We can't take care of daycares, Medicaid, Medicare. We have to take care of one thing: war.
Two days after returning from Beijing with no resolution on Iran, the Trump administration moved deeper into war planning — reviewing options that include ground troop deployment and, by some signals, nuclear weapons. The war has already claimed over three thousand Iranian lives and destroyed eighty-one thousand civilian structures, yet none of its stated objectives have been met. In the oldest of imperial patterns, the response to failure is not reflection but escalation, and the costs — measured in lives, in dollars, in the price of bread and gasoline — are falling on ordinary people on all sides.
- The US and Israel are conducting their most intensive military preparations since the ceasefire, with renewed strikes potentially days away and ground troop deployment under serious Pentagon review.
- Trump amplified the threat with AI-generated imagery of invasion maps and nuclear explosions, while warning Iran publicly that 'there will be nothing left of them' — signals that crossed from rhetoric into strategic declaration.
- Establishment voices like Senator Lindsey Graham and Wall Street Journal contributors are openly calling for attacks on Iranian energy infrastructure and a multi-stage ground operation to collapse the Iranian state.
- The war's economic shockwaves are already fracturing domestic life — gasoline above four-fifty a gallon, vegetables up forty-four percent, and a trillion-dollar price tag projected — while Trump told reporters he does not think about Americans' financial situation.
- Labor unrest is spreading in direct response to the cost-of-living crisis: rail workers in New York, auto workers in Michigan, and others are striking or authorizing strikes, linking the defense of living standards to the question of war itself.
Two days after returning from a state visit to China — one marked by public warmth with Xi Jinping but no agreement on Iran — President Trump's administration was already deep in war planning. The New York Times reported that US and Israeli forces were conducting their most intensive military preparations since the ceasefire, with renewed attacks potentially beginning within days. No diplomatic resolution had emerged from Beijing. The silence spoke for itself.
The war's toll was already staggering: more than three thousand Iranians dead, eighty-one thousand civilian structures destroyed. Yet none of the stated American objectives had been achieved. The Iranian government stood. Its military remained intact. The Strait of Hormuz was not under American control. The response to this failure was not reassessment — it was escalation.
On Sunday, Trump convened his national security team and posted to Truth Social that Iran had better move "FAST, or there will be nothing left of them," accompanying the message with AI-generated imagery of invasion arrows converging on a Middle Eastern map. Other recent posts showed him at a command console with mushroom-cloud explosions on the screen above — an unmistakable signal that nuclear options were being considered. Pentagon planners, according to the Times, were reviewing ground troop deployment, acknowledging in their own language "significant risk of casualties."
The political class offered no brake. Senator Lindsey Graham called for strikes on Iranian energy infrastructure. Democrats on the Sunday programs focused not on opposing the war but on condemning Trump for being insufficiently aggressive toward China. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer warned against "betraying Taiwan." The machinery of escalation had no meaningful opposition within Washington.
The costs were landing hardest on working people. Fresh vegetable prices had risen forty-four percent on an annualized basis. Gasoline averaged four dollars and fifty-one cents nationally. Brent crude had climbed roughly fifty percent since the war began. The Pentagon acknowledged twenty-nine billion dollars spent — not counting damage to American bases — while one economist projected total costs reaching one trillion dollars. Asked about Americans' financial struggles, Trump said simply: "I don't think about the financial situation of Americans."
The strain was producing ruptures. Long Island Rail Road workers struck for the first time since 1994, paralyzing the nation's busiest commuter line. Auto workers in Michigan rejected contract offers and moved toward strikes. The authorization votes were nearly unanimous. The cost-of-living crisis generated by the war had become the immediate cause of labor unrest — and the connection between the struggle for wages and the struggle against war was becoming harder to ignore.
Two days after stepping off the plane from Beijing, President Trump's administration was already deep in the machinery of war planning. The New York Times reported on Friday that the United States and Israel were conducting their most intensive military preparations since the ceasefire took hold, with the possibility of renewed attacks on Iran beginning as soon as the following week. The timing was stark: Trump had just completed his first presidential visit to China in nearly a decade, a state visit marked by public gestures of goodwill with Xi Jinping, yet no public agreement emerged on resolving the Iranian crisis, no official statement was issued.
What the war had already cost was immense and visible. More than three thousand Iranians were dead. Eighty-one thousand civilian structures lay in ruins. Yet the United States had achieved none of its stated objectives. The Iranian government remained in place. The Iranian military had not been weakened. American forces did not control the Strait of Hormuz. The failure was becoming undeniable, and the response was to escalate.
On Sunday, Axios reported that Trump planned to convene his national security team in the Situation Room on Tuesday to discuss resuming combat operations. The meeting would follow a Saturday session at Trump's golf club in Virginia, attended by Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, and Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff. That same Sunday evening, after a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump posted to Truth Social: "For Iran, time is running out and they better get moving, FAST, or there will be nothing left of them." He accompanied the message with an AI-generated image of a Middle Eastern map overlaid with the American flag, red arrows pointing toward Iran from all directions—a visual suggestion of ground invasion.
Trump had posted other images in recent days. One showed him pressing a red button at a command console, mushroom-shaped explosions displayed on a screen above. The signal was unmistakable: he was considering nuclear weapons against Iran. According to the Times, Pentagon options under review included deploying American ground troops inside Iran—an operation that would carry, in the Pentagon's own language, "significant risk of casualties."
The pressure to resume attacks came from multiple quarters. Seth Cropsey, a former deputy assistant secretary of the Navy under Reagan and George H.W. Bush, published an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal titled "How to Finish the Job in Iran." He argued that Trump must "follow through on the threat of disproportionate force. This means preparing for a multi-stage operation, including ground troop deployment, that forcibly reopens the Strait of Hormuz to accelerate the collapse of the Iranian state." Cropsey laid bare the economic stakes: if oil remained around one hundred fifty dollars a barrel for the rest of the year, inflation would accelerate, supply chains for key industries would fracture. Trump had a limited window, Cropsey wrote, to resolve this crisis favorably and secure economic recovery while protecting American interests and prestige. But that required deploying the full spectrum of American power.
On the Sunday morning talk shows, Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Trump's most prominent foreign policy ally, called for renewed bombing of Iran's energy infrastructure. "What President Trump has done militarily has been amazing," Graham said. "But there are still more targets. And there are things we can do to cause damage. Energy infrastructure is their weak point. If we go back into battle, I would put energy first." The Democratic Party offered no opposition to the planned escalation. Instead, Democrats appearing on the Sunday programs devoted most of their foreign policy remarks to condemning what they saw as Trump's insufficiently belligerent stance toward China at the Beijing summit. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer declared: "For the sake of democracy and global economic stability, Trump must not betray Taiwan."
The war was already reshaping American life. Fresh vegetable prices had risen more than forty-four percent on an annualized basis over the previous three months. The national average price of gasoline stood at four dollars and fifty-one cents per gallon. Brent crude had climbed roughly fifty percent since the war began. When asked about the financial situation facing Americans, Trump told reporters at the White House this month: "I don't think about the financial situation of Americans." At an Easter lunch at the White House on April first, he had been more explicit: "We can't take care of daycares, Medicaid, Medicare, all these individual things. We have to take care of one thing: military protection. We are at war." The Pentagon comptroller, Jay Hurst, admitted to Congress the previous week that the war had already cost twenty-nine billion dollars—a figure that did not include damage to American bases. Harvard policy economist Linda Bilmes told Fortune in April that she was confident the total cost would reach one trillion dollars.
Meanwhile, the domestic fractures were widening. Approximately thirty-five hundred workers at the Long Island Rail Road walked off the job at midnight on Friday, paralyzing the busiest commuter railroad in the United States in its first strike since nineteen ninety-four. Thirteen hundred United Auto Workers members at Nexteer Automotive in Saginaw, Michigan, had rejected two contract offers in six weeks and were pushing the union to call an immediate strike. A thousand UAW members at American Axle in Three Rivers, Michigan, voted ninety-eight percent on May twelfth to authorize a strike when their contract expired on May thirty-first. The immediate trigger for these labor actions was the cost-of-living crisis generated by the war. The defense of workers' living standards had become inseparable from the struggle against war itself.
Citas Notables
For Iran, time is running out and they better get moving, FAST, or there will be nothing left of them.— Trump, posted to Truth Social after call with Netanyahu
Energy infrastructure is their weak point. If we go back into battle, I would put energy first.— Senator Lindsey Graham, on Meet the Press
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why does Trump keep posting these images—the red button, the invasion map? Why not just make the decision quietly?
Because the images do political work. They signal resolve to his base, they intimidate Iran, they prepare the American public psychologically for what's coming. The posts are part of the machinery of escalation.
But he's already at war. What's the difference between what's happening now and what he's threatening?
Scale, mainly. The current operations have failed to achieve their stated goals. Ground invasion is a different order of commitment—it means American soldiers dying, not just Iranian civilians. It means the war becomes undeniable at home.
The Democrats aren't opposing this. Why?
Because they see the real enemy as China, not Iran. They think Trump is distracted. They want him to be more aggressive toward Beijing, not less aggressive toward Tehran. The war itself isn't the problem for them—the target is.
Three thousand dead, eighty-one thousand buildings destroyed, and nothing achieved. How does that lead to more war, not less?
Because failure in imperial projects often triggers escalation, not retreat. The prestige of American power is now tied to Iranian collapse. Backing down looks like weakness. So the only way forward, in their logic, is to go deeper.
What about the workers striking? Does that matter?
It matters enormously. The war is pricing people out of food and gas. The strikes are the first visible crack in the consensus. If labor organizing spreads, if it connects explicitly to opposition to the war, that becomes the real constraint on what Trump can do.
So this story isn't really about Iran at all?
It's about Iran, but it's also about American power, American money, and American workers. The three are tangled together now. You can't understand the war without understanding the strikes.