Key Takeaways
The US-Iran Ceasefire Has Collapsed — Trump declared the June Memorandum of Understanding “over” after Iranian attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz triggered new US strikes, returning the region to active conflict.
No Clear Strategy or Exit Plan — The author criticizes Trump for starting the conflict without consulting Congress or allies, lacking defined objectives, and having no viable exit strategy — resulting in higher oil prices, closed shipping lanes, and rising casualties.
Significant Human and Financial Costs — The conflict has already caused 13 American deaths, hundreds of wounded, thousands of Iranian casualties (including civilians), and billions in military spending, with risks of becoming another prolonged “forever war.”
By now you’ve probably heard the latest news that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has officially surrendered to Trump and American soldiers are now occupying Tehran.
I just made that up. But who the hell knows? Two weeks ago, Trump declared: “For the first time in 3,000 years, we are going to have peace in the Middle East.”
Today, he declared that the ceasefire is “over.”
Weeks ago we had a ceasefire and a “memorandum of understanding” with Iran that, according to Trump, gave us everything we wanted, including an end to Iran’s nuclear program.
But the so-called “memo of understanding” left almost everything to be negotiated, including Iran’s nuclear program, its missile program, its support for terrorist groups, and its repression of its own people.
Before that — at the end of February — we had the promise of a quick “four-to-six-weeks” intervention.
The cold, hard fact is that America is far worse off today than we were before Trump started this conflict — without consulting with Congress or our allies. The Strait of Hormuz is once again effectively closed. Oil prices are moving upward.
Iran’s nuclear stockpile remains hidden. The regime in Tehran is more extreme and resolute about gaining a nuclear bomb than ever before.
Meanwhile, 13 Americans have been killed and some 425 have been wounded in action. Over 3,400 Iranians have been killed, including 120 schoolchildren, and 26,000 Iranians have been injured. The Pentagon has already asked Congress for about $70 billion to cover the early operations around Iran, and the cost rises every week.
Trump never gave the American people a good reason for attacking Iran in the first place. He had no objective and no exit strategy.
The likeliest future is a low-level continuation of this conflict as far as the eye can see — coupled with sporadic announcements from Trump that it’s over and America has won, which are then contradicted by another set of attacks by Iran’s missiles and drones, followed by another round of American aggression and Iranian retaliation.
This is the “forever war” that Trump criticized when he ran for office in 2024.
The question is whether he and the spineless Republican Congress that have supported this debacle will be held to account.This article was published at Robert Reich’s Substack
About Robert Reich
Robert B. Reichis Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center for Developing Economies, and writes atrobertreich.substack.com. Reich served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, for which Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century. He has written fifteen books, including the best sellers "Aftershock", "The Work of Nations," and"Beyond Outrage," and, his most recent, "The Common Good," which is available in bookstores now. He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine, chairman of Common Cause, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and co-creator of the award-winning documentary, "Inequality For All." He's co-creator of the Netflix original documentary "Saving Capitalism," which is streaming now.
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