The Insurgent Empire: Standoff War, Trashcanistans, and the Proliferation Trap

Big Serge Thought ^ | 4/8/26 | Big Serge

[EnderWiggin1970]

As we cross the one month mark of the Israeli-American war on Iran, a sufficient corpus of data is emerging to contemplate the kinetic dynamics of the conflict. This is a very strange war. It is not merely the fact that the roster of combatants and associated parties - Netanyahu, President Trump, Lindsay “Holden Bloodfeast” Graham - comprise the most polarizing figures in world politics today. As if to punctuate this fact, I fully anticipate angry comments berating me for using a sanitized and emotionally titrated word like “polarizing.” But we digress.

Far more interesting than endless apoplexy over Israel or Trump is a look at the kinetic scheme of the war and what its long term strategic ramifications might be. We are using the term “war”, although it has somewhat humorously taken on life as a “Special Military Operation” - a riff on Russia’s idiosyncratic bureaucratic parlance for the war in Ukraine, which the White House inadvertently stepped in when they referred to Operation Epic Fury as a “special combat operation.”

The idea of a Special Military Operation is interesting in its own right, and carries a connotation of regime change achieved through a mixture of military force and subversive coercion. Such a label was highly appropriate in the case of America’s January operation in Venezuela, where an overwhelming strike package was combined with political preparations which had Vice President Delcy Rodríguez in position for a favorable transfer of power. In contrast, the conflict in Ukraine has clearly spiraled beyond the scope of a “special operation”, which we can loosely define as kinetically coerced regime change or diplomacy. As early as 2022, Russia was prepared to transition to a conventional war with multiple army groupings and a robust logistical apparatus...

[EnderWiggin1970]

Always enjoy this bloggers' posts. In this article, in a nutshell, he makes the point that the US has been attempting to prosecute the war in Iran as if it were an insurgency (albeit a high-tech one relying almost exclusively on air power), rather than through conventional military means.

[Deaf Smith]

Already posted earlier this morning.

[quantim]

“Trashcanistans”

I like this made up name, there’s a few in Congress where it applies such as Tlaib, Omar...

[Nateman]

An amazing alliance. Of course Jew hate comes oozing out all over the place simply because they are Jews. In spite of the World hating Jews and the constant efforts to harass and procecute them they still keep coming out on top. Whatever it is that pushes them towards success the World could use more of that. I prefer the winners

[Mimi.M]

Excellent analysis - the parallel with an insurgency (though top down - literally - vs bottom-up) is brilliant. And it also makes sense of the lack of coherence re goals. Basically, ‘cripple ‘em and then leave them to their own devices’. Btw, it’s an okay strategy, but must be done (and perhaps periodically redone) sufficiently, in order to work - or that which reconstitutes will be even stronger.

[Mimi.M]

Money quote (aka buried lede):
“The standoff campaign has been extraordinarily effective at destroying Iranian military capacity, but military capacity is not the same thing as governing authority. The Iranian state apparatus — its ministries, its courts, its bureaucracies, its revolutionary legitimating ideology — has not been destroyed. It has been decapitated and embarrassed, but decapitation and embarrassment are not the same thing as elimination. History is replete with examples of states that survived devastating military campaigns by retreating to the resilience of their civil institutions and the obstinacy of their populations”

IOW, if you shoot at the king, best not miss. And if you don’t kill your enemy, in the end, you make him stronger.

[Jan_Sobieski]

if you shoot at the king, best not miss

Umm…we took out the King, his cabinet, and his military. Very few “misses”, wouldn’t you say?

[ckilmer]

if you shoot at the king, best not miss

Umm…we took out the King, his cabinet, and his military. Very few “misses”, wouldn’t you say?

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but if after all that —they survive AND the population does not rise up against them AND replace them—then slowly over time they will rebuild.

at this point we are not just talking about known unknowns but also unknown unknowns.