ARTEMIS II AND IRAN April 10, 2026

A cartoon in last Friday’s San Francisco Chronicle says much about the war on Iran. 

Wiley Miller’s “Non Sequitur” appeared two days after Artemis II lifted off to circle the moon. Two astronauts ride in a moon buggy. One holds a rifle. A gun rack holds three more.

The dialog balloon: “Let’s call it quits, Houston. There’s nothing here to kill.” The caption: “Why Americans stopped going to the moon.” 

The war has brought out the worst in America’s leaders. Yes, theocratic Iran menaces the Middle East. Tehran’s “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” chants constitute more than words. Iran sponsors terror groups, including Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and Shiite militias in Syria and Iraq.

October 7 was real. Hamas murdered 1,250 people in Israel. Incendiary words also encourage violence on a smaller scale. Witness antisemitic acts, including murder, plaguing the U.S., Europe and Australia. 

Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth exhibit the same lust for violence. Hence they call the Department of Defense the Department of War. The Department of Defense was so named in 1947. World War Two taught us that attempts to conquer other nations should never again be allowed to happen. The U.S. would defenditself and its allies, not impose its will on other nations. (Which, yes, we often did.)

Trump and Hegseth boast about violence. And abuse it. U.S. forces have blown up small boats allegedly smuggling drugs in the Caribbean and Pacific instead of interdicting them and taking their crews prisoner. (Wednesday’s “Non Sequitur”: A lawyer tells an imprisoned mob boss, “No… whacking a guy is only justified as preemptive if you’re the government.”)

Re Iran, on Wednesday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced, “The United States has achieved and exceeded those core military objectives in just 38 days.” Yes, the U.S. and Israel have decimated—though not obliterated—Tehran’s military capabilities and killed many top leaders.

Yet Trump has not achieved regime change—if that was his objective. He wanted to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons—a worthy goal. Yet last June, he stated that we had “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear facilities. Iran retains enriched uranium. The closing of the Strait of Hormuz represents another key issue. But the strait was open before we attacked Iran. 

On Easter, Trump, good Christian that he is, ranted on Truth Social: “Open the fucking strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in hell — just watch.” On Tuesday morning, he threatened: “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will.”

How do you spell w-a-r c-r-i-m-e?

Tuesday afternoon, a ceasefire was agreed to. It’s shaky. Armageddon remains within reach. So does savaging the reputation of America’s military.

Yesterday, David French—a former Marine lawyer in Iraq—asked our military in the New York Times: “Do you serve Trump, or do you serve an even deeper law than the Constitution — the universal moral imperative to protect the innocent and the vulnerable?” 
We’ll see.

Regarding Wiley Miller’s lunar cartoon, Trump and Hegseth have no one on the moon to kill—yet. As to Artemis II, the name of the capsule proves ironic. 

We sent “Integrity” to the far side of the moon. But we can’t locate integrity as near as Washington.