Does anyone else ponder about the inevitable collapse of the United States? It’s keeping me up at night just thinking about it. Here’s how I fear it will happen:

In a matter of 1 to 3 months, Iran will have successfully depleted all of our missile interceptors and destroyed all our radar systems and installations in the Gulf, rendering our security presence for the Gulf countries completely useless, and Gulf countries will ultimately see great losses with attacks on desalination plants and other critical infrastructure if/when they align with the US and enter the war directly.

In the meantime, by this point we’ll have attempted a military invasion of Kharg Island or one of the other islands or coastal areas of Iran, attempted a raid on Iran’s nuclear material, and maybe launched some tactical raids elsewhere within Iran by that point, with varying degrees of success, but would ultimately become bogged down in an unsustainable war of attrition that will be militarily and fiscally costly as well as extremely politically unpopular, such that within six months, Trump will unilaterally concede to Iranian demands and will withdraw forces from the region entirely.

In the absence of security guarantees from the US, the Gulf will rush to sue for peace with Iran and seek new security guarantees from nuclear armed Pakistan against the threat of Israel, and will abandon the petrodollar, instead conducting trade in Iranian currency, or the Euro, yuan, or ruble. The abandonment of the dollar in global oil trade will trigger a massive sell-off of the dollar as well as a commensurate sell-off in dollar denominated debt as the dollar collapses in value. This will trigger a global liquidity crisis and the banking system will completely collapse.

Meanwhile, because a decline in debt values means higher yields, interest payments on nearly $40 trillion in US federal debt will skyrocket to unserviceable levels, and a financial crisis will simultaneously force massive fiscal stimulus that will cause soaring deficits leading to a government collapse. The Federal Reserve will do everything in its power to mitigate this by engaging in Open Market Operations to buy up treasuries in an attempt to stabilize yields, but this process of monetizing the debt will only expand the money supply, further eroding the value of the dollar and contributing to the feedback loop of declining debt values and higher yields.

The result will be Weimar style hyperinflation and the complete destruction of all savings and of the US government as a whole. Combined with global food shortages because fertilizer production and exports have collapsed due to the war, which will drastically reduce crop yields, and America will be completely wiped out. Mass unemployment, mass starvation, societal collapse. The silver lining is that there isn’t much factionalism in our country like there was in the Civil War, so I can’t fathom a full blown second Civil War breaking out, but how would order be restored? Will America balkanize into city states? What will happen to the US military when soldiers no longer are able to be paid? Will America collapse into a Libya type of situation? What impact will this have everywhere else around the world?

The big hope I have is that Trump will successfully manage to negotiate with Iran and the Gulf countries to continue to maintain the petrodollar, because that’s the linchpin holding this all together. If the petrodollar dies, so does America with it. But with $40 trillion in debt and a military that’s unprepared for war with even a middle power like Iran, Russia and China are looking at the US like a bunch of ravenous wolves. They are primed to ascend to hegemonic power, and the US and Europe are in deep trouble.

I hope and pray this all can be avoided, because there’s quite literally nothing I can think of that could prepare any of us living in the West for this. Allahu Musta’an. HasbanAllahu wa ni’mal wakeel.