A brief multi-decade strategy recap:

Europe’s core strategy was to rely on American defense, Russian commodities, and investments in China’s clean energy revolution in hopes of achieving economic growth and reducing global carbon emissions. [It achieved neither.]

Iran’s strategy was to use violence and subversion to unite and ultimately lead the Muslim world. It was to invest heavily enough in its military over the course of decades to deter foreign aggression and wipe out its adversaries. [It achieved the opposite.]

China’s strategy was to achieve global political dominance by building an economic model based on non-economically viable infrastructure investments (at home and abroad), to mark losses in those bad investments at zero, to hide its economic data from public scrutiny, to silence any dissent about this approach, and to commit itself fully toward a new economic model that depends on growing non-economically viable exports fast enough to keep outrunning its growing pile of non-viable debt. [Too soon to tell, but it has the press fooled.]

The United States strategy was to lean into its strengths as a financial, economic, technological, agricultural, military and now energy superpower in a way that is encouraging of self-reflection, experimentation, reallocation, and therefore ultimatley course correction over time. [Still a 6x superpower. Still course-correcting]

I realize it’s quite fashionable to describe America itself as a failure, one without a coherent strategy, and one whose relevance and power is clearly in terminal decline.

I realize it’s fashionable to see Europe as wise, Iran as strategically successful, and China as inevitably dominant.

I also realize it’s possible to simultaneously despise Donald Trump (as I do) and still see why this consensus assessment is nonsense.

America course corrects. Slowly, sloppily, and reluctantly, but it nevertheless does so faster, more willingly, and more completely than anybody else.

I believe this is because it’s so very acceptable for us to say to each other why we’re failing. We’re confident enough to do that and follow through.

It’s why we grill our own sacred cows so often. It’s why we do it with such gusto.

We tried Europe’s energy model for a little while. Then we grilled it. We tried dependence on China for a while and now were grilling it. We tried 20 year boots on the ground nation building experiments and it’s clear to me we’ve grilled it. If you think a stand-off war with Iran is a mistake, take comfort in the fact that some 70% of Americans fervently agree with you. We’ll grill it and move on.

This is not so true in these three other polities.

Course correction is the secret ingredient. We’re so keen on self-criticism we even do it when we’re succeeding. It’s how we learn.

Iran doesn’t change that, in my view. It reconfirms it.