Trump's illusion of Iran's unconditional surrender myth / Possibility of turning Iran into a second Afghanistan? / Did Japan surrender unconditionally? War as a tool to shift the balance of bargaining

Violation of previous agreements, a surprise attack in the midst of ongoing negotiations, and the killing of officials whom Washington considered more inclined toward negotiations — actions the United States carried out in the opening weeks of the war — are not tactics aimed at paving the way for an agreement. The expectation of achieving military victory has deprived the US government of a clear framework for ending the war; and that too in

Andisheh Group: Vahid Islamzadeh has translated the article by Steven Biddle, Sam Winter-Levy and Yuri Zhukov, entitled "The Dangerous Idea That Drives Today's Optional Wars", published on the Foreign Affairs website, and provided it to Ambassador Arjan for publication. From the perspective of political philosophy and epistemology of war, this article deals with the fundamental criticism of an "illusory idea" in the strategic thought of modern governments: belief in the possibility of "absolute military victory". According to the authors, the idea of ​​military victory originates from the wrong philosophical assumption that coercive force can completely destroy the "human agency and political will of the enemy" and force him to surrender unconditionally. Like what we are witnessing today in the open military aggression of America against Iran. This article argues that philosophically, war is not a tool for the absolute physical destruction of another, but a violent way to redefine the balance of power and change the expectations of the other party in the context of "bargaining and agreement".

In the modern world, Carthage is an exception; Armies and nations, even after heavy defeats and loss of capitals, still have the "agency of choice" and can dictate the terms of an agreement to the victorious side by imposing exorbitant costs or resorting to irregular warfare. That political leaders (from the Tsar of Russia and Netanyahu's government to the designers of interventionist campaigns) think that with the fire of military superiority they can close the political file of the conflict forever without the consent and agreement of the other party, is an epistemological error that leads to the "subjugation of strategic imagination" and the continuation of bloody crises. The realist philosophy of war reminds us that no conflict ends without reaching a point of common will, and ignoring this fact is the most costly mistake of world leaders. Read this article below:

Military victory is a tempting idea. Imagine being able to defeat the enemy with a short and violent military campaign and achieve impressive results for a considerable cost. The administration of Donald Trump expected to achieve such a result in Iran in February 2026. Benjamin Netanyahu's government also sought to achieve such a victory in Gaza in October 2023, and then pursued the same goal in Lebanon and Iran. Russian President Vladimir Putin also believed that the 2022 invasion of Ukraine would bring him such a victory. Many critics of the US policy in Afghanistan and Iraq decry the failure to achieve military victory and compare these wars to decisive results on the battlefield; The results that they believe were achieved in the Persian Gulf War in 1990 and 1991 and also in World War II. Until recently, in the discussions about the US aid to Ukraine, there were widespread requests to help this country in order to achieve a military victory; Requests that equated negotiation with appeasement and compromise against the enemy.

However, those who use the term rarely define it. "Victory" means achieving the political goals for which we entered the war. But "military victory" has a meaning beyond this. The adjective "military" indicates that these goals are achieved through battle and warfare, not at the negotiating table. Negotiation requires compromise and compromise, and it entails the risk that the parties will drag out the negotiation process by wasting time and wear out the political will of the other party. On the other hand, victory on the battlefield promises that the enemy will be so crushed and brought to his knees that he will not have any meaningful choice other than accepting the terms of the victor, that too within the time frame set by him. The appeal and widespread popularity of this idea originates from this promise.

But the idea of military victory is a dangerous myth. All modern wars end with negotiated settlements; Negotiation is not an alternative solution that we turn to only if a more favorable option fails. To end a war, both sides must decide to stop fighting, and such a decision always requires serious and significant bargaining. Of course, destruction is important; It is this destruction that distinguishes war from peacetime politics. But its role is to form an agreement, not to completely destroy the enemy; Something that almost never happens.

The myth of military victory has often led governments to start or continue wars based on misconceptions about how they will end. The Trump administration believed that Iran could be forced to surrender unconditionally by resorting to force; But the United States now finds itself in a deadlock. The Netanyahu government's belief that it can defeat Hamas militarily has prolonged the Gaza war towards an unattainable goal. Putin, expecting to win on the battlefield in Ukraine, has involved both countries in a war that has no clear prospect of ending.

If Chinese leader Xi Jinping makes the same mistake, an attack on Taiwan could involve Beijing in a conflict that is easier to start than to end. A conflict whose consequences will go far beyond the Taiwan Strait. On the other hand, if the United States imagines that it can achieve a military victory in a war with China, it may find itself engaged in a battle of attrition that will not be easy to end.

Vague and confused perceptions of how wars end before the war also fuel errors in the field of intelligence and intelligence assessments, military modernization, and the design of the armed forces. Also, a misunderstanding of the relationship between bargaining and fighting leads to a systematic inability to link negotiation strategy with military operations planning. Until policy makers understand that wars only end when both sides are ready to lay down their weapons, they will continue to be frustrated by the inability of military force to achieve their political goals.

No war in modern times has been able to destroy the enemy's ability to resist. The conflicting parties can always continue to fight if they want; Even if the enemy crushes their military forces on the battlefield or captures their capital. Such stability can turn the page and determine the fate of wars. Winning the war requires that the remaining combatants, and even those who might join the resistance, be offered a settlement that they prefer to continue the resistance. These agreements may be one-sided and strongly favor one side. However, the terms of the agreement and the bargaining over it are always important: no war ends unless both sides decide to accept an agreement and stop fighting.

The only alternative is to physically destroy the enemies. Rome managed to do this when it ended the Third Punic War by enslaving the remaining citizens of Carthage and, according to a legend, sprinkled salt on the ruins of the city - so that nothing could be left in it. But in modern times, no war has reached this standard, and only a few have even come close. Since the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815, losing sides in wars between states have lost an average of eight percent of their troops. In two-thirds of these wars, the loss of troops was less than ten percent. The only country that lost more than 90% of its troops was Paraguay; That too during the Triple Alliance War (1864 to 1870). Most parties accept defeat long before their ability to resist ends; That is, they agree to an agreement whose terms are against them.

Agreements that end a war may be explicit or implicit. In frank negotiations, the parties directly communicate with each other, make proposals and respond to each other's proposals; Among them, we can mention the ceasefire of the Korean War and the Dayton Accords in 1995, which ended the Bosnian War. In implicit bargaining, the parties show their acceptance or rejection of the terms of the other party without entering into formal negotiations, through actions, threats or declaring their positions.

For example, the Persian Gulf War of 1990 and 1991 ended when the US-led coalition declared a unilateral ceasefire and Iraqi forces stopped fighting without a diplomatic exchange. The battles had shown Saddam Hussein, the president of Iraq, that the continuation of the resistance would result in the further advance of the coalition forces and might even lead them to Baghdad. The cease-fire announcement also conveyed the message that US forces and their allies would maintain their positions, provided Iraqi forces did the same. Saddam received this message and responded to it in return. Then General Norman Schwarzkopf, the commander of the coalition, ordered Baghdad to send a military delegation to Safwan Air Base to negotiate a cessation of hostilities. The outcome of this process was highly beneficial to the United States and its allies. They liberated Kuwait; That was their main goal. Saddam maintained his rule, but lost his conquests and faced limitations in the post-war era; As a result, his condition worsened even before the invasion of Kuwait.

The Iraqi army was no longer able to defend its positions or resist the advance of coalition forces, but many of its soldiers continued to fight; Even after the fall of Baghdad, when their only option was to resort to unconventional methods of warfare. The Sunni Baathists understood the conditions they were implicitly offered: life under a US-backed Shiite government. They chose to continue the war. In 2003, US military casualties and injuries were less than 3,000, but eight years later, this figure exceeded 33,000. The rebels failed to restore Saddam's rule, but the war did not end in 2003; That is, when Baghdad fell and the official Iraqi army disintegrated and practically disappeared.

Afghanistan provides a similar example. By mid-2002, the US invasion had disarmed the Taliban, occupied Kabul, and driven the group's leaders out of the country. The Taliban, like the Baathists of Iraq a year later, were facing an enemy that had military superiority and had taken control of their land; While in the short term, they had no prospect of recapturing the capital. If "military victory" could end the war, Afghanistan would have to be a resounding success for the United States. But it did not happen. The Taliban survivors, even though their situation was much more difficult than Saddam's situation in 1991, did not accept the proposed conditions; The conditions based on which, there was no place for them in the structure of the Afghan government. They continued to fight as irregular forces and by 2021 they had recaptured Kabul, pushed American forces out of the country, and restored their rule.

The fact that military victory is unattainable does not mean that effectiveness on the battlefield is unimportant. But the purpose of fighting is not to destroy the enemy; Rather, it is to change the balance of bargaining power between the two parties, by changing their expectations about the costs they will incur in the future. Success on the battlefield can be the basis for fruitful negotiations, but it is not a substitute for negotiation.

Perhaps the most cited example of military victory—that is, the imposition of victory through coercive force on an enemy brought to its knees—is the Allied conquest of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan in World War II. In conflicts from Afghanistan and Ukraine to Gaza, policymakers and pundits repeatedly point to the apparent destruction of German and Japanese military might, contrasting these two cases directly with wars that ended in negotiated settlements.

However, World War II did not end because the losing sides had no choice but to surrender. The battles had not disarmed Germany and Japan. Both countries were still capable of inflicting heavy casualties on the Allies and neither surrendered unconditionally. The winners of the war offered both countries explicit conditions - that is, specific conditions. The concessions given in this framework were few and the Allies won without doubt. But even World War II ended through agreements between sides that still had options.

Imperial Japan sent nearly eight million soldiers into the field during the war. Less than two million of them were killed in the battles. When Japan surrendered in August 1945, more than six million armed, equipped, uniformed and commanded soldiers were still in the field. These forces were no longer able to regain the conquests of Japan; Conquests that the Allies had gradually taken back since mid-1942. By the summer of 1945, the United States had driven Japan's navy into its ports, cutting off Tokyo's control over airspace and sea lanes. As a result, the Allies were on the verge of invading Japan and deposing Emperor Hirohito.

However, Japan still resisted; Not because he expected to destroy Allied armies, recapture lost territory, or throw the invading force into the sea, but because he wanted to obtain more tolerable terms for a final settlement by threatening to kill more Allied soldiers than the Allies were willing to pay for victory. Japan still had considerable leverage. In the Battle of Okinawa, which ended in June 1945, Japanese forces killed or wounded 50,000 American soldiers. In August, the US War Department estimated that an attack on Japanese soil would cause hundreds of thousands more casualties. Japanese leaders were aware of this and hoped that the prospect of such casualties would force the Americans to moderate their terms. It happened like that.

The Allies had called for "unconditional surrender" at the Casablanca Conference in January 1943, but never defined exactly what they meant by that phrase. The Tokyo authorities assumed that this demand included the dismantling of the imperial system and the imprisonment of the emperor. Japan continued the war for more than two years, rather than accept such an end.

On July 26, 1945, ahead of the planned November invasion of Japan, the Allies issued the Potsdam Proclamation. The document once again called for an "unconditional" surrender, but also included several explicit conditions. Japan maintained its sovereignty over its four main islands. Japanese soldiers would return to their homes without being detained. The country maintained its industries and its people were not forced into forced labor. Japan also gained access to raw materials and trade. In fact, the declaration did not call for unconditional surrender; Rather, he stated the conditions of surrender clearly.

Most importantly, this declaration was silent about the position of the emperor; The silence that reflected the debates and wide-ranging disagreements among the officials of the United States government. Some, including Secretary of State James Burns, wanted an outright declaration that Hirohito should be tried for war crimes. In contrast, others, including Secretary of War Henry Stimson, argued that such a demand would prolong the war and preferred that Hirohito remain on the imperial throne.

The final document, as a compromise, did not say anything about this. Stimson hoped that Japan would consider this silence as an implicit proposal to preserve the monarchy; And so it happened. Tokyo took this silence as a sign that the emperor could remain in office. Hirohito was the emperor of Japan until his death in 1989.

This scoring was limited, but not insignificant. Regime change was still the main goal of the Allies, but it was never their only goal. All members of the US War Cabinet insisted on the Emperor's trial. Some were willing to give up this goal to end the war; Others were not so prepared. Keeping Hirohito safe meant giving up a goal that was less important than regime change, but still important.

Japan's insistence on achieving this privilege had a heavy price for this country. If Tokyo had accepted the conditions before the Potsdam Declaration a few months earlier, hundreds of thousands of people would have survived and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki would not have happened. However, Tokyo managed to force the Allies to change their offer; Consequently, Japan's surrender was not unconditional. Japan's defeat was the result of an agreement in which the balance of power was heavily weighted in favor of one side, not a military victory that was imposed on the other side without leaving any possibility of choice and influence.

Germany also provides a similar example. When the country surrendered in May 1945, the Wehrmacht, the German armed forces, still had more than three million armed soldiers actively resisting. German forces had been steadily losing ground since the Battle of Stalingrad in 1943, and by early 1945, the Allies had advanced deep into the Reich. However, the German army continued to fight until the last moment and inflicted heavy casualties on the enemy. In the Battle of Berlin, which took place in April and May, more than 360,000 Soviet troops were killed, wounded, or reported missing.

Millions of surviving Wehrmacht soldiers could disperse in rural areas, turn to irregular warfare, and continue fighting after the fall of Berlin; As the Taliban of Afghanistan and the Baathists of Iraq did a few decades later. Hitler's close circle had even investigated such a possibility and compiled written plans for guerrilla resistance. However, his successors decided to end the war and signed the surrender document on May 7. In the case of Germany, as in Japan, it was a choice, and the Germans could have taken a different path. German leaders eventually concluded that accepting the proposed terms was a more desirable option than the cost of continuing a protracted war that Germany was fully capable of waging.

Although the conditions that Germany accepted were extremely detrimental to this country, it did not mean unconditional surrender. The Allies had made explicit terms, and in early 1945, they eased the terms to induce the Germans to lay down their arms. The fall before, American policymakers had proposed a plan for post-war Germany that became known as the Morgenthau Plan. This plan, which Henry Morgenthau, the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States, had proposed for the first time, tried to eliminate the possibility of its aggression again by destroying Germany's industrial power, disarming this country and dividing it into small and poor states that were considered the remnants of the former Germany. According to this plan, German factories would be dismantled; The Ruhr industrial zone was under international administration; The workforce of this area was transferred to other places; They destroyed its mines; German civilians were forced to work abroad; And German assets were confiscated.

When the plan was leaked in September 1944, Nazi Propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels used it to incite German public opinion into resistance. He argued that if the Allies intended to inflict such a disaster on Germany, the Germans should resist to the last bullet. Goebbels ordered German troops in the city of Aachen, which was under American attack at the time, to "turn every house into a fortress." Allied officials, who attributed the city's stubborn resistance to the Morgenthau plan, publicly exonerated the plan and moderated their position.

At the Yalta Conference in February 1945, US President Franklin Roosevelt declared: "Our aim is not to destroy the German people." In the final terms of surrender, there was no more talk of deindustrialization, forced labor and the permanent destruction of the German economy. In the final weeks of the war, the Allies added other explicit conditions: Germany would not be annexed by other countries, it would maintain its independence - although it would not have full sovereignty, nor would it remain as a unified country - and it would rely on armed German citizens to maintain internal order.

These conditions were not very strict. The victory clearly belonged to the Allies. Germany gave up all of its war aims, surrendered to military occupation, and remained divided for 45 years. However, the terms on which the war ended were not insignificant. The Allies wanted the dismantling of the Nazi regime, but their demands were not limited to that. The fate of post-Nazi Germany was very important for both Germans and Americans.

Roosevelt preferred a punitive peace that would bring Germany to its knees and weaken it forever; But in the end he settled for a milder outcome, because it seemed that the model he had in mind in the first place was not acceptable to the Germans. The decision was the result of intense deliberation and showed that the Allied leaders were consciously trying to reduce the severity of the conditions, which they found to be too strict. Germany accepted terms that provided at least some guarantees for the post-war era; That is after the signatories realized that the Allies no longer intend to deprive Germany of the power and possibility of reconstruction forever. The result was a one-sided agreement based on implicit pressure; But still, it was a real deal.

No war can end without an offer that the enemy can accept; It doesn't matter how powerful the armed forces of one side are or how one-sided the balance of the battle is. The warring parties can almost always continue fighting; Just as the Taliban did in 2002 and the Iraqi Baathists in 2003, and the Germans and Japanese in 1945 could have taken the same path. This resistance can continue even after the loss of the capital and the collapse of the conventional military forces of a country. Sometimes such resistance can dramatically change the fate of the war; As the Taliban were able to turn the tide in their favor by 2021. The continuation of the war may be costly, but it is not necessarily fruitless.

This is more than just playing with words. Misconceptions about military victory have profound consequences. Policymakers who see negotiation as a secondary option and less valuable than military victory may reject initial offers for dialogue; Proposals that could shorten the war or even change its final outcome. After the fall of Kabul, the representatives of the former regime went to the United States and demanded an agreement that would provide them with a legal status and a role in the new Afghanistan. The administration of George W. Bush, believing that he had won a military victory and no longer needed to negotiate with a defeated enemy, rejected these proposals and formed a government that excluded the Taliban and their supporters. The result of this decision was two decades of war, tens of thousands of deaths, expenses amounting to several trillion dollars and finally the return of the Taliban to power. A return far less consistent with US interests than a 2002 compromise agreement would have been.

This issue is not limited to Afghanistan. During World War II, the anti-Hitler resistance movement within Germany sought to overthrow the Nazi government and negotiate an early end to the war. In 1944, this movement reached the threshold of Hitler's assassination, but the Allies' insistence on unconditional surrender stopped the opponents. They could hardly convince other German elites to risk their lives by participating in a coup plot; That is when even in case of success, the result was nothing but the destruction of Germany at the hands of ruthless allies. Even if the surrender terms of 1945 had been announced earlier, the conspirators might still have been defeated; Or the coup succeeds, without reaching an agreement to end the war earlier. However, the Allies' insistence on achieving a military victory did not increase the likelihood of such an attempt being successful.

The Trump administration's war with Iran is another example of this issue. The White House presented various goals, but from the very beginning, it designed its military campaign in such a way as to force Iran into what US President Donald Trump calls "unconditional surrender"; Not to create a pressure lever to be used at the foot of the negotiating table. Violating previous agreements, launching a surprise attack in the middle of ongoing negotiations, and killing officials Washington deemed more willing to negotiate—all of which the United States did in the opening weeks of the war—are not tactics intended to pave the way for an agreement. Expecting a military victory has deprived the US government of having a clear framework for ending the war; That too in a situation where costs are increasing: billions of dollars in military spending, under pressure from weapons stockpiles, and wider economic disruptions.

The war in Ukraine also shows the same error. Putin started a war that had no practical or realistic way to end it quickly and cheaply. When Russia's military adventure failed by April 2022, he did not return to the negotiating path that had been briefly opened in March; Instead, it escalated the war. In September of the same year, Russia annexed four regions of Ukraine to its territory; Areas that he did not even have complete control over. Since then, this action has narrowed Moscow's maneuvering space for compromise.

Instead of serious negotiations, the Kremlin has repeatedly expanded the scope of the war: bombing Ukraine's civilian infrastructure, mobilizing more troops, and attacking Europe's industrial sector in a subversive campaign whose true nature is hard to disguise. All wars eventually end at the negotiating table, but no party to a conflict can make an agreement whenever they want. Both sides must be ready to reach an agreement; And Russia is not ready for this.

On the other hand, no practical and realistic strategy pursued by the United States and Europe could end the Russian war without Putin's approval. Even with significant aid from America and Europe, Ukraine was as unable to achieve a military victory as Russia. And Moscow's maximum terms practically meant the end of Ukrainian sovereignty. American and European policymakers should have understood from the very beginning that they are facing a long war from which there is no easy way out; A war that required sustained industrial mobilization, not a series of short-term aid packages. These aid packages were not considered a valid sign of the allies' commitment and determination, neither for the defense industry contractors nor for the Kremlin. The purpose of the battle is to open a space for bargaining; But Putin's choices have not created such an atmosphere so far, and only the continuation of a much more intense and extensive battle can create it.

A misunderstanding of how wars end can lead to ill-conceived military operations. Since all wars end in some sort of agreement, the only rational purpose of fighting is to change the terms of that agreement to one's advantage. However, US policymakers rarely integrate negotiation strategy with military campaign planning. US military plans for Afghanistan between 2009 and 2013, including those that Washington pursued after the start of negotiations with the Taliban in 2011, sidelined the State Department officials responsible for reaching a political agreement and never explained how continued military operations could create leverage in negotiations. Instead, American forces mostly remained in fixed positions to ensure the safety of the people. This approach weakens Washington's hand in negotiations, as it limits its ability to redeploy forces and reduces the possibility of credible threats or incentives to various Taliban factions - based on their willingness to negotiate.