Two years after publicly denouncing the Iraq War as a catastrophic mistake and warning against “senseless war,” US Vice-President JD Vance now faces scrutiny as the administration he serves in oversees a major military strike that killed Iran’s Supreme Leader, raising fresh debate about Washington’s foreign policy direction.
On March 20, 2023, then-Ohio senator JD Vance posted a lengthy thread on X, formerly Twitter, marking 20 years since the United States invaded Iraq. In the posts, he described the war as a historic blunder that cost lives, destabilised the Middle East and strengthened Iran.
“Twenty years ago we invaded Iraq. The war killed many innocent Iraqis and Americans. It destroyed the oldest Christian populations in the world. It cost over $1 trillion, and turned Iraq into a satellite of Iran. It was an unforced disaster, and I pray that we learn its lessons,” Vance wrote.
He acknowledged that as an 18-year-old he had supported the war and enlisted in the Marines shortly after the invasion began.
“As an 18-year-old kid, I supported the war. I enlisted in the Marines a month after we invaded, and left for bootcamp a few months after I graduated from high school. Even though I was just a kid, I still feel guilty for supporting the war,” he said.
Vance added that he has often reflected on how he and many others came to back what he called a “world-historic disaster.”
“I think often of what led me to go wrong in 2003, and more importantly, what led so many smart people to support a world-historic disaster. Very few of its cheerleaders show any remorse or willingness to rethink what made them so wrong.”
In the same thread, he linked his foreign policy evolution to his eventual political alignment with Donald Trump, arguing that critics within the conservative movement who opposed Trump had also been among the strongest supporters of the Iraq invasion.
“There are many reasons I changed my mind on Donald Trump, but Iraq is perhaps the most important. Not that he was an early critic of the war, but that the people in the conservative movement who hated him most were the most wrong, and the most proud, about foreign policy in 2003,” he wrote.
He named figures such as Bill Kristol and David Frum, adding that he had once admired them before concluding their opposition to Trump was, in his view, projection. He also referenced Pat Buchanan in that context.
“We are still living in the ideological cage created by that projection. Our foreign policy is still held hostage by men so desperate to avoid looking in the mirror that they will support the next war, and then the next one, until their country is hollowed out,” Vance said.
He concluded with a call for accountability and restraint. “I hope we do better in the future. And I know that we won't until the people who led us into Iraq are scorned and ignored across the spectrum. Iraq was a disaster, yes, but the best way to do justice to the honored dead is to learn the lessons purchased by their blood.”
The resurfacing of those posts comes after a joint United States–Israel strike on Saturday killed Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in what officials described as a targeted operation. The strike marks one of the most significant escalations involving Iran in recent years and has triggered heightened tensions across the region.
Vance, who now serves as vice-president following an election campaign built heavily around promises of restraint abroad and avoiding new wars, has been at the centre of administration deliberations on foreign policy, according to US officials.
The contrast between his 2023 warning against “the next war, and then the next one” and the current military escalation is likely to intensify debate in Washington over the administration’s strategic doctrine and whether the lessons Vance said were “purchased by blood” have been fully absorbed.
