The Iran War, Recent Work, and What's Next
Hi everyone,
It’s been a while since I’ve sent a post, and I wanted to start by saying thank you for sticking around.
Over the past few months, I’ve been much more active on X than on Substack as the Iran war unfolded. Between publishing real-time analysis, writing articles and reports, closely tracking developments, appearing in the media, and responding to a rapidly evolving situation, I simply haven’t had the time to give this newsletter the attention it deserves.
That said, I wanted to share some of the work I’ve been doing and let you know that I plan to return to Substack with much more regular analysis in the days and weeks ahead.
My biggest project over the past several months has been completing a major report for the Center for International Policy, produced with support from the Ploughshares Fund and Horizon 2045, which I’m excited to finally share with you at the following link:
Beyond Maximalism: Reimagining U.S. Strategy Toward Iran Through Systems Thinking
The report examines four decades of U.S.-Iran relations to identify the recurring patterns that have repeatedly undermined diplomacy and fueled cycles of escalation. Its central argument is that the current catastrophe was not inevitable. The report shows how hubris, groupthink, and repeated reliance on coercion helped produce the very outcomes Washington sought to prevent. It concludes by outlining a different strategy grounded in strategic realism, reciprocal diplomacy, and long-term risk reduction.
To bring these ideas to broader audiences, I also wrote two essays based on the report’s core arguments. The first, published in The American Conservative, argues that America’s decades-long conflict with Iran has been defined by a persistent overreliance on coercion and a fundamental misunderstanding of how Tehran perceives its security interests. Rather than producing a weaker or more accommodating Iran, these policies have repeatedly strengthened the very dynamics Washington sought to reverse.
The second essay, co-authored with Nancy Okail and published in The Nation, argues that Trump’s Iran policy reflects a deeper institutional failure rather than simply one president’s decisions. We examine how weak accountability, limited oversight, and a persistent inability to learn from past failures have allowed militaristic strategies to be recycled despite repeatedly falling short of their objectives.
Beyond writing, I’ve also had the opportunity to bring my analysis to a broader public audience through television interviews and media appearances. Most recently, I joined Al Jazeera English for two discussions on the evolving Iran war and the prospects for diplomacy.
Across the two interviews (Link 1, Link 2), I discussed the strategic deadlock facing the Trump administration, why military pressure is unlikely to produce a lasting political outcomes, and the growing economic and geopolitical costs of continued escalation. I also emphasized the need to rebuild U.S. credibility through serious diplomacy rather than tactical pauses, and why the underlying drivers of the conflict remain unresolved the current lull in fighting.
I look forward to sharing more regular analysis here again soon, and as always, thank you for reading and for your continued support.