Former Secretary of State Antony Blinken revealed that both the Obama and Biden administrations spent years resisting pressure from Israeli leadership to launch preemptive military strikes against Iran. Obama refused repeated calls for action, instead pursuing diplomacy that produced the Iran nuclear agreement. Biden similarly rejected pressure for escalation after the October 7 attacks, reportedly coming within thirty minutes of authorizing a preemptive strike before deciding against it.I’d venture to say the other reason Obama and Biden declined to attack Iran is the situation we have now, the situation that caused Trump today to imagine nobody remembers last week when he told the world they had missed their chance to join the game, and wouldn’t be welcome at the after party. This week, he’s begging even more countries than he told to piss off (he pissed on European allies; now he needs them and Asian help if he can get it). The salient question is still: what does he expect?
Trump took a different path, with his administration launching military action against Iran—the exact scenario his predecessors had worked strategically to avoid.
The danger lies in an asymmetric cost dynamic. Iran can wage conflict far more cheaply than the United States, deploying $20,000 drones while the U.S. responds with $4 million Patriot interceptors. This imbalance allows weaker adversaries to drain resources from stronger ones over time, Pakman noted.
Experts warn that Trump may have succumbed to the same pattern that characterized his first term—believing flattering foreign leaders who promised dramatic breakthroughs, as happened with Putin and Kim Jong Un. The administration now faces a painful choice: commit to prolonged costly conflict or execute a politically humiliating exit.
I don’t mean in terms of response, but in terms of help. The Navy didn’t protect ships in the Strait last week. What do they offer differently this week? What will a flotilla of ships, or several, accomplish? The only way to control the Strait is to control Iran, and that would require a conquest on the order of what the Allies did to Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan. In crudest terms, it would mean the Strait was closed for a very, very long time. And a bigger commitment of blood and treasure than a supplemental spending bill and 5000 sailors and marines.
Who’s up for that?
What Trump’s looking for is not a solution, or a palatable exit. He’s looking for a deus ex machina to bail him out. Daddy’s money won’t do it this time. Neither will filing bankruptcy and hacking off the diseased limb. Trump never takes bankruptcy. He sets up companies that crash casinos and airlines and football teams and even buildings. It’s never him. But this time it is.
It’s him, and it’s us. And there’s no court to make it go away, no creditors to dump it on and walk away from.
And it always comes back to Israel, which really doesn’t care how they affect the world. Their “right to exist” is as narcissistic as Trump’s ego; and really, far more dangerous. Israel can certainly defend itself, as any nation can. But it’s no accident one of Trump’s excuses for this “excursion” is a pre-emptive strike on a @dangerous” Iran. That’s a very convenient excuse for being constantly at war; especially when you call it your “right to exist.”
What? Nobody else gets that consideration?
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