Former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul on Wednesday wrote about the U.S. war against Iran: “Reporting tells us that there is no real National Security Council-led inter-agency process operating in the Trump administration. They don’t even have a full-time NSA! So that probably explains why (1) the mission of the war is ill-defined, (2) the comms roll-out was a mess, and (3) they didn’t think of all the second and third order effects of war because that memo was never written, let alone discussed in the WHSR, as would be the tradition of any past administration, Democratic or Republican.”
Note: As of early 2026, the United States National Security Council (NSC) is chaired by President Donald Trump. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been serving as the Acting National Security Advisor and running the NSC since May 2025. The NSC, which advises the president on foreign and defense policies, also includes the Vice President (JD Vance) and Secretary of Defense (Pete Hegseth), in addition to the Secretary of State.
Reporting tells us that there is no real National Security Council-led inter-agency process operating in the Trump administration. They don’t even have a full-time NSA! So that probably explains why (1) the mission of the war is ill-defined, (2) the comms roll-out was a mess,…
— Michael McFaul (@McFaul) March 12, 2026
Retired U.S. Army Colonel, Joseph J Collins, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Stability Operations (2001-2004), replied to McFaul: “We failed to prepare for Iran’s attempts at closing the strait of Hormuz. A blind man could see that coming. It has happened so many times in the past. We were also surprised at Iran striking out at its Arab neighbors who were helping us. No goals, no contingency planning.”
Note: Collins describes himself as a “Never Trump Republican turned Democrat.”
Former White House, Commerce, and Treasury official Jim Secreto also replied to McFaul: “As painful and imperfect as the working through the interagency process can be, it’s an essential part of running the government, surfacing issues, coordinating on implementation, etc.”
Note: Secreto served as Deputy Chief of Staff at the U.S. Department of Commerce, Counselor for Investment Security at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, and Special Assistant to the President (Biden) at The White House.
Secreto added: “The absence of an NSC may have allowed POTUS to impose a top-down approach to policy making but it’s also led to tons of mistakes. That’s especially true when one part of the government doesn’t know what another is doing leading to amateur roll outs that are later rolled back (DOD issuing a list of Chinese military-backed companies and then pulling it back after the WH objected). Maybe DOD would have just held off on issuing the report if the WH would have had a meeting about it beforehand!”
