By attacking Iran, it looks like President Trump has accomplished three of his personal agendas, something he criticized former President Barack Obama for.
Trump's a lot more like Obama than he wants to admit. | Source: JIM WATSON / AFP
President Trump unleashed a lethal airstrike in Baghdad on Friday that led to a massive escalation in tensions between the United States and Iran.
Among those killed was Qassem Soleimani, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s overseas forces. He was “extraordinarily” close to the supreme leader of Iran.
As tensions spike, the question arises: Why President Trump would risk a war when he was so vehemently against it back in 2013?
Here are three things he appears to be trying to accomplish. Unsurprisingly, we’ve seen all of them before.
When Bill Clinton was about to get impeached in December 1998, he distracted the country by launching military operations in the Middle East.
Sound familiar?
There’s little chance the Republican-controlled Senate will remove President Trump from office. Still, he may want to remove his historic impeachment from the media limelight.
Key Islamic nations, including Iran, have been moving to ditch the US dollar entirely. This move threatens the dollar’s status as the world’s reserve currency.
If Iran succeeds in escaping from the dollar’s hegemony, the recent US sanctions would be rendered impotent.
By stirring tensions between Iraq and Iran, President Trump sent a warning to Iran. If Iran continues on its path away from the dollar, there are other ways the United States can create problems for them.
Ironically, Trump is effectively emulating what Hillary Clinton did to fortify the dollar’s reign in the Middle East.
President Trump has incurred substantial backlash for his tweets dating back as far as 2011, when he criticized Barack Obama for his Iran policy.
Is he doing what he once thought was unacceptable for re-election purposes? It certainly seems so if you consider what Trump thought of Obama’s similar actions back in the early 2010s.
He predicted that Barack Obama would escalate tensions with Iran just to get re-elected. Conventional wisdom says that wartime presidents don’t lose elections.
Despite the glaring hypocrisy, the airstrike seems to have pleased Trump’s base heading into the critical election year.
Iran has promised “severe revenge” for the killing of Soleimani. Donald Trump may be accomplishing his political goals by ramping up Middle East hostilities, but the question lingers: Has he bitten off more than he can chew?
Last modified: September 23, 2020 1:27 PM
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