Ray McGovern

Putin’s trusted aide Vladimir Medinsky leads delegation in Geneva to negotiate with US and Ukraine. Russian Dep. Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin & Kirill Dmitriev also part of US team. Galuzin has just blasted Kyiv for undermining US efforts toward peace.

Why War With Iran is Not Imminent or Inevitable: My Take

Ray McGovern, February 16, 2026

When virtually all guests on Judging Freedom have been saying for months that a US attack on Iran is inevitable, and the moderator says it is not a case of IF but WHEN (as in the title given one show this morning: “Just How Imminent is the Attack on Iran”), it becomes recognizably difficult to “turn the battleship around”, as we used to say. Even if more caution were indicated.

So far today, no one has mentioned:

1— Less than 25 percent of Americans want an attack on Iran, acc to very recent polls;

2— US citizens’ support for Israel has plummeted

3— Trump told Netanyahu to pound sand just five days ago. “I insist on negotiations; I made no new agreements with Netanyahu”

4— Does Trump want to start an unwinnable war just months before the mid-terms? With US body-bags? For Israel?

5— Iran CAN close the Strait of Hormuz; in war circumstances, they probably will.

6— Russia and China have not been given the importance they deserve – far from it. For example … I asked a friend/analyst of China for comment earlier this morning; pls see his take in the following:

The strategic implications for the US are critical. The “maximum pressure” strategy is being bypassed by a “maximum integration” strategy between Tehran, Beijing, and Moscow.

China currently imports 1.4 million barrels a day of Iranian oil. The “Persian Fortress” is a matter of national industrial life for China. As Modern Diplomacy explains, “Beijing views the Mossad’s success in penetrating the Iranian interior as a direct threat to its economic interests and its Belt and Road Initiative.” Moscow is careful to exclude a “mutual defense” commitment to Iran to avoid being dragged into a conventional war. Its technical assistance ensures Iran remains a thorn in the side of Western interests, distracting US resources away from Eastern Europe.

The US strategy of isolating Iran is now a dead-end street.As Joe Kawly explained in an article published by Alhurra, “China enables endurance, not escalation… it helps Iran sustain capability while staying below the threshold that would trigger direct US retaliation.” The US is now faced with a Middle East in which the “Axis of Resistance” is now a technologically buoyant front supported by the world’s second-largest economy. As “round two” approaches, any attack on Iranian territory now faces a wall of Chinese sensors and a Russian alliance that has now gone past the point of no return. The Middle East may have officially lost its uncontested airspace. [Emphasis by RM]

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260210-the-new-axis-of-resistance-sino-russian-technological-buoyancy-in-iran/

Nima & I talk Iran, Ukraine. I give glass-half-full analysis that Trump will continue to “insist” on diplomacy on Iran. Also discuss different roles of military analysts (enemy capabilities) and political analysts (enemy intentions) in light recent history

Australians against genocide are charged by mounted police as President Herzog visits. Consortium News Editor Lauria is on scene w/camera https://x.com/Consortiumnews/status/2020972369381408913. Will there be a suitable “Welcome Committee” to greet Netanyahu when he arrives in DC today? https://consortiumnews.com/2026/02/09/police-attack-anti-herzog-protesters-in-sydney/

Mr. Netanyahu Goes (AGAIN) to Washington – in a rush! Will he try to get Trump to attack Iran? I doubt it this time. Netanyahu wants to hear directly from Trump why he labeled the US-Iran talks in Oman “very good”. Witkoff role on Ukraine also discussed.

Focus was on Iran nuclear, with cameo by the late CIA Iran-Contra operative Dewey Clarridge (indicted on 7 counts of perjury, pardoned by Bush Sr.) in a July 2015 clip. Clarridge: “Saudis already have nuclear bombs, or dibs on them, or access to them” Huh?

February 8, 2026

Has Trump been trumped by large, powerful, resolute Iran?

By Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition, Glen Ellyn, IL

Last June Israel attacked Iran, got blooded bad enough to beg Trump to negotiate a ceasefire. Trump got a reality lesson as well. Iran responded with its own attack to Trump’s one-off strike that did not “obliterate” Iran’s nuclear program, damaging a US base in Qatar. The message was clear. Any all out US attack could bring home hundreds, possibly thousands of US body bags.

Both Iranian responses demonstrate Iran has enormous firepower to both defend any US Israeli attack, but also inflict enormous damage on its attackers. And that damage would not only be to US, Israeli forces, it would shut down the Strait of Hormuz, likely wrecking the US, Israeli; indeed world economy.

Did Trump get the message? At first no. He conspired with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in December to foment violent domestic protests to overthrow the Iranian regime. Trump planned a mid-January attack to push the protesters to victory. But when Iran crushed the protests, Trump backed down once again, realizing a strengthened Iranian regime would repel any attack just like in June.

That has left Trump in an impossible quandary. He’s put the massive US military armada on Iran’s doorstep knowing he cannot possibly succeed without incurring US, Israeli losses. But his credibility is destroyed if he admits defeat and withdraws the US armada.

What to do? Trump’s M.O. when cornered is to set up fake, negotiations with his adversary to buy time and seek trifling concessions so he can claim a complete, overwhelming victory. That won’t work with Iran. His upcoming negotiations with Iran will fail worse than his failed negotiations with Denmark and NATO to gobble up Greenland. Trump’s demands going in are so extreme, essentially guaranteeing end of Iranian sovereignty, they are a non-starter.

Trump is also not the master of his destiny with Iran. He knows Iran poses no threat whatsoever to US interests. But Trump also knows he’s subservient to his Israeli masters who demand he attack Iran to destroy Israel’s last Middle East hegemonic competitor. Even major US casualties could serve Israel’s agenda by forcing Trump launch all out war to avenge those casualties as not dying in vain. It’s even possible that Israel would use their own massive casualties to drop a nuke on Tehran. Once Trump pulls the trigger on his armada installed at Israel’s behest, there is no reversal of the inevitable catastrophe for Middle East peace; possibly world peace.

It was a snap for Trump to bring his military up to Venezuela’s border and slaughter a few hundred folks with boat strikes and outright invasion to score a presidential kidnapping. Bringing that same military up to Iran’s border will be a criminal war too far for Trump. Either he blows up the Middle East, destroying US and Israeli forces along with Iran in a conflict that could go nuclear, or he admits defeat, turns tail and sheds his warrior credibility.

By caving to Israeli demands, Trump has left himself no satisfactory way out. Has he met his match in large, powerful, resolute Iran? Sure looks like it.