Editor’s note: In this Future View, students discuss the war in Iran. Next week we’ll ask: “Do you think society still views owning a home as essential for achieving the American Dream? Why or why not?” Students should click here to submit opinions of fewer than 250 words by March 16. The best responses will be published Tuesday night.
What the War Has Taught Us
The war in Iran has reaffirmed several truths about global politics. First, the U.S. remains the world’s pre-eminent military power. From the capture of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro to the decapitation of Iran’s theocracy, the U.S. military has demonstrated again and again its professionalism and precision.
Second, U.S. military success requires allied support. The United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and other Arab powers, along with Israel and U.S. bases in the region, have been the targets of Iran’s retaliation. Sure enough, the fall of Iran’s revolutionary regime will yield strategic benefits for these countries. But it’s no trivial matter that their leaders, presumably despite pressure from their own populations, are willing to share in the burden of the U.S.-Israel operation.
Third, China and Russia are unreliable patrons. In January, Beijing, Moscow and Tehran formed a trilateral security pact for deepened diplomatic, economic and security cooperation. But just as Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin failed to prevent Mr. Maduro’s capture, they have thus far proved helpless in sustaining the Iranian regime’s leaders in the face of overwhelming U.S. and allied military might.
If Iran emerged from the conflict a more Western-friendly power, this would create the conditions for broader Mideast peace and stability. Washington could then redouble its focus on the Indo-Pacific. President Trump would cement his status as among the most consequential presidents in U.S. history. And the current campaign will have proved justified.
—Cheney Wen, Yale University, law
What’s the Plan?
Only the most committed anti-American apologists would fail to cheer the fall of Iran’s autocratic regime—one that has chanted “Death to America” for decades, suppressed dissent and sponsored terrorism across the Middle East. But this sentiment is almost immediately replaced by anxiety among my peers: Is there an actual plan?
So far, we’ve seen little indication that the administration’s strategy extends meaningfully beyond toppling Iran’s longtime government. My generation grew up watching America learn that lesson the hard way in Iraq. It’s difficult to imagine that forcibly collapsing the government of a multiethnic sectarian state of nearly 100 million people produces anything more than a power vacuum. Our generation will inherit whatever fills it.
If this succeeds, and Iran makes the transition to a democratic or friendly government, it would be among the greatest foreign-policy triumphs in modern American history. But if it descends into chaos or a new oppressive regime, President Trump—who savaged George W. Bush on a debate stage in 2016 for exactly this kind of adventurism—will find history returning the favor. We aren’t asking for miracles, Mr. President. We’re asking for competence.
—Alexander Skowronski, Boston College, mathematics and economics
This Was Long Overdue
I’m no neocon warmonger, but bombs away, Mr. President. In 1979 Iranian students broke into the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days. Many of these same students joined the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which actively promotes and funds terrorist organizations threatening the existence of Israel, a key democratic ally, and all U.S. interests in the region. The regime openly supports groups such as Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis.
For 47 years, the Iranian regime has threatened global security, and the U.S. is justified in its response. The regime has declared war on the world and democracy, including on Israel, the closest target. The former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in 2015 said that Israel wouldn’t survive the next 25 years.
The threat isn’t theoretical: Iran has been the primary financier of groups that carried out more than 180 attacks against U.S. forces in the Middle East between 2023 and 2024. The cost of inaction, measured in proxy warfare, undermined democracies and American security, is too great a risk. Pre-emptive military action against the regime isn’t aggression. It’s a necessary response.
—Anna Broussard, Hillsdale College, politics
Not So ‘America First’
This isn’t an “America first” foreign policy. Throughout his political career, Donald Trump has defined that term to entail no new foreign military engagements. “America first” was billed as a foil to the war in Iraq, which was fought to change that country’s regime and prevent the use of “weapons of mass destruction.” Yet in going to war against Iran, Mr. Trump has invoked those two reasons. It’s a contradiction at best, and hypocrisy at worst.
The situation would have been different if Iran were planning an imminent armed attack against the U.S., but there’s no evidence to suggest this was the case. Mr. Trump previously said that Iran’s potential to build a nuclear weapon had been terminated by the much-touted B-2 bombers during Operation Midnight Hammer last June. Did Mr. Trump mislead us about that operation?
There’s one clear beneficiary in this conflict: Israel. The U.S. is helping the Jewish state take out its biggest regional threat, which has targeted it for years. Yet whatever the strength of our alliance, we shouldn’t be fighting Israel’s war. It costs American lives, American dollars and American credibility with no clear net benefit to the U.S. Many conservatives were already reconsidering the American alliance with Israel. This war gives them yet another reason to do so.
—Arjun Singh, George Washington University, law
America Actually Did Something
For too long, U.S. presidents and other politicians have offered peace deals that brought no real change. Some 32,000 innocent lives were taken by the Iranian regime this year in the span of a few days, according to human-rights monitors—not including the tens of thousands of Iranians the regime has locked away. The world watched this massacre happen and barely offered support until Operation Epic Fury. This tragedy, coupled with the ayatollah’s obsession with nuclear weapons, ultimately justified the American intervention.
Iran has contributed to significant violence around the world. The regime supports terrorist proxies that attack America. It supplies China with oil. It arms Russia with drones. This war isn’t only about the Middle East. It’s also about global order. Without oil from Venezuela or Iran, China will be forced to pay the global price for oil. Without Iranian help, Russia’s slow production of drones and missiles would create a noticeable dent in Moscow’s military abilities.
This war provides an opportunity for potential regime change. That would be a blessing for the world, and it would give some well-deserved peace to the Middle East. For that chance, this war is worth the risk.
—Bobby Nelcoski, University of Miami, finance
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