Welcome back to Lucid, and hello to all new subscribers. This Friday, March 27, 1-2pmET, we’ll gather for our weekly Q&A. Paying subscribers will receive a link at 10amET to register for the Zoom meeting. Those who can’t attend will find the video at lucid.substack.com after the event.
Our guest will be Jack El-Hai. He is the New York Times-bestselling author of The Nazi and the Psychiatrist, recently adapted into the major movie Nuremberg, which stars Rami Malek and Russell Crowe, and many other books. We’ll talk about accountability, authoritarian personalities, the legacies of Nazism, and more.
If you’d like to join these stimulating conversations, you can sign up as paying or upgrade to paid here:
The Iran War, Forecasting Incompetence, Degrading Diplomacy
Here is the video of Monday’s conversation with Rep. Jason Crow (D-CO). He is a former Army Ranger and Bronze Star recipient who deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. He serves on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and House Armed Services Committee. He is also a lawyer and advocate for veteran’s rights.
We talked about the risks to national security and the U.S. military due to the Trump administration ignoring protocols and assessments from military, intelligence, national security, and regional experts that normally are a fundamental part of the lead-up to war. I wrote about this last week, in case you missed it:
I also wanted to talk with Rep. Crow because in his capacity as a member of the House Select Committee on Intelligence he had a revealing exchange with Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard about the rationale for the war and the fact that the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader (Ali Khamenei) not only did not bring about regime change, but has created a more volatile situation.
The new head of state, Khamenei’s son Mujtaba, is far more extreme than his father, and has deep connections and loyalty among the Revolutionary Guards that have always been the radicalization engine of the Islamic state.
We spoke about the costs of this war for the American people, and how it is making the country less safe.
Moral and Other Costs for the U.S. Military
As a historian of military coups and other situations in which armed forces are asked to abandon their loyalty to the Constitution and become an instrument of repression of domestic populations, I had to ask Rep. Crow if he was concerned about the fate of the United State military under the Trump presidency.
Rep. Crow was among five Democrat lawmakers (all veterans or national security professionals) who in November 2025 released a powerful video about the costs of obeying illegal orders. It is worth quoting at length:
“We are veterans and national security professionals who love this country and swore an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. That oath lasts a lifetime, and we intend to keep it. No threat, intimidation, or call for violence will deter us from that sacred obligation.
“What’s most telling is that the President considers it punishable by death for us to restate the law. Our service members should know that we have their backs as they fulfill their oath to the Constitution and obligation to follow only lawful orders. It is not only the right thing to do, but also our duty.”
“This is about who we are as Americans. Every American must unite and condemn the President’s calls for our murder and political violence. This is a time for moral clarity. In these moments, fear is contagious, but so is courage. We will continue to lead and will not be intimidated.”
These principled words enraged Trump sufficiently that he accused the lawmakers of "seditious behaviour, punishable by death" (and then claimed that he was not actually threatening them with death).
The integrity and reputation of the U.S. military are at stake, as well as the lives of service members. They are called to fight in a war that had no Congressional discussion or approval, and they are led by an unscrupulous Commander in Chief and a Secretary of Defense who has neither the gravitas nor the experience to handle this situation.
Hegseth as an Example of Engineered Incompetence
As I argued in a Lucid essay of January 2025, autocrats may appoint weak individuals who lack experience and connections to positions of high authority. They do this so those officials will be under their control and are less likely to develop an autonomous power base —something coup-conscious autocrats fear. What they want in a minister or secretary is loyalty and a willingness to repeat their lies and break the law.
Hegseth has all of these qualities, and I predicted he would damage the operational efficiency and reputation of the U.S. military. “How can someone who traffics in conspiracy theories and falsehoods have oversight of military intelligence and lead an organization that depends on reliable information?”
We are already seeing the toll of this syndrome of “engineered incompetence,” and disregard for facts. Hegseth’s aggressive measures against the press tell us he feels no duty to provide accurate information about the war. His duty is to validate the version of reality Trump believes in. .
“We Negotiate with Bombs”: The Degradation of Diplomacy
Hegseth was also chosen because of his scorn for international and democratic norms about human rights, codes of conduct in war, and what he called “stupid rules of engagement.”
This includes an apparent loathing for activities designed to prevent wars: the realm of diplomacy. In 2025 I wrote about the devolution of diplomacy into staged bullying, shakedowns, cover for private deals, and other self-interested practices that counter what diplomacy is supposed to be.
The unfolding of the Iran war confirms that Trump sees diplomacy as a waste of time and compromise as a sign of weakness. We know now that the administration rejected negotiated solutions that would have given the Trump administration a “win.” Instead, they chose violence, bombing rather than signing an agreement to end the conflict.
Now we have Hegseth, the former Fox Business weekend host, supplying the slogan that sums up the authoritarian approach to international relations:
“We negotiate with bombs,” Hegseth declared at a recent press conference.
Remember these words. They link the risks for the U.S. military in continuing to enable this illegal war with a mentality that sees violence as a way of solving differences of opinion, whether at home or on the geopolitical stage. This is the mentality of Fascism, and we all know how the militaries that supported those regimes ended up.
