There's a history lesson hiding in plain sight here. In 1941, Claire Chennault watched Allied fighters get slaughtered over Burma because they fought the Zero in dogfights where Japanese pilots were unbeatable. The RAF sent Buffaloes, then Hurricanes, then Spitfires. Same result each time. The institutional assumption was that Japanese aviation was imitative and inferior. The Zero kept proving otherwise and the brass kept explaining each loss away individually. It had no armor, but was so maneuverable they couldn't touch it. What's more, the early Japanese pilot training (as documented in Saburo Sakai's autobiography Samurai) was so intense that fewer than one in three hundred cadets made the cut.
Chennault was an insubordinate, hard-headed man like his hero Billy Mitchell. He refused to let doctrine overwrite what the data was telling him. He studied the Zero obsessively, admitted the P-40 couldn't climb with it, couldn't turn with it, couldn't match its ceiling so he built his entire tactical system around those hard truths.
Dive-and-zoom attacks. Never slow down. Never fight on the enemy's terms. His pilots also benefited from a vast early warning network of spotters across Yunnan province, which gave them altitude and position before any engagement. The Japanese could never figure out how the Flying Tigers always knew they were coming.
This F-35 story has the same smell. "Flattened" defenses that apparently still had enough distributed, survivable capability to track and engage the most sophisticated stealth aircraft ever built? The official narrative keeps saying dominance; the signal traffic keeps saying contest.
Remember too that Iran doesn't need to "win." It already replaced the leadership killed in the early strikes. It will continue to suppress reform. They literally have the west by the balls because the Strait of Hormuz isn't just about oil, it's also the pipeline for rare earth metals, fertilizer, and a million other things vital for technology.
The most dangerous assumption in any air campaign is that the enemy's capability matches what your targeting runs told you it was. Iran, like Chennault's spotters, may retain exactly the kind of networked, mobile, low-signature capacity that the strike packages weren't designed to find. Each incident gets explained away but you can't explain a pattern. War has changed, and continues to change.
Remember too that North Korea was entirely destroyed in three years by LeMay's intensive firebombing campaign that burned 95% of all buildings, dams, railroads, power stations, and roadways into black ash. They never surrendered, and in fact hardened into the isolated prison state we see today.
There is no endgame. No strategy of any kind. Hegseth is an imbecile and Trump's frontal cortex has been shrunk small as a golf ball by dementia. AIPAC will spend billions to make sure their candidates on both sides of the aisle will elections, and there's always the backup plan of using nukes to end elections altogether.
J Hardy...this is excellent. I love the history you inject into your comments. You put your finger on the exact danger: institutions keep mistaking narrative control...for actual control...and they keep doing it right up until reality humiliates them.
The Chennault comparison is especially strong because it gets at something bigger than airpower. It gets at how brittle systems behave when they’re trapped inside their own assumptions.
They explain away each warning sign one at a time...instead of admitting the whole model may be wrong. This is such a critical thing that you have so eloquently pointed out.
Your point about Iran not needing to “win” is dead-on. That’s one of the MOST important things people miss.
A regime or network only has to remain FUNCTIONAL...adaptive...and costly enough to break the fantasy of clean dominance. Once that illusion cracks...yeah...the entire political sales pitch around the operation starts to rot...and smell.
Same with North Korea. Total destruction did NOT produce surrender...moderation...or some neat strategic end state. It produced hardening. That historical lesson should be tattooed onto the forehead of every armchair escalation addict in Washington.
Really sharp comment. You’re seeing the pattern very clearly.
Another Chenault connection is a direct link to the drone assassination campaign started during the Obama administration. When the Obama DOJ needed legal grounding, they explicitly and publicly cited Operation Vengeance as the governing precedent. Attorney General Eric Holder's legal team, in the clearest public articulation of the program's legal basis, stated:
"This is not a novel concept. In fact, during World War II, the United States tracked the plane flying Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto — the commander of Japanese forces in the attack on Pearl Harbor — and shot it down specifically because he was on board... the same rules apply today."
Prior to that, in 1941, FDR gave military assistance to Chiang Kai Shek (or "Cash My Check," as Stillwell called him) using unilateral executive authority, bypassing Congress and existing law. he covertly inserted American military power into a foreign conflict under commercial/mercenary cover. No legal framework, just presidential will and Article II.
It's the institutional habit that the AVG established: the president, acting on his own reading of threats and intelligence, committing American military power covertly, without public authorization, based on the conviction that the strategic situation demands it. Trump is a heavily leveraged dotard in rapid (and let's hope final) decline who is surrounded by people so incompetent they couldn't hold any power other under circumstances. Look at the confirmation of dumbass Markwayne as further example of that.
I think Iran is getting a lot of assistance in terms of acquiring weaponry from the obvious suspects. We may now be in the most nightmarish proxy war we could ever imagine.
That’s the nightmare scenario: not Iran acting alone...but Iran plugged into a wider anti-U.S. support network...whether that means intelligence...targeting help... components...or...technical advice.
Recent reporting AND testimony point to Iran seeking or receiving help from Russia and China...with outside support ranging from intelligence-sharing claims...to continued missile and drone-related backing.
That’s what makes this feel less like a clean bilateral war...and more like a proxy-rich escalation trap. You’re seeing the shape of it clearly!
Also I believe people are about to experience a level of propaganda that most of us have never experienced or ever conceived of....discernment is a must. My instincts are just screaming that at me.
That’s what makes this so hard to watch: we’ve seen this PATTERN before, and we know where this kind of reckless swagger can lead.
You’re right that the absence of serious leadership matters. Very much so.
When the cautious...competent people are gone...what’s left is EGO...IMPULSE and people playing cowboy with other people's lives.
And...yes...the trapped personnel should be front and center. Once thousands of Americans are exposed to the fallout of bad planning...this becomes unforgivable fast.
CONGRESS should not be sitting on its hands here. INEXCUSABLE is exactly the right word, NK.
Well, I guess this is to be expected. Iran is playing the long game while Trump is doing whack-a-mole in the hole. He is being played by Netanyahu, Putin, Xi, and I bet even MBS. Trump doesn’t know history, especially world history. He wouldn’t give a shit even if he was educated, to him it’s all about the oil and the money. 🤮 I really cannot stand him. It’s a cult, not a political party anymore, just a CULT, and should be dealt with as such. #HOLDFAST
Iran receiving Intelligence from Russia and China puts a global threat to our troops and others in this illegal war not approved by Congress. M Nance in previous articles highlighted not only in his books but given his own expertise assessment of where a lot of info is coming from. The F-35 info, statistics not known given as well to target? (thought of this last night) From what I understand to be true, correct me if I’m wrong but the WH knows exactly where our troops are. Trump has called our military suckers and losers during his 1st admin. Thank you Jack for your articles, some of which I haven’t commented, your insight and expertise I appreciate.
Iran is not done, degraded, disintegrated....not by a long way. They have a lot of weapons, tools, and assistance from Vlad and Kim. Probably others. North Korea has a vast wealth of weapons. Thanks for the analysis.
I've learned to treat what President Epstein Fury says as the exact opposite. I think I know the middle east better than this sad regime and I taught elementary 41 years, but did have a Marine brother who was in that area in the 70s- late 80s. He was there under ayatollah 1. He was sent there to possibly remove him. They decided to not. Power vacuum and more double down violence and retaliation. He explained it well. So listen and think the opposite.
Jo Burns...yep, focusing on that is a great place to work from.
Iran doesn’t need to be “winning” to still be dangerous...just intact, adaptive...and able to keep applying pressure.
The historical point your brother made...yeah, that's a powerful one. Removing or weakening leadership...without a real plan for what follows...or for ANYTHING ELSE, for that matter...almost always creates something MORE volatile...not less.
Your instinct to question the official narrative and look for what’s being missed...you're right on track!
Military Aid and Supplies: North Korea has historically been a key supplier of arms to Iran. In the context of the 2026 conflict, reports indicate North Korea is prepared to supply missiles and has a long-term interest in providing technical military support, including tunneling expertise.
Win, lose or draw I’m not at all sure how this ends. Go in without a plan, metrics, definition of victory or a way out….? What could go wrong? Maybe everything?
When my body freaked out over the initial bombing, I figured we were in for a very rough time. I think t got played in a huge way, I think he’s in over his head and the mishaps piling up do not allay any misgivings whatsoever. And now he’s talking about Cuba? How many ways can you say stretched too thin. The Ford has been at sea FAR longer than it should have been due to its maintenance schedule and it’s dealing with a fire, limping to a port for overdue maintenance.
The messaging you’ve outlined here along with the other structural cracks you've pointed out are painting quite a picture. I don’t think we’re at collapse yet but… how long?
They’re improvising inside a SYSTEM that PUNISHES improvisation.
What you said about going in without a plan...metrics...a definition of victory...or an exit ramp gets right to the heart of it.
That’s how bad situations turn into grinding ones. And yes, “stretched too thin” is exactly the phrase that KEEPS surfacing here.
I think your read is strong: not collapse...not yet...but...visible STRAIN.
That’s the part a lot of people miss. Systems usually don’t announce collapse with a trumpet. They show you overload, contradictions...degraded maintenance...sloppy messaging...and a growing GAP... between posture and capacity. That’s the picture coming into view. No doubt.
Your point about your body reacting early also matters. A lot of people felt that jolt for a reason. Sometimes...your nervous system picks up the instability BEFORE the pundit class is willing to name it.
Thank you for this. “You keep us all sane (ish?)” is about the best endorsement I could ask for. I'd be lying is I said I didn't love it.
Jack is doing something important in this newsletter, and it deserves to be named precisely.
He is not arguing that the United States is losing. He is arguing something harder to hear: that the people making decisions may not know the difference. That is the historical danger. Not defeat. Delusion.
Every major military miscalculation of the twentieth century followed the same structure. The official narrative simplified the battlefield. The simplified narrative produced overconfidence. The overconfidence produced escalation. The escalation produced the catastrophe that the narrative had made unimaginable.
Vietnam. Iraq. Afghanistan. The details differ. The structure does not.
What Jack is tracking — the F-35, the F-15s, the KC-135, the gap between “flattened” and “still operational” — is not a list of battlefield incidents. It is an early warning system. It is the data that arrives before the reckoning. The data that gets explained away, individually, until it cannot be explained away collectively.
File the date. March 19, 2026. A writer in Kansas City looked at the pattern before the pattern had a name. That is what good journalism does. That is what this newsletter is doing.
The most dangerous four words in wartime are not a threat from the enemy. They are four words spoken internally, by the side that is winning on paper: We have this handled.
Read this. Share it. The gap Jack is describing does not close on its own. It widens. And what lives in the widening gap is the decision no one is ready to make because no one admitted the situation required it.
Mary E...not that I’ve seen. Public reporting so far says it was damaged during a combat mission over Iran...and then diverted for an emergency landing at a U.S. base in the region.
I have not seen credible...verified reporting pinning it down more precisely as “over water” versus a specific spot inside Iran. However, I will be watching closely...and make it known if that becomes available.
Also, Jack, I know it takes time on your part to respond to these comments (after you have already devoted a lot of time preparing the post), and I want you to know I appreciate it. I read your replies to others’ comments as well. Thank you.
Trump, because of his stupidity and ego and gullibility and narcissism didn't walk into the trap he ran into it with open arms. First it was the testimony yesterday, now this news about the F35, more revelations about Netanyahu's machinations...we are in so much more trouble than they are letting on.
What we might have just learned is that one or more of our potential enemies cracked the code on the F-35 and let Iran test that theory in real time, something they've thankfully been unable to do.
If Russia, China, and/or North Korea now know how to stop our best weapons, the entire global order has been upended, American hegemony is officially over, and no amount of propaganda and bluster from the incompetents in DC can change that reality.
We should not be surprised if we find among all those boxes of documents that were scanned and most likely handed to Russia in 2020/2021 had F35 plans in them.
I’m wondering what all this means to folks on the ground here in US. I spent over $40 to fill up my Honda Civic today. Every time I shop it costs more. But we are relatively well off-retired and own our house. Friends are having babies. I can’t imagine what they think, if they are involved enough to even see anything but network news. That uninvolved group scares me. I’d like your analysis of what to watch for closer to home. Thanks, as ever. #HoldFast👹
Technology…. The most advanced “stealth” fighter made. Invisible to technology, radar, missile guidance, tracking…. But what about good old fashion bop-bop guns with line of visual sighting. The type of guns used 80 years ago on battleships to fight off those 0’s. Can cart them around on the back of a truck and hide them in a cave.
Satellite fly overs won’t be quick enough to find them if they are on a sit and hide. Just because it’s stealth doesn’t mean you can’t hear them coming.
Lucky battery out of a cave got a feather.
We might have the best fighters in the air…. But this is going to be a dread out on the ground. Vietnam? Caves, tunnels, holes.
And not knowing who is going to be on our side in country. Remember, this is a Religious Holy war against Satan for them.
Tulsi gabbard, in particular, testifying today in a Senate hearing implied all appropriate intelligence describing the high probability of current outcomes and miscalculations was delivered to trump. WHY the shift from 3/18 to 3/19? Because the Senate on 3/18 discovered the omission in her oral statement concerning the fact that Iran is yet to resume uranium enrichment? It was included in her written statement. Republicans were even involved in some appropriate questions. Is she just covering her backside? Iran's capabilities come as no surprise knowing Iran's available video verification showing many mobile missile launchers. They open residential roofs to launch missiles. They manufacture shahed drones. They export drones to Russia and share technology. They diversify their manufacturing throughout their expansive borders. Underground manufacturing and storage is embedded everywhere. US has no Ukrainian state of the art drone defense. Closing The Strait of Hormuz, all 24 miles at its narrowest, is child's play. Intelligence briefings then included all this information available to an outside observer and classified information only available to The Orange Degenerate. He and he alone disregarded all this verifiable intelligence. I'm interested to see how mainstream media portrays this hearing.
Great post, Jack.
There's a history lesson hiding in plain sight here. In 1941, Claire Chennault watched Allied fighters get slaughtered over Burma because they fought the Zero in dogfights where Japanese pilots were unbeatable. The RAF sent Buffaloes, then Hurricanes, then Spitfires. Same result each time. The institutional assumption was that Japanese aviation was imitative and inferior. The Zero kept proving otherwise and the brass kept explaining each loss away individually. It had no armor, but was so maneuverable they couldn't touch it. What's more, the early Japanese pilot training (as documented in Saburo Sakai's autobiography Samurai) was so intense that fewer than one in three hundred cadets made the cut.
Chennault was an insubordinate, hard-headed man like his hero Billy Mitchell. He refused to let doctrine overwrite what the data was telling him. He studied the Zero obsessively, admitted the P-40 couldn't climb with it, couldn't turn with it, couldn't match its ceiling so he built his entire tactical system around those hard truths.
Dive-and-zoom attacks. Never slow down. Never fight on the enemy's terms. His pilots also benefited from a vast early warning network of spotters across Yunnan province, which gave them altitude and position before any engagement. The Japanese could never figure out how the Flying Tigers always knew they were coming.
This F-35 story has the same smell. "Flattened" defenses that apparently still had enough distributed, survivable capability to track and engage the most sophisticated stealth aircraft ever built? The official narrative keeps saying dominance; the signal traffic keeps saying contest.
Remember too that Iran doesn't need to "win." It already replaced the leadership killed in the early strikes. It will continue to suppress reform. They literally have the west by the balls because the Strait of Hormuz isn't just about oil, it's also the pipeline for rare earth metals, fertilizer, and a million other things vital for technology.
The most dangerous assumption in any air campaign is that the enemy's capability matches what your targeting runs told you it was. Iran, like Chennault's spotters, may retain exactly the kind of networked, mobile, low-signature capacity that the strike packages weren't designed to find. Each incident gets explained away but you can't explain a pattern. War has changed, and continues to change.
Remember too that North Korea was entirely destroyed in three years by LeMay's intensive firebombing campaign that burned 95% of all buildings, dams, railroads, power stations, and roadways into black ash. They never surrendered, and in fact hardened into the isolated prison state we see today.
There is no endgame. No strategy of any kind. Hegseth is an imbecile and Trump's frontal cortex has been shrunk small as a golf ball by dementia. AIPAC will spend billions to make sure their candidates on both sides of the aisle will elections, and there's always the backup plan of using nukes to end elections altogether.
It will only ge worse.
J Hardy...this is excellent. I love the history you inject into your comments. You put your finger on the exact danger: institutions keep mistaking narrative control...for actual control...and they keep doing it right up until reality humiliates them.
The Chennault comparison is especially strong because it gets at something bigger than airpower. It gets at how brittle systems behave when they’re trapped inside their own assumptions.
They explain away each warning sign one at a time...instead of admitting the whole model may be wrong. This is such a critical thing that you have so eloquently pointed out.
Your point about Iran not needing to “win” is dead-on. That’s one of the MOST important things people miss.
A regime or network only has to remain FUNCTIONAL...adaptive...and costly enough to break the fantasy of clean dominance. Once that illusion cracks...yeah...the entire political sales pitch around the operation starts to rot...and smell.
Same with North Korea. Total destruction did NOT produce surrender...moderation...or some neat strategic end state. It produced hardening. That historical lesson should be tattooed onto the forehead of every armchair escalation addict in Washington.
Really sharp comment. You’re seeing the pattern very clearly.
-Jack
Thanks, Jack. You give me a lot to think about.
Another Chenault connection is a direct link to the drone assassination campaign started during the Obama administration. When the Obama DOJ needed legal grounding, they explicitly and publicly cited Operation Vengeance as the governing precedent. Attorney General Eric Holder's legal team, in the clearest public articulation of the program's legal basis, stated:
"This is not a novel concept. In fact, during World War II, the United States tracked the plane flying Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto — the commander of Japanese forces in the attack on Pearl Harbor — and shot it down specifically because he was on board... the same rules apply today."
Prior to that, in 1941, FDR gave military assistance to Chiang Kai Shek (or "Cash My Check," as Stillwell called him) using unilateral executive authority, bypassing Congress and existing law. he covertly inserted American military power into a foreign conflict under commercial/mercenary cover. No legal framework, just presidential will and Article II.
It's the institutional habit that the AVG established: the president, acting on his own reading of threats and intelligence, committing American military power covertly, without public authorization, based on the conviction that the strategic situation demands it. Trump is a heavily leveraged dotard in rapid (and let's hope final) decline who is surrounded by people so incompetent they couldn't hold any power other under circumstances. Look at the confirmation of dumbass Markwayne as further example of that.
This makes it even more dangerous.
I think you're right. My ears perked up the minute I learned of it previously.
Right, Sher'?!
-Jack
Thanks for being here.
I think Iran is getting a lot of assistance in terms of acquiring weaponry from the obvious suspects. We may now be in the most nightmarish proxy war we could ever imagine.
Exactly, Sher'.
That’s the nightmare scenario: not Iran acting alone...but Iran plugged into a wider anti-U.S. support network...whether that means intelligence...targeting help... components...or...technical advice.
Recent reporting AND testimony point to Iran seeking or receiving help from Russia and China...with outside support ranging from intelligence-sharing claims...to continued missile and drone-related backing.
That’s what makes this feel less like a clean bilateral war...and more like a proxy-rich escalation trap. You’re seeing the shape of it clearly!
-Jack
Also I believe people are about to experience a level of propaganda that most of us have never experienced or ever conceived of....discernment is a must. My instincts are just screaming that at me.
I agree. I don't want to agree. But...I do.
-Jack
I get it...I don't want to even think it...
Same.
#HoldFast
#HoldFast...becomes a more important concept with each passing day, Rae. Truly.
-Jack
😉
I knew you would know exactly why I put it there.
Thanks! 💕 Jack
Difficult to watch this unfold. We have been here so many times.
This is worse because the generals are gone, and everyone that support them.
We have COWBOYS again, and not very smart ones.
Congress can just order the fleet, planes, personnel home.
THOUSANDS of US personnel are trapped.
Inexcusable.
😡😠😡😠🗽🇺🇲🇺🇦
NK...absolutely.
That’s what makes this so hard to watch: we’ve seen this PATTERN before, and we know where this kind of reckless swagger can lead.
You’re right that the absence of serious leadership matters. Very much so.
When the cautious...competent people are gone...what’s left is EGO...IMPULSE and people playing cowboy with other people's lives.
And...yes...the trapped personnel should be front and center. Once thousands of Americans are exposed to the fallout of bad planning...this becomes unforgivable fast.
CONGRESS should not be sitting on its hands here. INEXCUSABLE is exactly the right word, NK.
-Jack
No way is this clean nor bilateral.
Agreed, Rae. 100%.
-Jack
You saw something about russia or china giving iran missiles and drones? Can you share thanks
Emma...yes, there are credible reports
China is supplying drones and air defense systems...while Russia is feeding Iran intelligence and targeting data.
Not overwhelming force...but something MORE dangerous: enough support to keep the fight contested and expose the illusion of total control.
That's the long and the short of it.
-Jack
Well, I guess this is to be expected. Iran is playing the long game while Trump is doing whack-a-mole in the hole. He is being played by Netanyahu, Putin, Xi, and I bet even MBS. Trump doesn’t know history, especially world history. He wouldn’t give a shit even if he was educated, to him it’s all about the oil and the money. 🤮 I really cannot stand him. It’s a cult, not a political party anymore, just a CULT, and should be dealt with as such. #HOLDFAST
Iran receiving Intelligence from Russia and China puts a global threat to our troops and others in this illegal war not approved by Congress. M Nance in previous articles highlighted not only in his books but given his own expertise assessment of where a lot of info is coming from. The F-35 info, statistics not known given as well to target? (thought of this last night) From what I understand to be true, correct me if I’m wrong but the WH knows exactly where our troops are. Trump has called our military suckers and losers during his 1st admin. Thank you Jack for your articles, some of which I haven’t commented, your insight and expertise I appreciate.
Who are the obvious suspects?
See Jack's post at 7:38pm.. He spells it out.
Iran is not done, degraded, disintegrated....not by a long way. They have a lot of weapons, tools, and assistance from Vlad and Kim. Probably others. North Korea has a vast wealth of weapons. Thanks for the analysis.
I've learned to treat what President Epstein Fury says as the exact opposite. I think I know the middle east better than this sad regime and I taught elementary 41 years, but did have a Marine brother who was in that area in the 70s- late 80s. He was there under ayatollah 1. He was sent there to possibly remove him. They decided to not. Power vacuum and more double down violence and retaliation. He explained it well. So listen and think the opposite.
#HoldFast
Jo Burns...yep, focusing on that is a great place to work from.
Iran doesn’t need to be “winning” to still be dangerous...just intact, adaptive...and able to keep applying pressure.
The historical point your brother made...yeah, that's a powerful one. Removing or weakening leadership...without a real plan for what follows...or for ANYTHING ELSE, for that matter...almost always creates something MORE volatile...not less.
Your instinct to question the official narrative and look for what’s being missed...you're right on track!
.
#HoldFast
-Jack
Can you link to weapons coming from north korea thanks
Military Aid and Supplies: North Korea has historically been a key supplier of arms to Iran. In the context of the 2026 conflict, reports indicate North Korea is prepared to supply missiles and has a long-term interest in providing technical military support, including tunneling expertise.
https://thediplomat.com/2026/03/north-koreas-response-to-the-israel-us-attacks-on-iran/#:~:text=In%20this%20context%2C%20North%20Korea's,against%20governments%20it%20deems%20threatening.
Win, lose or draw I’m not at all sure how this ends. Go in without a plan, metrics, definition of victory or a way out….? What could go wrong? Maybe everything?
When my body freaked out over the initial bombing, I figured we were in for a very rough time. I think t got played in a huge way, I think he’s in over his head and the mishaps piling up do not allay any misgivings whatsoever. And now he’s talking about Cuba? How many ways can you say stretched too thin. The Ford has been at sea FAR longer than it should have been due to its maintenance schedule and it’s dealing with a fire, limping to a port for overdue maintenance.
The messaging you’ve outlined here along with the other structural cracks you've pointed out are painting quite a picture. I don’t think we’re at collapse yet but… how long?
Thanks, Jack! You keep us all sane (ish?)!
Deb...absolutely.
They’re improvising inside a SYSTEM that PUNISHES improvisation.
What you said about going in without a plan...metrics...a definition of victory...or an exit ramp gets right to the heart of it.
That’s how bad situations turn into grinding ones. And yes, “stretched too thin” is exactly the phrase that KEEPS surfacing here.
I think your read is strong: not collapse...not yet...but...visible STRAIN.
That’s the part a lot of people miss. Systems usually don’t announce collapse with a trumpet. They show you overload, contradictions...degraded maintenance...sloppy messaging...and a growing GAP... between posture and capacity. That’s the picture coming into view. No doubt.
Your point about your body reacting early also matters. A lot of people felt that jolt for a reason. Sometimes...your nervous system picks up the instability BEFORE the pundit class is willing to name it.
Thank you for this. “You keep us all sane (ish?)” is about the best endorsement I could ask for. I'd be lying is I said I didn't love it.
-Jack
Jack is doing something important in this newsletter, and it deserves to be named precisely.
He is not arguing that the United States is losing. He is arguing something harder to hear: that the people making decisions may not know the difference. That is the historical danger. Not defeat. Delusion.
Every major military miscalculation of the twentieth century followed the same structure. The official narrative simplified the battlefield. The simplified narrative produced overconfidence. The overconfidence produced escalation. The escalation produced the catastrophe that the narrative had made unimaginable.
Vietnam. Iraq. Afghanistan. The details differ. The structure does not.
What Jack is tracking — the F-35, the F-15s, the KC-135, the gap between “flattened” and “still operational” — is not a list of battlefield incidents. It is an early warning system. It is the data that arrives before the reckoning. The data that gets explained away, individually, until it cannot be explained away collectively.
File the date. March 19, 2026. A writer in Kansas City looked at the pattern before the pattern had a name. That is what good journalism does. That is what this newsletter is doing.
The most dangerous four words in wartime are not a threat from the enemy. They are four words spoken internally, by the side that is winning on paper: We have this handled.
Read this. Share it. The gap Jack is describing does not close on its own. It widens. And what lives in the widening gap is the decision no one is ready to make because no one admitted the situation required it.
#HOLDFAST
Jack, that was great! Do you know where that happened? Over water? Over Iran itself? Elsewhere?
Mary E...not that I’ve seen. Public reporting so far says it was damaged during a combat mission over Iran...and then diverted for an emergency landing at a U.S. base in the region.
I have not seen credible...verified reporting pinning it down more precisely as “over water” versus a specific spot inside Iran. However, I will be watching closely...and make it known if that becomes available.
-Jack
Also, Jack, I know it takes time on your part to respond to these comments (after you have already devoted a lot of time preparing the post), and I want you to know I appreciate it. I read your replies to others’ comments as well. Thank you.
It hadn't occurred to me how non descript the word winning was until this last week.
Fact, Emma. There's more ambiguity in Trump's use of that word than there is sugar in a Snickers Bar.
-Jack
Wow, you couldn't have said it better J Hardy Carroll!
Wasn't that a great piece?! I agree, Cheryl.
-Jack
Right before reading you, I read this article which goes along with your hypothesis. https://thinkbigpicture.substack.com/p/trump-escalation-trap-lbj-vietnam?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=2n1rj
Trump, because of his stupidity and ego and gullibility and narcissism didn't walk into the trap he ran into it with open arms. First it was the testimony yesterday, now this news about the F35, more revelations about Netanyahu's machinations...we are in so much more trouble than they are letting on.
Proxy war indeed.
What we might have just learned is that one or more of our potential enemies cracked the code on the F-35 and let Iran test that theory in real time, something they've thankfully been unable to do.
If Russia, China, and/or North Korea now know how to stop our best weapons, the entire global order has been upended, American hegemony is officially over, and no amount of propaganda and bluster from the incompetents in DC can change that reality.
We should not be surprised if we find among all those boxes of documents that were scanned and most likely handed to Russia in 2020/2021 had F35 plans in them.
They underestimated Iran & Iran’s response to being attacked.
I’m wondering what all this means to folks on the ground here in US. I spent over $40 to fill up my Honda Civic today. Every time I shop it costs more. But we are relatively well off-retired and own our house. Friends are having babies. I can’t imagine what they think, if they are involved enough to even see anything but network news. That uninvolved group scares me. I’d like your analysis of what to watch for closer to home. Thanks, as ever. #HoldFast👹
"[A] direct hit on a stealth platform suggests that the enemy still has teeth." ... OR is being guided by Putin!
But the chinese system is so much better, do you think china cut them out so they had to go to russia? That would be interesting
Thanks for this update, Jack.
Technology…. The most advanced “stealth” fighter made. Invisible to technology, radar, missile guidance, tracking…. But what about good old fashion bop-bop guns with line of visual sighting. The type of guns used 80 years ago on battleships to fight off those 0’s. Can cart them around on the back of a truck and hide them in a cave.
Satellite fly overs won’t be quick enough to find them if they are on a sit and hide. Just because it’s stealth doesn’t mean you can’t hear them coming.
Lucky battery out of a cave got a feather.
We might have the best fighters in the air…. But this is going to be a dread out on the ground. Vietnam? Caves, tunnels, holes.
And not knowing who is going to be on our side in country. Remember, this is a Religious Holy war against Satan for them.
Oh boy. And we refused Ukraine. Talk about stupidity.
Tulsi gabbard, in particular, testifying today in a Senate hearing implied all appropriate intelligence describing the high probability of current outcomes and miscalculations was delivered to trump. WHY the shift from 3/18 to 3/19? Because the Senate on 3/18 discovered the omission in her oral statement concerning the fact that Iran is yet to resume uranium enrichment? It was included in her written statement. Republicans were even involved in some appropriate questions. Is she just covering her backside? Iran's capabilities come as no surprise knowing Iran's available video verification showing many mobile missile launchers. They open residential roofs to launch missiles. They manufacture shahed drones. They export drones to Russia and share technology. They diversify their manufacturing throughout their expansive borders. Underground manufacturing and storage is embedded everywhere. US has no Ukrainian state of the art drone defense. Closing The Strait of Hormuz, all 24 miles at its narrowest, is child's play. Intelligence briefings then included all this information available to an outside observer and classified information only available to The Orange Degenerate. He and he alone disregarded all this verifiable intelligence. I'm interested to see how mainstream media portrays this hearing.