The U.S.-Israeli war against Iran and Lebanon continues to go on, a simmering flame that not only does damage in its own right, but could explode into a raging firestorm at any point. This war continues to wreak real havoc in the global economy—causing inflation, fertilizer shortages in agriculture (which will affect world hunger), etc. Moreover, horrendous crimes—including those carried out by the U.S. ally in this war, Israel, and the horrific deprivation in Iran combined with periodic U.S. terror from above—form a steady, bloody drumbeat. (See "U.S.-Israeli War on Iran: News Update.") We have called on people to speak and act much more forcefully against this, and last month’s article by the revolutionary leader Bob Avakian—“The New York Times Insists on Support for War Crimes—When They Are ‘Our’ War Crimes”—takes apart and directly challenges some of the way that people’s thinking is molded which keeps them going along with this.

At the same time, it is worth it to look at some of the contradictions that the U.S. has been encountering from the angle of how these imperialists themselves see the larger strategic implications of where all this could go. In this regard, Robert Kagan, a prominent “neo-conservative,” has written a provocatively titled analysis “Checkmate in Iran—Washington can’t reverse or control the consequences of losing this war,” (The Atlantic, May 10, 2026).¹ 

Kagan writes that “It’s hard to think of a time when the United States suffered a total defeat in a conflict [such as in Vietnam or Afghanistan], a setback so decisive that the strategic loss could be neither repaired nor ignored" [in large part because these defeats didn't have that much impact on the global strategic situation].” He goes on to say that:

Defeat in the present confrontation with Iran will be of an entirely different character. It can neither be repaired nor ignored. There will be no return to the status quo ante, no ultimate American triumph that will undo or overcome the harm done… The roles of China and Russia, as Iran’s allies, are strengthened; the role of the United States, substantially diminished. Far from demonstrating American prowess, as supporters of the war have repeatedly claimed, the conflict has revealed an America that is unreliable and incapable of finishing what it started. That is going to set off a chain reaction around the world as friends and foes adjust to America’s failure.

In another, more recent interview Kagan elaborated on this. He added that “I'm not advocating this, but I think the only military solution would have to be a land invasion that removes the Iranian regime from power. And since I don't think the United States is going to undertake that, I don't really know what the answer is. Sometimes, there isn't an answer.”²

Faultlines, Fragilities and Real Dangers for Humanity

Again, Kagan—coming from an imperialist perspective in which the lives and suffering of millions matters for nothing up against calculations of “great-power interests”—may, or may not, be fully or even fundamentally correct in his analysis. But 1) he is pointing to real trends and real possibilities, as this so-called “ceasefire”—which in reality is an ongoing “low-intensity” war that grinds on week after week; and 2) he is definitely getting a hearing. While Kagan says he opposes a “land invasion,” there are very likely more than just him with positions of power and influence who would (like Kagan) also see such an invasion as “the only way out”—and who, on that basis, would be FOR it.

Such an invasion would be horrific and horrifically unjust—going way beyond the level of criminal destruction and murder that the U.S. has already carried out there. Such an invasion would dramatically affect and could easily come to engulf the whole Middle East, and powers like China, Russia, the various other European and Asian imperialists. And it would pose the real danger of setting loose a dynamic that could even spiral into a nuclear war.

Others in the ruling class, including both Democrats and Republicans, argue that the U.S. needs to extricate itself—to make a peace deal and get out—as soon as possible, even with the loss of influence in the short run. Why? Many explicitly argue that the U.S. needs to much more focus on feverishly preparing to go bigger and harder against the U.S.'s main imperialist rival, China. This comes up within Trump’s fascist movement and even his administration and is the position, again, of many influential Democrats as well. 

But let’s be clear: all sides are arguing over how best to violently contend to continue to run a worldwide capitalist-imperialist system that requires the daily exploitation and oppression of literally billions of people, and the ongoing accelerating destruction of the environment. There is no side of this equation in which the interests of the masses of people are represented and no power within this madness who can put forward any solution to what Bob Avakian has called this system’s “forced march into the abyss.”

The Urgent Need to Forge a Way Forward Out of the Madness

We can no longer afford to allow these imperialists to continue to dominate the world and determine the destiny of humanity. They need to be overthrown as quickly as possible. And it is a scientific fact that humanity does not have to live this way. —Bob Avakian

Nobody anywhere in this argument among the powers that be seriously argues for a world without such conflicts, for a world moving to root out the plunder and repression of the majority of the planet by the “great” powers, for a world in which the masses of people are mobilized to save and then set about repairing the environment, for a world in which all forms of oppression are uprooted.

Yet such a way does exist—a way crystallized in the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America. As WE NEED AND WE DEMAND: A WHOLE NEW WAY TO LIVE, A FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT SYSTEM, puts it, 

The Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America is completely, fundamentally different than the U.S. Constitution. This Constitution for a new socialist republic provides a sweeping vision, a firm foundation and concrete blueprint for bringing into being a society, and ultimately a world, free from all forms of slavery, all exploitation and oppression based on class, race, sex and gender, all relations in which one part of humanity is subordinated to and dominated by others.

The new socialist system based on the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America will do what can never be done under this system of capitalism-imperialism: Through its institutions, through elections and in an all-round way, this new socialist system will provide the means to politically empower the masses of people, in order to carry out the revolutionary transformation of society, and to contribute to this process in the world as a whole.

Such a world can only begin to be realized through an actual revolution of millions moving in an organized way to shatter the grip of the ruling class; and such a revolution can only be made when, among other things, the ruling class can no longer rule in the ways that people have been conditioned to accept. Conflicts like the ones we describe and analyze above not only shed light on why this system must go; they could also form part of the larger mix that might come together to put such a revolution directly on the agenda.