The Daily Signal - Victor Davis Hanson: What the Situation On the Ground In Iran Actually Looks Like

Episode Date: August 4, 2026

Iran’s strategy may be less about negotiating with President Donald Trump and more about delaying, dragging out the conflict and waiting for the Democrat Socialists to take power in Congress.But while the Left claims Trump is running out of time, the reality on the ground suggests Iran is the one being squeezed, with its economy, military and industrial infrastructure steadily deteriorating. Victor David Hanson argues that Iran may be trying to survive until the 2026 midterms, but the growing radicalism of the Democrat Party could ultimately give Trump and Republicans a political advantage on today’s edition of “Victor Davis Hanson: In a Few Words.” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the Daily Signal podcast, where we provide intelligence for the intelligent. Now, without further ado, here's today's take. In Toronto, every arrival is a statement, and nothing says it better than this. Cadillac Optic was the number one selling luxury EV in Canada for 2025. Find your rhythm across a seamless 33-inch display and an immersive 19-speaker AKG surround audio system. This city demands agility, and Optic delivers with precision, to make every drive extraordinary. Let's take the Cadillac. Find out more at Cadillac Canada.ca.

Luxury sales claim based on S&P Global Mobility, Canadian New Vehicle Total Registrations for calendar year 2025 for the Cadillac definition of luxury. What is Iran trying to do? Iran is trying to talk, hit the golf, close the straight, talk, repeat, wash, rents, spin, drag it out, see Donald Trump, lose the house, have the house left, and it's new Islamist socialist-based cutoff funds for Iran. and then wait out the clock and get a Democratic Socialist type of president.

What's going on? What's the big picture? We're missing what's actually happening every day. Hello, this is Victor Davis Hansen for the Daily Signal. We're hearing more and more every day about Iran and Trump, as the midterms now are only about 90 days away. There's kind of a narrative that is emerging left, and right that we are bogged down. I've heard the word Vietnam evoked. Donald Trump may have contributed to that because although in that 150 days we've been operating in the Gulf, we've only

bombed around about 50 or so days, and we've been discussing 100 days. So the narrative has emerged that Donald Trump promises to hit them hard. They back down and they say they want talks. They do want talks. They want to delay, delay, delay, delay. Donald Trump then sporadically hits them. They come back to the table. We have no idea who we're dealing with because the Iranian Revolutionary Islamic Guard seems to be playing the bad cop and the moderate electorate, moderate in quotation marks. Elected officials seem to put a happy face on things and they either have no power or authority, or they're in league with the hardcore to give them time and say to run out the clock.

So what are the relative pressures? Everybody's getting very angry of this on, off, on, off. And we're concentrating too much on what Donald Trump says. We know what each side is doing. Donald Trump has 90 days for the midterms. If he should lose the midterms, his teeth. is convinced, A, that there will be an impeachment circus for the next two years, and B, anybody around him will be hauled before Senate and House committees, but mostly in the House,

because I don't think the Republicans will lose the Senate. And they will be inquired. They will be researched. They will be raided, and it will cost them a fortune, and that will be a statement. and that will be a circus. So Donald Trump doesn't want that. To avoid that, he has to have gas getting near $3 a gallon, the world price around $65 a barrel,

the Strait of Armuz open, and all that requires him either to have a new Iranian government or a debilitated Iranian government or a negotiated settlement. What is Iran trying to do? Iran is trying to talk, hit the golf, close the straight, talk, repeat, wash, rents, spin, wash, rinse, spin, drag it out, see Donald Trump, lose the house, have the house left, and it's new Islamist socialist-based cut-off funds for Iran, and then wait out the clock and get a democratic socialist type of president that would follow the Obama. regiment and pretty much appease them and let them do what they want. So what's going on? What's the big picture? I think we're missing what's actually happening every day. There is still an embargo on Iran. No tankers can come in with merchandise, food, material goods, industrial goods,

and no Iranian oil is getting out. We have bombed now most of the rail link. that go into the former Soviet Union and on into Russia and on into China. So they are not getting imports and they are not exporting. They may have some airlift capacity and regional airports where China or Russia are sending in material, but it won't be much. But more importantly, they are debanked. Assets are frozen. Economic embargo ensues.

They are losing in revenue about $500 million per day, and that loss is geometrically increasing, not just arithmetically. In other words, as you start to damage their infrastructure, their bridges, and we have, their roads, and you start to inflict enormous damage on the military, and they draw scarce resources from the domestic economy to fix it, the people are getting more anguish and poor and poor, and the country is getting worse and worse. We don't see that because of what? We don't see that because there's no ground troops. It's not embedded. We don't know what's going on. So while the left keeps saying to all of us that time is running out for Donald Trump, we're in a Vietnam quagmire,

the war is lost, we need to just look at not what the left says, not what the right says, not even what Donald Trump says, not what Iran says. Just look dispassionately and disinterestedly at two things. What is the actual state of affairs in Iran? We have tragically lost 18 soldiers and probably spent $40 billion. But at that cost in blood and treasure, we have debilitated, neutered, deindustrialize, and pretty much destroyed the military, industrial, and nuclear. complex industry of the largest state in terms of economics and population and area.

If you combine all those factors together in the Middle East and the bully and the most anti-American. And so while the left thinks time is running out, the actual data show us that Iran is running out of time. I don't know who will win the standoff, but Iran has less resources and less where were the to withstand this python-like squeezing of it than we do in inflicting it. We can do this forever. One final asterisk or footnote. Things have changed somewhat. Donald Trump and the Republicans don't think the midterms are lost.

If they thought the midterms were lost, then they would accelerate the bombing probably and say, we have nothing left to lose. Let's end the Iranian threat now. But they don't think it's lost because of what? They have outraged. They, the Republicans, have $400 million war chest that they will spread very generously throughout these 435 House races and the Senate races. The Democrats only have about a fourth of that.

Redistricting, whether due to red state legislatures that are in the majority or from Supreme Court rulings on racial gerrymanding might give them another five to eight to nine seats. They otherwise would not pick up. That's important. More importantly still, we don't know what Iran is going to be like. If there is some kind of negotiation or if the strait should remain open or if the price of oil, people's anguish might turn to satisfaction, that it's sort of like. like the Venezuela or the Panama denouement.

They worked, and they will forget the cost and look at the result. That could happen even before the midterm. But most importantly, finally, this is not a Democratic Party that is running candidates for office. There's two things going on. Number one, a socialist-dast, communist-das, Islamist core, base movement has captured the Democratic Party. It's not just Zoran Mondami. It's not just Ilyan Omar. It's not just

Rashida Talib. It's not just Chevalier. It's not just Millette Kiroz. I could go on and on. It's not just Hassan Piker. These are the front-line soldiers. But it's the fear of them that makes milk-toasty, sort of not Democrats go left and fear they're going to be primary. And the point of all is the publicity is not good for the Democrats. They either have to disown these crazy people or keep mom about it and quiet about it or endorse them. So when you have Gavin Newsom says, capitalism doesn't work either.

He's a mainstream Democrat in the left-wing sense of the Democrat in these days. When he says that, that means that almost every single Democrat is terrified of the socialist and will ape and mimic them to survive politically. And that is going to filter down to the American people. And they do not want to hear that message. And they will not like that message. And so here in the 11th hour of the midterms,

when things look the most bleak, the Democratic Party has thrown, given, extended a life raft to Donald Trump. And two things then in finishing. Look at what's going on the, ground, what's happening on the ground in Iran, who's getting worse off every day, not what people say, and look at the midterms, not from what people say, but the actual conditions that are in flux right now. And we don't know what's going to happen, but it doesn't necessarily

mean the Republicans are either going to be stuck in Iran, they're not, and they will not be stuck necessarily with losing the house. Thank you very much. Hanson, the Daily Signal. Thank you for tuning in to the Daily Signal. Please like, share, and subscribe to be notified for more content like this. You can also check out my own website at victorhansen.com and subscribe for exclusive features in addition.