This is F%$#ing Insane

Former Biden National Security Council staffer Jacob Stokes is calling for military strikes on Chinese data centers to prevent the PRC from eclipsing the United States on AI.

This guy has drunk so many flavors of Kool Aid, possibly some laced with LSD, that it buggers the mind.

While American tech billionaires fret over the capabilities of Chinese AI, one national security advisor has a brilliant idea to flatten the competition: simply bomb their data centers to smithereens.

In a new report titled “Superpowers and AGI,” former Obama-era national security official Jacob Stokes calls for United States to begin preparing readiness drills in response to Chinese AI development — up to and including military strikes on the nation’s data centers, the South China Morning Post reported.

AGI, or artificial general intelligence, refers to the theoretical point at which an AI model achieves human, or superhuman, levels of reasoning and intelligence. Though the science is still out on whether such a system is even possible, Stokes’ report begins from the assumption that AGI is inevitable, and that if the US can’t get to it first, its military needs to prepare to take drastic action.

Referring to the US as a hypothetical “laggard state” behind China’s achievement of AGI, Stokes — now the deputy director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, a prominent DC think tank — writes that the country could “try to sabotage the leading state’s AGI systems, either through physical infiltration or offensive cyber operations; that is, cyberattack.”

 How do idiots like this secure comfortable sinecures at think tanks?

Not a Good Look

Click to embiggen







I am referring, of course, to CVN-72, the USS Abraham Lincoln, which has arrived in Laem Chabang, Thailand looking like an extra from the zombie film 28 Days Later.

No wonder crewmen were literately throwing themselves into the ocean. 

The U.S. Navy’s supercarrier USS Abraham Lincoln is now in Thailand for a much-deserved and highly publicized liberty port call. The carrier had gone 286 days without making such a stop, with much of that time spent executing grueling combat operations against Iran. The ship has been run very hard, relying on at times a rickety conveyor of sea replenishments to continue operating for months on end, and it has the scars to show for it. The Lincoln looks very much worse for wear, with so-called “running rust” and algae caked all along the sides of the hull, as well as around the edges of the flight deck and sponsons on either side. It’s something of a startling appearance for one of the most powerful ships on the planet and a major symbol of U.S. power projection, but it is also a reminder of what the vessel and its crew have endured for months on end.

The Lincoln arrived in the Thai port of Laem Chabang earlier today. The carrier did make a stop in Guam in December 2025 and reportedly made another one somewhere in the Middle East in July. However, in both cases, these have been characterized as brief logistical stopovers that did not offer any real opportunity for personnel onboard to disembark. Thai media reports say the carrier is expected to remain in Laem Chabang through the end of the weekend.

Great Googly Moogly!

Pakistan Said This?

While there have been recent movement toward China over the past few years, Pakistan has been in the pocket of the United States.

Not any more, it seems, because Pakistan has stated that it is not bound by unilateral US sanctions against Iran.

Pakistan said it is not “obliged to” comply with unilateral sanctions on Iran unless they are imposed by the United Nations, signaling a willingness to continue trade after the US warned of economic penalties against countries doing business with Tehran.

Islamabad is following bilateral agreements with Iran and while trade between the two neighbors remains robust, “there is a desire to expand,” Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Tahir Andrabi said at a weekly briefing Thursday.

Pakistan relied on its ties with Iran to negotiate the release of oil tankers early on during the conflict. The two countries have also agreed to Pakistan, Iran Agree on Completing Free Trade Agreement Soon a Pakistan, Iran Businessmen Aim to Boost Trade to $10 Billion to increase bilateral commerce by more than threefold to $10 billion. 

Pakistan has been trying to balance its relations with the US and Iran during the war. The country has strengthened its ties with the US during President Donald Trump’s second term, particularly after emerging as a key mediator between Tehran and Washington.

Last week, Pakistan’s army chief was in Iran as part of negotiations to end the Middle East conflict after tensions flared up again.

Iran won the war, and there are consequences of this. 

Speaking of Political Malpractice………

Trump's disastrous and incompetent Iran adventure is deeply unpopular, and it's getting less popular by the day, but the Democratic Party establishment (There is no Democratic Party establishment) refuses to come out against the war.

To quote (not) Tallyrand, "This is worse than a crime, this is a mistake." 

There’s definitely something uncanny about this: We’re five months and 10 days into Donald Trump’s war of choice with Iran, and it’s been about five months and five days since he lost it. Trump won’t end the war because he can’t accept terms that make clear how badly he fucked this up, and we’re all captive to his narcissism. The result is that U.S. credibility is in tatters. Everyone’s mad at us for creating a global energy crisis, and rightly so. Nobody trusts Trump to honor his word, because he’s a liar. Nobody trusts him to make good on his threats, because he makes them endlessly but never follows through. He’s depleted U.S. munitions stockpiles badly enough to leave service members, and allies that rely on our preparedness, vulnerable to adversaries.

It’s a cockup of world historic proportions. And yet… it’s often not among Trump’s biggest day-to-day political liabilities. The war is slow-bleeding support from the GOP. But there are no sustained calls for Trump to resign in disgrace, or face impeachment, or any consequences that match the scale of the failure. And yet we know, because we weren’t born yesterday, that presidents and cabinet officials have been mired in damaging controversy for much smaller military blunders. Remember Barack Obama’s redline in Syria? Or Benghazi?

………

What do you think would happen to Democratic Party approval ratings if Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries wrote up an agenda like the one I proposed here, including a promise that if Democrats win the election, they’ll defund Trump’s war against Iran? Would they go up or down?

What if they were able to communicate, unabashedly, that Trump had humiliated America. That through his own foolishness, megalomania, and dishonesty, he had made the United States seem weak and feckless to the world. That this is, for the pendency of his regime, a disaster for U.S. strategic power—but also that it’s fundamentally aberrant. Something Democrats will set right once Trump is gone.

What if Democrats told the electorate, but also the world, that American renewal could begin early, but only if voters gave Democrats enough power to dog walk Trump to the end of his term. No more threats to invade or occupy enemies or allies on a lark. No more denial about the failure of his foreign policy. He might serve his last two years in full—Republicans could still ensure his acquittal on impeachment—but he’d be muzzled and on a tight leash?

People are disinclined to vote for careerist coward hypocrites.

Of Course He Did

Benjamin Netanyahu rejected Trump's peace plan for Gaza because even the illusion of peace will result in his losing power and going to jail for corruption.

It's really that simple. 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected US President Donald Trump's 15-point plan for Gaza, stating that no military pull-out will happen until Hamas is "genuinely" disarmed.

Trump's Board of Peace said last month it had reached an agreement for the "complete disarmament" of Hamas and other armed groups in Gaza.

But Hamas said handing over its heavy weapons was contingent on Israel ending "all forms of aggression" and withdrawing its forces from Gaza.

On Sunday, a senior Board of Peace official insisted the US-backed peace plan for the territory remained the only way forward.

Israel has continued to carry out strikes on Gaza since agreeing to an initial ceasefire in the territory last October.

"Israel rejects the 15-point document," Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting on Sunday.

This is what happens when a leader is convinced that a loss of power will result in their incarceration.

This applies to Donald Trump as well. 

Sub Hed of the Day

In an article noting that Iran seems to be spending a significant amount of resources attempting to blast Amazon warehouses and data centers off the map in the Middle East, we have the sub hed, the line between the headline and the byline saying, "That's one way to deal with data centers."

I like that framing.

There’s data center activism, fought with Facebook groups and petitions, and then there’s data center annihilation, fought with guided missile and suicide drones.

Recently, the Iranian military announced it had hit and damaged two Amazon data centers in the island country of Bahrain with a volley of cruise missiles.

After the attack, the Iranian state media outlet Tasnim published a partial statement from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, saying that the “IRGC Aerospace warriors… in response to the aggression and assault… by the child-killing American army on the under-construction and civilian facilities of DarKhoveyn, attacked and destroyed the central data infrastructure of the American company Amazon in Bahrain with several cruise missiles.”

Using images from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel-2 satellites, Bloomberg confirmed an attack on the data center campus had taken place, though noted it’s difficult to say how bad the damage is (Amazon refused to comment on Bloomberg‘s reporting.)

I do not approve of this war, nor do I approve of Iran's theocratic regime, but if they expanded their target list to include Flock Cameras, I would be more receptive to their ideas.

Just saying. 

Gee, You Think?

Iran has struck a number of clandestine CIA sites in the Persian Gulf area recently, leading some to wonder if Russia is providing targeting information to Tehran. 

Gee, you think?

The US has been providing extensive real-time intelligence and extensive mission planning assistance to the Ukraine since the war there began.

Why would anyone think that Russia would not do the same themselves for their ally?

When US Secretary of State Marco Rubio met Russian Foreign Secretary Sergey Lavrov on Thursday in Manila, on the margins of a summit of Southeast Asian nations, Moscow’s war on Ukraine was officially the top agenda item.

But the meeting between Rubio and Lavrov was held under the shadow of fresh reports suggesting that Russia might be playing a more active role than it has publicly acknowledged in Iran’s attacks on United States military sites in the Middle East.

Reports of Iran targeting sites belonging to the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) first emerged in the early days of the US and Israel’s war on Iran. Three days into the war, on March 3, The Washington Post reported that a CIA station in the US embassy in Riyadh had been targeted, according to two people familiar with the matter. On March 6, CNN reported, citing US intelligence sources, that Moscow had been helping Tehran locate US personnel and aircraft in the Gulf.

Now, more recently, the Reuters news agency on Wednesday reported that Iranian drone attacks on CIA facilities, specifically on the embassy in Saudi Arabia, had prompted US intelligence to investigate possible Russian involvement, suggesting that the strikes’ effectiveness and precision could suggest possible evidence of support.

I would make a number of points here, first I'm pretty sure that Iran's organic intelligence capabilities in the region are pretty good, and locating covert CIA facilities is probably well within their capabilities, and second, this is a foreseeable and measured response to similar American actions in the Ukraine.

You mess with the bull, you get the horns. 

 

 

Yeah, War is Bad, But

Sometimes it's tough to feel that way, particularly when things like an Iranian drone strike did significant damage to an Amazon Central Data Bahrain.

Not a fan or theocracies, but I am even less of a fan of kleptocratic monopolists like Amazon.

Iranian forces destroyed Amazon’s central data infrastructure in Bahrain, according to state-aligned media reports.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps claims to have targeted and destroyed the American tech giant’s infrastructure with cruise missiles in response to an American attack that allegedly destroyed an under-construction nuclear site in Southern Iran on Monday, according to reports from Iran’s Fars News Agency. Amazon has not yet confirmed damage to its infrastructure in the region, though Bahraini authorities have acknowledged that air raid sirens were activated on Tuesday and said they intercepted a wave of Iranian strikes, though officials have not reported what, if any, material damage was sustained at this time.

You know, Bezos also has a yacht. According to this website, it was just north of Vanatu 5 days ago.

Gnarly

So, Trump has resumed airstrikes on Iran, and Iran has retaliated, killing at least 2 American soldiers operating air defense units in Jordan, along with strikes on Kuwaiti desalination and power plant.

From a tactical perspective, it appears that the Iranians have better targeting capabilities, as they are hitting specific military targets for tactical advantage, while the US is blowing up bruidges and drinking water infrastructure.  

Meanwhile, it looks like the international fossil fuel markets are getting skittish, and may be going into full panic mode if the shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz continue.

We've lost this war, and the sooner that this is acknowledged by the PTB, the better. 

I Hope That This is Trolling

NEWS: A 10 foot tall participation trophy has been placed on the National Mall in honor of Donald Trump's "enthusiastic involvement" in the Iran war.

A group called Secret Handshake is taking credit. pic.twitter.com/EtagBVTEWH

— Aaron Parnas (@AaronParnas) July 13, 2026

Because if the group erecting an, "Iran War Participation Trophy," for Donald Trump is serious, it provides yet more evidence that Idiocracy was a documentary.

If this is a troll, it is a truly master full troll. 

Since I am an optimist, and since a number of media sites, including the Washington Post, have reported that this was a brilliant bit of mockery, I'll just leave it at, "Well played, motherf%$#ers."

Speaking of the Ongoing War

Trump has announced that the cease fire has ended and that the United States will resume its blockade on Iran and charge a 20% fee on all ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz.

I'm not sure what the legal justification is for charging such a fee, and in announcing the blockade he is announcing a resumption of war against Iran.  (It's why Kennedy called the blockade of Cuba during the Missile Crisis an, "Embargo.")

The fee that President Trump wants to charge ships going through the Strait of Hormuz would significantly increase the cost of transporting oil and other products through the crucial waterway, shipping operators and logistics experts said.

On Monday, Mr. Trump said the United States would charge a 20 percent fee on all cargo shipped through the strait, as a way to recover the cost of providing military protection to vessels using the waterway.

……… 

Mr. Trump did not explain exactly how the 20 percent fee would be calculated.

But if it were charged on the value of the cargo, it could more than double the cost of shipping oil through the strait.

Scores of ships have gone through the strait with Iran’s permission, taking routes close to the Iranian coast. On Monday, Mr. Trump said he was reinstating a U.S. naval blockade of ships that use Iranian ports.

……… 

In late June, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said: “No country is allowed to charge tolls or fees on an international waterway. That’s existing international law.” 

He forgets the most important internal law, "We don't care, we don't have to, we are the United States of America mother f%$#ers."

Bummer of a Birthmark, Donnie

A Federal Reserve Governor has publicly stated that they are seriously looking at a rate hike.

I kind of think that the collapse of the cease fire with Iran, and the oil price spikes that have resulted, make this even more likely.

Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller said policymakers may need to raise rates in the near term if underlying inflation continues to signal broad price pressures.

“If we get another hot reading on core inflation this week, then the FOMC will need to consider tightening monetary policy in the near term,” Waller said Monday, referring to the central bank’s rate-setting committee, in remarks prepared for an event in New York.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics is due to release fresh data on consumer prices on Tuesday.

Waller emphasized the economy was in good shape, with the labor market appearing stable and consumer demand resilient. Still, he said, monetary policy was at a “crossroads” because of inflationary pressures driven by tariffs, energy prices and the build-out of artificial intelligence infrastructure.

“No matter how you cut it, or what measure you want to use, inflation is up this year,” Waller said. “At this point, I am concerned about the elevated pace of core inflation.”

I'm a dove on inflation, not that counts for anything, but the fact that this probably has Donald Trump's head exploding amuses me.

I Hate Reruns

So, Trump has declared that the cease fire has ended, and the US is launching strikes on Iran while Iran has responded in kind.  (Also, the US has revoked its waiver of sanctions on Iranian oil, which counts for little giving that the shooting war has started up again.)

I expect to see gas price increases returning shortly. 

 

Congress Found Some Cojones

Both houses just passed a joint war powers resolution resolution directing Trump to cease all hostilities against Iran.

I think that this is  second or third time in the 50+ year history of the War Powers Act that it has been used to end hostilities, rather than authorizing them.

The Senate voted to limit President Trump’s ability to conduct military operations against Iran without congressional authorization after four Republicans joined with Democrats in a stinging rebuke to Trump a week after he signed a memorandum of understanding with Iran.

The resolution passed by the Senate on Tuesday afternoon, in a 50-48 vote, directs the president to remove U.S. armed forces from hostilities against Iran unless explicitly authorized by Congress, other than to defend America, an ally or partner from “imminent attack.” The resolution, previously passed by the House, is nonbinding but marks the first time both chambers of Congress have passed the same measure to curb Trump’s power to wage the war against Iran.

………

The House passed the same resolution on June 3, in a 215-208 vote, with four Republicans joining Democrats in support.

I do not think that this will amount to a hill of beans, the Trump administration is not one to follow the law, and the constitutionality of a joint resolution is confusing.

Still, it does appear to be a shift in the political direction of the Republican Party. 

Speaking of the Predictions of Nostra-Dumbass, a Deal Got Signed with Iran

I got it wrong when I said that there was no deal on the table as well.  There will be a signing a deal in Switzerland. (Apparently Trump signed the deal at Versailles, doubtless while eating cake.)

You gotta hand it to the Islamic Republic of Iran.  It took the Vietnamese 14 years to defeat us, it took the Afghans about 20 years, and it took the Iraqis about 6 years.

It took the Iranians about 16 weeks to kick our ass, as demonstrated by this 14 paragraph memorandum. 

A quick summary of the deal.

1. The end of hostilities, including in Lebanon, and this applies to Israel as well.
2.  Mutual respect of Iranian and US sovereignty.
3. A 60 day deadline this deal unless both sides agree to extend it.
4. The US will end its blockade and remove some troops in 30 days and Iran.
5. Iran will charge no transit fees on the Strait of Hormuz for the next 60 days.
6. Iran gets $300,000,000,000.00 in aid to rebuild. (Maybe not from the US)
7. The US will waive all sanctions immediately and rescind all sanctions as quickly as is practical including those by the UN Security Council and the IAEA.
8. Iran will not develop nuclear weapons.
9. An agreement to remain at the pre-hostilities status quo. 
10. The US agrees not to create or renew any sanctions.
11. The US agrees to release frozen and seized Iranian assets.
12. There will be some sort of arrangement to enforce the final deal.
13. Final status negotiations when paragraphs 1, 4, 5, 10 and 11 are all being implemented. 
14. This agreement shall be formally approved by the UN Security Council.

So, the US withdraws troops from the area, ends the blockade, releases Iranian assets, ends sanctions, arranges for Iran to get three hundred billion dollars, and leans on Israel to end its attacks on Lebanon.

In return, the Iranians agree not to develop nuclear weapons (which they have always said was the case) and not to charge transit fees on the Strait of Hormuz for 60 days. 

It's a loss for the United States, and even the New York Times Editorial Board noticed and took a break from polishing Trump's balls to say this.

I'll Believe It When I See It

So, we have yet another report of a deal to end the US-Iran War.

I won't believe it until the ink is dry.

Donald Trump has claimed a deal well over a dozen times in the past few months, so the White House's credibility is below that of the Tooth Fairy.

With a draft deal between the United States and Iran now on the table, speculation has been swirling about exactly what is in the agreement.

President Trump insisted on Friday that reports circulating about details of the proposed deal were incorrect. In a post on social media, he said the terms “Iran leaked” to the media “have NOTHING to do with the terms that were agreed to, in writing.”

There were conflicting accounts of the deal in Iranian media, with one hard-line news outlet reporting terms more favorable to Iran and the state news agency providing a more measured description. On Friday, Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said that a deal “has never been closer,” but added that “the media should refrain from entering speculation about its content.”

Much about the emerging deal remains murky, with both sides keen to frame it as a victory. What is known is that a “memorandum of understanding” between the two sides is under discussion.

I do not see any way that a deal that is acceptable to Iran could be cast as a victor for the United States, since the Iranian government, for very good reason, does not believe that the United States can be trusted to keep its end of the bargain.

As such, I think that any deal that would be signed would necessarily include a removal of sanctions, a repatriation of frozen Iranian assets from the US, and a redeployment of US forces out of the region.

I do not believe that (even with the horrible US press corps) that this could be sold as a victory, and Trump is terrified of being seen a loser.

Then again, what do I know. 

 

Meanwhile, In the Persian Gulf

So, it appears that an Iranian drone took down an Apache helicopter and Trump launched retaliatory attacks on Iran, including strikes on at least two reservoirs, (Yes this is a war crime according to black letter international law) and then Iran responded by striking US bases and US related infrastructure among Gulf nations.

A US Army helicopter gunship was apparently struck by an Iranian Shahed drone before going down near the Strait of Hormuz—but it’s unclear whether the one-way attack drone was deliberately aimed or achieved more of a lucky accidental strike.

Axios correspondent Barak Ravid first reported an unnamed US government official’s comments that an Iranian drone had hit the US Army AH-64 Apache helicopter before the latter went down on June 8. The New York Times later confirmed that reporting through more anonymous US officials, including one official who said US military investigators were still evaluating whether the Iranian drone strike on the helicopter was intentional or accidental.

………

The basic models of Iranian Shahed drones rely on GPS satellite guidance and preprogrammed coordinates to strike stationary targets from long range and are not usually designed to track and strike moving targets, said Mark Cancian, a senior adviser with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank based in Washington, DC, in an interview with The New York Times. But he suggested that Iran may have received newer Russian-modified Shahed drones that can be remotely operated to strike targets in motion.

Whatever the case, the result is that an Iranian drone that usually costs about $35,000 managed to take down a US Army helicopter with a price tag of $25 million. The only silver lining for the US military was its successful rescue of both helicopter crew members from the water due to the unprecedented use of a drone boat.

………

Trump was initially inclined to shrug off the Apache helicopter’s downing after the pilots were rescued, according to The Wall Street Journal. But the president apparently changed his mind during a White House briefing when both Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine “recommended military action” and shared more details about the Iranian Shahed drone striking the US helicopter.

The strikes from US fighter jets targeted Iranian air defense, ground control stations, and surveillance radar sites near the Strait of Hormuz, according to the US Central Command press release. But Iran’s state broadcaster claimed the US military strikes also damaged water tanks and cut off the water supply for at least 20,000 people in Hormozgan province.

Iran also retaliated by launching yet another round of Iranian missile and drone attacks against Gulf countries such as Bahrain and Kuwait, along with Jordan, according to The New York Times. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, an Iranian paramilitary force, said it had targeted US bases in the region, including the US Fifth Fleet base in Bahrain, while claiming to shoot down yet another US MQ-9 Reaper drone.

More on the strikes on the reservoirs: (Also see the mealy mouthed confirmation from what Atrios calls that f%$#ing paper)

The United States and Iran engaged in some of the most intense fighting overnight since all-out hostilities in the ongoing US‑Israeli war on Iran were halted with a Pakistan‑mediated temporary ceasefire on April 8.

A comprehensive peace agreement remains elusive as Iran and the US have exchanged a series of proposals and counterproposals in the weeks since that pause. After a string of smaller escalations, however, the US struck targets in Iran following the downing of a US Apache helicopter close to the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, and Iran retaliated by hitting US military bases in the Gulf.

The US military said it targeted communications and radar facilities. Iranian officials, however, said civilian infrastructure was also damaged, including two water reservoirs.

If correct, this is the first reported strike on civilian infrastructure in Iran in several weeks, but it comes at a time when Iran is facing a severe water shortage.

Yeah, US military has forsworn attacks on civilian infrastructure for a few weeks, what sweethearts.

And Trump provides yet more evidence that he's senile or profoundly stupid:

U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday said he was "shocked" that Iran attacked neighboring Gulf states in retaliation to U.S. and Israeli strikes, insisting that nobody could have predicted such a response.

"They weren't supposed to go after all these other countries in the Middle East. So they hit Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait. Nobody expected that. We were shocked," Trump said at a White House event.

He doubled down hours later, stating that "the UAE is like the banker for Iran. Qatar, they are neighbors and got along okay. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain. No expert would say that's gonna happen. It's not a question of 'gee should you have known' - and if we did, big deal. We have to do what we have to do," he said in the Oval Office.

In reality, many experts have long warned that Iran was willing and prepared to strike these countries. Iran itself further warned explicitly that neighboring states hosting U.S. military bases could be targeted as part of its deterrence strategy.

I wonder how much longer they can to maintain this façade, because world inventories of oil and other distillates have fallen off of a cliff.

Even if the Strait of Hormuz were to open tomorrow, these inventories would take about 6 weeks to see new oil.

I honestly expect to see 1973-style gas lines in the United States.

Today in Unbelievably Crappy OpSec

I have done a Google reverse image search, and this image, and there are literally dozens of copies of this floating around the web.

We know the size of the boom, the size of the F-16, and the size of Palm Jumeirah precisely.

This means that the location of this shot can be determined with a big of basic map work and trigonometry to well within 10 meters.

Not a good look, unless, of course, you are a member of the IRGC. 

Ecch (Tweet) of the Day

LMAOOO pic.twitter.com/6tHT922FK1

— VolgaLad (@cym27s) June 3, 2026

Very dark humor, but I like dark humor.

This Won't Come to Much

The House of Representatives has passed a War Powers Act resolution requiring that Trump get Congressional approval to continue prosecuting the war against Iran.

It has to be approved by the Senate as well, and would almost certainly require a conference committee to hash out differences, and even then Trump would veto this.

The US House of Representatives delivered a stunning rebuke to Donald Trump over his war on Iran on Wednesday, as representatives backed a move to force him to seek approval from Congress or withdraw US forces.

The House voted 215 to 208 in favor of the war powers resolution, as four Republicans voted with Democrats. The dissident Republicans were Thomas Massie of Kentucky, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, Warren Davidson of Ohio and Tom Barrett of Michigan.

Wednesday’s vote came nearly two weeks after House Republicans cancelled an earlier scheduled vote, on the grounds that they lacked the votes to defeat it.

The vote sends the resolution to the Senate. A handful of Senate Republican defectors joined Democrats last month to advance a similar resolution forcing Trump to seek congressional approval after four Republican senators rebelled and voted with the Democrats.

………

The vote’s impact is largely symbolic, as it is unclear whether the House version, which is a concurrent resolution and does not need to be signed by the president, carries the force of law, even if it also passes in the Senate. But it was a striking demonstration of the nascent willingness among a segment of Republicans to defy Trump, who has kept a vise-like grip on the party on Capitol Hill, through his willingness to exact retribution against dissenters.

 It embarrasses, and likely enrages, Trump, but beyond that, I do not expect anything to change.