Trump Is Frantically Searching for an Offramp From His Disastrous War
His strategic defeat is now clear for all to see.
According to news reports, Iranian and U.S. negotiators are closing in on a deal to end Donald Trump’s reckless, unconstitutional war. As the terms revealed that Trump’s war failed to attain his aims (e.g. permanently ending Iran’s nuclear ambitions), Republicans began blasting the deal. A Trump Truth Social post attempted to contain the backlash. He insisted he had told the negotiators to proceed carefully because time was on our side.
It bears repeating that Trump’s overly cheery take that we are on the verge of a deal may be nothing more than Trump spin. (Axios reported the deal could take days to complete.) Negotiations could stall at any time, leaving the Strait of Hormuz closed and no agreement on Iran’s nuclear program.
The agreement reportedly under discussion would simply continue talks about Iran’s nuclear program. A final nuclear deal, if concluded, would require Iran to give up its stockpile of enriched material (or reduce the level of enrichment) and suspend enrichment for a fixed time (as under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action). One imagines Iran will be happy to talk and talk and talk. The purported agreement, according to U.S. sources, would permit free shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. That would simply be a return to the status quo.
But most galling for Republicans, Trump’s agreement reportedly would unfreeze $25 billion in Iranian assets, a significant achievement for the economically hobbled Iranian regime. Recall that Republicans and Trump personally excoriated President Barack Obama’s agreement to unfreeze a mere $1.7 billion in conjunction with the JCPOA, which they claim amounted to funding Iran’s nefarious activities.
War hawk Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) freaked out as details of the agreement dribbled out. “If it is perceived in the region that a deal with Iran allows the regime to survive and become more powerful over time, we will have poured gasoline on the conflicts in Lebanon and Iraq,” Graham warned on X. “A deal that is perceived to allow Iran to survive and possess the ability to control the Strait in the future will put Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Shia militias in Iraq on steroids.” Graham was not done with his scathing review:
This combination of Iran being perceived as having the ability to terrorize the Strait in perpetuity and the ability the inflict massive damage to Gulf oil infrastructure is a major shift of the balance of power in the region and over time will be a nightmare for Israel.
Also, it makes one wonder why the war started to begin with if these perceptions are accurate.
He was not alone. “The rumored 60-day ceasefire — with the belief that Iran will ever engage in good faith—would be a disaster. Everything accomplished by Operation Epic Fury would be for naught,” tweeted Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), the Senate Armed Services Committee chairman.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) chimed in as well, saying he was “deeply concerned” about the reported deal, the New York Times reported. “It would be a ‘disastrous mistake’ if an agreement resulted in Iran being able to enrich uranium, develop nuclear weapons, and have effective control over the Strait of Hormuz, he said.” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) on CNN observed, “It doesn’t make sense to me ... now we’re talking about a posture where we may accept nuclear material remaining in Iran?”
The deal under discussion would dispel any notion that the United States “won” the war. The Wall Street Journal was quick to conclude: “The agreement, if completed, wouldn’t achieve Trump’s main goal of preventing Iran from ever acquiring a nuclear weapon.”
If this deal holds, there will be no question that Trump’s war amounted to a major strategic failure. Maybe we get an agreement similar to the JCPOA, which would have been in place had Trump not exited the deal. (Getting back in war something you already had is nothing to cheer about.) The agreement would leave the regime (perhaps more radical than ever) in place, deny Israel any permanent end to the Iranian threat, reveal the limits of U.S. influence and power in the region, and, by default, afford China (as evidenced by Trump’s pathetic showing at the summit) increased stature and confidence. Preventing a restart of a war no one wanted and an end to the energy shock Trump provoked can hardly been called “wins.”
The entire episode underscores the utter fecklessness of the Republicans in Congress, who don’t exercise their constitutional authority or conduct even minimal oversight. The deaths and injuries to U.S. troops, the deaths of thousands in the region, the physical destruction in Iran and Lebanon, the damage to the Gulf states’ oil operations, the extensive depletion of U.S. munitions, the tens of billions in costs, and soaring energy costs (and broader inflation spike) have achieved no lasting, positive result for the United States or its allies in the region. At best, we would be back to an agreement akin to the JCPOA but with a much emboldened, more dangerous, and well-funded Iranian regime.
Whether this deal gets finalized or not, Congress must conduct extensive oversight to fully investigate the Trump regime’s malfeasance, incompetence, and lack of honesty. If war crimes were committed, the officials responsible need to be held accountable. And finally, Congress needs to pass legislation to prevent this and future presidents from unilaterally blundering into unnecessary, ill-advised and illegal wars in the future.
Nice to see Bibi joining the long list of smacked asses who thought they could rely on Trump. He should have heeded Kruschev's wisdom at the end of The Death of Stalin when, in answer to Kaganovitch's inquiry as to whether Malenkov could be trusted, Nikita said: "You can never trust a weak man."
If only the Congressional Republicans would finally discover their collective spines and do the job they were elected to do. But none of us should hold our breath waiting for that to happen.