This is the moment of reckoning.
This article examines the depth of planning, policy architecture, and long-term strategic vision underpinning the Israel–U.S. alliance in the Middle East – scrutinising its intelligence networks, the critical miscalculations, and the unfolding reality of a conflict in which Iran is gaining ground across multiple fronts.
A 30-Year Doctrine Made Policy
A policy document titled A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm, whose architects were a study group led by American neoconservative Richard Perle, was presented to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 1996. The plan advocated regime change across North Africa and the Middle East. It envisaged the overthrow of seven states. These would be replaced with more compliant governments, aligned with Israeli and American ambitions for dominance and regional hegemony. This would begin with the removal of Saddam Hussein in Iraq as a vital Israeli strategic objective, followed by Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, and Sudan, before concluding with Iran.
Consequently, what we are observing today is not a recent development.
It reflects a long-standing doctrine – systematically weakening powerful regional actors while allowing devolved governance to take their place.
The document asserted that regime change was preferable to engaging in any negotiations with the Arab world. Its objective extended beyond military triumph. It sought a comprehensive geopolitical reconfiguration of the Middle East in Israel’s favour. In several respects, subsequent decades appeared to affirm this logic- from Israel’s vantage point. Perle was formerly associated with the Project for the New American Century, which promoted the 2003 invasion of Iraq following the September 11 attacks, based on inaccurate claims regarding weapons of mass destruction. Although Iraq possessed no such weapons, the objective of removing Saddam Hussein was achieved. It left behind a fractured and fragile state.
The war dismantled Hussein’s government. It dissolved the Baath Party. It destroyed what had once been the most formidable Arab army in the region. For Israel, the strategic implications were profound. Iraq, historically among the few Arab states capable of militarily confronting Israel, ceased to function as a coherent regional power. Prolonged instability followed. Baghdad was left with a precarious political system, struggling to sustain national unity. Across the region, once-powerful Arab nationalist states fragmented into weakened or internally divided entities.
Following September 11th 2001, those who penned ‘Clean Break’ and PNAC principals, Richard Perle alongside Abrams and Dobriansky, moved into positions of direct power in the Bush administration.
To date, Netanyahu’s strategy is in alignment with the policy’s objectives. The pursuit of regime change remains central to the agenda of the Netanyahu- Trump coalition. But recent history delivers a blunt warning: After decades of bloodshed in Afghanistan, the Taliban were replaced by the Taliban.
The FDD and the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA)
In January 2021, when Trump left office, Elliot Abrams (Trump’s special Envoy) established the Vandenberg Coalition as a forum to keep aggressive Zionist foreign policy experts coordinated to advance their strategic agenda.
In its 2025 annual report, the Coalition asserted that it had influenced Trump’s Middle East policy, noting that it was “pleased to see some of our policy recommendations set as the course of action for US policy in the Middle East, including President Trump’s Executive Order ending funding to certain United Nations Organisations, including UNRWA”.
The Vandenberg Coalition’s advisory board is deeply entwined with two of Washington’s most powerful institutions advocating a hardline stance on Iran: the Foundation for Defence of Democracies and the Jewish Institute for National Security of America.
Vandenberg advisory board member, Reuel Marc Gerecht, and senior fellow at FDD, previously served as director of the Middle East Initiative. A former CIA Directorate of Operations officer who targeted Iran, Gerecht has advocated for regime change in Tehran for more than two decades.
Another advisory member, John Hannah, served as Dick Cheney’s national security adviser from 2005 to 2009. Hannah holds various positions as a senior fellow at JINSA, and as senior counsellor at FDD. He has consistently called for regime change in Iran.
The FDD, Vandenberg Coalition, and JINSA have operated jointly on several anti-Iran and Zionist initiatives.
Two Synonymous Wars: Iran v The Global Economy and Israel/America v Regional Regime Change
So far, the tactical military success of the Iranians is evident; Iran reduces American/Israeli conventional military capabilities routinely. Meanwhile, the strategic failure with longer-term consequences for international stability have been evident for the U.S. The first war is one of interceptors, drones, and missiles and Israel’s targeting of Iranian leaders, now entering its fifth week. The U.S has so far failed to fully account for the resilience of the Iranian regime, the way it has dispersed key weapons systems.
Let’s talk about the second parallel war which is playing out across global shipping routes, energy markets, and political leadership circles. In its broader confrontation with the global economy, Iran still holds significant leverage. Tehran’s efforts to disrupt maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz- a critical chokepoint in the world’s energy supply chain – have already caused disruptions and reverberations throughout the international system.
Last week, Trump’s ultimatum to Iran, to fully open the strait within forty-eight hours or suffer attacks on its power plants highlighted the correlation between these two wars
China and Russia’s Support for Iran
Iran supplies 13 percent of China’s oil imports at discounted rates. Since 2021, Iran has been locked into a 25-year cooperation agreement with Beijing, securing $400 billion in oil at below-market prices, in exchange for Chinese investment and security cooperation. Russia, for its part, has relied on Iran as its most significant partner in the region since Western sanctions were imposed in 2014. Both states have supported Tehran for years, financially, militarily, and diplomatically. Their response to the strikes has so far been limited to condemnations of the United States. Nevertheless, China and Russia continue to stand behind Iran.
Gaza and the West Bank
The Knesset includes ministers with a plethora of criminal convictions and extremist ideological positions, these individuals continue its war on children by carpet bombing Gaza and forcibly displacing its population. These actions align with a plan produced by Israel’s Intelligence Ministry shortly after October 7th 2023 and justifications from Biblical statements. However, Israel’s campaign in Gaza did not yield the decisive strategic outcome its leaders had anticipated. Instead, it exposed significant vulnerabilities in both military capability and political standing.
The repercussions extended far beyond Gaza. The onslaught on Gaza deepened divisions within Arab and Muslim societies, particularly between governments aligned with Washington and those opposed to Israeli policy. It also triggered a never seen before- unprecedented surge of global solidarity with Palestinians.
Meanwhile, the ethnic cleansing of the Israeli- occupied West Bank, alongside its de facto annexation, continues to accelerate. Existing settlements are expanding. New ones are being planned. This trajectory corresponds with Mike Huckabee’s – who didn’t even bother to pretend that the United States supports a two-state solution, while continuing to provide weapons, substantial financial assistance, and unwavering political backing to Israel. On stark contrast, many Muslim leaders still speak of a two state solution.
Attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians and their property persist daily. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reports thousands of such incidents involving settlers and soldiers in the West Bank between the beginning of 2024 and April 2025. Over a thousand have resulted in fatalities. The strategic cost of this reputational decline is immense. Military strength depends not only on armaments but also on legitimacy. Once eroded, legitimacy is difficult to restore.
Trump’s erratic messaging
Donald Trump’s messaging has been erratic on timelines and outcomes, reflecting a broader intellectual erosion. At times claiming the war could end within “two to three weeks,” while elsewhere suggesting prolonged escalation or total victory. At the same time, journalists and officials have challenged a number of his claims about the war’s success, including assertions that Iran’s nuclear capabilities had been “obliterated.” During public address and interviews, Trump has reduced geopolitical realities to simplistic narratives. Moreover, his stated objectives have shifted repeatedly, from suggestions of regime change, to denying such intentions, to implying it had effectively already been achieved.
This pattern of contradiction, exaggeration and has reinforced a growing perception that Trump is a weak leader who frequently lies in order to strive for perceived strength.
Despite the depth of preparation, planning, and institutional backing attributed to Washington, this groundwork has done little to produce what it had intended in execution.
The coalition’s fundamental error lay in assuming that a strategy reminiscent of the 2003 Iraq invasion would yield a similar outcome in a vastly different context.
That assumption ignored both the lessons of Iraq- where initial military success gave way to long-term strategic failure and even strengthened Iran’s regional position, and the distinct nature of Iran itself.
In war, strategic discipline and intellectual chess-playing are indispensable, and what has emerged from the coalition so far, has ceded both the narrative and operational advantage to Iran, a reality increasingly reflected in the trajectory of the war.
