On Friday night, Britain, France, and the U.S. launched an attack on facilities connected to Syria’s chemical weapons program. While the move may have helped somewhat to restore America’s damaged credibility, argues John Hannah, it is a far cry from a prudent and coherent approach to Syria—or a deterrent to Bashar al-Assad:

[T]he United States could have sent far more powerful messages to the Syrian government’s key military and intelligence power nodes of the risks they run to their own survival through mindless obedience to Assad’s genocidal criminality. Ditto the Russians and Iranians, and the realization that their failure to rein in the most psychotic tendencies of their client could substantially raise the costs and burdens of their Syrian venture if they’re not careful. In short, everything the United States wanted to do with the strike—hold Assad accountable, re-establish deterrence against the use of chemical weapons, send a message to the Russians and Iranians about the price to be paid for failing to control their client, and move toward a credible political settlement—could have been done more effectively, at acceptable risk, with a significantly larger strike.

More fundamentally, I have deep concerns about what appears to be the president’s emerging strategy in Syria. It amounts to defeating Islamic State, deterring the use of chemical weapons, and then withdrawing U.S. forces as quickly as possible from eastern Syria. As for the more strategically significant menace posed to vital U.S. interests by an aspiring Iranian hegemon seeking to dominate the Middle East’s northern tier, drive the United States out of the region, and destroy Israel, the administration’s strategy is not particularly compelling. As best as one can tell from the president’s recent statements—including the one he made on Friday night announcing the Syria strike—it amounts to encouraging some combination of regional allies (and perhaps Russia) to fill the vacuum the United States leaves behind.

That kind of abdication of U.S. leadership rarely works out well. . . . The president is right [that] the Middle East is a deeply troubled place. There are no great victories to be won there. There is no glory to be gained. Just worse disasters to be avoided, threats contained, and important national interests preserved. Yes it is imperative that the United States does so smartly, prudently, by, with, and through local partners and multilateral coalitions, using all instruments of national power, and in a way that sustains the understanding and support of the American people. But do so the country must. Packing its bags and vacating the playing field to the likes of Russia, Iran, and Hizballah is escapism masquerading as strategy.

If Iran succeeds in obtaining nuclear weapons, the war in Gaza, let alone the protests on college campuses, will seem like a minor complication. Jonathan Schachter fears that this danger could be much more imminent than decisionmakers in Jerusalem and Washington believe. In his view, Israel seems to be repeating the mistake that allowed it to be taken by surprise on Simchat Torah of 2023 and Yom Kippur of 1973: putting too much faith in an intelligence concept that could be wrong.

Israel and the United States apparently believe that despite Iran’s well-documented progress in developing capabilities necessary for producing and delivering nuclear weapons, as well as its extensive and ongoing record of violating its international nuclear obligations, there is no acute crisis because building a bomb would take time, would be observable, and could be stopped by force. Taken together, these assumptions and their moderating impact on Israeli and American policy form a new Iran concept reminiscent of its 1973 namesake and of the systemic failures that preceded the October 7 massacre.

Meanwhile, most of the restrictions put in place by the 2015 nuclear deal will expire by the end of next year, rendering the question of Iran’s adherence moot. And the forces that could be taking action aren’t:

The European Union regularly issues boilerplate press releases asserting its members’ “grave concern.” American decisionmakers and spokespeople have created the unmistakable impression that their reservations about the use of force are stronger than their commitment to use force to prevent an Iranian atomic bomb. At the same time, the U.S. refuses to enforce its own sanctions comprehensively: Iranian oil exports (especially to China) and foreign-currency reserves have ballooned since January 2021, when the Biden administration took office.

Israel’s response has also been sluggish and ambiguous. Despite its oft-stated policy of never allowing a nuclear Iran, Israel’s words and deeds have sent mixed messages to allies and adversaries—perhaps inadvertently reinforcing the prevailing sense in Washington and elsewhere that Iran’s nuclear efforts do not present an exigent crisis.