The War in Iran Is Not the Blunder You Think It Is

tl:dr I think the Trump administration is placing a bet that more sympathetic autocratic nationalists will emerge in lieu of the old liberal order in Europe due to increasing acute economic pressure from the War in Iran. I believe that this train of logic made the invasion of Iran more appealing to them, as previous American presidents have been dissuaded precisely because it would have such harsh impacts on the United States' traditional allies.

I’ve seen some brazenly shallow takes on the left-leaning side of the media coverage surrounding the Trump administration’s highly illegal engagement in Iran. The argument more or less goes like this:

1. The Trump Administration believed they could decapitate the Khamenei regime with ballistic missile and drone strikes.
2. The Trump Administration foolishly underestimated:
   1. The ability of the Khamenei regime to endure post-decapitation
   2. The willingness of the Khamenei regime to close the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation and
   3. The economic downturn that would come about from the Strait being closed
3. The Trump Administration is now looking for an off-ramp to get out of a messy, protracted engagement before it begins materially degrading the national economy and, more importantly, reducing support among the core MAGA coalition.

While I appreciate the standard military thought being applied above, it fails to cohesively consider the realities of dealing with the Trump administration. Despite being more than a decade into the ascension of mainstream illiberalism and autocracy within the Republican Party, the collective Left™ seems to have not furthered their understanding of the strategic aims of the MAGA elite. No matter how much you disagree with them, it is a poor assessment to chalk up Donald Trump and his lieutenants as fickle, impetuous thugs. They have a coherent theory-to-power and the war in Iran is just another broader step in bringing it to reality.

America’s involvement in Iran is not a case of a drunkard Secretary of Defense and his narcissist King engaging in some militaristic gallivanting with brazen disregard- this is a calculated gambit. If it succeeds, it will pay large dividends toward MAGA’s goal of degrading liberal democracies.

That is a very extraordinary claim, and so it requires extraordinary evidence. Bear with me for a bit, as this is a long chain of thoughts to string together.

First, we must understand that MAGA foreign policy is substantively different from all predecessors, including Republicans. For most of the time post WWII (with some notable exceptions) America has generally support nations which adhere to democratic norms including regular elections, low trade barriers, and free speech. The United States supported warm relations with countries and international conglomerates that share these norms (NATO, EU, Canada, Australia, etc.). That has been more-or-less standard fare for the past 80 years, but Republicans took a sharp turn with the ascension of Donald Trump a decade ago.

American Republicans have veered away from these aims of promoting democracy and free trade. Why? Well, my position is because I think that they’ve stopped believing in it themselves. The jury is still out on whether the GOP is captured by neo-reactionaries who wish to move away from democracy altogether or just your standard white nationalists, but the underlying sentiment on full-throated democracy is clear. Many of the influential right-wing “intelligentsia” (specifically Curtis Yarvin, Steve Bannon, Peter Thiel, etc.) have very plainly stated that they do not believe democracy has a worthwhile intrinsic value. The populist right-wing believes democracy is fine when it gives them power but otherwise is not legitimate.

As a domestic example- if you press even a “moderate” Republican representative on the topic of 2020 election today, the party line is “Congress certified Joe Biden won the election”. A cynic’s interpretation of that statement is that those representatives are implying Congress can choose to anoint a President regardless of the election outcome through backhandedly insinuating that this already happened in 2020 (or if that is too far of a stretch for you, just look at half the things Donald Trump has said about the SAVE act and federalizing national elections).

MAGA is not irrationally fleeing from our traditional allies- they have a depressingly consistent logic both at-home and abroad; the democratic parties of Western nations are just as (il)legitimate as the American Democrats, and therefore it is only logical that American foreign policy should seek to disempower them so that they (MAGA) might advance our own interests.

This is no more evident than in the “palatable” version of the MAGA-authored American National Security (2025) and its more reactionary unofficial, unpublished version. Both state that MAGA elites view the European Union and NATO as threats to “political liberty and sovereignty” and seek to drive wedges to split them apart, though the unredacted long-form is more explicit about courting the fringes of the EU away from their budding federation. To quote Steve Bannon, perhaps the foremost architect of MAGA foreign policy- “I want to drive a stake through the Brussels vampire.”

But what the hell does undermining democracy abroad and pulling out of NATO have to do with Iran? Isn’t Iran an autocratic state? Shouldn’t we want to hit the bad guys?

Despite reports which assert that MAGA was magically unaware that striking Iran would lead to stressing global energy markets and particularly stress nations which are net-consumers of oil, there is simply no conceivable world where the President and his board of advisors were not fully aware of this spike in the road. The President has no-doubt been getting advised about Iranian actions nearly daily, and thinkers from across the entire spectrum of political thought are intimately familiar with the interplay between Iran, oil transport, and import dependence.  

Let us pose hypotheticals from the position of assuming the MAGA white house is staffed by people who have some modicum of foresight. What if they discussed the possible resultant economic stress before we began our engagements? Who benefits if Iran closes the Strait?

Iran possesses the capability to disrupt global oil trade but does not possess the capability to retaliate against American homeland. Shutting down the Strait via mining or missile barrages is highly escalatory affair, but most of the northern hemisphere still possesses the ability to buy and produce oil at inflated prices. The people who are put under the most pressure in this environment are those with the highest oil deficit as a percentage of GDP, and those who benefit the most are the ones with the highest surplus as a percentage of GDP.

Let’s do some calculations based on recent data and an oil shock price of $30/barrel (i.e. we are experiencing a $30 “surcharge” on each barrel)

This data tells an interesting story. Russia emerges as a clear economic benefactor of this situation, and gains immense fiscal breathing room in a time of dire need. However, this table doesn’t tell the full story- some countries who are “losers” on this list have easily alternate sources of oil to help stymie the bleeding. Others, not so much.

China and India already buy a large amount of Russian oil, and presumably would have no problem in buying more. The United States can probably reliably source more oil from Canada. South Korea is in a bit of a bind but can probably find a way out of with help from Indonesia.

Europe, though?

They’re in quite a bind. With the Strait closed and Iran threatening oil production in the Middle Eastern region, Europe has no local oil producers to turn to that could possibly make up for their massive deficit. They are engaged in a lukewarm war with Russia via Ukraine and have been incurring large amounts of new military spending as the Trump administration has been attempting to withdraw from the conflict (or, if you’re more cynical, attempting to tilt the cards in Russia’s favor). Even as they pay the higher prices, they are funding their adversary. Out of all the major economic powers, it is Europe who is in the worst position to weather this conflict- not the United States, as much as our Left™ media would like to whine.

Beyond this, European leaders are reluctant to send through own ships into the fray for good reason- a prolonged engagement in Iran will be costly in material, lives, and polling support. And, like a broken record, MAGA is already spinning up the media channels to paint European leaders as selfish, cowardly, and otherwise non-supporting of the United States. You and I might not quite see it that way, but the MAGA masses are being fed a sufficient casus bello to spark a right-wing divorce from NATO.

This predictable economic stress and continued alienation from the United States is sure to spark the seeds of unrest within Europe, and populist parties are more likely to emerge victorious in the subsequent high-energy elections as a consequence. The War in Iran stresses the already bending institutions in the Old West, and I think the Trump administration is placing a bet that more sympathetic autocratic nationalists will emerge in lieu of the old liberal order in the aftermath. Europe, under increasing economic pressure, will feel the need to make peace with Russia and send bright beacon to the world that democracy, when push comes to shove, will choose to elect itself away.

Now, none of this proves a grand conspiracy. I don’t think it needs to. A disruption in the Strait of Hormuz does not hit the United States evenly across its alliances. It disproportionately burdens Europe, places strain on already fragile political coalitions, and creates immediate economic upside for authoritarian exporters like Russia. It is possible that Trump and company blundered into what is ultimately a boon for their reactionary foreign policy goals, but I think it is more likely that this was part of the calculus all along.

The danger here is not simply that a conflict with Iran could spiral or that oil prices might rise. It is that the downstream effects of such a conflict accelerate the fragmentation of the liberal democratic bloc at precisely the moment it can least afford it. Economic pain translates into political instability, instability into electoral shifts, and those shifts into a reordering of alliances that may not easily be reversed.

If that chain of events sounds far-fetched, it is worth asking which parts of it are actually in dispute. The mechanics are well understood. The vulnerabilities are well documented. The only real question is whether we are willing to recognize the consequences of these actions before they fully materialize.