“He thinks everything is transactional, he can deal with the deal one step at a time and see how things unfold, but war is fast, uncontrollable, unpredictable and deadly,” said Julian E. Zelizer, a Princeton history professor and the editor of a book of essays about Mr. Trump’s first term.
“He’s doing the same techniques he always does — threatening people, insulting people, seizing attention to what he wants to say — he’s learning that it doesn’t always work,” he added. “He’s doing the art of the deal in a way that’s just creating chaos.”
That’s from this article in the NY Times about Trump’s war. (gift link) It’s actually much too kind but it is interesting. He’s in so far over his head that it’s breaking him.
He loves the violence though. Just loves it:
“We have unparalleled firepower, unlimited ammunition, and plenty of time — Watch what happens to these deranged scumbags today,” he wrote in a Truth Social post this month. “They’ve been killing innocent people all over the world for 47 years, and now I, as the 47th President of the United States of America, am killing them. What a great honor it is to do so!”
And his henchmen love to see it:
“President Trump is acting like a wartime president should — decisive, unafraid to use his constitutional authority and focused on protecting Americans rather than getting bogged down in the kind of endless and rudderless conflicts we saw under his predecessors,” said Mike Davis, who leads the Article III Project, a conservative advocacy group, and was an early supporter of Mr. Trump’s war.
“Presidents don’t need permission to defend the country, and the media and Democrats will do anything to delegitimize Operation Epic Fury,” he said. “President Trump’s legacy won’t be judged on process or polls, but on whether he succeeds in neutralizing the Iran threat and making Americans safer.”
Trump knows what he’s doing is illegal.He says it right up front. But he’s immune from all accountability as long as he has 33 Republican sycophants in the U.S. Senate he won’t be impeached and the law can no longer touch him.
Here’s an interview with an expert you might find interesting:
NATE SWANSON spent nearly two decades in the U.S. government, including most recently as a State Department representative on the Trump administration’s Iran negotiating team and previously as the National Security Council’s director for Iran in the Biden administration. Days before the U.S. bombed Iran, Swanson published a piece predicting that Iran would do exactly what it has done should the U.S. attack.
That’s expertise President DONALD TRUMP had available to him — until Swanson, a BARACK OBAMA holdover, was “forced out” of his post after a critical tweet from conservative podcaster LAURA LOOMER, Swanson said. Loomer did not return comment and a White House official, speaking on background, noted that Swanson did not serve on the National Security Council in the Trump administration.In his piece for Foreign Affairs published Feb. 24, Swanson wrote that Iran would not capitulate after a bombing campaign, but rather escalate and “target global oil flows and international shipping, sending energy prices up and creating a serious political liability for Trump.” And indeed, Iran has made scattershot attacks on energy targets and others across the region, as well as throttling passage through the Strait of Hormuz by threatening attacks on ships.
In an interview with POLITICO this week, Swanson predicted that the Trump administration’s negotiations with Iran will not go well because both sides are “irrationally confident” in their positions. Neither side seems willing to find an offramp at this point, he said.
“I think the war is probably going to go on longer than anyone anticipated,” he said.
We spoke with Swanson this week about his predictions — and what he thinks comes next in the war with Iran.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Trump keeps saying Iran’s response has surprised him — that no one told him Iran would retaliate against regional energy infrastructure. How does that kind of comment from the president sit with you?Obviously, it’s not true. There are many people in the government who told him that there was high risk involved. He just chose not to listen to them. And as someone who was forced out of the government and wrote pretty much exactly what was fairly obviously going to happen, that doesn’t sit super well.
What is your current take on the state of the war today?
I think both sides are probably irrationally confident in their standing, and so I think that’s a little worrisome. So I think the war is probably going to go on longer than anyone anticipated.
Trump continues to believe that military success is leading to Iranian political capitulation, which isn’t happening.
Let’s remember that Iran has a vote and Iran is dead set on resisting and defying expectations. I also think they’re kind of irrationally confident without an off-ramp.
I think we’re going to be stuck in this conflict longer and with likely escalations to come. I think the problem is the president is not going to get any off-ramp, and I think we’ll probably go through some of these ground operations he’s considering.
So you’re not convinced by these negotiation talks right now?
One, Iran has rejected them. It’s the same thing that Iran rejected for previous iterations. They’re feeling confident. They feel like they should be making the demands, not the U.S., and obviously the U.S. isn’t adhering to that. So I don’t think either side is ready to compromise.
You negotiated with the Iranians last year, representing the Trump administration posture at the time. What do you think are the most notable changes from either side since then?
On Iran’s side, I think there’s a real hardening coming out of the June war. They didn’t know what to make of Trump before that. I think they have hardened and shown less flexibility. So they haven’t really seriously engaged, it’s more performative than serious. That’s where Iran has shifted a lot since last June.
In the U.S, I think the shift came earlier. And I think they didn’t know what they wanted out of a deal and I think the U.S. became more beholden to our domestic politics on this, and listening to outside influence so no enrichment, etc.
If you were still there at the NSC, what advice would you give to the president today?
You’re not gonna be able to control the off-ramp. Iran is not going to capitulate, so the idea that you’re gonna be able to unilaterally set the off-ramp isn’t going to happen. Either you’re going to have to escalate or you’re going to have to compromise. And so those are just the two options.
Fabulous.