Show Notes
Donald Trump has once again stepped back from a threatened major attack on Iran. So has America lost the Iran War? Or is Trump’s apparent hesitation part of a longer strategy to exhaust the Iranian regime?
Aimen and Thomas discuss:
Whether Iran has outmanoeuvred Trump despite America’s overwhelming military superiority
Aimen’s three possible futures for the war: US withdrawal, prolonged attrition or extreme escalation
Why an American retreat could unleash an even more destructive regional war
Israel, the Gulf states and Pakistan in a Middle East without American restraint
The revival of the US–Iran MoU and President Pezeshkian’s lack of authority over the IRGC
America’s possible ‘death by a thousand cuts’ strategy against Iran’s military and economy
Iran’s collapsing currency, soaring inflation and ability to withstand prolonged pressure
Trump’s highly personal style of government and the absence of a stable American war strategy
The limits of air power and America’s repeated failure to convert destruction into political victory
The danger of nuclear escalation if Iran races towards a bomb or misreads Trump’s restraint as weakness
Join the Conflicted Community here: https://conflicted.supportingcast.fm/
Find us on X: https://x.com/MHconflicted
And Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MHconflicted
And Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conflictedpod
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Conflicted is a Message Heard production.
Executive Producers: Jake Warren & Max Warren.
Produced and edited by Thomas Small. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
More from CONFLICTED
We welcome back friend of the show Baraa Shiban, who was recently on the front lines in Yemen. The Houthis have surrounded Taiz once again. Can the city that has defied Yemen's tyrants for generations hold out against another devastating siege?
In this latest Conflicted Conversation, Ruben Andersson, professor of social anthropology at Oxford University's Department of International Development, discusses his new book Age of Security: The Rise of a Global Obsession.
In this latest Conflicted Conversation, journalist Adrian Wooldridge discusses his latest book Centrists of the World Unite: The Lost Genius of Liberalism.
Sudan’s civil war has become a regional proxy struggle, with the UAE, Egypt, Iran, Turkey and other powers backing rival armed camps as the country fragments under the pressure of war. But while the RSF’s foreign support has drawn intense scrutiny, the forces sustaining Sudan’s army — from Islamist networks to drones, money and weapons supplied from abroad — have received far less attention.
The war is widening, diplomacy has stalled, and the Middle East is once again sliding towards escalation as the relationship between Israel and the Gulf states grows closer while pressure on Iran is mounting at sea, in the air, and across its network of regional allies.