Taking Royal Hostages

 

Historically, a militarily defeated country was required to provide hostages to the victor to ensure compliance to whatever treaty came into force after a war.  The defeated king would be required to send members of his family to be kept in the imperial household of the victor.  Thereafter, any violation by the defeated power would result in, among other consequences, the death of these hostages.

Thinking about the current situation in the Middle East and the Gulf, it seems so logical that the Gulf countries, whose economies depend on oil and gas infrastructure and whose people depend on desalinated water and also electricity for air conditioning would want to cut a deal with Iran for peace.  It is clear that Iran can target and hit any such facilities that they choose. 

So why haven’t these Gulf countries come to some sort of mutually agreeable terms to keep the Gulf open for shipping, sustaining life, etc.?  To my knowledge, the United States isn’t holding hostage any crown princes of the various Gulf monarchs.  But the United States is, in fact, holding countless billions (trillions) in wealth from these same monarchs.  Investments in US assets, investments held at US institutions, and investments denominated in US dollars. 

Is the US capable only of confiscating Iranian or Russian assets?  Of course not. 

These monarchs are between a rock and a hard place: watch their countries and, therefore, the source of their wealth destroyed, or watch their accumulated wealth confiscated.

MAGA Update

 

Well, let me start with a big “if”: if what we are reading about this MOU to end the war in Iran is accurate, or even approximate, it represents a total capitulation by Trump and the United States government.  Of course, there was no choice but to capitulate, because it would have taken total annihilation of Iran to avoid this – and total annihilation of Iran would have meant half the world’s population dies.

Another big “if”: if the agreement can hold….  Because too many powerful forces with the means to ensure it doesn’t hold don’t want it to hold.  Obviously, I am not talking about Iran – as, assuming the terms we read are somewhat accurate, they come out a big winner.  There are players in this game who aren’t bothered at all with the prospect of half the world dying.

With those caveats and concerns in place, two thoughts:

First: poor JD Vance.  He is the one being sent out to sell the deal.  Not Trump, not Rubio, not Hegseth.  Why is that?  Trump is too embarrassed, and neither Rubio nor Hegseth ever had any hope at all of capturing the working-class base of what was MAGA in any future election.  So, making them take the fall is meaningless because the working-class base of MAGA would never support them in the future anyway.

Vance did have some hope of doing that – carrying that part of the base.  If you want to ensure Vance destroys any possibility that he can carry that ball in a couple of years, get him to go out and defend the war and then defend how the deal is good for America. 

It is his Kamala Harris moment: “I can’t think of a single policy of Joe Biden / Donald Trump where I would do something differently.”  Oh…not even the strategically stupidest decision in US history to launch this war against Iran?

Second: I have commented on this before, but I think it is far more evident now.  Many who voted for Trump – again, call it his working-class base – wanted the US out of foreign wars, bring the troops home, shut down the foreign military bases, get out of these international institutions like the UN, the EU, NATO, etc.

Trump is doing that.  I certainly don’t like the way he is doing it, but what if he is doing it the only way it can be done in Washington: give the neocons and all associated with wanting more war everything they want? 

Could he get US troops out of the Gulf otherwise – if the bases hadn’t been destroyed by Iran?  Could he have ensured that the other power centers in the world gained strength at the cost of reducing the position of the US without this war?

Probably not.

So, who knows if this was by Trump’s design.  But it certainly looks like it will be one effect.  With that said, I still don’t see this empire dying without a fight.  It remains very dark before the dawn…if we survive until dawn.

Not to say that Trump and this administration hasn’t failed elsewhere.  They have failed at almost everything promised, and many of the things they are succeeding at really stink for some sort of movement toward sanity. 

An Unfortunate Development

 

There are a handful of podcasts / YouTube channels that I listen to or watch by individuals who advocate for some aspect of the Christian life.  I tend to stay away from those channels that are overly polemical, and especially do not appreciate the impugning of the character of other Christians of good faith.

So, I really don’t like seeing what has happened and is happening between Gavin Ortlund and Jonathan Pageau on the topic of who can be saved.  I have long valued the work of each of these men – obviously different in doctrinal and theological beliefs and practices, yet both men dedicated to spreading a Christian message as they each see it.  Both also dedicated to advocating for their respective traditions.

Pageau recently put out what was at the same time one of his best and one of his worst videos.  Best, because he spoke clearly about what he sees as theologically beautiful in the Eastern Orthodox tradition, and worst because he openly impugned Ortlund’s character and motives regarding Ortulnd’s understanding of the Eastern Orthodox answer to this question of who can be saved. 

Pageau’s video did bring the two together to discuss the aforementioned topic: who can be saved (available on each of their channels).  I wanted to see if they could have a good conversation on their agreements and disagreements, so I began to watch it. 

I was only able to watch about half of it.  Frankly, Pageau made it more difficult to watch – at least for me (and this having nothing to do with theological matters). 

I really have no conclusion, other than I find it unfortunate – even a little sad.