President Trump can’t articulate any semblance of a real “day-after plan” in his war on Iran. The president was questioned by the media after his Tuesday meeting with Irish Taoiseach Micheál Martin at the White House. “You just said that Iran is just a military operation to you. But do you not have a day-after plan, and if so what is your day-after plan for Iran?” a reporter asked. “Well we have a lot. Look, if we left right now it would take 10 years for them to rebuild. But we’re not ready to leave yet. But we—we’ll be leaving in the near future. We’ll be leaving in pretty much the very near future,” Trump said vaguely. “But right now they’ve been decimated from every standpoint. And again, we’ve had great support from countries in the Middle East. But we’ve had … essentially no support from NATO.” Reporter: Do you not have a day after plan for Iran?Trump: We have a lot. If we left right now, it would take ten years for them to rebuild. But we're not ready to leave yet. But we we'll be leaving in the near future. pic.twitter.com/0cVcqdURtN— Acyn (@Acyn) March 17, 2026Once again, it sounds like the Trump administration went into this war with no real plan. First Trump was saying that he’d have a hand in picking Iran’s next leader. That didn’t happen. And his call for U.S. allies to help defend oil tankers attempting to pass through the Strait of Hormuz went unheeded—which is why he spent much of Tuesday bashing NATO instead of talking about a day-after plan. “NATO is making a very foolish mistake,” Trump said earlier in the meeting. “I’ve long said that, you know, I wonder whether or not NATO would ever be there for us. So this was a great test. Because we don’t need them.”Ultimately, Trump’s “near future” timeline offers no hope that this war will end anytime soon. And even if it does, at least 1,444 Iranians of all ages, 850 people in Lebanon, 15 people in Israel, and 13 American servicemembers have already been killed. Thousands more have been injured, and both cultural heritage sites and basic infrastructure have been decimated in Iran. The grim real estate makeover plan he’s trying to build over the rubble of the Palestinian genocide in Gaza isn’t a viable option here.