Day 153: Trump Greets Woodrow Wilson
While the above AI-generated image (via NightCafe) might not be the best representation, there is a great deal of truth in the idea that Trump is slowly becoming Woodrow Wilson's understudy. Not only did Wilson implement racist policies as Trump has done (MAGA isn't Make America Great Again as much as it is Make America White Again), but Wilson also campaigned on an isolationist platform, only to engineer America's entry into World War One at a politically advantageous moment for the ambitious president. As this New Zork Times headline suggests, Trump's "America First" isolationism is becoming creeping Middle Eastern adventurism:
Let's be clear: Iran is a bad actor on the world stage, and has been for a great many decades. This is why no one is rushing to their aid. Sure, Russia, China, et al. might speak fondly of the nation, but their lack of assistance exposes how it is just talk, an alliance of convenience rather than an actual defensive pact.
What is more, Iran has never been so weak. Hamas's bloodthirsty terror attack on October 7 proved to be a pyrrhic victory as a corruption-bedraggled Netanyahu saw a golden opportunity to delay his legal comeupance by launching a total war campaign against them, one that has successfully smashed the terror organization, removing a key pawn from Iran's chessboard. Netanyahu then rinsed and repeated with Iran's proxy army, Hezbollah, decapitating (literally and figuratively) that terror operation with a brilliant cell phone bomb op right out of a techno-thriller. Iran was down a second pawn. The final coup d'gras occurred when the pro-Iranian Bashar al-Assad government fell to rebels with startling speed, costing Iran a key staging ground for its meddling. Now, Iran was down two pawns and an entire piece! As any chess player knows, when playing at a high level, such a material deficit is almost impossible to overcome against a skilled player. Iran is now in danger of being checkmated, with even Russia being taken off the board due to being bled white by Putin's ill-fated war against Ukraine.
Iran stands alone.
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This is why I was not surprised by Netanyahu's attack on Iran. It makes strategic sense. If not now, when?
However, what irks me is how Netanyahu planned his attack, which is to say how he intended to manipulate the most easily manipulated president in American history to do his dirty work.
I am not one to praise Trump (as can be seen by perusing my posts!😁), but in negotiating with Iran to surrender their nuclear program, Trump was recognizing that for all its flaws, Obama's butter-for-guns deal made sense and was preferable to outright war, at least from an American perspective. Trump 2.0 was clearly trying to replicate that deal, but one with greater strictures on Iran - again, the right thing to do. (Did I just praise Trump again?!) Clearly, Netanyahu saw that as a threat to his plans. As such, he launched a surprise attack on Iran with the obvious intent to scuttle those talks. In a subsequent television address, Netanyahu explained that he was forced to immediately act because Iran could have a bomb in a timeframe that spanned from weeks to a year.
Stop and think about that. From weeks to a year...
Let me put this to you: Let's say you brought your car to a mechanic for repair work and he told you that the car would be ready sometime between a few weeks to a full year later. Would you leave your car with him? Of course not! Such a timeframe is functionally useless.
Doubly so when you are making the case for an imminent threat.
Right from the get-go, Israel's justification for striking Iran was transparent bunk.
Soon after, a concerted Israeli propaganda campaign started, with the world being told how successful the attack was that night. Well, except for the three nuclear facilities that are the linchpins for Iran's nuclear program. Apparently, Israel forgot it didn't have the weaponry to successfully destroy those high-priority facilities. Darn. What an unfortunate oversight. Gee, I wonder who could hit those sites....
So, after announcing this attack was about stopping Iran from getting a nuclear bomb, Isael proceeded to bomb, you know, television stations and unreleated targets like that, while also sending its Wormtongues out to make the case that this surprise attack was about Iran's nuclear program, as well as everything else, from human rights abuses to the (false) narrative that Iran was involved with the October 7 attack. And something about a kitchen sink as well...
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Enter the most gullible man on the planet: Donald Trump.
As anyone who objectively follows Trump knows, he is not a man of principle. As James Carville (in)famously pointed out about Bill Clinton, Trump has no core set of ideological beliefs. He is purely transactional. This is why Netanyahu, a man far more intelligent and cunning than Trump, understood he could take this Trump...
“We will measure our success not only by the battles we win, but also by the wars that we end, and perhaps most importantly, the wars we never get into,” he said.
...and turn him into the man that agreed to enter Israel's war and, as the above NYT's article states, is now talking about regime change for a country two and a half times the size of Iraq.
While how precisely Netanyahu accomplished this feat is up for debate, I suspect that it had a great deal to do with the TACO Trump meme, which is to say that confronted by a tough decision, Trump Always Chickens Out. Indeed, it was interesting to see even the corporate media find the courage to laugh at Trump's statement late last week that he was going to take two weeks to decide what he was going to do about Iran, a familar Trumpism that usually equates to never doing anything at all; it is his equivalent of telling the teacher that his dog ate his homework.
This tongue-in-cheek observation from even normally reserved anchors like CNN's Kaitlan Collins must have stung Trump's ego, much as the TACO label continues to infuriate him, because it was just a day later that the attacks were launched without further warning, something that has served to add insult to injury as Iranian took Trump at his word that he was going to allow two weeks for futher diplomacy.
That would be my guess as to the reason for the sudden reversal on Trump's pledge to be a peacemaker rather than a warmonger. Despite his MAGA cult's delusion to the contrary, Trump doesn't play chess. He doesn't even play poker, the other game often compared to international diplomacy. Trump just plays whack-a-mole, lashing out with a mallet at targets of opportunity, both out for some sort of internal rage, as well as the enjoyment of inflicting pain with power. I suspect his decision to go all-in on Israel's war was motivated by such superficial reasons rather than any sort of grand strategic vision.
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The million-dollar question is, what happens next? Did Trump repeat the mistakes of the Bush administration and get the nation involved in a costly Middle Eastern conflict? Or will Iran take the hits on the chin, engage in some posturing, but let things cool off?
Honestly, I don't know.
As I wrote above, Iran is in an incredibly weakened state, the likes of which have not been seen...ever? Militarily, the armed forces of Iran use antiquated equipment from the late 20th Century, which is why they have been so ineffective at repelling both Israeli and American airstrikes. Except for its domestic drone production, which has produced battleworthy drones now used by Russia in Ukraine, Iran's military is best geared towards asymmetric warfare, such as sabotage, terrorism, mine-laying, cyber attacks, and long-range drone and ballistic missile attacks. This is not to downplay its sizable army, the largest in the region, mind you, but as Russia has learned in Ukraine, a large but poorly equipped and trained military is no match for a foe using the latest gear and the best training - i.e., Israel and the United States. What is more, Iran, having lost control of its skies, would struggle to muster troops, let alone launch a ground campaign, in full view of a sky filled with Israeli and American aircraft. This is why I think Iran is going to struggle to get its licks in.
But there is a wrinkle.
For all its incompetence, the Bush administration did get one thing right about the Iraq War: you cannot truly end a nation's nuclear program without controlling the ground where it is being developed. Despite the USAF's sales brochure that has for decades now proclaimed its services as a one-step solution to all the world's military problems, the truth is that bombing campaigns are only good at harassing an enemy and slowing its progress towards victory. To stop an enemy, it takes ground forces. Period.
If I were Iran, I would bait Trump into a ground war. This might not even be as hard as it sounds, as initial battle damage assessments of last night's air strikes contradict Trump's boasting about the destruction of all three sites, but rather consider those sites to be "severely damaged." Knowing how anyone in the US government who wants to keep their job needs to spin every statement to avoid earning Trump's ire, you can be pretty sure that that "severely damaged" assessment is probably closer to merely "damaged."
If that comes to pass, it won't take long for the celebrations to end and the ketchup to hit the wall at that point.
Indeed, he seems to be leaning in that direction already. And with former Bush neocons refusing to learn anything about the mistakes of the Bush years pushing for another war, not to mention the more hawkish members of MAGA who were never onboard with isolationism but rather want to return to spheres of influence where America, China and Russia agree to divide the world amongst themselves, it is not inconceivable that Trump will conclude that a ground invasion will be necessary, especially if Iran does muster some sort of high profile damaging retaliation against US interests.
Again, there are just too many unknowns, too many moving parts, to predict where this is going. It is even conceivable, but not likely, that Russia, or even China, might decide to come to Iran's aid as a way of testing the oft-shaky resolve of this administration, resulting in Trump going TACO again, a damaging scenario for US global credibility, or, again, as a way of baiting America back into the region, a scenario both Russia and China know will prove to be disasterous for this administration.
We just don't know. And that is a thought that should keep Americans awake at night as a mercurial and easily manipulated man like Trump rides his latest hobby horse into the unknown.
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