The US president wanted an easy win, but the conflict is spiralling following Israel’s attack on a gas field and Iranian retaliation across the region

Shortly after the US and Israel began their illegal assault on Iran , with the US president still preening himself over the kidnapping of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro the previous month, a state department official joked that Donald Trump had a new foreign policy credo: “Decapitate and delegate”. It was a reversal of Colin Powell’s invocation of the “Pottery Barn rule” ahead of the invasion of Iraq: you break it, you own it.

Gen Powell, then secretary of state, was warning that wars can escalate beyond expectation and are harder to exit than enter. It remains unclear what precisely the Trump administration expected from this conflict – perhaps not least to the White House itself – but it is certain that the president was not paying heed when people described the likely consequences.

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From Brexit to fiscal rules to living costs, diagnoses multiply. Steel policy points to a missing link – the need for a strategy to rebuild

The government has raised tariffs to protect the steel industry. It also nationalised the UK’s remaining blast furnaces last year to keep them running. Both moves point to the same conclusion: the current economic model is not working. A series of interventions from Labour’s Sir Sadiq Khan and Angela Rayner as well as the Green party leader, Zack Polanski , this week suggests that an economic debate on the centre-left and left of politics is under way. The disagreement is no longer about whether there is a problem. It is where the problem lies.

Sir Sadiq, the London mayor, is right that Brexit has raised costs for businesses and households . Closer EU alignment would improve trade, investment and market access. That matters. But rejoining the EU won’t on its own rebuild the UK’s domestic capability. Ms Rayner points to a real institutional problem. If the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) understates the benefits of public investment, the state may be constraining itself unnecessarily. That matters too. However, changing the OBR model is not a strategy.

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Foreign minister issues warning after Israeli attack on South Pars gasfield, as Qatar reels from retaliatory strike

• ‘Doomsday scenario’: a visual guide to the oil and gas site attacks in the Middle East

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Iran said on Thursday it would show “zero restraint” if its energy infrastructure was targeted again, as Qatar revealed that almost one-fifth of its liquefied natural gas export capacity had been knocked out in an Iranian strike, in an attack likely to have a years-long impact.

The warning, delivered by the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, follow Israel’s attack on the Iran’s massive South Pars gasfield – which it shares with Qatar – which triggered Iranian retaliatory strikes on Qatar’s Ras Laffan gas complex and other Gulf neighbours, sending stock markets tumbling globally and triggering sharp increases in gas prices .

Readers offer suggestions on how to make the upper chamber more relevant, in response to an article by Polly Toynbee

A reformed Lords could give us the best of all worlds: a chamber that connects and legitimises the disparate parts of our higgledy-piggledy devolved constitution without challenging the primacy of the directly elected Commons ( So long, hereditary peers – but the Lords is still full of absurd anachronisms, 13 March ).

Three-quarters of its members could be indirectly elected by local councillors, with temporary seats reserved for the heads of the national governments and regional mayors. Party leaders not yet in the Commons – such as Zack Polanski – could also sit there. The remaining seats could be time‑limited appointments for experts such as retired civil servants and former ministers, perhaps with different voting rights. An independent commission could oversee appointments, vet eligibility and weed out dodgy donors.

Dr Simon Williams says the UK is trying to build a quantum ecosystem while hollowing out the academic pipeline that produces the talent

Liz Kendall is right to warn that the UK must not let quantum computing talent slip through its fingers ( UK must learn lessons from AI race and retain its quantum computing talent, says minister, 17 March ).

However, UK Research and Innovation’s current funding decisions risk doing exactly that.

Responding to an article that asked whether the flagship Radio 4 news programme has lost its way, Francis Bown writes that it was ever thus

Since I went up to Cambridge in 1968, BBC’s Today programme has been the invariable way the wireless has kickstarted my brain for the coming day ( Has Today had its day? BBC’s flagship Radio 4 show grapples with podcast age, 13 March ).

Complaints about content, structure and presenters have always accompanied its broadcasts, being simply signs of the programme’s importance – just as was the telephone call to the studio from Margaret Thatcher, when the prime minister wanted to make a point live on air. Yet even its old fans must admit that Today has recently lost its way in two important respects. (Assessing the personalities I will leave to others: I am still mourning the departure of Jack de Manio.)

Political repetition | Lakes v loughs | Weighty fruit | First fibs

One thing missing from most of the commentaries following the death of Jürgen Habermas ( Editorial, 18 March ) was his use of the expression “history as a learning process”. That he took the idea seriously was understandable, given that he was born in Germany in 1929, but the sad truth is that politicians keep making the same old mistakes even when the consequences of their actions are staring them in the face.
Dr Charles Turner
University of Warwick

• “Testing of water from Lough Neagh, which has a surface area 26 times bigger than Windermere” ( Report, 14 March ). I am in Ohio and I don’t know the size of Windermere. I reckon it is about 26 times smaller than Lough Neagh.
Mary Jo Hanlon
North Royalton, Ohio, US

• Jones was vice-captain in Red Roses’ World Cup triumph

• Centre to lead team in Six Nations opener against Ireland

Meg Jones has been chosen to lead England’s world champions in 2026 after the regular Red Roses captain, Zoe Stratford, announced her pregnancy on Wednesday.

Jones, who was vice-captain when England beat Canada to lift the World Cup last September, will take over from Stratford for the upcoming Women’s Six Nations. England kick off their campaign against Ireland on 11 April at Twickenham when a tournament-record crowd of more than 60,000 will be in the stands.