have special forces, they have air supremacy, they have technological omniscience, satellites, but they don't have infantry. They don't have lots and lots of ships. Therefore they cannot stop the Houthis. And what's Winning Point is that Joe Biden has come out and said, "Yes, we know we are losing the war in the Red and yes, we know that we cannot stop the Houthis, but we are going to continue on this path."

Does that make sense? This is the idea of hubris: not knowing your limitations. And when you are faced with your limitations, you refuse to accept your Okay? That's why, when the US military is given the order to invade Iran, they'll probably go along with it, because they cannot imagine the possibility that they could be defeated in Iraq.

And then you have Corps, the Revolutionary Guard. As we discussed last class, they want war with the United States, they're very angry about US interference in Iraq. During the Shah regime, which was a brutal police state from 1953 and then 1979, the Americans were the ones who were backing this police state. So there are many who are angry about this. They're also angry about the fact that the US continues to protect Israel and Saudi Arabia. They're also angry about the fact that Trump killed General Soleimani.

As we discussed, it's possible that the Revolutionary Guard Corps killed, last week, the president of Iran, Ibrahim Raisi, and all because he was preventing war. They want war with the United States. So you see the map, you see the logic of this. There are powerful forces in the United States pushing the United States towards war. You have Trump, who has basically agreed in his first term to raise or increase escalation with Iran. Within the Trump White House there will be Jared Kushner and Nikki Haley to push this war both privately and publicly.

The US military has so much hubris that they think they can win this war, and Iran wants to provoke the United States into invading it. The United States and Iran can have many and so Iran has many, many strategies in order to provoke the United States into war. Basically the United States is looking for a reason, and Iran wants to give them a reason. That's why I think war between the United States and Iran is very likely in the next 2 to 4 Okay, any questions so far?

Are you clear about where we are so far, before I move on? Any questions? So now let's talk about the actual war. Most of this is speculation, but I'm using speculation in order to help us better understand what a war would look So let's pretend that it's March. Trump goes on TV. He announces Operation Iranian Freedom, a full-scale US invasion of Iran. Along with Israel and Saudi Arabia as its main partners, but the United Kingdom, UK, will be involved. Australia will be involved.

UAE will be involved. Poland will be involved. So you have many countries Iran together. And Trump goes on TV and explains to the American public why the United States is fighting this war. This is what Trump says. First, he says that for the past year there have been violent protests in You have religious protests. You have political protests. You have ethnic protests. The Iranian people are sick of the Ayatollah. They are sick of the dictatorship. They want democracy. They want freedom. In response, the Revolutionary Guard are killing thousands of protesters.

Iran is on the brink of civil war. Therefore the United States has an obligation to protect the people of Iran. The people of Iran are praying for freedom and democracy, and the United States, the world's greatest democracy, must give them democracy. So the first reason is freedom and democracy.

US intelligence, along with Israeli intelligence, have discovered that for the past 2 years Iran has been working very, very hard on developing a nuclear bomb. In fact, Iran is only 1 month away from having three nuclear So that New York City, San Francisco and Los Angeles could all be destroyed.

So to prevent this, we must strike first to stop Iran's nuclear program. Iranian proxies, the Houthis, Hezbollah, many groups, have been disrupting in the Middle East, in both the Red Sea and the Strait of Hormuz. 40% of the world's oil passes through that region, mainly to East Asia, China, Japan, South Korea.

Our global prosperity is at stake. We must go to war to protect these shipping lanes and ensure that the oil goes to China, Japan and South Korea, so that they can continue their economic prosperity. So the United States, as the world hegemon, has a responsibility to protect global prosperity.

Iran has been launching attacks against our allies, Saudi Arabia and Israel. has been violently attacking Israel, killing dozens of Israelis, innocent The Houthis have been attacking Saudi Arabia's oil fields, damaging the economy. We have an obligation to protect our allies, our friends in the Middle East. And the last reason is we know for a fact that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps is a sponsor of terrorism. Last week in a mall there were gunmen who went and killed 170 people. Our intelligence says that it was most definitely an Iranian operation.

So for these five reasons we have decided to invade Iran. But don't worry. This invasion will be successful because we have a lot of allies. The UK, Israel, Saudi Arabia, all friends will be part of this operation. Our special forces are already in the looking for their airbases and their We can knock them out at the beginning of the war. Also, we have been in contact with Iranian opposition groups. They want to overthrow the regime, and when we help them, they will install democracy in the country. Our American military is the greatest in the world.

In 1991 our military defeated Saddam Hussein in 100 hours. In 2003 our military defeated Saddam Hussein in less than 3 weeks. To prove that we are the greatest in the world, we will defeat Iran in only 2 weeks.

So do not worry. We will be strong in protecting democracy, freedom and global prosperity. So that's what Donald Trump will say to the people of the United States. And of course, you're going to have large-scale protests throughout the country opposing this war, but most people in the country will support this war. All right. So after the speech, the operation is on TV, we'll watch this on TV and the internet together on YouTube together, and we'll be so impressed by the power of the US military. This is Iran.

This is the Strait of Hormuz. Saudi Arabia, Israel is here. Red Sea is here. Iraq is here. So in the Strait of Hormuz comes the Gerald R. Ford. It's a $13 billion This thing is designed to destroy countries. It is now prowling the Strait of Hormuz to ensure that shipping is safe. America establishes air supremacy very quickly, meaning that it has complete control over the skies. Nothing can move in the skies without then a massive invasion force is sent to Iran and the US troops land. Maybe 200,000 Saudi Arabia troops land.

Maybe you have 300,000 to half a million troops in And they are about to strike Tehran in the north. So in the south, the United States and its allies have established a foothold. They have a huge presence in the country and they're about to attack Tehran. All right. You understand what has Now I'm going to ask you this question. At this point, I think the war has been Who has won the war?

America has established air supremacy. It controls the skies. The US Navy controls the seas. You have 100,000 US troops in country ready to strike Tehran. The war has been decided. Who has won the war?

Okay. Obviously this is a trick question. Obviously Iran has won the war. Why? What's the problem with this plan? This is typical American doctrine, shock and awe. This is how they fight wars. But there's a problem with this plan. What is it?

Why would the Iranians want this? When they're occupying the south, no one wants Okay, let's go back to military doctrine. In traditional military doctrine, you have three principles: mass forces, avoid encirclement, protect supply lines. These are the three things you must absolutely obey if you want to win the war. So using traditional military doctrine, explain to me why the United States has lost the war right now.

Exactly. First of all, they're encircled. Do you know why? Because Iran is all mountains. It's a fortress. Meaning that to get these troops into the country, you have to air drop them.

But guys, once you're in the country, you can't get them out of the country. You Okay, so that's the first problem. They've been encircled. What's the second problem?

They can't actually north. Why not? It's too heavily defended because of all the mountains. That's right. And what else? It's very hard to move tanks and equipment through Yeah, that's right. So they failed to mass forces. Iran has a population of 90 million people. You will need at least three to four million soldiers to even think about conquering the country. They've got 100,000 in this country. And as Jack says, you can't move tanks through mountains. They're not designed for mountain What are they going to do?

So they can't mass forces, and they've been encircled, and what else is a And this is the biggest problem. Exactly. They cannot be resupplied. They have no supply lines. For them to be resupplied, airplanes have to drop ammunition and food into the country. But again, Iran is all mountains, so it's very easy for Iranians to shoot down the airplanes. Does that make sense? When you pass through mountains, you can't see what's on the ground. A guy, a random guy with a rocket launcher, can just shoot down the helicopter.

Which is what the Afghans did against the Soviets in the Afghanistan And that's why the Soviets lost the A drone can take down any airplanes. So in other words, these guys are trapped. You think they're soldiers, but they're not. What they really are Does that make sense? You have too many people in the country, so you can't get them out of the country, but you don't have enough people to actually launch a strike against Tehran. You can't resupply them. And they've been encircled by Iranian All right?

Does that make sense? The logic of having 100,000 US troops in the country is that once you're in the country, all the resistance to the regime will rise and strike against Tehran. The Iranian army will mutiny against the country. That's the Why do we think this won't happen?

Why won't the Iranians revolt against their government? Why don't they want to revolt? That's right. Okay, so Iranians hate Americans. Remember that Iranians remember the Shah. From 1953 until 1979, the Shah, the American-supported Shah, was running a brutal police state. So brutal that everyone in Iran revolted against the regime. That's number one. Why else would the Iranians not support the Americans?

That's the first reason. Iran has a bad history with America. Why else? Guys, which country is next door? What happened in Iraq? America destroyed Iraq. From 2003 until 2011 America was there destroying the country. America said that it would bring freedom, democracy. It would bring prosperity. It would bring wealth. But instead it just destroyed the country. American soldiers were running into houses every night, pointing guns at children, destroying and arresting men for no reason. Iranians saw all this on TV. They heard about all this from So they know that if America comes, it's to destroy the country, not to bring freedom, democracy, not to bring prosperity, it's to destroy the country.

That's why they're going to fight. And another reason is that they think that they belong to a great civilization, so they value their freedom and independence. Does that make sense? They're not going to submit to a foreign conqueror.

Why else would the Iranians resist? Also religion. The Iranians are religious. They believe that key that say America is Satan, and they have a duty, a religious obligation, to fight Satan. So for many reasons, there's just no way that Iranian people are going to stand with America. You might have a minority, but most are going to resist.

Okay, so does that make sense? Any questions so far? And why do the Americans think that they will rise up then? Okay, that's a great question. Why would the Americans think that the Iranian people will rise up? The answer is that they need to justify the Does that make sense? They have to have a logical explanation for why this invasion will Because one of the criticisms against them will be like, "You need 4 million people to invade Iran. You don't have 4 million soldiers. They have at most 1 million soldiers total throughout the world."

They have about 60,000 in the Middle East, so they can't get a million. So the only explanation is, "Okay, well, we're going to pretend that once we invade, the people of Iran will support us." Do you understand? So it's not based on truth, but it's an explanation for why the invasion will succeed. Does that make sense?

Yeah, but the doubt was like, what they tell the public, but do they actually Oh, you know, that's a great question. So that's their propaganda, but do they actually believe this?

And the answer is hubris. They do believe this, because they have hubris. Again, it's hard because we're not in the But once you're in that position where you have access to nuclear weapons, when you can kill anyone in the world, when you can see everything in the world, it makes you think you're God. Remember last semester we were reading the Greeks. And the Greeks believe the worst thing is Because it makes you think you're God, but you're not God. And you're going to get into a lot of trouble if you think you're God.

Okay. Does that make sense? All right. Any more questions? Okay. So Trump says that Iran is 1 month from developing a nuclear bomb. America's been saying this for the past 10 years. You just Google this. America's like, "Oh, Iran is only 1 month away from a nuclear bomb." They've been saying this for the past 10 years. So do you understand? When Trump gives a speech, there's actually no evidence that any of this is true, but this is how he'll explain the invasion.

All right. And chances are that even if Iran possessed a nuclear bomb, they won't use it. Why not? That gives America a reason to use its That's right. The reality is that there's only one way that America can win this war against Iran. They can just nuke the country. And America will do that if it has enough, if it has a pretext.

Nuclear weapons is something that Iran is very afraid of. So does it make sense? All right. This becomes So American soldiers are trapped in this country. So now the question then is, wait a minute here, why would America do something so stupid as send 100,000 soldiers into the country for no reason and get them Okay? That's a question. And what I want to do now is make you the argument that there are two ways that we can prove or provide evidence that this is true. The first is historical Historical analysis means that are there historical examples like this?

Are there historical analogs? If there are, then this could be true. The second method is through game theory analysis. Why would the actors who are rational do something as stupid as trap 100,000 American soldiers in Iraq? All right? So we'll first find historical analogs, examples that are similar to this, and then we'll look at game theory to try to reason out the motivation of the actors. So let's first look at game theory. Oh, sorry. Let's first look at historical analysis.

The year is 415 BC, in Athens. Remember that we studied Thucydides, the Peloponnesian War, last semester. So we will now discuss the Peloponnesian War. The war is for The year is 415 BCE, and for the past 17 years Athens has been fighting a brutal war against Sparta. It's a And then for whatever reason, a man named Alcibiades has a suggestion, and this suggestion is, to win the war against Sparta, let's go invade Sicily.

Nicias, his opponent, is like, "Why the hell would we want to invade Sicily? It's far away." And Alcibiades is like, "Well, because it has a lot of money. If we invade the country, we can take their money." And it turned out, by making this argument, the people of Athens really supported this argument. Because the reason why is the war was costing them a lot of money, and they had become addicted to the easy money of empire. So they want to fight this war. So Nicias has this great idea of how to convince people not to go to war.

What he says to the people is, "Okay, guys, I know you want to fight this war. I know that you think this war is a good idea, but Sicily is a huge place. It has a navy. Therefore we need a massive expedition force against Syracuse in Sicily. We need at least 5,000 soldiers. That's a lot, because their total Athenian population is about 50,000 people. 5,000 soldiers is a lot for And we need about 100 ships." The idea is Nicias is trying to scare people into agreeing to not fight.

That's the idea. The Athenians say, "That's a great idea. Let's send a massive force against Sicily and Syracuse, so the war can be won just like that. Shock and awe." So the problem though is that never before in its history has Athens sent a large expedition force against another power. Does that make sense? When the Persians invaded, they were invading Athens. Athens didn't go and invade Persia. So when you have sent a massive expedition force against another country, what is your number one What is the thing that you must resolve?

But the Athenians didn't really think about it, because they had actually no in fighting a foreign war. Okay. So yeah, the enemy knows the terrain better than you do. But there's actually a much bigger problem than And it is what?

Okay, the biggest problem is resupply. And this is something that the Athenians didn't think about because they never thought They never fought a like this before. So they sent this huge expedition against Sicily. And which was a naval power, were surprised because they were like, "Why would the Athenians want to invade us?" So for the first year the Athenians were destroying the Syracuse army, and the Syracuse army had to retreat back into their city. And so the Athenians laid siege to the city. Syracuse is here, the Athenians are here.

And the Athenians control the sea. So this situation is very similar to this situation. Do you But then what happened was that the couldn't resupply themselves. And the reason why is Syracuse also had a navy, and they could stop the Athenian navy from resupplying the Athenian troops. And therefore the Athenian army was wiped out Sicily. And this caused the Athenians to ultimately lose the war against Sparta, and it caused the Athenian empire to Okay? Do you understand? Again, historians have been trying to figure out for a long time why the Athenians would do such a stupid thing as send such a huge army against Syracuse.

Because the risk of failure was catastrophic. And the only answer is, well, the had hubris. They never really lost a war and they had become addicted to empire. Which is the same situation America finds itself in today. Does that make sense, guys? All right?

So this has happened before in history. When the Athenians invaded Sicily and lost to Syracuse, their entire army was wiped out in Syracuse, because they couldn't resupply their army. Does that make sense? All right. The second example we can look at is the Vietnam War.

In the beginning of 1960, the beginning of the decade, most Americans have never heard of a country called Okay? Most Americans didn't know what it was, they didn't know where it was. By the end of the decade, in 1969, half a million American soldiers were in the country, destroying everything, but also getting destroyed themselves. 58,000 US soldiers died in Vietnam. So the question then is how did this happen? Why would this 1960, Vietnam was a distant country no one has ever heard of. By the end of the decade, half a million US soldiers were in country fighting this war against an enemy they really didn't know.

In 1971 the Pentagon Papers came out. The Pentagon Papers was a history of America's involvement in the Vietnam War dating back to the 1950s, and it made three major points. The first point is that American leadership, military leadership, has been expanding the war in Vietnam without public knowledge. This is what we call mission creep.

Maybe at first they sent some observers to the country, then they sent some advisers and trainers, then soldiers. So, mission creep. Slowly over time, things escalate, and you don't really understand why things escalate, but they do.

Second point is that American leadership from very early on knew the war was This was the greatest military in the world. They dropped more bombs in Vietnam in the '60s than all bombs were dropped in World War II, and they could not win the war. The reason why is, to win a war you have to solve three problems. The first problem is clear strategy. What are you trying to accomplish in this country? What are your clear military objectives? Second is you must adapt to the battlefield.

Because all your best plans will change over the course of the battle, so the adversary that is most willing to adapt to the battlefield will win. The third thing is the will to fight.

So if you want to look at a war and who's most likely to win the war, you ask these three questions. One, does this guy have clear military objectives that everyone understands? Because that will determine strategy. Second, is this guy adapting to the battlefield? The third, does this guy still have the will to fight? If the answer is yes to all three questions, then the person will most likely win the war. And if you look at the Vietnam War, even though America was killing a lot of people, it killed 3 million Vietnamese during the course of the war, it was not destroying the enemy's will to fight.

In fact, it was making them And therefore more people willing to fight the Americans. So very early on, the American political leadership knew the war could not be won. So then the question is, why did America stay in the war? The answer is credibility.

Credibility just means they didn't want to lose face. They didn't want to be laughed at by the Chinese and by the Soviets and by the Europeans. But there's actually another way to understand credibility, and it's what I call the Have you guys heard of a sunk cost And the idea is never ever go into a casino. The reason why is that when you go to a casino you start losing money, and at some point you cannot leave the casino. Why not? You feel like you've lost so much, so now you have to make it back.

Exactly. You want to reclaim the money you've lost. You've invested so much that you cannot leave. You have to get that money back. And that's the problem with war. Eventually you've invested so much you cannot leave the war. And that's what happened in Vietnam. America invested so much it can't It didn't want to leave the war because it did not want to admit that all this has been lost. It's what we call the sunk cost fallacy. And that's why, even though America could not win the war, it still wanted to fight the war.

Does that make sense? So the Vietnam War is another example that is similar to this, where America invests enough soldiers that it refuses to leave the war and admit defeat. Does that make sense, guys? All right.

Now let's look at one more example, and this is the most recent example, and it's the Russia-Ukraine war. As you know, in February 2022 Putin ordered a special military operation against Okay? And this is Ukraine. And Russia attacked from three axes. The north to take Kiev, the capital.

You have the east to take Donetsk, and then you have the south from Crimea to take the south. As we know, the north failed. The north attack failed and the Russians had to turn back. But the east and the south were successful. Now let's think about this. You have an extremely powerful military attacking your country, Ukraine. If you were the Ukrainian president, if you were the Ukrainian military, there's really only one way you can fight this war and win. What is it? Using traditional military doctrine.

How much you fight this war? You guys know? Let's go back to mass forces, avoiding circle men, protect supply lines. How much you fight this war? There's only one way you can fight this war.

To me? How do you destroy supply lines? There's only one way you can fight this war and win. And what is it? The enemy's attacking you, right? So what must you do?

Okay. The answer is you must retreat. The enemy's attacking, so you pull back your forces. Why would you do that? What's the logic of that? Because then they have longer supply lines. Exactly. It's that simple. You want to overextend your enemy. Ukraine is a huge country, and Russia didn't send that many soldiers. Maybe 160,000. That's not that many soldiers. So if you just give them space, they're going to outrun the supply lines. And then when they outrun their supply lines, you can encircle them and you can disrupt their supply.

That's the only way you can win the war. What did the Ukrainians do instead? That's the only way to win this war, but what did the Ukrainians do instead which made them lose the war?

Yeah. So the Ukrainians refused to give up space. They refused to give up land. They wanted to fight for every inch of territory. And eventually, because the Russians had more forces, mass forces, they were able to push through. So that's the first major mistake that Ukraine But then last summer Ukraine launched something called a counteroffensive. Once Russia was able to take space, because Russia is a land army, it started to develop fortifications, defenses, mainly artillery.

And that's three lines of defenses. And in the summer the Ukrainian military, for whatever reason, sent tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of soldiers against this artillery, and the Russians blew everyone up.

Now here's a question. Why are the Ukrainians doing this? They've lost the war now. They have no more soldiers. Right now the average age of the Ukrainian army is about, it's over 40 years old. They have guys in their 60s and 70s fighting in the military. They don't have enough manpower. The war is lost. Why would the Ukrainians do this? First of all, why would they fight for every inch of territory, and why would they launch a counteroffensive against a superior enemy?

What's the problem? Okay, the first is the president. The guy is a TV actor, which means that he doesn't think strategy. He just thinks what looks good on TV. For the first 2 years of the war we're watching this on TV, and it looked as though the Ukrainians were going to win this war.

I remember 2 years ago people were saying that the Ukrainians are going to march to Moscow and overthrow People were saying that. The reason why is that Zelensky is a master of public image manipulation. He was distorting reality for people through television. The problem with that though is it's not reality, guys. The reality on the ground is very different from TV. So who else is like Zelensky in this world? Trump is exactly like Zelensky, do you understand? Trump is also concerned about what looks good on TV.

He's like, "I must look strong. We must look as though we're winning this war." He doesn't really care about strategy. Because of this, it's very likely that he orders a land invasion of Iran, because it would look good on TV. So the problem with Zelensky is he cared about what looked good as opposed to what actually worked. But you also have other problems, like you have extremists in the Ukrainian military, and these extremists, they're Nazis. They're neo-Nazis. The traditional understanding of Nazis are people who killed Jews.

But the Russians don't understand Nazis that way, because remember Germany and the Soviet Union fought this war. So the Russians understood Nazis to be enemies of Russia who want to kill there were many neo-Nazis in Ukraine. They hate Russia. They want to kill as many Russians as possible. And they're the ones who are pushing for as much war as possible. So you have these extremists in the Ukrainian military.

The last reason is, it's an open secret that NATO is helping the Ukrainian military against Russia.

You have NATO military advising strategy against Russia. So it's most likely that the summer offensive last summer was a NATO plan and not a Ukrainian plan. It's possible. We also know that NATO special forces are in the country directing missile strikes against Russian forces. Which means what?

If this is true and if Ukraine loses the war, meaning that it doesn't have enough soldiers to continue to fight this war, what will NATO do? Send their own Yeah. Yeah, I mean, according to what happened in the Vietnam War and the Athenians' expedition against Sicily, it is most likely that the most likely outcome will be that NATO sends its own troops against Russia. So Macron of France has said that we want to send French soldiers, and the British prime minister has said that he's considering conscription for British people.

Which means that young British citizens will be drafted into the army to fight Russia. All right? So these are three historical examples that are very similar to what could happen in Iran. Does that make sense, guys?

All right. Any questions before I All right. Is this clear so far? Now let's use another mode of analysis called game theory analysis, and this is what I've been teaching you this semester. The idea is that society, what happens in the real world, is a game among human beings. Each person is trying to play this game so as to optimize the outcome for that person. So the question then is, why would the United States send 100,000 troops into Iran? Let's look at the individual motivations of the individual players.

So you have the United States. What does the United States want to do? By doing what? And accomplishing what? It wants to topple the regime in Tehran, and you can only do that through a ground invasion. So the United States is trying to topple Iran. But then you also have other actors, Iran. What does Iran want to do?

What does Iran want to do? Or basically the Revolutionary Guard Corps, what do they want to do? To kill me? They want to kill as many Americans as possible, do you understand? They want to force an American land invasion. So Iran wants to force a US invasion, knowing that if the US invades, it has to lose the war. It will lose the war. The Revolutionary Guard can just send suicide bombers against the United States. Now let's look at Israel. We know that the United States wants to topple Iran.

We know that Iran wants to force a US invasion to defeat the Americans, to humiliate the Americans, and exact revenge for what happened in the past. What does Israel want to do? What is Israel's ultimate outcome? Do you guys know?

If you were Israel, what do you want to To defeat all the proxies. Okay. So you want Iran defeated, and then what do you want to happen? You want Iran defeated, you want the proxies defeated, and then what do you want to happen?

Do you want the United States to stay in the Middle East? What happens if the United States and Iran both lose the war? Iran is destroyed as a country, the United States is destroyed as a military presence in the Middle East. What would Israel becomes the top dog in the Middle East. Do you understand?

Israel can now control the entire Middle So the optimal outcome for Israel is Iran and the United States are both destroyed. Do you understand? How about Saudi Arabia? What is their optimal outcome?

Exactly the same as Israel. Exactly. Do you understand? Which will leave the Middle East to Saudi Arabia and Israel, but Israel is a far superior military to Saudi Arabia. Remember, it's very easy to blow up Saudi Arabia. They have oil fields. Not that easy to blow up Israel. So Israel becomes the top dog. Do you understand game theory? In other words, all the major participants want an invasion of Iraq.

But they want different outcomes. Saudi Arabia and Israel most benefit if this situation happens, where you have 100,000 US troops in the country and they can't get out, because it becomes the sunk cost fallacy. The United States can only pour in more Okay? Does that make sense? All right.

So is this clear to you guys? You can either use historical analysis to get to this outcome, but you can also use game theory to get to this outcome.

Any questions so far? Okay, great. So Celine asked the most pivotal question. The United States has nuclear weapons, which is its ultimate trump card. So what Trump can say to Tehran is like, 500,000 troops in country, you have to let them go or I will nuke you. Do you understand? Trump can say that. Listen, I'm Trump, I'm Donald, I need to look strong. I have 100,000 troops in the country. I can't get them out of the country. So he says to Tehran, you either let them go, okay?

You either guarantee them safe passage out of the country or I will nuke you. So that's what will happen. That is what Donald Trump will Once the situation arises, the only way for Donald Trump to save face is to threaten Tehran and say, you either let my guys go or I will nuke the entire country.

How does Tehran get out of the How do the Iranians protect themselves against this possibility? Because you're actually right. This is exactly what will happen if this situation arises. Trump will respond with nuclear weapons or the threat of nuclear weapons. So what must the Iranians do to protect themselves against this possibility? Who can help the Iranians now? Russia. Do you understand? So before this war happens, Iran and Russia must come to an agreement where Putin says from the outset, no one is allowed to use nuclear Okay?

If Iran uses nuclear weapons, I will nuke Iran. If the United States uses nuclear weapons, I will nuke the United States. If Israel uses nuclear weapons, I will nuke Israel. If Putin says that, how will the world react?

If Putin says this, you are not allowed to use nuclear weapons, how will the world react? He's a hero. He saved humanity. But because he says this, the United States is now trapped.

You understand? And so this becomes a black hole for the United States, where they can only send in more troops. They can't get any troops out, they can only send in more troops. What's the problem with this? What's the problem with sending in more No, there's actually a huge problem with this idea of sending more troops. What is it?

Okay, no one wants to go fight, you understand? The military cannot recruit soldiers. All right? But even if you did have enough troops, as Jack says, you can't resupply them.

Why can't you actually resupply your army? Why not? But there's a bigger problem than the supply lines. What is it? What do you need to create bullets? America has no manufacturing capacity, because America moved all its manufacturing capacity to China. Remember this. For every one ship that America can build, China can build 232 ships. That's what the Pentagon says. Do you understand? So if this war were to there's actually no way America can win this war. It's just completely trapped inside And once it becomes trapped, the sunk cost fallacy comes into play, and America just puts in all its resources into the but it's a black hole.

It cannot use nuclear weapons because Putin has said from the outset, you are not allowed to use nuclear weapons. All right? But now the question then is, why would Putin do that? Why would Putin involve himself in this war? And that's what we'll discuss next All right? How Putin sees this war and how Putin will react in this war. But before we end, are there any questions about any of this? Does this make sense to you guys? Is this clear?

Any questions? Is it possible for the United States to invade Iran through Iraq, if they send their armies to the Oh, that's a great question, yeah. So the problem with Iraq is that Iraq is an independent country, do you understand? There are 10,000 American soldiers in Iraq.

So you would need their permission. Even if you had their permission, there's a problem here, because there are lots of Shia militiamen in Iraq who are loyal to Iraq, and they would see the American invasion force as an opportunity to attack the Americans, because they're still angry at the Americans for what happened in Iraq.

Even if they could have a staging area in Iraq, they still have to deal with mountains, do you understand? All right? I mean, the problem is you have 100,000 troops in the country. You have to get out of the country, and it's very hard to get them out of the country. If you go through the mountains, you're going to get ambushed in the mountains. If you go through the air, those drones are going to strike you down. That's the issue.

All right? Does that make sense? Any more questions? Okay, great. So on Friday we'll talk about Putin.