Dear friends,
I just wanted to share a thought that’s been on my mind lately. Yes, Trump has attacked Iran — but Iran hasn’t responded in any major way. That in itself is telling. It seems less a climax than a provocation, more bait than strategy. In truth, this might be part of a larger Western pattern: in its long twilight, the West no longer seeks peace but relevance — and sometimes, relevance requires war.
I recently heard a wild claim: that Norway was positioning a remote island of 150 people to tempt a Russian invasion, hoping to activate NATO’s mutual defence clause. Whether true or not, it captures something of the moment — the performative anxiety of a declining order, looking for conflict to reaffirm its own centrality.
As Amar writes, “It is heart-wrenching to see Iran being bombed by two nuclear states, while it remains a signatory to the NPT and compliant with IAEA inspections.” He recalls living in Tehran in 1980, a schoolboy witnessing warplanes above Mehrabad and the skies of Tehran blazing with anti-aircraft fire. That memory isn’t abstract — it’s personal, etched in smoke. His excellent comment is after the jump: Continue reading The West’s War of Decline