Luca Trenta

Groupthink.

If a screenwriter had scripted this a few years ago, they would have been shown the door immediately. Too fanciful.

Ali Khamenei’s killing continues long US tradition of letting others pull the trigger Declassified documents reveal details about the long history of the US seeking allies willing to cooperate to kill.

Here is an article @lucatrenta.bsky.social and I wrote in @uk.theconversation.com that situates the Khamenei killing within long hist of assassination plots where US prefers that someone else pulls the trigger. Based @nsarchive.bsky.social docs posted over years
theconversation.com/ali-khamenei...

'US plans collide with reality' is an amazing summary of the second Trump era.

Ali Khamenei’s killing continues long US tradition of letting others pull the trigger Declassified documents reveal details about the long history of the US seeking allies willing to cooperate to kill.

News stories have confirmed that the US provided the intelligence but did not pull the trigger on the strike that killed Khamenei. In our latest @uk.theconversation.com piece, @ajimenezbacardi.bsky.social and I discuss how this it not unusual.

theconversation.com/ali-khamenei...

Reaching net zero by 2050 ‘cheaper for UK than one fossil fuel crisis’ Climate change committee finds move to renewable energy would also bring health, economic and security benefits

"Achieving the UK’s net zero target by 2050 will cost less than a single oil shock and bring health and economic benefits while insulating the country against future costs, the government’s climate advisers have forecast."

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Tanti modi per dire pirla.

Absolutely shocking development in the US-Israel war on Iran.

[Stares in...Clausewitz, or Mike Tyson for that matter.]

Interesting use of the word "covert" there. @rorycormac.bsky.social.

For some time I thought it could be honest mistakes. Now, it’s just complicity.

Surely, in everyone's Top 3 of people who should not listen to when it comes to war planning, war fighting, or post-conflict reconstruction.

I thought Jon Yoo still having a cushy job at Berkeley and getting published everywhere was already pushing it after, you know, all the torturing. Now even Feith gets his piece published, although admittedly in the Bezos Post.

Sorry for jumping in, I'm only doing so because @emilarchambault.bsky.social tagged me in the thread. For a First Year IR course, it might be a good question to ask whether an international society (in the ES sense) still exists. Keating 2022 on the firewall of IS is a good starting point.

The first lesson of war is ‘know your enemy’ – and Britain’s enemy now is Donald Trump | Simon Tisdall As the Iran disaster escalates, the US president should be seen as an enemy whose actions threaten the lawful, democratic way of life everywhere, says Guardian foreign affairs commentator Simon Tisdal...

'As the Iran disaster escalates, Starmer should treat the US president as someone whose actions threaten the lawful, democratic way of life everywhere.' Agreed. Will it happen. Unlikely. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

End the sewage pollution scandal We're sick of it. Sick of the lies, sick of the greed, and sick of a system rigged against us. This is a scandal and this dirty business must end. For more than 30 years water companies have put corpo...

Did you watch Dirty Business? The main villain is now in charge of Welsh Water. I’m not much one for petitions, but I did sign this.

you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/en...

Genuine question: other US presidents were told by Israel to bomb Iran but didn’t. Did Trump do it because he is: a) self-obsessed, b) senile, c) an idiot, d) compromised by Israel on the Epstein files, e) all of the above.

Surely, we should also point out that the US already tried regime change via the Kurds (in Iraq) and it was an unmitigated disaster.

I guess, part of the reason is that personally (or financially) he wasn’t ruined at all. No accountability, no price to pay. Only cushy consultancy fees.

Just fascinating to see Blair, a man whose reputation was ruined by the Iraq war, advocate joining a war that is exponentially stupider and more chaotic. How is it possible to learn nothing from the worst mistake of your life?

Wow -- as first spotted by @BadFoxGraphics on X, Fox & Friends this morning used *old footage of a previous dignified transfer* to mislead their audience about the fact that Trump wore a baseball cap during the one yesterday

Remember the tan suit (during a press conference) scandal.

Spy Novels: A Starter Pack

Fantastic list.

www.nytimes.com/2025/08/23/b...

Shame it’s sold out. Would have been amazing for my first time in Hamburg.

I beg everyone, please stop sanewashing this administration’s policies.

Just arrived in Hamburg. Any tips (where to eat, what to see…in that order 🤣) are welcome.

We are currently at the intersection of 1984, It can’t happen here, and Night of Camp David. Buckle up.

@labouruk.bsky.social showing once again utter moral bankruptcy as well as a tendency to disinformation, they are so quick to spit in others.

Great to see leading legal scholars stand up for what is right. Refusing to call this illegal or engaging in hypothetical legal sophistry only legitimates further violence.

I like how a publication that helped drive Universities ranking-mad, stoke competition, helped made the life of academics more difficult is now shocked at the state of UK HE.

New euphemism just dropped for ‘President has no idea of what he is doing.’