President Donald Trump didn’t make a sustained case for war before launching strikes against Iran more than a month ago. During a prime-time address on Wednesday, the president persuasively argued that Iran is an international menace. Yet he didn’t do enough to explain what victory looks like — or how it can be achieved before the United States finds itself in another Middle Eastern quagmire.
“Over the next two to three weeks, we’re going to bring them back to the stone ages, where they belong,” the president declared. “In the meantime, discussions are ongoing.” Pairing extreme violence with a perpetual willingness to negotiate is classic Trump, but the markets weren’t impressed. Oil jumped and stocks fell Thursday morning.
The president was spot-on when diagnosing the Iranian government as a cancer. For decades the regime has funded terrorist proxies tied to the deaths of hundreds of Americans. Despised by its own people, the regime’s security forces killed tens of thousands of innocents this year alone.
Around 80 percent of Americans already have an unfavorable view of the Iranian government — a remarkably stable rating — but a majority opposes this conflict. That’s because of America’s poor record in the Middle East in general and the lack of a clear plan to end this conflict in particular.
Trump made clear that, like the presidents who came before him, he finds a nuclear-armed Iran unacceptable. Further, he said his administration was not seeking “regime change” but instead to end “the regime’s ability to threaten America or project power outside of their borders.”
The U.S.-Israeli assault has killed Iran’s top leadership, devastated its navy and grievously damaged its military infrastructure. These are serious and under-covered accomplishments, but the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps remains in control and still has the ability to fire some missiles and drones. With the Strait of Hormuz effectively shut down, will the U.S. keep the fight going until oil, gas and fertilizer can safely flow out of that chokepoint?
Trump says American allies should “build up some delayed courage” and retrieve their own resources from the strait: “Just take it, protect it, use it for yourselves.” On the other hand, he says that “when this conflict is over, the strait will open up naturally” because it’s in Iran’s interest. The question is when the conflict will end — and how much damage will occur before it’s over.
The first concern is the toll that the fight takes on America’s most important allies. It’s true that Gulf states once ambivalent about Iran have turned more comprehensively on the country. Yet America’s most important partners in Europe and Asia are suffering from rising energy prices and outright shortages.
Trump’s rhetoric on Hormuz has been especially alienating, and not just to left-leaning European governments. Giorgia Meloni, the Italian prime minister and one of Trump’s best friends in Europe, has turned on the president over the war.
The second issue is China. America’s greatest national security concern is deterring a Chinese seizure of Taiwan by force, and plenty of variables are at play.
Trump has shown a willingness to use force and use it effectively, and no doubt Xi Jinping has noticed how quickly the U.S. military has been able to gut Iran’s air defenses. Yet the Chinese also must be taking note of dwindling American munition stockpiles, including the reported expenditure of at least 850 Tomahawk missiles, a key weapon for the Pacific theater. A prolonged conflict that drains American resources will leave the Chinese encouraged about their ability to win a war of attrition.
Ending the war swiftly does not mean the U.S. has to accept a bad deal from the remnants of the regime. The best path out now is to declare victory and walk away from a sustained military campaign. The U.S. can maintain maximum economic pressure on the diminished regime while reserving the right to strike again. Any continued obstruction of the strait will be blamed on Iran alone. An open-ended commitment to pummeling Iran will extend the war’s harms for uncertain benefit.
Toward the end of the speech, Trump mentioned the length of other wars in U.S. history. He’s right that the 32 days America had been at war in Iran is nothing compared to more than eight years in Iraq or 19 in Vietnam. Yet leaders don’t start wars expecting them to drag on and become more costly than the public will countenance. It will take discipline to end the war quickly — and more discipline to strike again the next time Iran needs to be contained.
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