Watching the War with Iran Unfold

 

The Middle East is a region where empires go to die, as we should know by now. Map of Iran during World War II from Wikimedia Commons, attribution notes: Uploaded a work by NEA Telephoto from Iowa City Press Citizen Newspaper Archives August 26, 1941 Page 1 with UploadWizard

I’ve not made a survey of all, or even a diverse range, of news media sources on the war between the U.S. and Iran—I am too busy living life, I suppose. But I have tuned into the war, consuming news media content and watching, with a great deal of anxiety, as the world again descends into violence and madness.

It is said that truth is the first casualty of war, and as is the case in almost any war, nothing is simple about this current conflict nor will we fully understand it for some time. Take, for instance, the ABC newscast of June 22, 2025, which I consumed in full on Sunday:

What impresses me, partly, was the weird war tone of the newscast, which included the anchor’s best wishes for returning American Air Force planes. They could have played martial music in the background. I don’t resent that sentiment—I’m glad they (the air personnel) returned safely—but I would recognize that this weekend was the final one for some people in Iran who likely were atomized by American bunker-busting bombs. I’d like some best wishes for them, too.

And, while I trust neither President Trump nor the yahoos he appointed (I don’t swell with pride when I see the U.S. Secretary of State nor the Secretary of Defense, for example), I want to recognize, too, that the roots of this conflict are deep and convoluted, even if it feels that the war was launched by a petulant orange toddler whose finger was placed on the nuclear trigger by a base of my fellow American voters whose motives and reasoning I don’t get.

Well. That sentence flew from my fingers almost too quickly. I think there are some emotions at boil in my mind. Wars do that, inflame passion before rational thought kicks in.

Anyway, I’m not a fan of Iran acquiring nuclear weapons, nor of the current Iranian regime, but neither am I liking the path that we are on. Just recently, President Trump was facing massive No King protests that overshadowed his bizarre birthday party tank fest. And suddenly, bam, we’re in a fight—in war, the first reaction usually is to rally around the flag, and American presidents in the past have used wars as a pretext to exceed their usual powers to quash dissent.

Does that play into Trump’s decision to launch U.S. bombers during an air war between Israel and Iran? Hard to say. I don’t know how deeply Trump thinks about anything, and that’s part of my anxiety over this conflict—we don’t have an FDR or even a Richard Nixon or President Bush at the helm. We’re in a time where the captain of our ship of state is old, ignorant, petulant, and spontaneous. There is a horse in the hospital.

Well, American “wars” since World War II have generally been shooting conflicts where Congress was never asked to declare war—although at least some past Presidents (think Johnson with the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution) have at least worked with Congress. And I hope this “war” does not expand, but anything can happen.

One definite change for me is how much I tune into news. My media consumption has shifted because of this little (I hope) war. I usually check the New York Times daily, but now I would say four or five times a day is the new norm. I’m not as regular a checker of other news apps on my phone—I have CNN and Reuters, for instance—but those buttons are being clicked now more often than usual. I read the “Green Gazette,” the electronic version of The Cedar Rapids Gazette, each day and these days pay more attention to the world-national news pages.

I am no expert, but when did that stop any human from commenting online? Here are some of my other takes on this war:

It’s not over. Sure, Iran attacked a U.S. air base today, and President Trump posted that it is time for peace now that Iran got the need to retaliate out of its system—but I am not buying it. The animosities that fueled this conflict are long simmering, and I think the deep thuds of the bunker busting bombs are going to echo for a while. How do most countries react when they are bombed? Did the U.S. say: “It’s OK, Japan, we don’t really need those antique battleships in the era of aircraft carriers, anyway” when Pearl Harbor was attacked? Did the U.K. give up when London burned? In American mythology, it took atomic bombs to convince the Japanese that their war effort was not sustainable, although many historians note that the end of the IJN plus the entry of the Soviet Union into the war may have had more to do with Japan giving up. In any case, conventional bombs that horrifically burned Tokyo (the deadliest air attacks of the war were not the atomic bomb blasts but incendiary bombing of the Japanese capital city) in March of 1945 didn’t motivate Japan to give up.

From Wikimedia Common: Bomb damage in Iran. This is from Israeli bombing on June 13, 2025. Still, given what we, the U.S., has done, we're going to share the blame. Original description: At dawn today, several explosions were heard in different parts of Tehran and other cities of Iran.The Zionist regime officially confirmed the aggression of this regime against targets on Iranian soil. The US Secretary of State claimed that Israel has taken unilateral military action against Iran. This is an image from the Tasnim News Agency website, which states in its footer, "All Content by Tasnim News Agency is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License." Per this discussion, all images without explicitly watermarked attribution to agency photographers are presumed to be outside this license.

Bombs may have complicated the Iranian drive for atomic power. It’s difficult to believe that they ended the drive—instead, they probably strengthened the Iranian resolve. They were attacked. They may not react well. Who could blame them?

I struggle to maintain good spirits and hope. People are dying in a war that we did not start and seemed all too eager to join. May it all work out for the best, but these are perilous times.

As a political strategy, I do think the Iran war did what Trump probably wanted it to do, a least for a brief time. Anybody been fussing over tariffs lately? The “no kings” movement seems of the distant past, for now. But the patriotic boost Americans feel when our armed forces join in a conflict can often be short-lived, and there is also the danger of a backlash. Even parts of Trump’s base can’t figure out what this “peace president” is thinking. Probably, the answer is not very much, and that’s part of the problem.

For now, Trump is having a moment. Moments are fleeting in politics, however, and even this moment is more chaotic than triumphant for this would-be authoritarian.

Today seems like uncharted times. Iran is a large country, more than 90 million people. It’s also a weak country, due to all kinds of economic, social and political problems. Frankly, the U.S., the world’s strongest superpower, faces ongoing economic, social and political problems. Media, government, everything seems to be in flux these days.

Of course, as Billy Joel sang, we didn’t start the fire. Everything is always in flux, it’s just that the pace and severity of flux these days is breathtaking.

From Wikimedia Commons, ethnic makeup of Iran. Attribution notes: By Iretn 847362 - Own workA source (reference) has not been provided for the data in this self-made work., CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=112682697

This war, as every war does, shows how important history is. Iran has a nuclear program in the first place because it was, historically, a U.S. ally, and the Eisenhower administration in the 1950s had an “atoms for peace” program that Iran participated in. When the Shah was overthrown in 1979, the Iranian nuclear program was put briefly on hold, but revived in the 1980s as tensions with the U.S. ratcheted up. 

We bombed Fordo (or Fordow, transliteration is messy), Natanz and Isfahan to, maybe, celebrate the summer solstice (makes as much sense as anything else I have read), and now we are in one of those historical pivot moments.

From Wikimedia Commons, the physical setting--a large country in Asia. As noted in "The Princess Bride," a rule of history is "never get involved in a land war in Asia." There is just so much land. Of course, this is an air war. For now. Attribution information: By Ikonact - Own workSources of data:Topography: ETOPO1 (public domain);Other data: © OpenStreetMap contributors;Tool:The map is created with Octave scripts developed by Ikonact, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=89573656

What is good about this situation? A bit. Iran’s drive to be a nuclear power may be stalled (although Iran may have the bomb sooner than we think, they did move nuclear materials before the American bombs fell). The bombings didn’t target cities nor cause mass casualties, even if Trump did tell Iran to “evacuate Tehran.” The retaliation against an airbase in Qatar was not a big deal.

What is bad? A whole bunch of stuff. There is plenty of destroyed Iranian real estate from Israeli bombing, and it is easy to see that we are linked with Isreal in this conflict now, especially from an Iranian point of view. Then, there is what war does to people, to truth, to the fabric of our world. Iran and Isreal are well beyond rhetorical conflict and are trading actual blows. Iran has been driven into the chilling embrace of Vladimir Putin and China. Our U.S. president lied to us during his election campaign when he said he would avoid foreign entanglements—but of all of the huge bucket of bad stuff this unfortunate series of events has unleashed, that somehow seems like the least surprising. We know he lied because his lips are moving. Well, honestly, it is usually his hand toes that are moving on his cell phone when he lies, but you know what I mean.

Supposedly, a Chinese curse is “may you live in interesting times.” I’m not tired of all the winning. I’m exhausted from the interesting.