The article argues that recent executive overreach and politicization have severely undermined established norms of U.S. civil-military relations. To restore professional standards, the incoming Congress must actively exercise its oversight powers, moving beyond mere criticism to demanding transparency in defense policy and personnel decisions. Key reforms include enforcing meritocratic promotion processes, requiring documented justification for senior officer removals, and preventing the partisan use of the military. These actions are crucial for bolstering public trust and ensuring the military remains a nonpartisan instrument of civilian control.
Why America Can’t Strangle Iran
English Summary
The article argues that despite repeated U.S. economic sanctions and recent military strikes, the Iranian regime possesses significant resilience and cannot be successfully strangled by external economic coercion. This resilience is rooted in the state's ability to offload economic pain onto ordinary citizens and firms, coupled with micro-level adaptations, such as maintaining large industrial inventories to mitigate supply chain shocks. While sanctions have severely impacted macroeconomic indicators, the regime's political structure remains intact because it has successfully managed the economic crisis to maintain its internal power base. Policymakers should therefore recognize that economic warfare alone is insufficient to achieve regime collapse, necessitating a strategic reassessment of sanctions' effectiveness and potential unintended consequences.
中文摘要
本文論述，儘管美國多次實施經濟制裁並近期進行軍事打擊，伊朗政權仍具備顯著的韌性，無法被外部的經濟強制手段成功扼殺。這種韌性源於該國能夠將經濟痛苦轉嫁給普通公民和企業，並結合微觀層面的適應機制，例如維持龐大的工業庫存以緩解供應鏈衝擊。雖然制裁已嚴重影響了宏觀經濟指標，但由於政權成功管理了經濟危機並維持了其內部權力基礎，其政治結構依然穩固。因此，政策制定者應認識到，單純的經濟戰無法達成政權崩潰，有必要對制裁的有效性及其潛在的意外後果進行戰略性重新評估。
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