Trump: about to strike Iran, or not?
The answer is “yes” – one or the other.
Here’s the NY Post on the subject, for what it’s worth:
Gen. Jack Keane — acting Army chief of staff at the start of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars — told Fox News Channel that after the Islamic Republic’s latest rebuff of President Trump’s peace proposals, the US and Israel were ready to restart attacks using intelligence collected since the cease-fire went into effect April 8.
“It’ll be a combined operation with the United States and Israel going full-throttle, all-out, no half-measures here whatsoever,” Keane said on FNC’s “America’s Newsroom.”
If that’s the case, what would it look like? This war is against the regime and not the people, and so there is a limit to the number and type of targets that the US and Israel are willing to destroy.
According to Keane, the war has until now left about 30% of the slated targets remaining, and obliterating them will be the goal:
It’ll be those targets that the US and Israel wipe out next, including facilities tied to Iran’s missile and nuclear program, continued.
Along with military targets, Keane also suggested the US would take out Iran’s revenue sources, a threat Trump has repeatedly levied against Tehran.
Does he mean oil fields? I don’t know, but that’s what comes to mind.
The left and the isolationist right keep alternating between calling Trump a heinous criminal committing war crimes, and yelling “TACO” at him – which means “Trump always chickens out”. That way they’ve covered all the anti-Trump bases. It seems to me, though, that the “TACO” charge gives the Iranian regime the possibly false hope that if they wait Trump out he will never attack. It would serve them right for trusting the US MSM.
If 30% of the slated targets remain, go get ’em. Also, removing IRGC control of Iran’s coastline and oil shipment capabilities should be a goal.
Apart from my hopes for renewed destruction of the IRI and its evil stranglehold on that nation, even more do I long for the decision to take the wholly unnecessary shackles off Israel’s fight to eliminate Hezbollah in Lebanon, to quit this insane US “diplomatic” footsie with that wretched pseudo-government there, and to cease paying the toll in Israeli soldiers’ lives in Southern Lebanon. Enough, already.
… even more do I long for the decision to take the wholly unnecessary shackles off Israel’s fight to eliminate Hezbollah in Lebanon
Yes
Here we go again: https://x.com/i/status/2056454406074212682
I’ll just leave this here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zGf7_YL70M
sdferr,
I just saw that……sigh… as several right leaning commenters noted yesterday, “Stop dicking around!”
The Iranians are not serious, and after having drones lobbed at them, I don’t understand what the UAE et al are thinking.
This needs to end this week. Trump’s slowly losing my support in this.
They will not learn their lessons any other way
I’m sure Trump is hip to Iran’s tricks. I’m not privy to his timing calculations.
Not that commenters here need any help understanding Iran’s misdirection magic, but this is an excellent summary with footnotes to history.
–JNS TV and Meira K, “Oh No… The Real Motive Behind Iran’s Negotiations Isn’t What Everyone Assumes!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1sq2kjJArg
Iran: Watch us smile and negotiate, while we (re)build weapons. Time doesn’t matter to us. We only have to survive.
Seth Cropsey in today’s WSJ
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-to-finish-the-job-in-iran-308c76c9?st=g73A1s
I like to think that Trump has a whole lot more information than I do, and that he’s playing this generally right, but I have no idea.
If I may be permitted a guess at the driver of this newest pause — and it’s only one of many possible — I’m taking my start from the President’s citation of the leaders of Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE as requesting this turn. So, what, why?
I’m thinking each of them expects their home infrastructure to be missiled to a fare-thee-well by the IRGC when hostilities kickoff again; they’re fearful, hoping to avoid another round of blows. Again, I’m guessing, but that’s how I read it. Pres. Trump needs them onside hereafter, so he goes yet another extra mile to assuage their anxieties.
I have no idea what Trump is up to.
Endlessly bragging about what happened the first week is irritating.
The guys in the Kremlin officially did not believe in an afterlife.
Christians do, but their idea of how to get there is different from Islam’s in general and these clowns in particular. It would be a serious mistake to confuse the two.
They have to be dead. And those who replace them should also be dead. Because nothing will change except the number of targets until these people are gone.
For a number of reasons, I’d like a strong republican to win next POTUS, but the most important is Iran.
If I recall The Three Conjectures, the result will be the deaths of many tens of millions of Muslims.
sdferr,
IOW, Iran has got the UAE et al exactly where they want them. They did that by the occasional drone strike to keep them off balance. I just watched the great video huxley linked. Such a move fits hand in glove with the strategy she outlined in the video.
Enough is enough.
”Here we go again.”
”…we will NOT be doing the scheduled attack of Iran tomorrow…”
Sigh.
”…and yelling ‘TACO’ at him…”
So was today not a TACO?
”Endlessly bragging about what happened the first week is irritating.”
Not just irritating, it’s counterproductive. We’ve been through this “Massive attacks are coming tomorrow — the worst attacks anyone has ever done to anyone else — At the request of so-and-so I’m calling the attacks off” loop what? Five or six times already?
You can play that trick once, maybe twice, but after that no one takes it seriously anymore. After five or six times it becomes a joke that makes America look weak and strengthens the IRGC’s negotiating position.
”I like to think that Trump has a whole lot more information than I do, and that he’s playing this generally right…”
In other words “Trust the Plan!”
I find it noteworthy (maybe even curious) that we’ve heard almost nothing about civilian casualties in Iran from US and Israeli strikes.
I want to think that part of that must be the improvement in precision of precision guided weapons, but that hasn’t stopped it before. We only need to look at Gaza last summer where every picture was of civilians holding empty stainless steel bowls, thus “proving” genocide by way of starvation.
“I find it noteworthy (maybe even curious) that we’ve heard almost nothing about civilian casualties in Iran from US and Israeli strikes.”
After the IRGC and Basij have murdered tens of thousands of their own people maybe there weren’t too many left to be hit by a wayward bomb or two, especially when they were told to stay at home and no civilan targets were targeted. Not many civilians on naval vessels or walking around Iran’s air force planes at military bases either.
Iran is 636,000 square miles and Gaza is 140 square miles or the size of Las Vegas – that might have something to do with the differences also.
The gulf states have taken their share of losses jubail and ras tanura, the ruwais field as well targets in dubai a similar target package in qatar
What Richard Aubrey said.
I hope Trump knows what he is doing; I wish he would just shut up in public and just tell the people who need to know; i.e. friends with a stake in this, and the Iranian thugs what he wants them to know.
We have very smart people running this show. I worry that smart people can be dangerous if they do not understand the fight they are in. Robert McNamara and his Whiz Kids were smart. Too damn smart to listen to people in uniform apparently. Likewise, Colin Powell and Richard Armitage were presumably smart, as was Gen Petraeus. They all underestimated the enemy’s resilience and the complexity of the environment.
–JNS TV and Meira K, “Oh No… The Real Motive Behind Iran’s Negotiations Isn’t What Everyone Assumes!”
One way to change their attitude is to show them their god’s will every 4 years, or less.
The evil must be destroyed, root and branch. Attacks will continue until unconditional surrender is accepted.
I don’t claim to be knowledgable about the strategies and tactics for the military/economic operations against the Iranian regime. That being said…
Was it Rumsfeld who said about Iraq, “You break it, you own it”? It doesn’t fully apply here, but what will be the future for the good Iranians after the Kraken is released?
Trump said he told the military to hold off on the planned attacks, but that they are ready to pull the trigger at a word from him. It seems to me that he is giving the regime one last chance to do it the easy way, rather than the hard way, but it will be done, one way or the other.
I’m more willing to trust the plan, than to be swayed by trollish blog commenters.
Geoffrey Britain (8:42 pm) said: “Attacks will continue until unconditional surrender is accepted.”
I ( and maybe only I) do not at all see any unconditional surrender. I don’t even see a conditional surrender. These muslim clerics-in-charge are certifiable suicidal nutcases. They will *not* surrender. It is their theological imperative.
My conclusion (in Geoffrey Britain’s words): “attacks will continue.” I will add, for clarity, attacks will continue indefinitely. As in, as far as the eye can see. Oceania will *always* be at war with Eurasia. Period. A long, never-ending twilight struggle.
I hear echoes of John F. Kennedy (Inaugural Address, 20 January 1961):
“Now the trumpet summons us again — not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need — not as a call to battle, though embattled we are — but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle, . . .”
And that’s the way it izzzzzz . . . (at least, the way it looks from where I sit) . . .
Don’t go wobbly.
Iwan depends on wobblies.
They have no wabbits.
You break it, you own it.
I think it was Thomas Friedman who said that. Once upon a time I read him quite frequently. I honestly believe that foreign policy analysts should study him closely. Whatever that man says, the opposite must be true.
This is not “wobbly” – it is deliberately vague, and brilliant.
From Day One, the press has been trying to extract a statement that can be construed as a deadline and used to “gotcha” the President.
The chances of Iran agreeing to give up its nuclear plan or agreeing to open Hormuz without significant concessions from the US are slim and none. The options are (i) remove the Iranian regime militarily; or (ii) cut and run with the least awful deal that can be had and try to spin it as a diplomatic success.
There is no third option.
” It seems to me that he is giving the regime one last chance to do it the easy way,”
For the last 4 weeks it’s been “one last chance”. It’s getting tiresome. Great article this morning over at American Thinker. The majority of the comments align with the direction I’m going. One in particular from a John Collins:
“But my faith is wavering. His desire for “beautiful deals” is almost pathological — akin to Trump Derangement Syndrome, not something to be reasoned with. His continued search for a deal makes him look silly, now, and naive. I’m hoping you are right, but day by day, my confidence is waning. And I believe it is happening across the MAGA base, folks like you notwithstanding. Nothing would make me happier than you being proven right and me being proven wrong, by the way. I’m just not so sure any more.
It’s gone on longer than it needed to already. Anything more is on borrowed time. He needs to get it done. Yesterday.”
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2026/05/there_is_no_such_thing_as_a_deal_with_iran.html
Oh ye of itty bitty faith…
(BTW, Option iii: the mullahs agree to ALL of Trump’s gentle hints…following which they declare TOTAL, GLORIOUS VICTORY over the two EVIL, SATANIC Enemies of God(TM) and their godless allies…um, praise Allah!…as they ride off into the sunset—towards Moscow? Istanbul?Wherever, just NOT Lebanon…)
You can destroy bridges etc. all you want it doesn’t make a difference to these people.
It must be a 2 step process:
1) Find out who believes in martyrdom and
who doesn’t.
2) Help the first mentioned and negotiate with the second.
The Iran problem won’t be solved without total buy-in, cooperation and support of the regional muslim states. POTUS appears to be pushing them to advance the no regional or intercontinental nuclear threat. Engaging the Gulf states to compel the Iranian regime to surrender their nuclear ambitions and material may just succeed. If it does we leave the aftermath to the more modern muslim states and the people of Iran to return Iran to the modern world. Otherwise we’re locked and loaded for more punishing strikes. It’s not a choice between force or diplomacy. It’s how they work together to achieve the desired end-state.
crasey:
Well said. Trump has shown what the US and Israel can do and have done. Iran is severely degraded.
Other nations, especially the Gulf states, are now recalibrating, which opens new possibilities for future cooperation, rather than the US and Israel remaining vigilantes doing the dirty work which the rest of the world can disavow.
In which case Iran and other bad actors can wait until the Democrats come back into power, then they are back in business.
The TACO callers got Midnight Hammer and Epic Fury spectacularly wrong. So I don’t worry that Trump has lost his nerve, though I do weary of his bombast.
Trump is under real pressure to resolve Iran soon in terms of getting back to the economy and driving into the midterms with momentum.
@ huxley > “Trump is under real pressure to resolve Iran soon in terms of getting back to the economy and driving into the midterms with momentum.”
Just a brief survey of news this last weekend leaves me persuaded that the Trump administration is quite capable of walking and chewing gum at the same time.
At least this time he has all his Cabinet Secretaries on deck, and more control of the bureaucrats (not enough, but better than Trump 45).
Plus, the voters are enforcing MAGA Party discipline on campaigning candidates this time around.