Iran Won Because America Is Stuck in the ‘Smart Bomb Trap’

Recorded in May. Join angryplanetpod.com to hear episodes early and commercial free.America’s war against Iran has gone on for more than two months and the United States has achieved none of its political objectives. American power has diminished, its munitions stockpile is low, and Iran now controls the Strait of Hormuz.Tehran has all the cards.To hear Robert Pape tell it, this was all predictable. Pape is a political scientist who teaches at the University of Chicago and specializes in the use of violence to achieve political goals. He’s the author of Bombing to Win and a scholar of air power failures. On this episode of Angry Planet, Pape walks us through the uses of air power, why it never achieves victory on its own, and why the Pentagon keeps promising it will.How you become an air power expertLosing Vietnam after such perfect precisionMan as meme“You don’t learn this by real estate deals.”There has not been a single case in history where air power alone has succeeded.“Our power is declining as a result of this.”The persistent myth of winning through air powerDumb bombs to precision weapons“It’s a dismal record of failure.”NATO in KosovoWhat are America’s definable political goals?Iran’s political goalsIran says seized tanker in Gulf of Oman, as US ‘disables’ two shipsPunishment, denial, and decapitationThe fragmenting GCCPape as CasandraBreaking Trump in the Strait of Hormuz“This will end up being America’s worst defeat since Vietnam.”A grim predictionThe Escalation TrapThe Gulf States Just Voted on American PowerFrom Kosovo to Iran: The Smart Bomb Trap and the Risk of Catastrophic EscalationBuy Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in WarSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On the morning of April 21, Trump posted an image of eight women on Truth Social, claimed they were Iranian dissidents set to be executed, and demanded that Tehran release them. Detractors, and several Iranian sources, claimed the women were AI-generated. A day later Trump claimed the women would no longer be executed and that he’d saved them.The truth is that the women are real and many are still in danger. Trump’s post made real Iranian women who protested the Iranian regime appear fake. The story speaks to a moment we’re in where it’s become impossible to parse truth from lies online. This was already difficult before AI-generated pictures and video. Now it feels impossible.On this episode of Angry Planet, Mahsa Alimardani is here to tell us the story. Alimardani is the Associate Director of Technology Threats and Opportunities at WITNESS.Eight real women turned into AI propagandaReal crimes bastardized into regime propaganda“We need to come to terms with the fact that our information environment is structurally different.”Content Credentials as a partial solutionHow AI is supercharging our chosen reality tunnelsThe cycle of uprising and repression in IranThe structure of Iran’s internet and how its blackouts workDomestic intranet as an alternative form of communicationAI-generated Lego propaganda videosIran ReframedExplosive Media’s deep connections to the Islamic RepublicPolitics as fandom, fandom as politics“Everything is becoming flattened.”“The onus on the person scrolling is a bit unfair.”Mahsa Alimardani’s LinkedInThe Real Iranian Women Protesters Trump Made Look SyntheticIn the Room With Iran’s Social Media SavantsHow AI Content Detection is Being Weaponized in the Iran WarIran Is Winning the AI Slop Propaganda WarSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Kim Song Ju, the man who would become Kim Il Sung, was born to devout Presbyterian parents. Billy Graham’s wife was born to christian missionaries in China and went to high school in Pyongyang. American protestants once spread the gospel in northwest Korea and found fertile ground for their gospel message. Kim listened, learned, and used those teachings to shape a cult of personality that rules North Korea to this day.On this episode of Angry Planet I’m joined by Wall Street Journal China bureau chief Jonathan Cheng to talk about his new book Korean Messiah. Cheng’s work is an exploration of the origins of North Korea and Kim’s deep ties to American Christianity.ShareAngry Planet as dress rehearsalBilly Graham in the Hermit Kingdom19th century Protestant missionaries in KoreaPresbyterians in the untamed northwestUntangling the history of a self-made godkingThe Kim Song Ju nativityWomen without namesAttending church during the Fire and Fury periodThe Soviet eraLeading from beyond the graveKim bombs his first public appearanceBuy Korean MessiahSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Recorded March 24, 2026. Subscribe at angryplanetpod.com to hear episodes first and commercial free.Last week an article published in Al Jazeera by an academic at the University of Doha in Qatar proposed something that felt crazy to some western war watchers: America and Israel’s strategy in Iran is working.On this episode of Angry Planet, author Muhanad Seloom is here to explain his position. Seloom is an assistant professor of international politics and security at the University of Doha. He’s also an Iraqi who lived through the Iran-Iraq war and both US invasions. From his perspective, the US has degraded Iran’s ability to hurt its neighbors in the long term and changed the regime.What comes next is a more complicated question.Why did this war even start?Setting aside morality and legality to look at ground truths“Iran is much weaker”Missile production, missile rangeThe highly enriched uranium is in one place“The regime has changed. Whether we like it or not, the regime has changed.”The case against the new KhameneiWhat is it like to live nextdoor to Iran?There’s a reason no one is standing up for IranWhy isn’t the GCC doing more?What happens if we pick up and leave?What’s the plan for what happens next?“It’s not easy to rise up.”Charging tolls on Hormuz“I have to say this: I am against the war in any way.”What about the JCPOA?A great unanswered question of historyAir campaigns don’t win wars…did America really lose in Afghanistan and Iraq?“War is hell.”Labelling Ethno-Political Groups as TerroristsThe US-Israeli strategy against Iran is working. Here is whySupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

America went to war in Iran, we’re told, because the idea of the country developing nuclear weapons was intolerable. Nukes are complicated and technical weapons that require scientists and experts to build, maintain, and manage. Highly enriched uranium (HEU) is core to the design and unless all of Iran’s HEU is accounted for the threat of it becoming a nuclear power will linger.So what would it take to get rid of Iran’s stockpile HEU?François Diaz-Maurin is on Angry Planet today to answer that question. Diaz-Maurin is editor for nuclear affairs at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists where he recently published an article outlining what it would take for US troops to neutralize Iran’s highly enriched uranium.How a civil engineer becomes a nuclear journalist“You can’t bomb away nuclear material.”“Technically, it’s nearly Mission Impossible.”How much highly enriched uranium (HEU) was left after last year’s strikes?Moving HEU around IranWhat we can learn from satellite photos and the International Atomic Energy AgencyWhy 60%?Managing scuba tanks full of gaseous toxins in a war zoneWhy blowing up the cylinders won’t work“Let me throw something weird at you.”Downblending versus exportingWe’re living in the third nuclear ageDeterrence works and that’s, maybe, not great?Trump may send US troops to neutralize Iran’s highly enriched uranium. There are no good optionsNetanyahu says Iran no longer has uranium enrichment capacityIran willing to dilute uranium stockpile as fresh protests eruptSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

AI enthusiasts love to say that the technology is as revolutionary and important as nuclear weapons. Even the Trump administration has adopted the metaphor. The President and the Department of Energy have repeatedly referred to the development of AI in the US as “Manhattan Project 2.0.”But is the buildout of LLMs and machine learning systems really as important as the development of the atom bomb? And what are the lessons from the atomic age that AI scientists should then learn? Do we need an AI Non Proliferation Treaty? An AI International Atomic Energy Agency?On this episode of Angry Planet, Ankit Panda comes on to talk about the uses and limitations of the “AI as nuclear weapons” metaphor. Panda is an expert in nukes and a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He’s been sharing his extended thoughts on the AI-nuclear connection at his Nukesletter Substack.Stanislav PetrovAI as nuclear weaponsWhy nuclear weapons resonate with people in the AI fieldThe Strategic Air Command storyThat time we spilled nuclear material all over Greenland and SpainNNSA and AnthropicAI as the next Manhattan ProjectA massive infrastructure projectFissile material as siliconWhat’s the AI version of an NPT and IAEA?AI and nuclear are both dual useOn AI wintersWhat AI is actually being used for, what it might be used forThe socialization around AI will change.AI Arms and Influence: Frontier Models Exhibit Sophisticated Reasoning in Simulated Nuclear CrisisSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Things have gotten very surreal in the dark corners of the internet. AI-generated prophets are preaching jihad in Facebook groups, Minecraft servers host digital caliphates, and school shooting fandoms gather to study their heroes and plot how to up beat their score. It’s a double bill on this episode of Angry Planet as two experts from the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), a nonprofit that studies and works to mitigate violent extremists, discuss the brave new world of online-born violence.First up is Milo Comerford, the co-author of a study about nihilistic violence. Then we’ve got Moustafa Ayad to talk about how the Islamic State is circumventing bans and pushing its message on social media.Staying sane on the internetViolence without ideologyThe Comm764True Crime CommunitySaints CultureWhen fandom becomes a killingAn aesthetics driven movementOnline and offline have mergedModeration is impossibleYou don’t have to hand it to ISISBroken text postingCopyright strikes and the Islamic StateFacebook professional as the gold standardAI resurrects dead influencersJihad influencersEven IS is obsessed with the Epstein filesVirtual caliphates in Roblox and Minecraft“We must be careful about what we pretend to be.”Once again, it all comes back to 4chanSaying nice things about twitter dot comBeyond Extremism‘The Comm’: The Group Linked to a Nationwide Swatting RampageHow the True Crime Community generates its own killersSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

America spent most of the 19th century at war with itself. It conquered its western expanse then collapsed into civil war. Once the North beat the South, partisan politics consumed the country for a generation. A string of assassinations, progressive firebrands, and civil service reforms burned people out on domestic politics and a bored and febrile nation began to search for meaning beyond its borders. It noticed the Spanish Empire was awfully close.In Splendid Liberators, award winning journalist Joe Jackson chronicles the beginning of the American myth of the “good war.” He’s on the show today to talk to us about Teddy Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and a general who lay in state at the Alamo.Recurring patterns in American historyRoscoe Conkling jumpscareRemnants of the Spanish-American War in South CarolinaWhat did liberty mean in the 19th century?Clara Barton, Leonard Wood and the dual American personalityThe first modern concentration campsThe Battleship of MaineWhen Congress used to fight, physicallyDrones won’t win a warThe US in the Philippines‘The water cure’American historians facing reality in the PhilippinesTeddy, finallyLaying in state at the AlamoBuy Splendid LiberatorsA Defense of General FunstonSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Greenland fever has faded for now but it will return. The world’s polar region, you see, is pretty damn important. As the planet heats and the ice melts, what was once an impassible warren of ice and snow has become a geopolitical opportunity.On today’s Angry Planet, we host journalist Kenneth R. Rosen who just published the book Polar War. He’s spent the past few years among the ice and snow, embedding with troops, yearning for snus, and smoking cigarettes with morticians in the long dark.Rosen knows what makes the Arctic so important and can see the truths that undergird the obsession with Greenland.Getting bombastic and angry about Greenland“We already have Greenland”How is Turkey “near Arctic?”The Greenland obsession as proof of climate changeWhat makes a good Arctic forceAccession to NATOServicing subs in the ArcticTrying to embed on a nuclear submarineMispronouncing place namesThe most powerful navy in the world doesn’t have an icebreakerSpies in the polar regions“It should have been an article.”Smoking under a tree in the darkSnus vs ZynThe death drive of the penguinBuy Polar War: Submarines, Spies, and the Struggle for Power in a Melting ArcticUS Army Poorly Prepared for Arctic Operations: Finnish Troops Forced Them to Surrender During Exercises in NorwayCan we just appreciate the fact State secrets were just leaked on this sub?Life Aboard a Nuclear Submarine as the US Responds to Threats Around the GlobeSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There was a time, just before the pandemic, when folks would say “Twitter isn’t real life” as a means of dismissing the horrors of social media. This was a cope, a way to ignore the worst political and cultural actors who now dominate our psychic landscape. Now those people are in charge and they’ve manifested Twitter into real life in a way previously thought impossible.The White House is posting Stardew Valley memes about whole milk. A Customs and Border Patrol official is asking people if they’re triggered when they respond with empathy to the murder of a woman. Laura Loomer, one of the most online gargoyles to ever live, is a serious policy player in administration. The Secretary of War has a video game tattoo.How did we get here? Michael Senters, a PhD candidate at Virginia Tech, is here to explain how online culture became the culture.It’s all for the postsA YouTuber comes to townWhat, exactly, does it mean to be terminally online?The right goes all in on identity politicsThe pandemic drove us all crazyTurns out the post-modernists were correctPosting yourself into a different form or realitySurvival tips for the extremely onlineDepraved art and Hearts of Iron IVDeus Vult?Video games as propagandaWe should have been harder on the online NazisJohn Romero will make you his bitchA brief history of Something AwfulFighting the performance regimeHow Fraud Swamped Minnesota’s Social Services System on Tim Walz’s WatchSix Prosecutors Quit Over Push to Investigate ICE Shooting Victim’s WidowDo you have stairs in your house?Fuck You And Die: An Oral History of Something AwfulSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.