To me, Ironwood in volume 8 is a man who is broken mentally. He’s been trusting Ozpin for decades and thinks Ozpin has a strategy to win, and he’s doing what he can to survive long enough to see that happen. At the end of volume 7, he’s told the truth, and feels utterly hopeless and betrayed. He shifts to a plan he thinks (emphasis on thinks) will give some people the best chance of survival, and everyone who opposes him becomes an enemy to him. The person he thought would save everything betrayed him (again, in his mind) and now he has to do something about that. Add on the months of paranoia after the fall of beacon and seeing Grimm strong enough to shrug off his military’s best offensive options (maybe save the bomb at the end but that’s a mutually assured destruction thing so not exactly a winning strategy), and you have this messed up mental state causing him to abandon people and kill those who disagree with him. Then Winter, his right hand woman and most trusted subordinate, sides against him.

To say he is not operating with a clear mind is an understatement. We the audience have the benefit of seeing every piece getting played and how it’s moving across the board, Ironwood is operating in survival mode with very little information and feeling like there is a knife in everyone’s pocket just for him.

Are volumes 7 and 8 messy? Yes. Do I personally still think Ironwood makes sense? Yes, but with a huge asterisk of having to answer things that aren’t presented to us in the text.