The idea that Trump or MAGA is in any sense “anti-war” is something between an absurdity and a misunderstanding. Kate and I had a good discussion of it in this week’s podcast. At one level it’s a simple fraud. Trump claimed he’d always been against the Iraq War at a time when the U.S. had been bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan for years. It was a helpful attack line and it was completely false. Trump wasn’t in politics in 2002 or 2003 and to the extent he said anything, like a lot of people, he was for it when it was popular and against it when it wasn’t.

During his presidency he signed off on the assassination/targeted attack that killed Qasem Soleimani; he heavily involved the U.S. in the Saudi war in Yemen; he maintained or expanded the U.S. fight against ISIS in Iraq/Syria. Those are at least a continuity with the Obama years and in key respects an expansion of it. The one arguable exception is the deal Trump made with the Taliban to leave Afghanistan — a bad deal which Joe Biden was saddled with and followed through on and was endlessly criticized for, by Trump more than anyone else. Afghanistan captures Trump perfectly — his one notionally “anti-war” position was continuity by definition. And he turned against it as soon as he was unpopular. Trump has gotten “anti-war” mileage out of his opposition to Ukraine aid. But that’s pro-Russia rather than anti-war.

Yesterday (in this post which didn’t go up as a BackChannel) I discussed the idea of “strategic depth” as a way of thinking about the sovereignty of the states in the battle against Trumpism. I want to expand on that. Because it’s become pretty central to my thinking about how the United States is going to survive the next three and a half years and begin the process of battling back. “Strategic depth” is primarily a concept for military studies. It refers to the shape and arrangement of the physical territory a country controls and how close its borders, which may be vulnerable to military attack, are to its concentrations of population, political and industrial centers. If all a country’s key stuff is right near a vulnerable border that’s a big problem. But in addition to where its key stuff is, does it have a lot of territory to fall back on if it suffers early defeats?

This is one of the most amazing stories to come down the pike in I don’t know how long, published over the weekend in The Washington Post. The short version is that Tim Sheehy, probable Republican nominee for Senate in Montana, is a comical liar and is trying to cover up that lie with a story so preposterous that it’s kind of a joy to run through because it’s so hilariously bad.

Seriously, I’m not overstating the case.

Let’s dig into the details.

10:38 PM: In any war, in any sport, you maintain the initiative and you’re on the road to victory. Harris has controlled the entire debate. She’s effectively baited him in a way no other candidate has ever been able to do. It’s not like she’s going to rocket into some big lead. People aren’t going to abandon Trump. But she needed to show she can dominate him, be the one in control. She has. It’s as simple as that. She’s also gotten him to spend most of the debate showing his most feral and angry self. This debate was a rout. I don’t think there’s any other way to put it.

10:19 PM: Is she actually going to overmatch him on the Afghanistan withdrawal question?

10:05 PM: Trump has simply been on the defensive for every moment of this debate. She delivers her messages, while also baiting him and he responds and gets angrier in a way that makes him even less coherent than normal. She’s controlling the tempo and frankly dominating the debate. Meanwhile he’s spent most of the debate talking about his worst vulnerabilities.