Know Your Enemy

By Mike Nelson

Thursday, July 09, 2026

 

Leading up to the announcement of the disastrous memorandum of understanding with Iran and in the weeks since, President Donald Trump and his Cabinet assured the American people that we should put faith in the value of the agreement because the Iranian leaders with whom we were negotiating were much more reasonable, intelligent, wise, and in every way better than those in power prior to Operation Epic Fury. The administration’s logic was that by killing Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and several of his senior leaders and commanders, we and our Israeli allies allowed more moderate officials to take over, moving the Islamic Republic away from decades of revolution and resistance and toward cooperation with the United States and broader international community.

 

Trump said the regime was now made up of “very rational people and they were nice to deal with. They were strong people, smart people. I think actually they’re smarter than the first and second group. But they’re not radicalized, and they’re, you know, looking to help their country.” Vice President J.D. Vance, in gullible fawning, told Jake Tapper on CNN that the “coolest thing” about the negotiations was witnessing the ideological rebirth of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps—an organization with revolution right there in its name—into statesmen committed to the world order. Treasury Secretary Bessent, channeling Carrie Bradshaw of Sex and the City sitting at her laptop, said, “We did not have regime change, but we changed the regime.” Bessent obviously thought this was a very clever line, as he used the exact phrasing on multiple occasions.

 

Just three days ago, Trump reiterated his belief in the regime’s transformation: “I think the third regime (as he refers to the current leaders of Iran) is more reasonable.” It’s not hard to read these quotes and imagine them coming from Obama adviser Ben Rhodes circa 2015.

 

One could be forgiven, then, for feeling disoriented by the new tone from the president Wednesday in Ankara, Turkey, at the NATO summit. When asked about the same people he had just a few days prior praised for their wisdom, pragmatism, and shared desire to find peace, Trump said, “They’re scum. ... They’re sick people. They’re led by sick people. They’re vicious, violent people.”

 

These comments come in the aftermath of Iran attacking three commercial ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, a clear violation of Iran’s agreement to allow the free flow of maritime traffic. In response, CENTCOM conducted a series of punitive strikes against targets in Iran. The United States has revoked the licenses allowing Iranian oil sales, originally issued as part of the MOU, and Iran targeted U.S. forces throughout the region and against the countries hosting them. The MOU—and the ceasefire it initiated—seems unlikely to endure. When asked on Wednesday if the MOU was still in effect, the president said, “I think it’s over. I don’t want to deal with them anymore.”

 

Trump is correct about the scummy nature of the mullahs and IRGC tyrants ruling Tehran. But the shift in rhetoric isn’t a reflection of actual change in the regime but rather in how he categorizes it. Whether the previous statements about Iran’s new path were based on doe-eyed naiveté or just the latest example of the Trump administration’s dishonest messaging probably varies based on which member of the administration was making them. To paraphrase Dana Carvey in the Saturday Night Live skit “The Arakawa Group,” Some are naïve, some are dishonest, some are naïve and dishonest—I do not wish to generalize.

 

But what is demonstrably true is that in addition to not fully understanding the causes for going to war or what he hoped to achieve, President Trump initiated this conflict without understanding the adversary he was facing. Neither his initial belief that decapitation strikes would result in a new regime, nor his continued belief that the economic and military pain we caused would be sufficient to extract the desired concessions has borne out.

 

In his campaign to coerce Tehran into compliance, he completely misread the motivations and desires of the Iranian regime. This is in part because the president tends to view others as acting the way he acts himself—transactional and generally without a guiding worldview. Solipsism is always a mistake, but especially so if one is a petulant, impulsive decision-maker whose understanding of the situation is about as deep as a paper cut. Trump is amoral whereas the Iranian regime is immoral, but they are immoral actors in the pursuit of long-term goals, enshrined in the Islamic Revolution of 1979. Believing the regime would willingly abandon those goals in exchange for relief from a conflict they’ve demonstrated they are not only willing to endure but willing to escalate is a critical error in the president’s thinking.

 

Despite constant proclamations to the contrary, the United States seems to be the party most eager to achieve a ceasefire. “Iran begged for this ceasefire, and we all know it. As the president Truthed this morning, a big day for world peace,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said at the beginning of a previous ceasefire on April 8. “Iran wants it to happen. They’ve had enough.” Iranian actions show that Hegseth was incorrect. Not only does the regime seem to have been relatively indifferent about ending the conflict, it seems to be wholly unbothered by the prospect of returning to hostilities.

 

While some of the faces on the chain of command chart have changed, the regime is the same government that has led Iran since 1979, the same regime that planned and provoked attacks against Americans in the Middle East and Jews globally, and, importantly for our understanding of their thinking in the current conflict, the same regime that endured hundreds of thousands of military and civilian deaths in their conflict with Iraq. While the commanders who ordered the crackdowns and killings of January 2026 may have been killed, they merely have been replaced by the second-tier leaders who carried those orders out.

 

So where are we now? Even with Trump’s new rhetorical shift, it’s unclear what actions will follow. The president’s statements from Ankara have created more confusion than clarity. He has returned to threats he had made in the past—against Iranian power and civilian infrastructure—threats that have diminished in impact each time he repeats them, to the point they are now perceived as hollow. He has suggested that while he is personally frustrated with the Iranians, he will allow Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to continue the negotiations initiated with the MOU. He has suggested that “we may just do it without a deal” because Iran “lies and cheats.” What it is, and how it will be achieved as though Iran is not a factor, is unclear.

 

Nobody pays to see a one-ball juggler, and a president needs to handle multiple issues at any given time. But President Trump has taken a hands-off approach to the war he initiated and the negotiations to end it, acting almost like a passive observer, at best mildly intrigued to see how things turn out as though he is not the one with the power to try to shape those outcomes. This war, and its resolution, should be the primary focus of his presidency until such a time it is truly concluded.

 

It is well past time for the administration to bring the focus for which the president is so poorly suited. And part of that focus is understanding the adversary sitting across the chessboard from us.