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Reposted by Paul Fritz

Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 23/06/2026

For those who chose to watch Messi, you chose...wisely. But the recording of this webinar with @pbfritz.bsky.social & me on how elites shape war, with a lot of discussion of Trump and the Iran war, is now available. Thanks to PSQ for organizing. www.psqonline.org/events.cfm?I...

psqonline.org

Political Science Quarterly: Academy of Political Science: Conferences and Meetings

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

TODAY @ 1pm: Sick and tired of watching Lionel Messi score goals in the World Cup? Eager for more analysis of the Iran war? Join us for a webinar with @pbfritz.bsky.social & me on the elite politics of war, based on his essay on my book The Insiders' Game @princetonupress.bsky.social. Details here👇

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 17/06/2026

On Monday, June 22 at 1pm ET, I'll be participating in a webinar with @pbfritz.bsky.social to discuss his essay on my book "The Insiders' Game: How Elites Make War and Peace" @princetonupress.bsky.social. Current events might come up? Join us! Register here: us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

Webinar information for book discussion with Elizabeth Saunders and Paul Fritz, June 22, 1-2pm ET.

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Paul Fritz @pbfritz.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

A pleasure to review such an outstanding book!

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 08/04/2026

And as many of us posted before the reprieve, the maybe-deal doesn’t change the fundamentals of the conflict. So it is either accepting the losses, which might get bigger given Iranian leverage and demands, or back to war in 2 weeks.

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Daniel Drezner @dandrezner.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

CNN reporting that Iran launched attacks on Israel and the UAE during or immediately after Trump’s address.

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Andrew Rudalevige @rudalev.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

In all seriousness... what did that achieve? what was the point of putting the president on TV, if he had nothing new to say? "Suck it up, it hasn't taken as long as Vietnam" is not as heartening as the White House seems to think.

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Paul Fritz @pbfritz.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

there's no making sense of that. it was pure flailing. there is no strategy. there is no endgame. he has no idea how to get out of what he's done.

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Paul Fritz @pbfritz.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

this is just like his war plan ... without purpose, incoherent, and possibly never-ending...

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Paul Fritz @pbfritz.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

With reported shortages of interceptors and more US troops moving into the region…

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Abu Aardvark @abuaardvark.bsky.social · 23/03/2026

Every time he says this re-indicts his cabinet of fools and the incompetence of his purged bureaucracy

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Caitlin Talmadge @proftalmadge.bsky.social · 12/03/2026

Well, there it is. Mines laid by small boats.

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Dan Nexon @dhnexon.net · 12/03/2026

Turns out Grok didn't include a lot of stuff in the war plans that it drafted for Hegseth and Rubio.

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Ankit Panda @nktpnd.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

This is going to be politically toxic to the US-ROK alliance under a progressive administration in Seoul: South Korea took the brunt of PRC sanctions for this deployment back in 2016-2017, only to have assets relocated for a war of choice in the Middle East that threatens its energy security.

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Caitlin Talmadge @proftalmadge.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

This is a technical story with stunning strategic implications. It is quite possible the US launched a massive war because Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff lacked the technical expertise to even understand what the Iranians were offering in negotiations. Absolute idiocy. www.ms.now/news/trump-i...

ms.now

Nuclear experts undercut White House claims about Iran reactor at heart of case for war

The Trump administration sent negotiators without nuclear expertise to lead talks on Iran’s enrichment program. Now, its public case for war centers on a facility that experts say cannot do what offic...

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

I know our expectations for this administration are in the basement but it is INSANE they started a war without a plan for the Strait of Hormuz.

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 09/03/2026

NEW piece from me @goodauth.bsky.social on the disastrous consequences of Trump and Rubio dismantling U.S. diplomacy. Managing the Iran War will be much harder; so will picking up the pieces. Diplomacy is a tool of war AND of peace. (Loosely based on thread below.) goodauthority.org/news/trump-a...

goodauthority.org

Trump and Rubio dismantled U.S. diplomacy. It’s making the Iran War harder.

Since the start of 2026, President Donald Trump has taken the wheel of American military power and pressed hard on […]

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Noah Shachtman @noahshachtman.bsky.social · 09/03/2026

The Trump administration put out a $20 billion plan to insure tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. It promised US Navy escorts for civilian ships trying to pass through. It assured us any Iranian threat was all-but-over. The market's reaction, so far, to these measures:

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Kate McNamara @katemcnamara.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

Definitive summary from @profsaunders.bsky.social of the infuriating and tragic destruction of America’s global role & powers by the Trump Admin, and its impact on the world in this terribly fraught time. 👇

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Paul Fritz @pbfritz.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

Raising the costs that Iran is willing to incur and cutting off your only hope to be able to claim some sort of victory short of occupying the country … genius!

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 04/03/2026

🧵Cans of Worms possibly opened by Trump's war of choice in Iran, a running list: (not exhaustive, with the caveat that I am not an expert on the region so these are questions from a US foreign policy perspective, please add others) 1/?

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Erin Cunningham @erinmcunningham.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

This should end well.

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Caitlin Talmadge @proftalmadge.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

May I humbly suggest we dial back the hyper-fixation on how long the administration says war will last. No one ever knows because war is unpredictable & adversary gets a vote. Where the administration should be hammered is on the incoherent explanation of why they started the war in the first place.

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 02/03/2026

Keep hearing commentators/Hegseth saying a version of "this is not Iraq, we are not doing nation-building, it's a decapitation, the people will handle it." That's what Iraq 2003 was supposed to be! Nation-building, de-Baathification, disbanding of Iraqi army, it all came *after* things went wrong.

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 20/02/2026

So he's definitely going to bomb Iran. (Not even really kidding)

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 14/01/2026

This. Constraint and accountability for using military force start closest to home. Advisers and members of the president’s party. Doesn’t have to be a vote, doesn’t have to be public. But there’s no constraining without it. War is an Insiders’ Game.

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Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp.bsky.social · 19/09/2025

The past week has shown us something scary — the concrete and specific outlines of a durable authoritarian state in America. Here's what this state would look like, and the precise policy levers Trump is pulling to get there from here. www.vox.com/politics/462...

vox.com

This is how Trump ends democracy

The past week has revealed Trump’s policy road map to veto one-party rule. Will Americans let him follow it?

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Jason "Red5" Lyall @jaylyall.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

This emergency food aid, enough to feed about 1.5 million children for a week, will be incinerated tomorrow rather than distributed in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Another in a long list of Trump's crimes against humanity.

theatlantic.com

The Trump Administration Is About to Incinerate 500 Tons of Emergency Food

Federal workers warned for months that the high-energy biscuits would go to waste.

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 22/06/2025

Still my biggest question aside from Iranian retaliation. What is the diplomatic plan?

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Caitlin Talmadge @proftalmadge.bsky.social · 22/06/2025

Trump is once against arsonist and fireman. If he hadn't pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal (which our own State Dept. certified Iran was in compliance with), we wouldn't be here.

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Elizabeth N. Saunders @profsaunders.bsky.social · 17/06/2025

🧵 To make this more concrete: don't assume Trump himself knows what he is going to do next in in the Israel-Iran conflict. He definitely doesn't want to get the US involved in a major war in the Middle East (that much he's been clear on). But he loves to bomb and look tough. 1/

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William Adler @williamadler78.bsky.social · 12/06/2025

"The American regime today arrested a member of the legislative opposition, after declaring it would 'liberate' that senator's province from opposition control using the armed forces"

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Brendan Nyhan @brendannyhan.bsky.social · 12/06/2025

Literally describing themselves as occupying a blue state like hostile territory with the military and federal forces.

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Paul Fritz @pbfritz.bsky.social · 01/06/2025

“The actions have obliterated decades of experience in national security and criminal matters at the F.B.I. and raised questions about whether the agents taking over such critical posts have the institutional knowledge to pursue cornerstones of its work. Image” www.nytimes.com/2025/06/01/u...

nytimes.com

Unease at F.B.I. Intensifies as Patel Ousts Top Officials

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Paul Fritz @pbfritz.bsky.social · 31/05/2025

This may end up being onw of the biggest self-owns ever www.nytimes.com/2025/05/31/w...

nytimes.com

World Scientists Look Elsewhere as U.S. Labs Stagger Under Trump Cuts

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Carl Quintanilla @carlquintanilla.bsky.social · 29/05/2025

Secretary of Transportation says you should be scared of public transportation. Four million people will ignore him, justifiably, and ride the NY subway tomorrow. 🤡

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Paul Fritz @pbfritz.bsky.social · 08/05/2025

Is clownsmanship a word? If not, can we make it one?

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 02/05/2025

This is blatantly authoritarian. No specific and credible allegations are laid against Krebs, beyond the fact he undermined the President's false claims about a stolen election. Nevertheless, Trump will direct the federal government to make his life hell. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/01/u...

nytimes.com

Chris Krebs, Ex-Leader of Cybersecurity Agency, Is Under Investigation, Trump Officials Say

The disclosure came three weeks after President Trump directed the Justice Department to investigate the former agency leader, Chris Krebs, in an act of score settling.

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Steve Herman @newsguy.bsky.social · 02/05/2025

Rock band REM releasing a remix of its first single, “Radio Free Europe,” to raise money for RFE/RL after the Trump administration froze its funding. www.instagram.com/reel/DJJluTO...

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Sara Mitchell @sbmitche.bsky.social · 30/04/2025

We should thank [our] lucky stars that Trump chose to do this in the most stupid way possible,” says Lucan Way, a political scientist at the University of Toronto who studies democratic backsliding.

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Brendan Nyhan @brendannyhan.bsky.social · 28/04/2025

Literally straight out of the authoritarian playbook. And no one should be calling it a "news distortion review" uncritically in a headline - that is Orwellian doublespeak

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Josh Marshall @joshtpm.bsky.social · 27/04/2025

It’s only getting much play in the trade/transport niche press. But pretty real product shortages beginning in mid-May or so are already locked in. They’re maybe a thousand miles out in the Pacific Ocean. Modern trade takes place in gargantuan container ships. There are very detailed records …

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