Multiple things can be true at once. Ayatollah Khamenei was an awful person and leader who terrorized and killed his own people, and the world and Iran are better off with him dead and gone. The United States entering another war of choice in the Middle East is a terrible idea (assuming we actually do). Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu probably have no plan for what they would do if they achieved regime change in Iraq, and maybe that’s better than if they do. Congress should vote on whether we go to war or not, but Congress is an impotent institution. Actual Iranians seem somewhere between bewildered and happy.

For the second time this year the United States has taken out a ruthless, disgusting, brutal dictator who is awful to his own people. No one should miss Maduro or Khamenei. For that matter, let me lump Mahmoud Ahmadinejad into this too, since he died in the strikes. None of these are good people. Whether we arrest them and remove them from office or kill them in an air strike, honestly, I don’t lose sleep over them. Khamenei has killed tens of thousands of Iranians this year. Read that again if you need. Maduro deteriorated Venezuela to the point of having pirates sailing around off their coast in the Caribbean. Sure, I think Donald Trump is an idiot, but I can’t sit here and honestly say it’s a bad thing that we removed these people. Actual Venezuelans and Persians seem fine with it, the anger almost all seems to be from white leftists. I really don’t care what they think of these events.

Is there any plan here though? When we removed Maduro, we allowed his butcher of a Vice-President to take over as the President there in exchange for access to oil. Will we end up just allowing a new Ayatollah to take power in Iran, or some other puppet strong man, in exchange for oil? My guess is yes, and that definitely defeats whatever good purpose these actions had. Reza Pahlavi seems like the most logical short term answer to who should lead Iran right now, and frankly giving the former Shah’s kid power seems like just our latest blunder in that region. About the only thing worse would be a full scale invasion and having to occupy the country and run it ourselves. It seems that the “Trump Doctrine” at this point is Bush’s “Axis of Evil” on steroids, where we go into every hot spot we’re unhappy with in the world and decapitate their leadership and let them figure it out after.

Trump ran his 2024 campaign talking about how he’d bring peace. He lied. He spent the first six months of his Presidency dismantling the federal government by force, simply shutting down whole agencies and departments that were created by laws, on his own word. He is actively trying to reshape the world now using American power. It is not entirely clear what the end result of his plans will be. He has not meaningfully tried to back down Russian aggression in Ukraine, or Chinese designs on Taiwan. It’s not clear that he’s willing to try and push countries who could potentially do major harm to America. In Iran though, it is probably his most aggressive move yet. Regime change there would do great harm to Russia. He has already drawn the Saudis into his coalition with Israel there. Toppling the Iranian regime could go a long way to defunding Hezbollah and Hamas. Toppling Iran isn’t super easy though. It could require an actual war that costs money and lives. There’s the potential that this is the new Afghanistan.

If I’m being honest here, I don’t really have a problem with taking down a terrorist, murderous regime. I just don’t trust the two guys in charge of this. Netanyahu’s decision to drag out his war in Gaza has not been good for anyone, so why would he handle this better? Trump is just maniacal and will do anything he can to try and get his face on Mount Rushmore and out of the Epstein Files at this point. Neither of these guys gives me any confidence. The fact that they have highly competent and funded militaries means they can succeed in a short term attack where they just approve the plans put forward by Generals and Admirals. I don’t really think either has a vision or plan that we should all be excited about.