Nancy's Notes

UPDATE- Early U.S. intelligence suggests Iran’s nuclear program has only been set back by a few months, a sobering reminder that you can bomb facilities, but you can’t bomb knowledge. Iran’s scientists, domestic supply chains, and technical capacity remain intact. Without access for IAEA inspectors, it’s anyone’s guess where that 60%-enriched uranium is now, or what its future holds. And for those cheering for regime change, be careful what you wish for. This is a theocracy, not a failed state. Sometimes, it’s better the devil you know than the one you don’t, especially when centrifuges are still spinning in the dark.*

I want to say this as clearly as I can. Donald Trump is about to walk into the NATO Summit like he just handed the world peace on a platter. Like this “ceasefire” is some kind of masterstroke of diplomacy. Like he deserves a Nobel Prize and a standing ovation.

Well, I’m not clapping.

Because I have a son who serves in the Canadian Armed Forces. He wears the uniform, and we are part of NATO. This isn’t abstract for me. This isn’t a campaign speech or a headline. It’s personal. It’s real. And what Trump does or doesn’t do on the world stage has direct consequences for the people I love.

So when I hear that there’s a ceasefire in the Middle East, I don’t breathe easy, I brace. Because this isn’t peace. This is a pause. A tactical timeout so both sides can reload and regroup. We don’t know what was promised. We don’t know who guaranteed what. And quite frankly, there is no reason in hell to believe that Netanyahu or the Ayatollah suddenly discovered diplomacy. These are two men who have repeatedly shown that they will manipulate global moments to serve their own survival, their own power, and their own narrative.

If this were truly a peace process, Iran would be welcoming IAEA inspectors through the front gates right now. They’d be handing over the uranium that got trucked out of the nuclear facility before the bombings. Instead? Silence. Deflection. And from both Iran and Israel this morning, a mutual shrug about “mistakes” made after the ceasefire was announced. Come on. These are not mistakes. These are deliberate moves.

We are still waiting on the BDA, the battle damage assessment, to tell us what was actually hit, and what was conveniently left untouched. Iran still has the means to produce nuclear weapons. That didn’t vanish in 12 days of airstrikes. Tunnels weren’t destroyed. Centrifuge facilities are still operational. Material is still unaccounted for. These aren’t strategic victories. These are PR Band-Aids.

Meanwhile, Trump wants a trophy. He’s not thinking about what’s still smoldering underground, he’s already drafting his Nobel speech.

Seriously! Iran hasn’t changed. Their core ambitions remain, to dominate the region, push the U.S. out of the Middle East, and deny Israel’s right to exist. And Israel, under Netanyahu, hasn’t changed either. He’s playing a long game, and right now, his grip on power is as much a motivation as any strategic objective.

So no, I don’t find this reassuring. If centuries of Middle East conflict could be resolved in a two-week news cycle, we’d have peace in our time every other Friday. But we don’t. Because this isn’t over. It’s not even close.

And I need to say something that’s been burning in me for days: Donald Trump talks about regime change like it’s a reality show plot twist. But he doesn’t seem to understand the people of Iran, who follow their Ayatollah with unshakable devotion. Just like the rest of the world can’t understand how tens of millions of Americans have become completely untethered from reality and follow him like he’s a messiah. You want to understand the Ayatollah’s grip on Iran? Take a good long look in the mirror, America.

The MAGA base and the followers of the Ayatollah aren’t that different. Blind loyalty. No questions. Absolute belief. And when you base global strategy on your inability to understand that… people die.

I didn’t grow up imagining that my son would be serving under these conditions, where political theatre masquerades as international policy, and nuclear silence is somehow supposed to comfort us. But here we are. He puts on his kit and steps into the world not knowing what lies ahead, because decisions made in air-conditioned rooms by men like Trump echo in real lives.

So no, I’m not here for Trump’s travelling peace circus. I’m here because I come from a family that serves. Because I understand what NATO is. Because I know what it’s meant to protect us from. And while Trump plays messiah on the NATO stage, draped in ego and spray tan, the rest of us are left praying his next delusion doesn’t light the world on fire.

NATO was built from the rubble of a world war, by people who knew what happens when fascism goes unchecked and strongmen start believing their own mythology. It wasn’t built for photo ops. It was built to stop history from repeating itself.

But here we are. Watching a man who dodged the draft and worships autocrats pretend he is a peace broker. This isn’t peace. It’s theatre and I don’t know what the next act will be.