Washington Merry-Go-Round

IMMEDIATE RELEASE 24 July 2026
WASHINGTON MERRY-GO-ROUND
Today’s Events in Historical Perspective
America’s Longest-Running Column, Founded 1932
He will call it Hegseth’s War
By Douglas Cohn and Eleanor Clift         
                                        
WASHINGTON – The war with Iran is not going well. It was supposed to be over in five or six weeks, and instead it is looking like another forever war. The president is in a no-win situation, and when he finally bails, as we suspect he will, he will be looking to blame somebody for getting him into this mess.
It is the way Washington works. Someone’s head will roll. And the Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, who calls himself Secretary of War, is the likely candidate to bear the brunt of the war’s failure.
The former Fox News weekend host is not a popular figure in and around the Pentagon. The flag officers despise him. He has fired over two dozen of them and stopped promotions of women and people of color.
Four more American soldiers lost their lives in this questionable venture. Two of them were women, whose presence in today’s military Hegseth has taken every opportunity to belittle and mock.
He is not popular with the MAGA base and its mostly isolationist views. Trump liked him because he looked good on television, and he stuck with him through a rocky confirmation hearing that included a sexual assault charge settled for a lot of money, and reports of excessive drinking.
There was early pressure to get him out after a classified call discussing military strikes was on a phone call open to a journalist. Trump backed him then, but in the end with Trump, loyalty only works in one direction, and Hegseth is the perfect fall guy.
There is no constituency out there cheering for him. The generals and admirals whom he has disrespected and questioned their loyalty find him immature and performative. He is playing at being a tough-guy soldier, ordering everyone over 30 to have their testosterone levels tested.
Trump got into the war with Iran at the behest of Israeli president Netanyahu, who made the case for attacking a weakened Iranian regime with the premise that it would collapse. The Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad, is highly regarded, but its predictions of success were called “farcical” by Trump’s CIA chief, John Ratcliffe.
Vice President Vance called the war “a bad idea,” but told Trump he would back him if he proceeded. What we know of Hegseth’s role is that he gave the orders that he knew Trump wanted, and it is on him – as it is on Trump himself – that they entered the war with no clear strategy.
The First Principle of War is the “objective” – an attainable objective – and the Trump/Hegseth team had more of what you could charitably call a wish list.
As the war unfolded and Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz, crippling the global economy, the media wanted to know who advised Trump and whether they anticipated what Iran would do.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Caine, as any military leader would, gave military options for what Trump wanted to accomplish, but the political decisions and expectations that flowed from that were up to the civilian political leadership.
Hegseth gave the orders to carry out what Trump intended, and we assume he did this without questioning Trump. Now that the bill is coming due for a war of choice that is failing, Hegseth had to come before Congress to ask for money to cover the $37.5 billion cost so far.
Members of both parties are not happy. Republicans know they will be judged harshly in the November midterms for funding a deeply unpopular war, while Democrats feel powerless to stop what they believe is a failed war.
When Michigan Senator Peters pressed Hegseth on how he would end the war, Hegseth accused the Democrat of “smearing the troops” when he said the war was a failure. “You sir, are the failure – not the men and women who are on that front line,” Peters responded.
Somebody must be blamed, and Trump never blames Trump. So, Hegseth is the perfect fall guy for what Trump is sure to call Hegseth’s War. He will not be missed.
 
See Eleanor Clift’s book Selecting a President, and Douglas Cohn’s latest books The President’s First Year: The Only School for Presidents Is the Presidency and World War 4: Nine Scenarios (endorsed by seven flag officers).
Twitter:  @douglas_cohn
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END WASHINGTON MERRY-GO-ROUND