By Sam Sifton
Good morning. The price of oil is up again this morning, in part because of uncertainty about the goals of the war with Iran and when it will end. Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, has been fairly clear on those subjects, though. I’ll start with him.
Pete Hegseth Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times
Retribution and rage
Pete Hegseth wasn’t always like this. In 2005, a moral calling led him to volunteer for the Iraq war. He had read about a suicide bomber who killed 18 Iraqi children and wanted to ensure that ideology would not win. He sought justice, reports my colleague Greg Jaffe, who covers the Pentagon. He wanted democracy and freedom for the people of Iraq. He was moved to join Operation Iraqi Freedom by a kind of altruism.
Hegseth describes the war in Iran very differently. At a news conference last week, he said it would have “no stupid rules of engagement.” In another, he said that the U.S. military would shower “death and destruction from the sky all day long.”
He no longer talks about moral purpose or democratic ideals. “His bellicose, at times vengeful, rhetoric,” Greg writes, “reflects his belief that the United States’ lofty goals in Iraq and Afghanistan caused the military to lose focus on its main task, killing the enemy, and led to costly defeats in both wars.”
He won’t let President Trump make that mistake. Today’s campaign isn’t about enduring freedom. It’s called Operation Epic Fury. “Maximum lethality, not tepid legality,” Hegseth said earlier this year. “Violent effect, not politically correct.” Anything that distracts from that mission is weakness. “This is not 2003. This is not endless nation-building,” he said on Tuesday. “It’s not even close. Our generation of soldiers will not let that happen again.”
Of course, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were disasters for the United States. Greg spoke about that with Phil Klay, a writer who is a Marine Corps veteran of the Iraq campaign. “There’s always someone who thinks that if only we were crueler, if only we’d killed another million Vietnamese, then we would have won this war,” Klay told him. “If you reduce war to the satisfied feeling you get when you kill the enemy, it makes it a lot simpler.”
By any memes necessary
A social media video released by the Trump administration mixed pop culture clips with bombing footage. A video released by the White House
You can see Hegseth’s antagonistic rhetoric playing out in the meme videos that the White House has released on social media since the start of the war, writes James Poniewozik, our television critic.
The clips show explosions accompanied by SpongeBob SquarePants saying, “You want to see me do it again?” Or Hegseth at a briefing, with Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” as the soundtrack. Bombs explode to the tune of Nelly’s “Here Comes the Boom.” There’s Maximus from “Gladiator.” Here’s the antagonist-protagonist warrior Kylo Ren from “Star Wars.”
“The aim is a kind of brazen, joking-not-joking anti-meaning,” Jim writes, “a vibe of dominance unbounded by narrative, reason or moral argument.”
It’s a largely male vibe, at that. Christopher Reeve’s Superman pledges to fight for “truth, justice and the American way.” A menacing Walter White of “Breaking Bad” says, “I am the danger.” There is no good and evil in these clips, Jim writes, “only strength and weakness, winning and losing.”
That’s what drives Hegseth now.
More on the war
In Washington
- Pentagon officials told lawmakers in a closed-door briefing that the estimated cost of the war exceeded $11.3 billion in its first week.
- Some Trump administration officials are growing pessimistic about the lack of a strategy to finish the war. But they haven’t said this directly to Trump.
- The Pentagon has barred news photographers from Iran war briefings.
In the Middle East
The remains of a school in Iran at the start of the war. IRIB TV, via Agence France-Presse
- The U.S. was responsible for a missile strike on an Iranian elementary school, according to preliminary findings in a military investigation. Outdated targeting information may be to blame.
- Iran’s counterattacks have slowed down. Either its arsenal is depleted or it is holding weapons in reserve, experts say.
- At least seven people died in Israeli strikes on Beirut this morning. Lebanese officials say Israel’s bombing campaign against Hezbollah has killed more than 600 people and driven 800,000 from their homes.
- Oil tankers continue to be targeted across the Persian Gulf region. Iraq suspended all oil terminal operations this morning after two tankers were attacked off its coast.
- Iran has fired indiscriminate cluster-munition warheads at Israel several times during this war. More than 100 countries have signed a pact to ban the weapons — though Iran, Israel and the U.S. are not among them.
- The U.S. plans to release 172 million barrels of oil from its strategic reserves, the Energy Department said, to help with rising costs. Dozens of other countries also plan to release oil.
- The war has rerouted flights around the Middle East. Click the graphic below to see more.
Note: Flight paths represent the position of flights every 30 minutes. Source: Flightradar24. Zach Levitt and Jacqueline Gu/The New York Times
THE LATEST NEWS
Politics
In Kentucky yesterday. Doug Mills/The New York Times
- Trump set out on a multistate tour designed to show voters that he is focused on the economy and their pocketbooks — and that he still has control over the Republican Party.
- Trump has yet to endorse either John Cornyn or Ken Paxton in the Texas Senate contest. He’s using that as leverage for a bill that would impose strict voter ID requirements.
- MAGA has embraced animal rights and pushed researchers to reduce their experiments on dogs, cats and primates.
- The administration is starting an effort to allow Veterans Affairs to put some homeless veterans into legal guardianship.
Tariffs
- The Trump administration said more than 4.4 million hours might be needed to manually process refunds requested by companies after the Supreme Court struck down many of Trump’s tariffs last month.
- The government also announced an investigation into unfair trading practices by 16 of America’s largest trading partners as it works to resurrect tariffs.
Around the World
- Britain: Prime Minister Keir Starmer was warned about Peter Mandelson’s close ties to Jeffrey Epstein before appointing Mandelson ambassador to the U.S.
- Ukraine: Defense companies figured out how to build drones without any Chinese components.
- Canada: Two patients died after donating plasma at clinics in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Health officials are investigating their deaths from the procedure, which is generally considered extremely safe.
- China: The government approved an expansive new law to promote “ethnic unity.”
Other Big Stories
- A former police officer in Missouri who took nude images from women’s phones during traffic stops was sentenced to two years in prison.
- A former government lawyer who had an outburst in court over the crush of litigation caused by the ICE crackdown in Minnesota is running for Congress against Representative Ilhan Omar.
- The chef René Redzepi stepped down from Noma, the restaurant he led to international acclaim, after recent reports in The Times about his abuse of employees.
- Lawmakers in Washington State agreed to create what supporters describe as a “millionaires’ tax.” One of the wealthiest, Howard Schultz, is leaving for Florida.
CAT CURIOSITY
The New York Times
Cats, we know, always land on their feet. But how?
To find out, scientists in Japan scrutinized the spines in feline cadavers and dropped a pair of live cats from about three feet up. (“To prevent injury,” the study’s author noted, “we placed a thick, soft cushion at the landing site.”)
They learned that the upper part of a cat’s spine can twist an astounding 360 degrees, which allows a cat to orient its front legs and head toward the ground in an instant. And they made another interesting finding: Cats, like many other animals, appear to favor their right-paw side.
Read more about how cats do this.
OPINIONS
How might the war in Iran end? Stephen Stromberg, an editor in Opinion, brought together the columnists Nicholas Kristof and Bret Stephens and the contributing writer Megan K. Stack to discuss.
Here is a column by Michelle Goldberg on a 31-year-old Floridian’s appeal for conservative young men.
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MORNING READS
In London. Joshua Atkins for The New York Times
Priced out of Broadway: It has become so expensive to stage theater in New York that producers are testing new shows in London.
Paying their share: Raise taxes on the rich? These New York millionaires are all for it.
Your pick: The most-clicked link in The Morning yesterday was an A.I. writing quiz.
TODAY’S NUMBER
$170 million
— That is how much Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan spent on an unfinished waterfront compound on an island north of Miami that locals call the “Billionaires’ Bunker.” It is the most expensive sale in the history of Miami-Dade County.
SPORTS
N.F.L.: Steve Tisch plans to transfer his stake in the New York Giants to his children after emails released by the Justice Department showed that Jeffrey Epstein connected him with multiple women.
Soccer: Iran will skip the World Cup when the U.S. hosts the event this summer, despite Trump’s assurances that its team would be welcome.
Baseball: The U.S. advanced to the quarterfinals of the World Baseball Classic.
RECIPE OF THE DAY
David Malosh for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Cyd Raftus McDowell.
Here’s a recipe that rewards repetition: chicken schnitzel with cucumber salad. You’ll dial in your technique over time, figuring out the flouring and egging and crumbing, the temperature of the oil, the right way to shake the pan to make the schnitzel puff and the proper amount of salt at the end. Make the recipe four times in the next few months and the last outing will be significantly better than the first, though the first will still be plenty delicious. And then you’ll have it for life. You’ll be a schnitzel maven. And that’s a good thing to be.
THE OSCARS
Clockwise from top left, scenes from “Sinners,” “Hamnet,” “One Battle After Another” and “Sentimental Value.” Neon; Warner Bros.; Focus Features
Which film will receive the best picture award at the Oscar ceremony on Sunday night? Which actors will be crowned best? Which director, which screenplay, which documentary, which score? A new category: Who provided the best casting? Kyle Buchanan, who covers Hollywood, has been handicapping the races all season — and reveals his predictions here.
For more on the Oscars: In the video below, Marc Tracy explains the way that voters pick the best picture winner. Click to play.
The New York Times
More on culture
- Field Music is a British cult indie band with a rabid fan base and more than a dozen acclaimed albums. Prince was a fan. That doesn’t pay the bills, though. So the band formed a Doors tribute group. Playing just one show a month as the Doors fills a void in their finances. “The margins for us were so, so tight,” the band’s frontman told The Times.
- A man in Virginia needed more space for his family. So he secured permits to build an addition to his house: three stories and 60 feet long, right up to the property line of his neighbor’s one-story home. Anyone have a problem with that? Look at the photographs.
- Jimmy Kimmel was skeptical about the F.B.I.’s warning of a possible Iranian drone strike on California.
THE MORNING RECOMMENDS
Adrian Dennis/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Heed the actor Bobby Cannavale’s advice and read Mark Kriegel’s sports biographies — he recommends the one on Joe Namath. (I’ll add “Pistol,” about the basketball legend Pete Maravich.) Cannavale also stands tall for bearded dragons. There, your mileage may vary.
Declutter your life to feel more organized. But don’t go big. Start with a small project (your sock drawer?) and you may actually succeed.
Hang some window drapes without putting your security deposit in peril by using these curtain rod brackets tested by the jalousie fanatics at Wirecutter. They leave (almost) no trace.
GAMES
Here is today’s Spelling Bee. Yesterday’s pangram was letdown.
And here are today’s Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections, Crossplay and Strands.
Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times and me. See you tomorrow. — Sam
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Host: Sam Sifton
Editor: Adam B. Kushner
News Editor: Tom Wright-Piersanti
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