On What Really Matters, Walter Russell Mead discusses the other strait Iran is threatening to close, the Trump administration’s interest in Ukrainian territorial concessions, rumors of increasing US troop deployments to the Middle East, and how the doves and the hawks both got Iran wrong.
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BYD’s chip Xuanji A3 is displayed during the 2026 World AI Conference on July 17, 2026, in Shanghai, China. (Getty Images)