Americans have been told a dozen different things about Iran to justify this invasion. None of them are consistent, and some military leaders have even framed this as a holy war. Over the weekend I released two bonus essays that will be difficult for some readers — one about the face of the enemy, and one about God’s love for Khamenei.
Today I want to do something simple and honest: I’m going to strong‑man the arguments for war — the best versions of them — and then show why they collapse under scrutiny, just like the WMD claims that led us into Iraq.
Fighting Israel’s War
Unable To Control a Supported Nation State
“Israel’s imminent attack on Iran forced US to join war, says Rubio”
The Independent
The strongest case for this: Israel is not a minor client but a strategic ally whose security is tightly bound to U.S. interests through decades of cooperation, intelligence‑sharing, and de facto defense commitments. When U.S. intelligence concluded that Israel was preparing to hit Iran — and that Iran would retaliate against American forces whether we joined the fight or not — Washington framed a pre‑emptive strike as the responsible move. In this view, the U.S. wasn’t doing Israel’s bidding but acting to protect its own troops, preserve regional stability, and uphold the credibility of its alliances. It’s a coherent argument on paper.
When you zoom out, the pattern is unmistakable: Israel behaves less like a stabilizing ally and more like a regional disruptor, carrying out cross‑border strikes in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, and even Turkey with near‑total impunity because U.S. power shields it from consequences. Civilian deaths follow these operations everywhere they occur, and Israel has repeatedly pushed Washington toward regime‑change confrontations across the region. This isn’t the posture of a partner protecting American interests — it’s a smaller state leveraging U.S. military power to pursue its own regional battles, with young Americans paying the cost.
A Biblical Duty to Protect Israel
“The Bible is clear: those who bless Israel will be blessed, and those who curse Israel will be cursed. Standing with Israel is not a political issue — it is a biblical mandate.”
Pastor John Hagee
The strongest version of the “biblical duty” argument goes like this: Scripture teaches that God blesses those who bless Israel, and for many evangelicals that creates a moral obligation for the United States to defend Israel militarily. Leaders like John Hagee have framed this as a clear biblical mandate, arguing that supporting Israel — even through force — is obedience to God’s plan. In this view, Israel’s security is not just a geopolitical concern but a spiritual responsibility, and resisting military support is seen as resisting God Himself.
The problem with this argument is that it treats a modern nation‑state as if it were the covenant people of God, ignoring the New Testament’s clear teaching that God’s family is now defined by faith in Christ, not ethnicity or national borders. The promise to “bless those who bless you” was given to Abraham, not to a 21st‑century government with F‑35s and a nuclear arsenal. And nowhere does Jesus command His followers to defend any nation with military force — in fact, He consistently redirects His people away from ethnic loyalty and toward enemy‑love, peacemaking, and a kingdom “not of this world.” When you apply basic hermeneutics, the entire “biblical duty to protect Israel” framework collapses; it’s built on a category error that confuses ancient covenant theology with modern geopolitics.
Iran Has Been at War with Us Since 1979
“Iran has been an imminent threat to the United States for 47 years. The president was right to act.”
U.S. Senator Tom Cotton
The strongest version of this argument says that Iran declared itself an enemy of the United States during the 1979 revolution, seized American diplomats, and has spent the decades since backing militias that target U.S. troops in Lebanon, Iraq, and Syria. In this framing, Iran’s support for groups like Hezbollah and various Shia militias is treated as a continuous, low‑grade war against American interests, making Iran an “imminent threat” not because of a single event but because of a 47‑year pattern of hostility. From this perspective, the U.S. strike isn’t escalation but finally responding to a conflict Iran has been waging all along.
Tom Cotton’s line only works if you erase the first move and our own record (And if you don’t understand the definition of imminent). If you start the story in 1979, Iran looks like the irrational aggressor; if you start it in 1953, you have to admit the CIA overthrew Iran’s elected government on behalf of British and American oil interests and installed a brutal monarch who ruled for decades. And if Iran is a “state sponsor of terrorism” because it arms proxies in the region, what does that make us, after funding, arming, or training the mujahideen who became al‑Qaeda, backing militias that evolved into the Taliban, and playing factions against each other in Iraq and Syria in ways that helped give rise to ISIS? Once you put those two facts on the table—the coup and our own proxy wars—the claim that “they’ve been at war with us for 47 years” looks less like history and more like a story we tell to avoid looking in the mirror.
Weeks Away from a Nuclear Weapon
“Iran is actively seeking nuclear weapons and could be only five years away from acquiring them.”
U.S. Secretary of Defense William Perry (1995)
The strongest version of this argument says that Iran has been racing toward a nuclear bomb for decades, with U.S. officials warning as far back as 1995 — when Defense Secretary William Perry said Iran could be only five years away — that Tehran’s program was accelerating behind a veil of secrecy. In this framing, every new intelligence estimate showing enriched uranium or advanced centrifuges is treated as proof that Iran is perpetually on the brink, and any delay in confronting them risks allowing a hostile regime to cross the threshold. From this perspective, claims that Iran is “weeks away” aren’t alarmism but a sober reading of a long pattern of deception, stalled inspections, and incremental technical gains that could collapse into a nuclear breakout at any moment.
The problem with the “weeks away” claim is that it ignores the three facts that matter most: first, Iran’s Supreme Leader issued a binding religious ruling declaring nuclear weapons haram, which is why U.S. intelligence repeatedly assessed that Iran had not decided to build a bomb; second, whenever Iran did cooperate with the international community — including the most intrusive inspections regime in history under the JCPOA — it was the United States that tore up the agreement, and it did so under pressure from Israel, not because Iran violated it; and third, the only nuclear‑armed state in the Middle East is Israel, which maintains an undeclared arsenal outside the NPT while insisting that Iran’s civilian program is an existential threat. Once you put these pieces together, the “weeks away” narrative looks less like a technical assessment and more like a political talking point that collapses under basic scrutiny.
“Death to America”
“Iran should have signed the ‘deal’ I told them to sign. What a shame, and waste of human life. Simply stated, IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON. I said it over and over again! Everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran!”
President Donald Trump
The strongest version of this argument says that Iran’s “Death to America” chant isn’t just empty rhetoric but a reflection of a regime that has acted violently against the United States for decades. In this view, the 1979 hostage crisis marked the beginning of an openly hostile relationship, and Iran’s support for groups that have killed U.S. Marines in Lebanon, Iraq, and elsewhere shows that the chant expresses real intent, not symbolic anger. From this perspective, Iran’s political culture normalizes anti‑American hatred, its leaders encourage crowds to repeat the slogan, and its regional proxies have carried out attacks that give the chant tangible meaning. For people who hold this view, the words and the actions reinforce each other: Iran says “Death to America,” and then backs forces that shed American blood.
The chant “Death to America” is routinely held up as proof of Iran’s irrational hatred, but it functions in Iranian political culture as symbolic protest against U.S. policy, not a literal call to kill Americans — and the contrast becomes stark when you place it next to actual U.S. presidential threats. In 2024, Donald Trump wrote: “Everyone should immediately evacuate Tehran,” a statement that implies real, physical danger to millions of civilians, backed by the world’s most powerful military. One side is civilians chanting political theater; the other has the capacity — and at times the willingness — to strike cities. When you compare rhetoric to capability, the moral framing flips: the chant is bluster, but the threats from Washington carry the weight of actual state power.
“Iran Wants to Wipe Israel Off the Map”
The strongest version of this argument says that Iran’s leadership has openly called for Israel’s destruction, most famously through the widely circulated translation of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s 2005 remark that Israel should be “wiped off the map.” In this framing, Iran’s hostility isn’t just political but existential: a revolutionary regime committed to eliminating a U.S. ally and empowering groups like Hezbollah and Hamas that have attacked Israel for decades. Supporters of this view argue that Iran’s rhetoric, combined with its missile program and nuclear ambitions, shows a long‑term strategic goal of erasing Israel as a state. From this perspective, Iran’s words and actions reinforce each other, making its threats toward Israel both credible and urgent.
The problem with this argument is that it rests on a mistranslation and a misunderstanding of Iranian political language. Ahmadinejad’s 2005 line — endlessly repeated in U.S. media — did not say Israel should be “wiped off the map”; the original Persian referred to the “regime occupying Jerusalem” eventually “vanishing from the page of time,” a prediction about political change, not a call for genocide. Iran’s official military doctrine is explicitly defensive, built around deterring invasion, not launching one, and Iran has never initiated a war against Israel despite decades of opportunity. Once you put these facts together, the narrative that Iran is bent on physically erasing Israel collapses; it’s a political slogan inflated into an existential threat, not a strategic plan backed by capability or historical behavior.
War is the failure of man like no other. It is a sin so vast it unravels everything it touches — culture, family, community, trust, innocence. War destroys. And I’m angry. I hate it. Maybe it’s a righteous anger, maybe it’s just the clarity that comes when you’ve seen what war actually is instead of what people imagine it to be. We entered into a war of choice for reasons so thin they dissolve under the slightest scrutiny, and people are dying because of it. If you think there’s glory in this, if you think it’s some grand achievement, then sign up and fight; otherwise you have no idea what you’re cheering for. I know what it is to show up in a war zone — to feel the concussion of rockets, to hear the whistle of an incoming round slicing the air above your truck. Those sounds don’t leave you.
War is the luxury of the rich and the shackle of the poor man.
and the ones who cheer it on will never carry the weight of what they’ve unleashed.
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