A humiliating defeat in his his unconstitutional war with Iran has turned convicted felon and sexual predator Donald Trump into what he fears most — a pathetic loser on on the world stage.
Trump’s inability to win what he predicted would be an easy win against the Islamic Repubublice showcases his lack of knowledge, failed leadership capbilities and a record of lying and corruption never before seen in an American president.
Writes Steven Erlanger in the New York Times:
To America’s allies, President Trump’s war in Iran, now in its sixth month, seems headed for a strategic defeat.
They worry that the inability of the United States to turn military superiority into a sustainably changed Iran has displayed a vulnerability that Russia and China will welcome. In addition, Mr. Trump’s goals remain unmet, and the U.S. military is running short on key armaments that it needs for global reach.
For the moment, Iran is seemingly resolute under a more radical government, its nuclear and ballistic missile programs are degraded but not destroyed, and the Strait of Hormuz is effectively under its control. The war has left both the United States and Israel in weaker positions — and blaming each other for the mess.
Iranian missiles and drones not only restrict traffic through the strait and damage the economic infrastructure of allied energy production, but they also continue to threaten American bases across the Middle East and have killed or injured American service members.
With Mr. Trump’s aims shifting, Washington is losing credibility both militarily and diplomatically, analysts said. Its conduct in the war underscores the impression that the United States is an unpredictable instrument of global disorder, they said.
The war may evolve, but so far the result has been “a strategic loss and an embarrassment,” said Robin Niblett, a former director of Chatham House, a think tank in London. “For U.S. allies and those who rely on the U.S. for security, this is confirmation that you can’t trust the United States.”
Even if the Islamic Republic collapses, he added, “people won’t forget that their security and their future were dragged into question by an unpredictable and wavering U.S. foreign policy.”
European allies remember Mr. Trump’s vow to seize Greenland from a NATO ally and his threats to leave the alliance unless other allies met his spending goals. Middle Eastern allies see their own security undermined by this war, even if they are too committed to Washington to abandon partnerships with the United States. But they are already hedging, looking for repaired ties with Iran and better relations with Europe, China and Russia, said Ali Vaez, the Iran project director for the International Crisis Group.
Many countries disliked the global order as it was, Mr. Niblett said, but there was one. “Now America has confirmed itself as a force of disorder and everyone is drawing lessons from it, and trying to be less dependent,” he said. “No one wants to be subject to a whipsaw foreign policy that doesn’t know its limits, and that is a strategic defeat.”
Mr. Vaez cited other recent developments as evidence that the United States has lost credibility as a guarantor of allies’ security, including Mr. Trump’s abrupt change of demands last week after announcing a landmark nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia.
“The Saudis do a nuclear deal with Trump that he walks back in 24 hours,” Mr. Vaez said. “This is the crisis of credibility of the U.S. Neither its military prowess nor its diplomatic promises can be trusted.”
The loss of trust is not limited to U.S. allies. Polls show Americans are abandoning Trump in droves, upset by his inability to confront inflation and the rising costs of gas, food and other staples of their lives. Even his once-stalwart Republican base of supporters have turned against him as more than 70 percent now say he is “unqualified” to lead the nation.
Trump’s escalating dementia has raised serious questions about his sanity while his actions have descended into outright corruption and criminal behavior.
“He’s a crook,” says Texas Senator Ted Cruz. “He’s corrupt,” adds longtime Democratic Strategist James Carville. He tells Ari Melber of MS Now that the criminal president is exposed as a president of “staggering corruption” by The Wall Street Journal owned by former Trump supporter Robert Murdoch.
