The president has long warned that going to war with Iran would be a “desperate” move to “save face.”
For years, 79-year-old President Donald Trump publicly claimed that a military attack on Iran would reflect an inability to negotiate, scrambled electioneering, or a limp attempt from a president to “show how tough” he is.
Early Saturday morning, Trump announced the U.S. and Israel had begun “major combat operations” against Iran, with a large-scale preemptive strike in which he indicated Americans are likely to die. He claimed the strikes were carried out to prevent the Middle Eastern country from completing its nuclear program and said they would allow its people to overthrow the authoritarian regime that has been in place for decades.
But this isn’t something the Trump of years gone by would have stood for, at least not if he’s taken at his word.
“Our president will start a war with Iran because he has absolutely no ability to negotiate,” Trump said of President Obama in a shouty video clip in November 2011. “He’s weak and he’s ineffective. So the only way he figures that he’s going to get re-elected, and as sure as you’re sitting there, is to start a war with Iran.”
“@BarackObama will attack Iran in order to get re-elected,” he said in a post on X, then called Twitter, the following January.
By the fall, he viewed aggression toward Iran as a pathway to re-election: “Now that Obama’s poll numbers are in tailspin—watch for him to launch a strike in Libya or Iran. He is desperate.”
That October, he said, “Don’t let Obama play the Iran card in order to start a war in order to get elected—be careful Republicans!” he warned.
Trump’s assault on Iran comes just months before the midterms, where polling suggests Republicans could suffer heavy losses. Meanwhile, Trump’s own poll numbers continue to slide. The latest Emerson College Poll on Thursday showed disapproval rates have risen to 55 percent, a four percent leap from last month and a 14-point swing from when he took office last year.
In September 2013, he said, “I predict that President Obama will at some point attack Iran in order to save face!”
Then, just a week later: “Remember what I previously said—Obama will someday attack Iran in order to show how tough he is.”
Two months on, in November, he was still banging the same drum. “Remember that I predicted a long time ago that President Obama will attack Iran because of his inability to negotiate properly-not skilled!” Trump said.
Thirteen years later, Trump’s message has shifted dramatically.
“To the members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, the armed forces, and all of the police,” he said as he announced the initial strike, “lay down your arms or you will face certain death.”
Iran has already hit back, with a state-affiliated news agency claiming it had launched retaliatory strikes on U.S. bases in Kuwait, UAE, Qatar, and Bahrain, the Guardian reports.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
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