On February 15th, 2003, hundreds of thousands of protesters took to the streets of New York hoping to march on the UN headquarters where, over that winter, the George W Bush administration had been attempting to make the case for the invasion of Iraq. Tens of thousands marched in other US cities, and millions worldwide, in a co-ordinated protest that, while impressive in its scope, was itself criticised for its relative lack of commitment compared to the campaign against the Vietnam War.
The mobilisation contrasted with the fact that the prospect of war was, in the US, relatively popular, with 60-70 per cent of Americans expressing support that year. In the blood and chaos that followed, the country soured on the occupation.
In March 2026, the US is again embroiled in a Middle Eastern war of choice, conducted even further outside the boundaries of international law. This war, being waged against Iran hand in glove with Israel, is already unpopular, with polls finding anything from 56 to 70 per cent of Americans in opposition. One poll puts the average net approval at -11. A rumoured ground invasion polls even worse, with barely 20 per cent of voters in favour.
Unlike in 2003, there is a clear partisan divide over the war, with Democratic voters almost universally opposed and Republicans supportive by a margin of about two to one. Such opposition is unsurprising. The war is by any objective standards illegal under international law. Practically the first action was a US bombing of a girls’ school that killed more than 150 people, most of them children.
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The US “secretary of war”, Pete Hegseth, and his colleagues have bragged openly of dispensing with common rules of engagement. The US has followed Israel’s lead from the Gaza war; breaking age-old taboos around the assassination of political figures, the deliberate creation of ecological catastrophes and the refusal of rescue at sea.
The administration has made little effort to sell the war beyond its substantial, but still minoritarian, base. The rhetoric of justification has been from the start insultingly incoherent. Secretary of state Marco Rubio caused a major scandal by indicating that Israel had essentially forced the hand of the US government, leading to furious efforts to walk the story back. The president has variously suggested that the war may take four to five weeks, and that it was “very complete”. Israel, meanwhile, is signalling a longer conflict.
The majority of the US public sees another needless war being conducted on behalf of an increasingly out-of-control ally (who many now regard as an enemy) that will have the result of killing thousands of civilians, increasing the price of oil, tanking the world economy and making attacks on US soil more likely.
There has been nothing like a “rally ‘round the flag effect” typically observed after major national crises or wars. There have been few, if any, conspicuous displays of patriotism or support of the troops. Voters may take out their anger on the administration come the November midterms, which are shaping up to be horrific for the Republicans.
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There has, however, been no corresponding large-scale street mobilisation against the war. Preference for an outcome does not equal salience. Protesters have so far numbered in the hundreds, or low thousands; small in comparison to marches of recent years. A serious protest movement can take time to spin up, but there is no escaping the fact that committed anti-war activism has been a minority proposition in US politics since at least the 1980s.
After the end, in practice, of military conscription in 1973, the public has found it easy to tolerate the relatively low numbers of professional soldiers killed in the innumerable military entanglements of the past 50 years. Anti-war activism has spiked at particular points, but been allowed to wither otherwise.
The sustained and committed activism against the Gaza genocide was met with brutal and multifaceted state repression, and many activists who might otherwise be leading the opposition are still dealing with the legal, social and personal fallout from their bravery.
Alongside this is a Democratic leadership that has been so muted in its opposition as to be essentially complicit. The complaints of Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer, one of Israel’s staunchest allies in the party, have been technical and procedural rather than moral.
The large section of the public that opposes Trump and this war are beaten down and burnt out, exhausted after 10 years of relentless right-wing dominance of public life. Many have disengaged from news media, and if they think of the war at all, it is with a mixture of resignation and disgust; a hope that it will end soon, but with little idea of how to bring that about.
The bitter irony of the situation is that the same disillusionment with the system that might lead one to oppose it can also cause paralysis and political quietism. With a fractured media landscape and algorithmically curated feed, it’s also quite possible to escape the conflict entirely, at least until it comes time to fill a tank of petrol.
For now the public is becalmed; neither actively supportive nor willing to expend energy on opposition. For most, they are simply hoping that it goes away.
