Podcasts · John Mearsheimer - Offensive Realism

Origins of the War In Ukraine | Episode 1

30 Jul 2026 · 37 min · S1 E1

In today’s episode I’ll explain why I believe a US victory is not possible and why the longer Trump waits to cut a deal with Iran, the worse the outcome for the US. I’ll argue that Trump would have been wise to settle the war months ago, after the initial bombing campaign failed. Instead, he kept looking for some way to win the war or at least find an off ramp that would allow him to make the case that the US achieved some of its goals and did not walk away from the fight empty-handed. But that search is a futile enterprise. There is no war-winning strategy available to him. ———————————————————— CHAPTERS 0:00 Introduction 0:33 The Current Situation in Iran 0:44 Overview of the Episode 2:47 The Four Goals of the US 6:17 The June 17 Memorandum of Understanding: A Surrender Document 9:18 Why Did our Strategies Fail? 9:51 The Five Possible Military Strategies 10:30 Strategy 1: The Discriminate Air Campaign 11:51 Strategy 2: The Indiscriminate Air Campaign 12:35 Strategy 3: Tit-for-Tat 13:07 Strategy 4: The Naval Blockade 13:26 Strategy 5: The Land Option 13:57 What the US Actually Did: The Timeline 18:35 Signing the MoU, Then Violating It 22:46 Why the Three Strategies Failed 36:20 Where We Are: America Has Lost 38:46 What Trump Must Do Now 40:31 The Iranians Hold the Cards 41:13 Summary & Conclusions ———————————————————— MUSIC "The Ice Giants" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Music modified (edited/remixed) from the original.