A Letter from 2065 About the 2026 Iranian War

Introduction

In a letter reflecting on an essay from 2026 by Jack Hassard about the U.S. military strikes against Iran, Skyler Fusaro emphasizes the significance of legal and moral questions about the war. Originally, Hassard raised concerns about the legality of the action under international law. He suggested that justifications for the strike were unstable. He also believed they were politically motivated. Fusaro notes that while the first discourse seemed uncertain, it now shows a pivotal moment. This moment marks the erosion of international order. He highlights the importance of questioning governmental actions to protect democratic values and uphold legal constraints.

Editor’s Note

The letter below is from Skyler Fusaro. It responds to an essay I posted in March 2026 titled “Questions Surrounding Iran: Legality, Purpose, and Economy.” The article was written shortly after the United States launched military strikes against Iran.

At the time, official explanations for the attack were shifting. Various justifications were offered. These included preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. They also involved responding to an alleged imminent threat. Additionally, weakening Iranian military capabilities was among them. Legal scholars questioned whether the action complied with international law or congressional authorization.

My essay simply raised those questions. It asked whether the strike met the legal standards governing the use of force after World War II. The essay also questioned what its strategic purpose was. Additionally, it considered what economic consequences will follow.

Fusaro is writing nearly forty years later. She treats the piece less as an argument than as a small record of uncertainty. It is a document from a moment of indecision. Americans were still trying to decide if the legal restraints on war remained intact.

—Jack Hassard

Atlanta

2060

Skyler Fusaro’s Letter

• Atlanta Federation District
• June 12, 2065

Dear Jack,

I read your old essay again this morning. It’s the one you wrote in March of 2026. You asked questions about the American war against Iran. Time has a way of clarifying things that seemed murky in the moment. Your piece now reads less like commentary and more like a document from the edge of a turning point.

What strikes me first is the simplicity of your question: Was the war legal?

International law after 1945 allowed war only in two circumstances. These are self-defense or authorization by the United Nations Security Council. You pointed out that neither condition clearly applied in the bombing of Iran. Legal scholars from that period expressed serious doubts about the operation. They noted that it resembled the type of aggressive war the post-World War II legal order aimed to prevent.  

In 2065 that debate sounds painfully familiar.

For historians now, the legality question matters for multiple reasons. It matters not just for what it says about Iran or about Trump. It also matters for what it revealed about the fragility of the rules the United States once championed. You reminded readers that America helped build the framework that outlawed aggressive war. When the country that wrote the rules begins ignoring them, the rules themselves start to weaken.  

That line appears in several textbooks today.

What you were really documenting was the slow erosion of the international order. It did not collapse all at once. Instead, it unraveled through exceptions. Wars were justified as “imminent threats.” Emergency powers were claimed in the name of national security. There were arguments that the rules did not apply when the stakes felt high enough. Today, many people view Donald Trump as the cause of this war. He is seen as working in collaboration with Benjamin Netanyahu. Support for this war was not favored by the majority of Americans, as for that matter, most of America’s allies.

Your essay also noticed something historians now emphasize: the shifting explanations for the war itself. In the days before and after the bombing, officials gave multiple reasons. These included preventing nuclear weapons and responding to an alleged imminent threat. They also aimed at destroying missile capabilities and punishing Iran for its support of militant groups.  

To a reader in 2026 those explanations probably sounded like debate.

To a reader in 2065 they sound like uncertainty. And that uncertainty was rightly directed at Trump, and his advisors including Hegseth, Rubio, and Vance.

Governments often offer several reasons for a war. This usually means the real motive is political momentum rather than a single clear cause. By then the machinery is already moving.

The economic dimension you raised also looks different from where we sit now. Iran in the early twenty-first century already lived under heavy sanctions. These sanctions had isolated much of its oil-dependent economy. They also discouraged foreign investment.  

War did not start that pressure—it intensified it. In hindsight, the conflict was part of a longer pattern of economic confrontation. This pattern blurred the line between warfare and policy.

But your essay was not really about Iran.

It was about America asking itself whether the rules still mattered.

In 2065, historians often think about the mid-2020s. They believe it was a moment when the United States stood between two paths. One path tried to preserve the international legal order that emerged after 1945. The other accepted a world where power mattered more than rules.

Your post captured that moment before anyone knew which path would win.

That’s why I keep returning to documents like yours. They preserve the uncertainty of the now—something the past often hides. When we look backward, everything seems inevitable. But in real time it never is. By the way, I came across an important article by Lucian K. Truscott IV. I’ve read most of his Substack essays. This one, The many, many wars fought by the empire that became Iran, gives a history lesson. This lesson is one that American political leaders in your time should have read. They underestimated Iran by not knowing anything about their history, nor geography of their country.

In 2026 you were simply asking questions.

History eventually answered them, though not in the way many hoped.

Still, your instinct was right. The health of a democracy can often be measured by whether its citizens are willing to ask those questions. They need to do this before it is too late.

And you did.

With respect from the future,

Skyler Fusaro

Atlanta, Georgia

2065