{"id":58319,"date":"2026-03-25T12:01:57","date_gmt":"2026-03-25T20:01:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=58319"},"modified":"2026-03-25T12:01:57","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T20:01:57","slug":"william-astore-more-on-the-iran-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2026\/03\/25\/william-astore-more-on-the-iran-war\/","title":{"rendered":"William Astore: More on the Iran War"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><i>Reprinted from <a href=\"https:\/\/bracingviews.substack.com\/\">Bracing Views<\/a> with the author\u2019s permission.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>On March 19 I was on \u201cJudging Freedom\u201d to discuss the Iran War, America\u2019s soaring national debt ($39 trillion and rising), the Pentagon\u2019s call for another $200 billion to bankroll this disastrous war, Joe Kent\u2019s recent resignation and what it means, and Tulsi Gabbard\u2019s evasive and disappointing testimony before the Senate.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/xIAT71EuWWM?si=1fYT8GfUFK2sGhw7\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>As I noted on Judge Napolitano\u2019s podcast, the Pentagon has failed eight consecutive audits yet it never stops asking for more money. We would be fools to give it to them.<\/p>\n<p>We also discussed the many costs of war and Iran\u2019s capacity to influence how and at what level this war is being waged.<\/p>\n<p>The quicker this unnecessary, illegal, unconstitutional, and dangerous war ends, the better for everyone.<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s something in our national ethos that accepts war and violence, even celebrates and glories in it. Perhaps it\u2019s because war\u2019s costs are largely kept isolated from us; perhaps it\u2019s incessant violence on TV, movies, video games, and the like; perhaps it\u2019s an unthinking acceptance of \u201cwarrior ethos\u201d talk; perhaps there are too many so-called christian nationalists who see war as some sort of holy struggle and the fulfillment of Biblical prophecy; perhaps there\u2019s simply too much ignorance and not enough truth; perhaps there\u2019s too much fear being stoked, especially Islamophobia. And perhaps there\u2019s simply too much money, profit, and power in war, especially in the context of Ike\u2019s military-industrial-congressional complex.<\/p>\n<p>One thing is certain: as Ike said, as MLK said, a nation constantly at war experiences spiritual death, a crucifixion on a cross of iron.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author\u2019s permission. On March 19 I was on \u201cJudging Freedom\u201d to discuss the Iran War, America\u2019s soaring national debt ($39 trillion and rising), the Pentagon\u2019s call for another $200 billion to bankroll this disastrous war, Joe Kent\u2019s recent resignation and what it means, and Tulsi Gabbard\u2019s evasive and disappointing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":290,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[758],"class_list":["post-58319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"0","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":"And Joe Kent's Resignation"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/290"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58319"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58319\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58323,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58319\/revisions\/58323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58319"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=58319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}