When Interests Collide

Is there anyone with whom you agree 100% of the time? Most people are not in lockstep with their spouses on every topic, so there is no reason to believe that allies will always be in sync, either. This point is important amid the anticipated resumption of hostilities with Iran and America’s contentious relationship with the rest of NATO.

Let’s start with how the cease-fire has not resulted in an agreement. Because it was never intended to. Because not everyone wants the fighting to end. And because two parties cannot work out a deal in a conflict that involves multiple other parties, especially when negotiations consist of each party pushing proposals it knows the other will reject.

This war centers on the US and Iran. It also affects Israel, which gets daily briefings from the Trump team while opening a new front in Lebanon. It affects the Gulf states that are being struck and are questioning their reliance on American protection. It also affects the non-combatant nations whose economies are being strangled as the products they rely on are stuck in transit.

This is becoming yet another case study in how wars, while insanely easy to start, are often very difficult to end. It’s why I keep going back to these three points: what is the mission now, beyond a non-nuclear Iran; how is victory defined; and what will the aftermath look like? The dilemma is that these questions go beyond Washington and Tehran. Each of the other that is affected has its own self-interests, which may or may not align with ours.

What America wants is almost certainly not the same thing as what Israel wants. For all his bluster and Trump being Trump, this president doesn’t want a chaotic and dysfunctional Iran, because that would mean even more instability in the Middle East. The Netanyahu govt, meanwhile, would very much like to see an Iran that mirrors Iraq, Syria, and Libya, existing as one more failed state, too preoccupied with its internal sectarian and tribal issues to notice its neighbors.

This outcome serves neither American nor European interests. Western adventures in the Middle East have a habit of sparking the mass migration of people who have no interest in relocating for the sake of becoming British, French, German, or American. These outcomes are painfully visible in a Europe that is being colonized, its culture being uprooted and changed in real time. The same thing, on a much smaller scale, is happening in parts of the US and Canada. Here and abroad, the people who were once welcomed as refugees appear far more intent on conquest than assimilation.

The potential fallout of an Iran that is destroyed and left to deal with factional infighting has a great deal to do with NATO partners being reluctant to join the battle. They’ve seen the movie before and they know how it ends. Europe is already feeling the economic shock from this conflict. When combined with the continent’s self-inflicted wounds regarding energy policy, farming, national identity, and the irrational desire for war with Russia, it’s not hard to understand why the Euros are not on board.

The nations within NATO have indeed grown spoiled and entitled. That is not just true, it is also the predictable result of creating dependency. The US was content to do the heavy lifting for decades because doing so served American interests. Then came this Trump guy, who first held the Europeans accountable for their promised contributions to NATO, and then threatened to withdraw from the alliance when the asked-for help in this conflict was refused.

The European response is the same thing that happens every time conditions are imposed on aid that was previously given unconditionally. The same thing happened on a different level during Congressional debates about food stamps and the imposition of certain requirements on recipients. As with the Europeans, people who were used to getting something for nothing freaked out upon learning that they were no longer getting money without strings.

The US has long enjoyed the luxury of being separated from the battlefield of the moment by thousands of miles. It is hard to overstate the effect of this on the American psyche. The typical citizen may feel some discomfort over surging gas prices or worry about higher costs on everything else if this continues much longer. But we are not likely to enact rationing as other nations are doing, nor are there sirens going off to warn of incoming missile fire.

Amid the jingoism and watching the world’s most expensive and best-equipped military overwhelm a smaller, weaker opponent, the average citizen is more interested in individual pursuits than in global affairs. The younger ones, in particular, want to know who moved their American dream while an impotent DC duopoly dithers over budgets, what to do about its ethically challenged members, and the continued decoding of the Epstein files.

Eventually, this war will end. What will the region look like when that happens? It’s not a small consideration. There is also an ironic twist that binds the administration and the regime; each has painted itself into a corner with desperately little wiggle room. Trump cannot back down because he’s made too much noise; the regime can’t back down because everyday Iranians might well kill the leadership themselves. Something has to give.

Meanwhile, more US troops are being deployed to the region, and Trump is talking about another possible bombing campaign while Pakistani officials are trying to engineer more talks. I want to believe that Trump’s bravado is a means to a peaceful end, but this implies that any decisions are his and his alone to make and are driven by America’s interests. A regime without nukes is in our interest; an Iran reduced to rubble and internally broken is not.