Miscalculation By Both Sides Has Brought Us To The Edge Of Annihilation In The Middle East

Both sides in this war fundamentally misunderstand one another, and we are all going to pay a very great price as a result. The Iranians are convinced that if they can just inflict enough pain on the global economy the Trump administration will be forced to end the war and give Iran everything that it is demanding. Of course that isn’t going to happen. Donald Trump is not like other U.S. presidents, and he has no intention of losing this war. But the Iranians have no intention of losing this war either. Trump and his team keep moving up the escalation ladder because they believe that if they just hit Iran hard enough the Iranians will be forced to surrender at some point. Unfortunately, those that are running Iran view the world far differently than we do, and they simply are not rational.

On Monday, Trump once again warned the Iranians that they have until 8 PM eastern time on Tuesday to make a deal…

President Donald Trump doubled down on his threat to strike vital Iranian infrastructure if no deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz is reached by Tuesday evening, adding that negotiations are ongoing but time is running out for Tehran.

“The entire country can be taken out in one night, and that night might be tomorrow night,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday, repeating his 8:00 p.m. ET deadline for an agreement.

The Iranians have already rejected all of Trump’s proposals, and so there isn’t going to be a deal by the deadline.

So it appears that Trump really does intend to destroy every power plant and every major bridge in Iran…

“We have a plan, because of the power of our military, where every bridge in Iran will be decimated by 12 o’clock tomorrow night, where every power plant in Iran will be out of business…it’ll happen over a period of 4hrs if we want it to. We don’t want that to happen.”

We have never seen a president of the United States make a threat of this nature.

But I believe that Trump is not bluffing.

He is warning that he is literally going to bomb the Iranians back to the “stone ages”…

“This is a critical period… We’re giving them until tomorrow, 8:00 pm Eastern Time — and after that, they’re going to have no bridges. They’re going to have no power plants. Stone ages.”

There is just one huge problem with that plan.

Trump has told them in advance what he intends to do, and the Iranians are going to surround their power plants with children…

Alireza Rahimi, Deputy Minister of Sports and Youth, is calling on children and teenagers to gather at power stations tomorrow starting at 2 PM.

Iran is trying to gamble that the U.S. will not strike these facilities if they are filled with children.

The Iranians did the exact same thing when we threatened their power grid last month.

There were videos all over social media that showed women and children gathered at Iranian power plants.

Needless to say, we can’t bomb women and children because that would be extremely immoral.

The rest of the world would be absolutely horrified and would never look at us the same way again.

So if Trump really wants to hit Iran’s bridges and power plants, he is going to have to wait until the women and children leave.

I think that Trump is incredibly frustrated because he wants Iran to surrender so that he can declare victory and end this war.

Just a few hours ago, he told the press that one way or another he will eventually get the Iranians to admit defeat…

Trump, speaking to reporters after an Easter event at the White House on Monday, said Iran has been “obliterated” but does not want to admit defeat.

“They don’t want to cry, as the expression goes, uncle, but they will,” Trump said.

Destroying Iran’s infrastructure is not going to achieve that goal.

But they are going to do it anyway.

In fact, the U.S. and Israel apparently have “an updated list of energy and infrastructure targets” ready to go…

Israel has approved an updated list of energy and infrastructure targets in Iran in case negotiations fail, according to two Israeli sources cited by CNN.

The updated target list reflects Israeli expectations that the conflict could escalate further if diplomatic efforts do not produce an agreement.

Israeli officials are said to be highly skeptical that a deal is achievable under current conditions, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu personally conveying his concerns to US President Donald Trump.

There is no way that this is going to end the war.

Instead, it is just going to escalate matters to an entirely new level.

You see, the truth is that Iranian leaders do not see the world the way that westerners see the world.

They view everything through the lens of their extremely radical version of Shia Islam, and that ideology “leaves little room for compromise”…

Iran’s ruling system is often described in political terms, but critics and former insiders say its core is far more radical — a belief structure rooted in religious absolutism, messianic expectation and a worldview that leaves little room for compromise.

As a new generation of commanders rises within the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps following recent military blows under Operation Epic Fury, analysts warn that this ideology may become even more entrenched.

Figures such as Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and Ahmad Vahidi are often cited as part of a cohort shaped by years of conflict in Iraq and across the region — one that sees religion, security and survival as inseparable.

Speaking of Vahidi, it is widely believed that he is the one that is making most of the key decisions for Iran at this point…

Pakistan believes that the commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps, Ahmad Vahidi, is effectively making the decisions in Iran, and is convinced his country is winning the war with the United States and Israel, a diplomatic source told Haaretz.

Vahidi is hardcore.

If he really is the one running the show, there is no way that Iran is going to back down any time soon.

Like other “Twelvers”, Vahidi is expecting the Mahdi to show up at any time…

At the center of that worldview is the belief in the Mahdi — a messianic figure in Shiite Islam whose return is expected to usher in a final era of justice after chaos.

Twelver Shiism is the dominant belief for Shias, the Mahdi, identified as the 12th Imam, is alive but hidden and will one day return. Iran’s political system positions the supreme leader as his caretaker.

Critics say that framework gives political authority a religious dimension that can make it difficult to challenge.

Since Vahidi is eagerly looking forward to the arrival of the Mahdi, there is no way that he would want to surrender to the United States and Israel at this stage.

In his mind, anyone that did that would be a total disgrace.

Instead of surrendering, the Iranians are pledging to strike back extremely hard if Trump follows through on his threats…

Advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Akbar Velayati threatens to attack power sites in Gulf Arab countries if the U.S. strikes Iran’s electricity facilities.

“The foolish U.S. President threatened to attack Iran’s electricity infrastructure. Arab rulers, in order to prevent the region from going into darkness, must make Trump understand that the Gulf is not a place for gambling,” Velayati said.

The Iranians are not bluffing either.

They are fully capable of moving even further up the escalation ladder, and that is what they fully intend to do.

So where do we go from here?

Well, there is no way that Trump can end the war as long as Iran continues to launch long-range missiles at major Israeli cities…

The bodies of four people were recovered from under the rubble at the site of an Iranian ballistic missile impact in Haifa, rescue services said Monday, as a fresh barrage targeting the same area lightly wounded four people and caused additional damage.

The four were named later Monday as Vladimir Gershovitz, 73, his wife Lena Ostrovsky Gershovitz, 68, their son Dimitri, 42, and his wife Lucille Jane, 30.

And there is no way that Trump can end the war as long as Iran has a stranglehold on commercial traffic through the Strait of Hormuz…

More significantly, it’s hard to imagine Trump allowing the war to end with effective control over the Strait of Hormuz remaining in Iranian hands. Whereas the US had been the guarantor of safe passage through the chokepoint in the past, Iran would become the arbiter of who gets to transit — and would undoubtedly use that to its advantage, charging fees and pressuring other countries by threatening to keep them out.

For now, Trump is trapped in this war, and that won’t change even if he continues to go up the escalation ladder.

Of course the Iranians could make things far worse if they continue to go up the escalation ladder.

If the Iranians were to use unconventional weapons, there is no way that the U.S. and Israel would ever be willing to end this war without full regime change in Tehran.

So let us hope that we never get to that stage, because then there would be absolutely no way out of an apocalyptic scenario.

In the end, the Iranians will do whatever they feel like they need to do.

We have already watched them gun down tens of thousands of their own people, and they continue to publicly hang political protesters…

The Islamic Republic of Iran took the lives of two men convicted of trying to storm a military facility and access an armory in January, the Mizan news outlet of Iran’s judiciary indicated on Sunday, according to Reuters.

An organization called Iran Human Rights said that the Iranian news agency reported that the two individuals, Mohammad Amin Biglari and Shahin Vahedparast Kolor, were hanged on April 5.

Biglari, a 19-year-old computer science student, Kolor, 30, were arrested with several other individuals on January 8 amid a crackdown against protesters in the nation’s capital city of Tehran, according to the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights.

There is no limit to what the Twelvers in Iran will do to protect their precious revolution.

Every time Trump escalates matters, instead of surrendering the Iranians will just escalate matters themselves.

Both sides have made tragic miscalculations, and this really has brought us to the edge of annihilation in the Middle East.

We are going to witness so much death and destruction in the days ahead, and for now there appears to be no way out.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com. He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing. You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter. Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites. These are such troubled times, and people need hope. John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.