Okay, this is humiliating. The United States initiated an unprovoked war with Iran…and we lost. We lost in every measurable way. In the 250 year history of the US, we’ve never suffered such a calamitous and decisive strategic loss.

The US military may never recover from this. Oh, sure, over time we can rebuild our weapon stockpiles. And we’ll maintain technological military superiority over (most of) the world. But in terms of reputation and confidence, we’ve shit in our pants. That stink won’t go away.

We have Comrade Trump and Pete Hegseth to directly blame for this. But it’s not only the fault of those fuckwits. We elected Trump. You and I may not have voted for him, but there’s no escaping the fact that we, as a nation, elected him a second time, knowing exactly who and what he is. We elected him and, again, that stink won’t go away.

Obviously, starting a war with Iran was massively stupid in the first place. Hell, starting a war with any nation instead of using the soft power of diplomacy is massively stupid. But Jesus suffering fuck, if you’re stupid enough to start a war, at the very least you need to make sure you have a solid, practical plan to win it. At the very least, make sure you have clear objectives that are attainable militarily. At the very least, make sure you have a plan for after you’ve achieved those objectives. At the very fucking least, make sure you can justify the war to the families and friends of the troops who’ll die in it.

But all that would require professional military leaders. We don’t have many of those left. Pete Hegseth saw to that. There’s never been a Secretary of Defense so blatantly unqualified to hold that post as Pete Hegseth. A long history of serious alcohol abuse should have been enough to disqualify him. A repeated history of fiscal mismanagement (of both Concerned Veterans for America and Vets for Freedom) should have been enough to disqualify him. A history of marital infidelity and sexual abuse of women (including an accusation of rape that was derailed by a financial settlement with the accuser) should have been enough to disqualify him. His lack of military leadership experience should have been enough to disqualify him. Hell, his arrogant and offensive personality should have been enough to disqualify him

But no. Trump wanted him and MAGA gives Trump whatever he wants. Hegseth is the only Secretary of Defense whose approval to the position required a tie-breaking vote by the Vice President. No Democrat voted for him; only three Republicans opposed him.

Hegseth proceeded to recreate the military in his own image. White, male, arrogant, reckless, careless, vindictive, testosterone-poisoned, extreme Christianist, and deeply deeply stupid. He and Trump approached Iran like schoolyard bullies. And Iran kicked sand in our face.

The United States is weaker now–weaker in almost every respect. Our international reputation is shit; our military has been effectively embarrassed, our economy is in shambles, any claim the US ever had to moral/ethical leadership is now as dead as Marley’s ghost.

Like I said at the beginning, this is humiliating. And (assuming this nation survives Trump and his MAGA lemmings) maybe that’s a good thing. Our only hope to regaining a place in civilized international society is to learn a little humility. We can’t just insist we’re great. We need to aim at just being decent, and hope we can make it so.