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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Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan, Japan's Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, and Indonesia's Vice President Gibran Rakabuming Raka during the G20 Leaders' Summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, on November 22, 2025. (Getty Images)