Trump has done almost everything totally different than those before him. He has done so many things that 'couldn't be done.' I'm gonna reserve judgement. I think he may surprise us all.
Certainly, if he follows the playbooks of past administrations and past military leadership, it will fail miserably. I don't think he will....I could be wrong....
Yes, but Napoleon was not the leader of the most advanced threat elimination technology the world has ever known. Napoleon did not have the ability to kill ANY leader of ANY country at ANY moment of his choosing. If the USA doesn't dominate the world, then someone else will. Frankly I would prefer the USA to maintain that position. And I would prefer we adopt a merciless stance against any world leader who would dare mess with us.
Trump was opposed to forever-wars, which is what we've been in with Iran for nearly 50 years. He's trying to end that conflict quickly. It needs to be done and I pray he will succeed.
Jesus flipped tax collectors tables over... Trump is cleaning up huge messes - for once very wealthy, productive nations.. Venez & Iran.
Our approaches in the past, have been non existent or without muscle.... and that's been terribly disappointing. Nothing improves without flexing our muscles. So, we're flexing them. Why is that, so disappointing?
Both Iran and Venezuela citizenry WANTS the U.S. to help them topple the tyrannical regimes. When's the last time semi-powerful Marxist, tyrannical regimes, populations -have wanted help?
Trump is creating his version of the NWO. He's not sitting on his hands, watching the Davos (unelected) crowd trying to influence world events.
In a few years, I suspect we'll have 2 new allies on the planet -- critical positioning
in the ME and for Central & Southern America. A real NWO.
There are several things you are missing in the Iran War:
1. Trump is bombing military targets, and removing terrorist leaders that the Iranian people hate.
2. He is catching the leadership at a weak time
3. Unlike the arrogant Nazis entering Russia in 1940, who murdered the Russians who thought they were there to liberate them from Stalin, Trump is willing to help the people overthrow their government, not murder them.
4. This is 40 years of oppression, and the Persian Folk are tired of living on the Islamic Plantation
The celebrations taking place outside of Iran indicate the true fillings of the Iranian people about what President Trump is doing.
So...while history is always very valuable in providing indications if not outright templates for repeating itself, in this case, those templates probably do not apply
This is Neocon propaganda. The Neocons even stated that a ticker-tape parade would happen once Iraq was liberated. Haha, are you really going to be fooled again?
Can you be this naive? No one in the Middle East has any say. Power is dictated by religion. Just as in Iraq, once you create a power vacuum, players from dozens of factions begin their own wars for control. Not to mention that Iran is a proxy for China and Russia. China gets a large amount of oil from Iran, and they even spent billions on a Silk Road to Iran. The Neocons never think beyond bombing a country. They've never been successful. All you are doing is swallowing the bullsheit propaganda.
I do not support the war on Iran. I did not vote for this. I voted for no new wars, America First, and releasing the Epstein files. I voted for Trump three times; he has lost my support because in this term, he’s proving to be no different than the swamp he campaigned against. He has betrayed his supporters. IMO, the people still supporting him are the same people that believe Tyler Robinson was a lone gunman on a roof with a .30-06. MAGA has become a cult. No critical thinking is taking place.
You are entitled to your opinion; most disagree. I certainly do.
This is not a new war, or are you Sleeping Beauty who went to sleep in 1978??? He is finishing a war that began in 1979 & none of the feckless presidents since have had the balls (or likely the technology, to be fair to them) to do what needed to be done.
You must not travel much. I do, & depend on being able to get assistance from the US Embassy when I am overseas. A country’s embassy is its sovereign territory abroad according to centuries old law & custom. We were attacked by the Iranian state in 1979.
Joan Hurlock’s opinion is worth as much as your’s. 1979 was forty nine years ago. Iran presently posed no real threat to us and if it did attack us, then, and only then, we would have every right to defend ourselves. Our posture should never be offensive, but always defensive. For years we have meddled in other countries’ internal affairs with disastrous results. That must end if America is ever to be great again.
Tell that to any of the Americans killed by Iranian proxies.
You advice worked out well in December 1942, didn’t it?
Best defense is a good offense. We are letting the Venezuelans & soon the Iranians settle their own internal affairs. Trump is not a neocon, but is a realist & he is POTUS, & has made better decisions than any of his predecessors or alternatives, IMHO.
Many of those Americans killed by Iranian proxies were our soldiers deployed in countries we had no business being in.
In December of 1941 Japan attacked our military bases at Pearl Harbor. President Roosevelt adhered to the requirements of our Constitution beseeching Congress for a Declaration of War to defend our country from further aggression. If the threat of Iran toward us is as dire as Trump has portrayed it, then he should have had beseeched Congress as Roosevelt had. Why did Trump bypass Congress? Maybe his portrayal of Iran isn’t as dire as he claims.
Venezuela and now Iran must do as Trump demands with the threat of further aggression from us if they don’t.
Compared to our most recent Presidents, Trump up until recently, did not have to try hard to be a better President. Our greatest President, George Washington, witnessed first hand the millennia old fighting amongst Europeans and Asians. Thus he warned all future generations of the United States to treat all other nations with benevolence and to avoid foreign entanglements. If Trump was wise and desires to achieve a reputation of one of our greater Presidents, he would heed the greatest President’s advice.
Lebanon was a largely Christian country when we had Marines stationed there that were killed by Iranian proxies & in 1979 our sovereign territory (US embassy) was invaded and all staff were taken hostage = an act of war.
So much for your assertion that our personal had no right to be there.
Maybe your position is that if Trump does it, he’s wrong. Are you a registered Democrat by any chance?
I’m going to leave this discussion now & wait for 4-5 weeks.
Other than defending our embassies we should have no other military presence in foreign countries and have no Constitutional basis for doing so.
I am neither a Democrat nor a Republican. The Democratic Party historically has been the party in support and defense of slavery, the KKK, Jim Crow laws, and the urban plantation. I will never support or vote for a Democrat. The Republican Party has been infiltrated by Democrats, hence the acronym “RINOS.” I do vote. In just about every election, I sadly find myself casting a vote in an effort to prevent a candidate from being elected. In the most recent Presidential election I felt compelled to cast a vote for Trump as the opposing candidate was and is IMHO stupid. I’m a firm believer our founding fathers created a Republic based upon a Constitution, a document that granted very limited powers to the federal government with safeguards to prevent any one person or branch of government from going rogue and oppressive. If any of us really desire to make America, the United States, great again we must return to the fundamental principles written within our Constitution. Anything less is a futile effort.
Roosevelt’s policies were largely responsible for provoking the Pearl Harbor attack (not saying that they weren’t justified), so it was not out of the blue. I don’t believe that there has been a declaration of war since including both D & R POTUSs, so your biased comment that Trump should ask for a declaration of war is ludicrous.
Roosevelt may have provoked the attack from Japan. A lot had to do with oil, once again.
The fact that no President since Roosevelt has acted in accordance with their sworn oath to uphold the Constitution to seek a declaration of war from Congress, does not now make it right for Trump to shirk his duty to seek a declaration of war. Some have argued Congress through legislation has somewhat lessened the President’s responsibility to seek declarations of war. That legislation was enacted to allow a President to retaliate in the event of a nuclear attack from a foreign entity wherein a delay could be deemed catastrophic. All that is debatable, including the Constitutionality of those laws.
Ok I'll bite. John, I know your military expertise is unquestionable, and Trump should replace Pete with you. But Trump is doing things DIFFERENTLY, and that is exactly what is needed. No we don't need to occupy Iran. Rather we just quickly discipline (i.e. tactical bombing to eliminate threats) them when they misbehave like a spoiled child, and we keep them busy thinking about how not to starve, instead of thinking about how to kill others.
The military industrial complex factories are working overtime to produce weapons to meet the never-ending demand to wage senseless wars. It is government welfare for industries. I have little doubt some of their profits gets contributed to political campaigns.
Unfortunately, just about every U.S. President gets sucked in by the Neocons.......always ending in their demise. All the regime changes fail.
Perhaps staying home and fixing our infrastructure would be energy, time & money better spent.
We are not the policemen of the world.
We just attacked a country that posed zero threat to us, did not attack us and worst of all was sitting at a negotiating table when attacked......and why you ask? Because Bibi controls Big Brain Don. Don said.....get in the coffin for Israel! No thanks! They deserve to get their ass kicked.
This is the Persian Empire......they built 'Wonders of the World' the ooze with Physicists, Mathematicians, Engineers and Inventors of extremely high caliber. They speak Farsi, this is not your everyday Arab world country. This is the Persian Empire! A far cry from 2 guys in a garage glue gunning stuff together.
Those guys in a garage glue gunning are effective at terrorizing the world. Kill them all. No mercy. Don't commit any ground troops. Just enter, kill, and leave same day. That's what I voted for!
"They ooze with Physicists, Mathematicians, Engineers and Inventors of extremely high caliber." The best of the best of them working on nuclear weapons and long range missiles. These are priority 1 not working on Iran's infrastructure.
The Persian Empire began it's decline in 651 as Arab armies swept in. Islam took root. And the gears of this astonishing civilization began, slowly and then all at once, to grind to a halt. For a few generations, Persian scholars thrived within the new Islamic order. But the transformation of Iran from a Zoroastrian, pluralistic, and innovative society into a rigidly Islamic theocracy laid the groundwork for long-term stagnation. Today, nearly 1,400 years later, that stagnation is measurable in everything from economic output to scientific discovery. And the men who just died in those airstrikes were its most ardent custodians.
That will be up to the people of Iran. If we have to keep breaking their strategic military toys we should do it so they can't strike outside Iran.
Leaving out the radical terrorists I've seen the Islamic leadership in most of the Middle East change their positions on Israel and the USA in my lifetime. The first I remember was the 6 Day war in 1967. The new leadership in those countries may not like the USA or Israel, but they're willing to get along and do business.
Man, your comments clearly, and without doubt, spell out your lack of knowledge and complete ignorance of reality! Iran was very close to having the capacity to launch long range missiles into the US! To “kill Americans” is, and for decades has been, one of their terrorist chants!!
Exactly as Jack stated. The Deep State IS THE TERRORISM! This is your standard Hegelian Dialectic. Problem----Reaction---Solution. If I want to take your freedom away from you.....you'll say no. So, I create a problem, then you react and beg me to take your freedom away because you fell for it and then I provide the solution...,,...I take your freedom, which you gave to me with a bow on it! This is the same script, bad movie, bad actors....same kabuki theatre ......YAWN!
I wouldn’t call an America first person a “bigoted leftist bitch,” nor swear at her. You demean yourself. Following Trump’s logic we should take out the leadership in North Korea too. He should have done that first as North Korea actually does have nuclear weapons and the capability to attack us here, not like Iran. The difference to me is Iran has oil, North Korea doesn’t. Connect the dots. What other country did Trump just recently send our military into to remove its leader? And what does that country have? What a coincidence! Oil!
Look at it this way: Middle East has altered American life--for the worst. Patriot Act, FISA, DHS, No Fly List, TSA, etc. All because Americans tremble at danger and beg/allow govt to assume 4th Amendment powers "for their safety".
Additionally, inadequate leaders and surreptitious handlers/lobbiers got the USA cross-threaded into Iraq, Afghanistan for decades and sacrificed soldiers for no apparent upside.
Additionally, Israel--right or wrong--is so endemically buried into American leadership and politics that it is paranoid in its existence re Iranian regime. This feeds into every aspect of middle east dynamics, so that stability is impossible for sundry reasons--regime touching all of them.
So, while NK may be a legitimate danger, Iranian regime has been an active, festering cauldron. One is enduring but manageable and definitely fraught with retaliation risk if "corrected". The other--regime--has been enduring but is manageable and the retaliation risk can be largely nulled.
So we were told. Do you have any idea how much Neocon bullsheit is spread? Can you remember any war the US has decisively won when Neocons were in charge? You can't because there was never one. What is happening now is the same evil playbook as Iraq. Now that Iran is weakened, a major war will begin between the two major religious groups in the Middle East. Just like during the Iraq war, a power vacuum was created by the stupid US war. Nothing good will come of this action. Neocons do not care about anything but war.
We will see. My money is on Trump not putting any soldiers in Iran, and let the Iranian people sort this out, while we keep a watchful eye out for our interests from a distance. A Hunger Games sort of offense, where we let them kill each other off, and briefly intervene with remote weaponry as needed when the wrong people get the advantage.
Mr. Trump is surrounded by Neocons. He bought into their regime-change rubbish. Can anyone remember a successful regime change, especially via air war violence? It's never happened; it takes soldiers on the ground, and even then, it's not sustainable. The Neocons are a cancer to society. Just like Iraq, an important tent pin was pulled out, killing Iraq's leadership. The same for Iran, get ready for a protected religious war for control of the Middle East. Mr. Trump has ruined his legacy.
"I fear that President Trump should have stuck with his America First campaign promises,...to avoid nation building."
One, you say "fear". This is not a time or instance for kinda-sorta-maybe. Those people will not serve the US interest here.
Two, you imply that Trump is nation building. He is not. He is defanging a long-lived threat to USA interests and citizens.
If the move here to eliminate the Iranian regime collapses into civil strife, civil war, a new regime, or pick your outcome, ONE thing may be said for certain: Iran no longer has the standing command structure or infrastructure to project war-like capabilities abroad.
USA interest met, CASE CLOSED.
If desire is to reopen, then understand that free nations will choose their paths, and if Iran 2026+ chooses to revert to Iran 2025- then so be it, but it is no fault of "nation building".
My problem with Trump's decision to bomb Iran is that it is not America First unless of course the ladies from Promethean Action are correct in that removing Iran from the British Empire destroys the corrupt system we've been living under for the past 100+ years. If not what is the ROI for the billions of dollars we are spending on weapons deployed? To make Israel great again?
Here is the definitive statement on the US/Israel Axis attack on Iran by Craig Mokhiber, international human rights lawyer & former director of the UN Human Rights Council in NY. "Two rogue nuclear powers have sought to justify their attacks on a third state that has no nuclear weapons by invoking nuclear control and non-proliferation.
Add to this the fact that, while Iran has not initiated a war with any other country in some two centuries, the U.S. and the Israeli regime are together responsible for most of the military aggression in today’s world, with attacks in recent years on Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria, Libya, Pakistan, Venezuela, Qatar, and Iran, as well as boats in the Mediterranean and in the Caribbean.
No other country on the planet even comes close to the violent record of the U.S. or of Israel.
At the same time, both countries are headed by violent, far-right, racist governments with records of extreme lawlessness. Both have joined together to perpetrate a genocide in Palestine. And both are headed by serial war criminals.
Indeed, Trump has attacked more countries (10) than any other President in U.S. history (not an easy record to break), demonstrating unprecedented recidivism for the crime of aggression, has murdered boat crews in the Caribbean, has attacked students and human rights defenders at home, and has unleashed violent, armed, xenophobic paramilitaries on people in U.S. cities.
For his part, Netanyahu is literally an indicted fugitive from justice, charged with crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court, and he heads a regime that has been declared to be guilty of apartheid, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.
Any fair assessment could only conclude that the focus on Iranian leadership and weaponry, in this context, is as absurd as it is dangerous."
I haven’t read all the comments yet, but virtually every assault on a nation has been under the guise of “freeing the people” and start a new democracy yada yada yada.
But it’s really about the oil. Libya. Iraq. Venezuela…it’s a pattern. Iranian oil is perfect. Why buy oil when you can get it for free?
The bully will finally get his reward.
Live by the sword. Die by the sword.
I predict the USA pattern is going to be very costly one day.
Iran has so many beautiful buildings that will never be built in the same way again. I would grieve if they were destroyed. I am more concerned about Bibi then Trump..yet Trump may be under the gun from the Zionists and so one cannot be sure of what will go down. It is all so dam maddening..Destroying the planet along with destroying each other!
Your columns used to be positive John….full of praise and hope for the beginning of President Trump’s undoing of four years of Democratic ruin; of leaders like RF Kennedy Jr. Sadly it’s been awhile since you’ve had much, if anything, that makes reading your journalism an uplifting experience! Your words in your current report actually are the worst and most disheartening! Would life for you be a happier place in Iran under the ayatollah regime??
what or WHO gives the US the right to play a role of a 'world police', in particular in countries of economic interests, with special 'nonnegotiable' policies?? Who decides about which country is allowed to have nuclear weapons and which not? Who decides to LIE to everyone who actually has those or similar 'weapons of mass destruction'???? Anyone who still believes the 9/11 official 'version' is true, is just embedded in a sleeping cell, with no exit! This time, it really might be TOO LATE for everyone to WAKE UP! How 'strange' it is all happening in times of Epstein files...
Last but not least, how the author even dares to talk about 'victory' is SO DISGUSTING, that one can only suspect a mental impairment.
Victory while KILLING HUNDREDS OF INNOCENT children???? Exactly the same way as in Gaza???
Exactly John - Thank you. W Bush, Obama (Libya) Trump etc do not give a damn about Nation Building or Bring Democracy to other countries, that's all a facade for Zio-Nazi Imperialism.
Zionist America and Israel are totally satisfied with First Strike, Murdering and Capturing and imprisoning leaders of other countries (Often as they are negotiating for peace like the last 2 times Iran was Attacked) but did they ever consider it could happen to them?
Trump has done almost everything totally different than those before him. He has done so many things that 'couldn't be done.' I'm gonna reserve judgement. I think he may surprise us all.
Certainly, if he follows the playbooks of past administrations and past military leadership, it will fail miserably. I don't think he will....I could be wrong....
Such was the common perception of Napoleon before 1812 and Hitler before 1941
Yes, but Napoleon was not the leader of the most advanced threat elimination technology the world has ever known. Napoleon did not have the ability to kill ANY leader of ANY country at ANY moment of his choosing. If the USA doesn't dominate the world, then someone else will. Frankly I would prefer the USA to maintain that position. And I would prefer we adopt a merciless stance against any world leader who would dare mess with us.
His playbook that made him president was that there would be no war! It didn’t take him long to overcome that lie. Terribly disappointed.
Trump was opposed to forever-wars, which is what we've been in with Iran for nearly 50 years. He's trying to end that conflict quickly. It needs to be done and I pray he will succeed.
Yes, the Neocons have him surrounded. He bought their regime change bullsheit. His legacy is now lost.
Uh, no.
Unless he gets a free Iran as a result - then he will b a hero.
Nobody wants another Iraq or Afghanistan....but Iran needed to be reined in.
Is this the right way? Who knows? Time will tell. The WRONG way has been what we did for 47 years, while they just got stronger and stronger.
So, the precision strikes weren't/aren't, war.
Jesus flipped tax collectors tables over... Trump is cleaning up huge messes - for once very wealthy, productive nations.. Venez & Iran.
Our approaches in the past, have been non existent or without muscle.... and that's been terribly disappointing. Nothing improves without flexing our muscles. So, we're flexing them. Why is that, so disappointing?
Both Iran and Venezuela citizenry WANTS the U.S. to help them topple the tyrannical regimes. When's the last time semi-powerful Marxist, tyrannical regimes, populations -have wanted help?
Trump is creating his version of the NWO. He's not sitting on his hands, watching the Davos (unelected) crowd trying to influence world events.
In a few years, I suspect we'll have 2 new allies on the planet -- critical positioning
in the ME and for Central & Southern America. A real NWO.
There are several things you are missing in the Iran War:
1. Trump is bombing military targets, and removing terrorist leaders that the Iranian people hate.
2. He is catching the leadership at a weak time
3. Unlike the arrogant Nazis entering Russia in 1940, who murdered the Russians who thought they were there to liberate them from Stalin, Trump is willing to help the people overthrow their government, not murder them.
4. This is 40 years of oppression, and the Persian Folk are tired of living on the Islamic Plantation
The celebrations taking place outside of Iran indicate the true fillings of the Iranian people about what President Trump is doing.
So...while history is always very valuable in providing indications if not outright templates for repeating itself, in this case, those templates probably do not apply
This is Neocon propaganda. The Neocons even stated that a ticker-tape parade would happen once Iraq was liberated. Haha, are you really going to be fooled again?
This isn't Iran liberation. It is regime takedown. Once the regime is out, the rest is up to Iran to self-determine.
Can you be this naive? No one in the Middle East has any say. Power is dictated by religion. Just as in Iraq, once you create a power vacuum, players from dozens of factions begin their own wars for control. Not to mention that Iran is a proxy for China and Russia. China gets a large amount of oil from Iran, and they even spent billions on a Silk Road to Iran. The Neocons never think beyond bombing a country. They've never been successful. All you are doing is swallowing the bullsheit propaganda.
Trump is not part of the neocons and neither is his cabinet. Those guys are gone this time around/
You have moved on from it is all the Jew’s fault to its all the neocons fault without a shred of evidence.
I do not support the war on Iran. I did not vote for this. I voted for no new wars, America First, and releasing the Epstein files. I voted for Trump three times; he has lost my support because in this term, he’s proving to be no different than the swamp he campaigned against. He has betrayed his supporters. IMO, the people still supporting him are the same people that believe Tyler Robinson was a lone gunman on a roof with a .30-06. MAGA has become a cult. No critical thinking is taking place.
You are entitled to your opinion; most disagree. I certainly do.
This is not a new war, or are you Sleeping Beauty who went to sleep in 1978??? He is finishing a war that began in 1979 & none of the feckless presidents since have had the balls (or likely the technology, to be fair to them) to do what needed to be done.
You must not travel much. I do, & depend on being able to get assistance from the US Embassy when I am overseas. A country’s embassy is its sovereign territory abroad according to centuries old law & custom. We were attacked by the Iranian state in 1979.
Your opinion is not worth much.
Joan Hurlock’s opinion is worth as much as your’s. 1979 was forty nine years ago. Iran presently posed no real threat to us and if it did attack us, then, and only then, we would have every right to defend ourselves. Our posture should never be offensive, but always defensive. For years we have meddled in other countries’ internal affairs with disastrous results. That must end if America is ever to be great again.
Tell that to any of the Americans killed by Iranian proxies.
You advice worked out well in December 1942, didn’t it?
Best defense is a good offense. We are letting the Venezuelans & soon the Iranians settle their own internal affairs. Trump is not a neocon, but is a realist & he is POTUS, & has made better decisions than any of his predecessors or alternatives, IMHO.
Many of those Americans killed by Iranian proxies were our soldiers deployed in countries we had no business being in.
In December of 1941 Japan attacked our military bases at Pearl Harbor. President Roosevelt adhered to the requirements of our Constitution beseeching Congress for a Declaration of War to defend our country from further aggression. If the threat of Iran toward us is as dire as Trump has portrayed it, then he should have had beseeched Congress as Roosevelt had. Why did Trump bypass Congress? Maybe his portrayal of Iran isn’t as dire as he claims.
Venezuela and now Iran must do as Trump demands with the threat of further aggression from us if they don’t.
Compared to our most recent Presidents, Trump up until recently, did not have to try hard to be a better President. Our greatest President, George Washington, witnessed first hand the millennia old fighting amongst Europeans and Asians. Thus he warned all future generations of the United States to treat all other nations with benevolence and to avoid foreign entanglements. If Trump was wise and desires to achieve a reputation of one of our greater Presidents, he would heed the greatest President’s advice.
Lebanon was a largely Christian country when we had Marines stationed there that were killed by Iranian proxies & in 1979 our sovereign territory (US embassy) was invaded and all staff were taken hostage = an act of war.
So much for your assertion that our personal had no right to be there.
Maybe your position is that if Trump does it, he’s wrong. Are you a registered Democrat by any chance?
I’m going to leave this discussion now & wait for 4-5 weeks.
Other than defending our embassies we should have no other military presence in foreign countries and have no Constitutional basis for doing so.
I am neither a Democrat nor a Republican. The Democratic Party historically has been the party in support and defense of slavery, the KKK, Jim Crow laws, and the urban plantation. I will never support or vote for a Democrat. The Republican Party has been infiltrated by Democrats, hence the acronym “RINOS.” I do vote. In just about every election, I sadly find myself casting a vote in an effort to prevent a candidate from being elected. In the most recent Presidential election I felt compelled to cast a vote for Trump as the opposing candidate was and is IMHO stupid. I’m a firm believer our founding fathers created a Republic based upon a Constitution, a document that granted very limited powers to the federal government with safeguards to prevent any one person or branch of government from going rogue and oppressive. If any of us really desire to make America, the United States, great again we must return to the fundamental principles written within our Constitution. Anything less is a futile effort.
Roosevelt’s policies were largely responsible for provoking the Pearl Harbor attack (not saying that they weren’t justified), so it was not out of the blue. I don’t believe that there has been a declaration of war since including both D & R POTUSs, so your biased comment that Trump should ask for a declaration of war is ludicrous.
Roosevelt may have provoked the attack from Japan. A lot had to do with oil, once again.
The fact that no President since Roosevelt has acted in accordance with their sworn oath to uphold the Constitution to seek a declaration of war from Congress, does not now make it right for Trump to shirk his duty to seek a declaration of war. Some have argued Congress through legislation has somewhat lessened the President’s responsibility to seek declarations of war. That legislation was enacted to allow a President to retaliate in the event of a nuclear attack from a foreign entity wherein a delay could be deemed catastrophic. All that is debatable, including the Constitutionality of those laws.
Ok I'll bite. John, I know your military expertise is unquestionable, and Trump should replace Pete with you. But Trump is doing things DIFFERENTLY, and that is exactly what is needed. No we don't need to occupy Iran. Rather we just quickly discipline (i.e. tactical bombing to eliminate threats) them when they misbehave like a spoiled child, and we keep them busy thinking about how not to starve, instead of thinking about how to kill others.
Well never-ending wars are VERY lucrative for those in the smoky back rooms...
Evidence not found for your predicate.
The military industrial complex factories are working overtime to produce weapons to meet the never-ending demand to wage senseless wars. It is government welfare for industries. I have little doubt some of their profits gets contributed to political campaigns.
The implication of the original comment was that Trump is in the pocket of the MIC, and I don’t see that.
The Europeans & Ukrainians are keeping the MIC busy on their own.
Unfortunately, just about every U.S. President gets sucked in by the Neocons.......always ending in their demise. All the regime changes fail.
Perhaps staying home and fixing our infrastructure would be energy, time & money better spent.
We are not the policemen of the world.
We just attacked a country that posed zero threat to us, did not attack us and worst of all was sitting at a negotiating table when attacked......and why you ask? Because Bibi controls Big Brain Don. Don said.....get in the coffin for Israel! No thanks! They deserve to get their ass kicked.
This is the Persian Empire......they built 'Wonders of the World' the ooze with Physicists, Mathematicians, Engineers and Inventors of extremely high caliber. They speak Farsi, this is not your everyday Arab world country. This is the Persian Empire! A far cry from 2 guys in a garage glue gunning stuff together.
Those guys in a garage glue gunning are effective at terrorizing the world. Kill them all. No mercy. Don't commit any ground troops. Just enter, kill, and leave same day. That's what I voted for!
"They ooze with Physicists, Mathematicians, Engineers and Inventors of extremely high caliber." The best of the best of them working on nuclear weapons and long range missiles. These are priority 1 not working on Iran's infrastructure.
The Persian Empire began it's decline in 651 as Arab armies swept in. Islam took root. And the gears of this astonishing civilization began, slowly and then all at once, to grind to a halt. For a few generations, Persian scholars thrived within the new Islamic order. But the transformation of Iran from a Zoroastrian, pluralistic, and innovative society into a rigidly Islamic theocracy laid the groundwork for long-term stagnation. Today, nearly 1,400 years later, that stagnation is measurable in everything from economic output to scientific discovery. And the men who just died in those airstrikes were its most ardent custodians.
Paraphrased from Alexander Muse.
And we think we are going to affect change with a country and people imbedded with 1400 years of Islamic theocracy, ideology?
That will be up to the people of Iran. If we have to keep breaking their strategic military toys we should do it so they can't strike outside Iran.
Leaving out the radical terrorists I've seen the Islamic leadership in most of the Middle East change their positions on Israel and the USA in my lifetime. The first I remember was the 6 Day war in 1967. The new leadership in those countries may not like the USA or Israel, but they're willing to get along and do business.
Man, your comments clearly, and without doubt, spell out your lack of knowledge and complete ignorance of reality! Iran was very close to having the capacity to launch long range missiles into the US! To “kill Americans” is, and for decades has been, one of their terrorist chants!!
Marilyn, let me guess? You're an Evangelical Christian hoping for Armageddon so you can have a 2nd Coming.
Or at least that's the rhetoric you have been told over & over again.
Let's agree to disagree. I think America needs a whole lot of fixing before we go 'fixing' everybody else!
America needs to eliminate the Iranian regime so that terrorism no longers scares the crap out of people in the USA.
TSA, DHS, Patriot Act, FISA exist because of Iran regime.
You want those gone and Americans to actually live and travel freely? Do what Trump is doing.
Exactly as Jack stated. The Deep State IS THE TERRORISM! This is your standard Hegelian Dialectic. Problem----Reaction---Solution. If I want to take your freedom away from you.....you'll say no. So, I create a problem, then you react and beg me to take your freedom away because you fell for it and then I provide the solution...,,...I take your freedom, which you gave to me with a bow on it! This is the same script, bad movie, bad actors....same kabuki theatre ......YAWN!
Love it!
Those things came about as a result of 9/11, an attack carried out mostly by Saudis, not Iranians.
Nope.
Conditioning from 1970's through 9/11 created DHS.
9/11 was the straw that broke the back, but only because the stress was already there.
I no longer want to agree to disagree. I no longer wish to share a country with people left of center and beyond.
Eff You, you bigoted leftist bitch.
I wouldn’t call an America first person a “bigoted leftist bitch,” nor swear at her. You demean yourself. Following Trump’s logic we should take out the leadership in North Korea too. He should have done that first as North Korea actually does have nuclear weapons and the capability to attack us here, not like Iran. The difference to me is Iran has oil, North Korea doesn’t. Connect the dots. What other country did Trump just recently send our military into to remove its leader? And what does that country have? What a coincidence! Oil!
Look at it this way: Middle East has altered American life--for the worst. Patriot Act, FISA, DHS, No Fly List, TSA, etc. All because Americans tremble at danger and beg/allow govt to assume 4th Amendment powers "for their safety".
Additionally, inadequate leaders and surreptitious handlers/lobbiers got the USA cross-threaded into Iraq, Afghanistan for decades and sacrificed soldiers for no apparent upside.
Additionally, Israel--right or wrong--is so endemically buried into American leadership and politics that it is paranoid in its existence re Iranian regime. This feeds into every aspect of middle east dynamics, so that stability is impossible for sundry reasons--regime touching all of them.
So, while NK may be a legitimate danger, Iranian regime has been an active, festering cauldron. One is enduring but manageable and definitely fraught with retaliation risk if "corrected". The other--regime--has been enduring but is manageable and the retaliation risk can be largely nulled.
The lady made an assumption about Marilyn which showed her bigotry, I am considering apologizing for my harsh words , Mr. Gallantry.
I think we are too close to this to have a clear understanding.
🥵🥵🥵🥵
So we were told. Do you have any idea how much Neocon bullsheit is spread? Can you remember any war the US has decisively won when Neocons were in charge? You can't because there was never one. What is happening now is the same evil playbook as Iraq. Now that Iran is weakened, a major war will begin between the two major religious groups in the Middle East. Just like during the Iraq war, a power vacuum was created by the stupid US war. Nothing good will come of this action. Neocons do not care about anything but war.
We will see. My money is on Trump not putting any soldiers in Iran, and let the Iranian people sort this out, while we keep a watchful eye out for our interests from a distance. A Hunger Games sort of offense, where we let them kill each other off, and briefly intervene with remote weaponry as needed when the wrong people get the advantage.
Mr. Trump is surrounded by Neocons. He bought into their regime-change rubbish. Can anyone remember a successful regime change, especially via air war violence? It's never happened; it takes soldiers on the ground, and even then, it's not sustainable. The Neocons are a cancer to society. Just like Iraq, an important tent pin was pulled out, killing Iraq's leadership. The same for Iran, get ready for a protected religious war for control of the Middle East. Mr. Trump has ruined his legacy.
"I fear that President Trump should have stuck with his America First campaign promises,...to avoid nation building."
One, you say "fear". This is not a time or instance for kinda-sorta-maybe. Those people will not serve the US interest here.
Two, you imply that Trump is nation building. He is not. He is defanging a long-lived threat to USA interests and citizens.
If the move here to eliminate the Iranian regime collapses into civil strife, civil war, a new regime, or pick your outcome, ONE thing may be said for certain: Iran no longer has the standing command structure or infrastructure to project war-like capabilities abroad.
USA interest met, CASE CLOSED.
If desire is to reopen, then understand that free nations will choose their paths, and if Iran 2026+ chooses to revert to Iran 2025- then so be it, but it is no fault of "nation building".
My problem with Trump's decision to bomb Iran is that it is not America First unless of course the ladies from Promethean Action are correct in that removing Iran from the British Empire destroys the corrupt system we've been living under for the past 100+ years. If not what is the ROI for the billions of dollars we are spending on weapons deployed? To make Israel great again?
Here is the definitive statement on the US/Israel Axis attack on Iran by Craig Mokhiber, international human rights lawyer & former director of the UN Human Rights Council in NY. "Two rogue nuclear powers have sought to justify their attacks on a third state that has no nuclear weapons by invoking nuclear control and non-proliferation.
Add to this the fact that, while Iran has not initiated a war with any other country in some two centuries, the U.S. and the Israeli regime are together responsible for most of the military aggression in today’s world, with attacks in recent years on Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria, Libya, Pakistan, Venezuela, Qatar, and Iran, as well as boats in the Mediterranean and in the Caribbean.
No other country on the planet even comes close to the violent record of the U.S. or of Israel.
At the same time, both countries are headed by violent, far-right, racist governments with records of extreme lawlessness. Both have joined together to perpetrate a genocide in Palestine. And both are headed by serial war criminals.
Indeed, Trump has attacked more countries (10) than any other President in U.S. history (not an easy record to break), demonstrating unprecedented recidivism for the crime of aggression, has murdered boat crews in the Caribbean, has attacked students and human rights defenders at home, and has unleashed violent, armed, xenophobic paramilitaries on people in U.S. cities.
For his part, Netanyahu is literally an indicted fugitive from justice, charged with crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court, and he heads a regime that has been declared to be guilty of apartheid, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.
Any fair assessment could only conclude that the focus on Iranian leadership and weaponry, in this context, is as absurd as it is dangerous."
https://mondoweiss.net/2026/03/understanding-the-u-s-and-israels-illegal-aggression-in-iran/?ml_recipient=180833828861904749&ml_link=180833728425100915&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=2026-03-02&utm_campaign=Daily+Headlines+RSS+Automation+-+8am
Not worth the electrons expended to transmit it.
I haven’t read all the comments yet, but virtually every assault on a nation has been under the guise of “freeing the people” and start a new democracy yada yada yada.
But it’s really about the oil. Libya. Iraq. Venezuela…it’s a pattern. Iranian oil is perfect. Why buy oil when you can get it for free?
The bully will finally get his reward.
Live by the sword. Die by the sword.
I predict the USA pattern is going to be very costly one day.
I'd consider the these to be swift victories...
First Gulf War, 42 days, January 17, 1991 - February 28, 1991.
1967 Six-Day War between Israel and Arab nations.
1973 Yom Kippur War from 6 to 25 October 1973, 19 days
Iran has so many beautiful buildings that will never be built in the same way again. I would grieve if they were destroyed. I am more concerned about Bibi then Trump..yet Trump may be under the gun from the Zionists and so one cannot be sure of what will go down. It is all so dam maddening..Destroying the planet along with destroying each other!
Your columns used to be positive John….full of praise and hope for the beginning of President Trump’s undoing of four years of Democratic ruin; of leaders like RF Kennedy Jr. Sadly it’s been awhile since you’ve had much, if anything, that makes reading your journalism an uplifting experience! Your words in your current report actually are the worst and most disheartening! Would life for you be a happier place in Iran under the ayatollah regime??
what or WHO gives the US the right to play a role of a 'world police', in particular in countries of economic interests, with special 'nonnegotiable' policies?? Who decides about which country is allowed to have nuclear weapons and which not? Who decides to LIE to everyone who actually has those or similar 'weapons of mass destruction'???? Anyone who still believes the 9/11 official 'version' is true, is just embedded in a sleeping cell, with no exit! This time, it really might be TOO LATE for everyone to WAKE UP! How 'strange' it is all happening in times of Epstein files...
Last but not least, how the author even dares to talk about 'victory' is SO DISGUSTING, that one can only suspect a mental impairment.
Victory while KILLING HUNDREDS OF INNOCENT children???? Exactly the same way as in Gaza???
It is indeed totally sickening.
Exactly John - Thank you. W Bush, Obama (Libya) Trump etc do not give a damn about Nation Building or Bring Democracy to other countries, that's all a facade for Zio-Nazi Imperialism.
Zionist America and Israel are totally satisfied with First Strike, Murdering and Capturing and imprisoning leaders of other countries (Often as they are negotiating for peace like the last 2 times Iran was Attacked) but did they ever consider it could happen to them?