Hegseth is one of those guys who just ignores the substance of your question to bring up something unrelated you did that's bad.
I heard him deride "utopian nation building" in Iraq but also we apparently can't have a nuclear armed Iran.
I'm, uh, not sure how he thinks we're going to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon without regime change, or how you do regime change without nation building.
Because the JCPOA was inadequate, so instead we are going to... uh... ???
We're apparently going to permanently prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon without regime change but also without treaties.
I guess we're just going to bomb them every few years for, uh, ever? Which is not a quagmire apparently.
I'm, uh, not sure how he thinks we're going to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon without regime change
Can Carthage get a nuclear weapon?
What about the Aztec Empire, is there a concern that they will get a nuclear weapon?
The alternative to regime change is destruction.
Kill your enemy in their thousand, in their millions. Choke the gutters with their blood, pile up their corpses until you blot out the sun with flies and vultures. Reduce every bridge, aqueduct, dam, and transport hub to a smouldering heap of rubble.
Build a mountain of skulls where their capital city once stood, and inscribe upon sheets of vellum crafted from human skin the following message; distributed to all leaders of the world: "This fate shall find all who defy us".
Iran cannot attain a nuclear weapon if Iran does not exist.
Heaven brings forth innumerable things to nurture man.
Man has nothing good with which to recompense Heaven.
Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill.
-message attributed to Zhang Xianzhong.
This should really go without saying, but what you are proposing here is called genocide and is a war crime.
If a state refuses to surrender and will not change its government internally, it is not the obligation of that state's enemies to install a new administration.
Iran can fight to the death if it so chooses, and you may refer to the death of a nation-state as "genocide" if you please.
This is what "Total War" means.
It's what anyone who takes international conflict seriously, as Hegseth does, recognises is at the top of the Escalation Ladder: destruction.
If you will not bend the knee, and you will not change your mind, it is not incumbent upon those you have wronged to come in and change your mind for you.
The resolve of Imperial Japan broke in 1945. Notably, it did not undergo an externally-imposed regime change; the Emperor broke free of his captors, resisted their attempts to kidnap him, and declared a surrender. He remained in power after the war.
Iran has a choice. It can overthrow the clerical rulers, bring back the Shah of its own accord, and have peace. Alternatively, it can dismantle its nuclear infrastructure, willingly carry out internal deindustrialisation, and revert to a bonze age economy under theocratic rule.
If it chooses neither of these, then it chooses to burn.
Except it doesn't have to because the US lost. Badly. Maybe the Land of the Eagle should be bending the knee.
Are you ignorant of world affairs, or just so blinded by ideology that you can't admit fault?
Iran's economy is in tatters, it has lost multiple high-ranking IRGC leaders, at least one supreme leader (nobody has seen Motjaba Khamenei since his supposed appointment, it's unclear if he's alive at all) has been killed, its navy is largely at the bottom of thr sea, it cannot launch any aircraft, and it has failed to inflict massive casualties in return.
If you think sending drones to kill civilians in neighbouring countries (therefore making enemies of them) is a resounding victory, and not a petulant child throwing a tantrum, then you have no understanding of geopolitics.
OPEC is dissolving. BRICS is dissolving.
The Major economic blocs that opposed/rivalled the Eagle Throne are doomed and will fall.
Meanwhile, Red China's fuel-hungry economy becomes ever-more reliant on the USA and USA-aligned countries. By the time it overcomes the self-inflicted disarray of its military leadership purge, it will be too starved of petroleum to risk invading Taiwan; and the window to ever initiate such an invasion is a few years away from closing due to their demographic catastrophe.
Cuba is buckling under the embargo, Venezuela continues to follow US interests in international trade.
Russia has faltered in Ukraine, making essentially no net territorial gain over the last few months, as ukrainian drone warfare proves more sophisticated, and the casualty rate will cause lasting damage to the Russian economy.
What part of all this looks like defeat to you?






















