Delusion, Not Diplomacy, Is Driving the Iran Conflict— What If Endless War Is The Strategy?

Trump Screwed It All Up Because of His Hatred For Obama… Iran’s Centrifuges Will Spin Again

JCPOA was largely effective in constraining Iran’s nuclear program & delaying its weapons potential until Trump ripped it up

Trump spent the last week going batshitcrazy any time anyone even hinted that his sneak attack on Iran wasn’t the complete obliteration of their nuclear capacity he claimed it was. He insisted, falsely, “We hit them hard— very hard. They were ready to go nuclear, and now they’re not going anywhere. We destroyed everything.” But multiple intelligence officials, international nuclear watchdogs, and even Israeli defense analysts pointed out that Iran’s nuclear program remains largely intact. Trump, a notorious liar, knew the strikes weren’t as devastating as he announced because of an Iranian call intercepted by US intelligence.

The self-aggrandizer-in-chief flew into a rage after a segment on Fox News questioned the effectiveness of the strikes, reportedly calling producers demanding a retraction. When a Wall Street Journal article quoted defense officials saying the attacks had only “modestly degraded” Iran’s capabilities, Trump took to Truth Social, ranting in all caps: “FAKE NEWS! WE GOT THEM ALL— EVERY SITE, EVERY FACILITY— THEY’RE FINISHED!” He even lashed out at one of his own former defense secretaries on Newsmax, calling him “a Deep State loser who never understood how real power works.”

Yesterday, Malcolm Moore, reporting from London, and James Shotter, reporting from Jerusalem, wrote that “Iran could be able to start producing enriched uranium again ‘in a matter of months,’ the head of the UN’s nuclear watchdog said, adding that there is no military solution to stop Iran from developing a nuclear weapon. Rafael Grossi, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said that while US bombs had dealt a ‘very serious level of damage’ to Iran’s nuclear facilities, ‘one cannot claim that everything has disappeared and there is nothing there.’ In an interview with CBS News due to air on Sunday, Grossi said: ‘They can have, you know, in a matter of months, I would say, a few cascades of centrifuges spinning and producing enriched uranium.’ Grossi’s comments follow a week of conflicting claims about the level of damage done to Iran’s nuclear programme by Israeli and US forces during the 12-day war launched by Israel this month... But the true extent of the damage to Iran’s nuclear programme— which Tehran insists is for peaceful civilian purposes— remains unclear.”

[T]he chief of staff of the Israeli military, Eyal Zamir, said Israel believed it had set the project back by “years”— although he cautioned that this did not mark the end of the Israeli campaign.

But both US and European intelligence agencies have suggested that the damage may have been less extensive, with a provisional US assessment leaked to the media this week suggesting Iran’s programme was set back by only a matter of months.

A key question is the fate of Iran’s 400kg stockpile of highly enriched uranium— a vital ingredient for a bomb— which preliminary intelligence assessments provided to European governments indicate remains largely intact.

Two officials told the Financial Times this week that the assessments suggested the stockpile was not concentrated in Fordow at the time of last weekend’s attack, but had been distributed to various other locations.

“We don’t know where this material could be, or if part of it could have been, you know, under the attack during those 12 days,” Grossi told CBS. 

“So some could have been destroyed as part of the attack, but some could have been moved. So there has to be at some point a clarification.”

He added that Iran retained the expertise to enrich uranium to weapons grade. “There is the self-evident truth that the knowledge is there. The industrial capacity is there,” he said. “Military operations or not, you are not going to solve this in a definitive way militarily.”

So now the question is whether Israel and the U.S. will resume making war on Iran or whether diplomacy can emerge from the wreckage. Netanyahu, predictably, has made it clear he’s uninterested in any deal that doesn’t amount to Iran's total capitulation— an outcome that even many in Israel’s own security establishment recognize as delusional. His maximalist position— zero enrichment, full dismantlement, and no sanctions relief— isn’t a negotiating posture; it’s a setup for permanent conflict.

But as Grossi bluntly noted, “you are not going to solve this in a definitive way militarily.” The knowledge can’t be bombed out of existence. Nor can centrifuges be permanently disabled if the political will remains to rebuild them. The question then isn’t just whether war can stop a bomb— it can’t— but whether there is still any space, politically or diplomatically, for something resembling realism to emerge in Washington or Jerusalem. And that’s where Netanyahu becomes the central obstacle. He’s not looking for a peaceful resolution— he’s looking for a perpetual enemy to justify endless war and his own hold on power. Every bomb dropped, every red line crossed, every dead Iranian scientist or civilian, feeds the narrative he’s built his political survival on. For Bibi, peace is the real threat.

Trump, of course, isn’t capable of realism. For him, it’s always about dominance, humiliation and spectacle. And under this second Trump term Netanyahu will keep dragging the U.S. deeper into a quagmire that can't be won, only prolonged. The choice ahead isn’t between peace and war— it’s between diplomacy and delusion. And unless that delusion is broken, the region will remain on the brink, held hostage to the ambitions of two men who see chaos not as a cost, but as a strategy.

The most likely scenario in the coming months isn’t a return to full-scale war but a dangerous cycle of escalation just below that threshold— covert sabotage, targeted assassinations, cyberattacks, and proxy strikes across the region. Israel will likely continue pressuring Iran through these means, with or without open U.S. backing. Iran, for its part, will respond asymmetrically— through its regional allies, through threats to global shipping, and perhaps eventually through a dash toward nuclear capability if cornered. The situation is volatile, and it wouldn’t take much— a miscalculation, a political distraction, or a high-profile assassination— for things to spiral completely out of control.

Diplomacy remains technically possible, but politically strangled, not even really on the table. Netanyahu has no interest in any deal that doesn’t amount to Iran’s total surrender and Trump is unlikely to push back; in fact, he may encourage it. The machinery of escalation is already in motion, fueled by delusion, denial and domestic politics in both countries… a formula for perpetual brinksmanship, and maybe worse. Looking forward, I’d say the region is locked in a low-intensity war, with nuclear capability always within reach, and peace perpetually out of reach— held hostage to the ambitions of leaders who see chaos as a political strategy.

Iran was humiliated by Netanyahu and his Trump puppet. But what none of the western coverage mentions is that historically, Iranians have a very, very long memory.