TEHRAN – Since February 28, the U.S.-Israeli aggression against Iran has raised serious questions about Washington’s strategic calculations, the extent of Israeli influence over American decision-making, and the future of diplomacy in West Asia. In an interview with the Tehran Times, Joe Lauria, a veteran American journalist and editor-in-chief of Consortium News, says Washington entered the war based on a major strategic miscalculation and underestimated Iran’s ability to resist military and economic pressure.

Lauria is a former UN correspondent for The Wall Street Journal and The Boston Globe and has also worked for Bloomberg News and The Sunday Times. He discusses Donald Trump’s role, Benjamin Netanyahu’s influence on U.S. policy, Western media narratives, and the growing risks of prolonged regional instability and energy insecurity.

The following is the full text of the interview:

You have argued that the U.S. entered the war with Iran based on a major strategic miscalculation. What were Washington’s main objectives, and why do you believe they largely failed?

Washington has been obsessed with Iran since the 1979 revolution reversed its 1953 coup. Like Israel, they see Iran as an obstacle to American global and Israeli local expansion. But instead of an obstacle, they falsely try to frame Iran as a threat to get domestic and international support for their anti-Iran policies.  Like Israel, the U.S. would like to install its own friendly government in Tehran to control the country and remove the obstacle. Unfortunately for them Iran is more than capable of defending itself, which is why every U.S. president until Donald Trump told Israel "No." No matter how much the U.S. would want to overthrow the Iranian government like Israel does, the U.S. knows it would not be possible and would lead to the disaster we are witnessing. Trump went against his own advisors and foolishly allowed himself to be used by Israel.

You have described the conflict as the “Israelization of America’s war,” suggesting Washington is following Israeli strategic priorities rather than an independent U.S. policy. How deep is this dependency, and can the U.S. separate its Iran policy from Israeli objectives?

It is only as deep as Donald Trump's own conviction about the enormous blunder he made in starting this war of aggression. If Trump himself were independent from Netanyahu and Israel, the U.S. could separate its policy from Israeli objectives, end the war and retreat. But he is not independent of Israel. He wants to get out of the trap he allowed himself to get into, but he can't seem to do it.

Previous U.S. presidents avoided direct war with Iran to prevent a wider regional conflict. What changed under Trump’s second term that made this confrontation politically possible?

I believe it has to do with at least two things:  Trump's longtime obsession with Iran. He recently posted a 1987 interview in which he talked about "taking Iran's oil."  He was not confident enough in the first term to try it, even though he had a national security advisor in John Bolton, who has long called for the U.S. to overthrow the government in Tehran.  The second reason is that I believe because Israel has serious compromising evidence of Trump's criminality in the Epstein files and that has boxed Trump in.

Trump has maintained the naval blockade while extending the ceasefire and says it is costing Iran heavily. Does this show that economic strangulation—rather than military victory—is now Washington’s main strategy? 

That seems to be Trump's latest idea, as unsatisfactory as it is to Netanyahu. But it still gives Netanyahu the opportunity to talk Trump into restarting the shooting war. Of course, the blockade will only deepen the resistance.

Is there still a real diplomatic path forward?

At the moment it does not look like there is one. Hopefully that will change.

How do you assess mainstream Western coverage of the attacks on Iran? 

Actually, because of the liberal media's deep hatred of Trump they have separated him from the normal bipartisan consensus on U.S. imperial adventures and have been critical of him for starting this war.  The usual rally around the flag and support the troops is mostly part of conservative media now like Fox News and The Washington Times.

With oil markets shaken, are U.S. allies beginning to see this war not just as an Iran issue, but as a wider threat to global economic stability?

I think U.S. allies in Europe and Asia have seen it this way from the beginning, as a threat to their economies and that's why they have not been supportive of the war.