The Atlantic
Trump’s Gladiator Delusion
The president’s South Lawn fight lacks the ambition of ancient Rome.
Center Left
Alternet.org
Trump's capitulation has an obvious loser — one he desperately won't acknowledge
Left
This week, the president canceled a planned attack on Iran intended to pressure the regime into making a deal. Donald Trump said he canceled, because a deal was already close at hand. It was the 39th time he said peace was imminent since the war started. CNN ran a super-cut:The regime denied a deal, but it did leak to Iran's state-run media text of the demands that it said the president had agreed to. The Wall Street Journal's Yaroslav Trofimov said: "It will keep the Strait of Hormuz under Iranian control, will promise Iran $300 billion in reconstruction money in addition to an immediate cash transfer of $24 billion, a suspension of sanctions and the withdrawal of US forces from the Middle East. Also a commitment not to bother Iran again about its missiles and proxies, and restraining Israel in Lebanon. The US gets in exchange a pinky promise to respect the [existing nonproliferation treaty]."It's "like Hirohito’s surrender," journalist Bill Grueskin commented. (Trofimov added: "Let’s just say it would be very difficult for Trump or any US president to explain such a deal.")In response to the suggestion that he was handing over the store and surrendering in humiliation, the president of the United States did what he does best: he threw a fit.But reporting by Axios suggests the opposite.Iran's foreign minister said today that a deal to "to extend the ceasefire, reopen the Strait of Hormuz and launch negotiations on Iran's nuclear program 'has never been closer.'" Trump told Axios that "he considered Araghchi's post 'very positive.'" Moreover, Axios said:• "Trump said he'd demanded a public clarification over the state media reports, which claimed Iran stood to receive billions of dollars in frozen assets immediately after signing.• "Trump also claimed Iran had privately "apologized for putting out false information." • "The president said he still thinks a deal could be signed over the weekend or on Monday."These are clearly face-saving demands. Because when the president said that the leaked text had NOTHING to do with the terms he agreed to, he was actually saying that it had EVERYTHING to do with the terms he agreed to. Moreover, leaking that text seems to have been crucial to forcing him to commit to them. As I'm writing this, Reuters is reporting that "while there were minor differences in the accounts [of the draft texts], all appeared to offer Tehran much of what it has demanded so far, with Trump appearing to win little of what he has sought beyond the reopening of the strait, which Iran shut after the US and Israel launched attacks in February."Also from Reuters, draft terms include:• "the US would immediately begin releasing billions of dollars in frozen Iranian assets and waive sanctions on its oil exports, in return for Iran opening the strait.• "Iran's nuclear program would be addressed during a 60-day period of talks.• "discussion of possible war reparations for Tehran and dropping longstanding US demands for limits on Iran's missile program."• "Israel ... has not been part of the negotiations. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country would not be party to the agreement."More details of peace terms are forthcoming, and those made public could be inaccurate, but I'm not the first to note that Trump is desperate to end this war. He thought he could roll over Iran's regime like he ran over Venezuela's. Instead, Iran's leadership turned more extreme and took over the strait by threatening ships passing through it. (No one underwrites insurance in a war zone.) Oil prices have soared, burning up the US economy. Trump is now -50 percent on inflation, per CNN. Eighty percent disapprove on gas prices."They better get their act together" he said of Iran. Or what – burn up more of America?Despite talk of tactics, there was never a way to end the war militarily. All Iran has to do is hit one tanker with one drone to bring shipping lanes to a halt. The only way to end the war was through deal-making. However, given that Trump is the world's worse deal-maker, despite a reputation to the contrary, we may end up seeing a deal that really is "like Hirohito’s surrender." That's why Shipwreck, a pseudonymous account run by a career intelligence analyst, said today: "I am betting we never see the full text of the deal from the White House.""No other way to sell it beyond a US surrender," he said."Iran is the winner," Iran's foreign minister said on state TV, according to Reuters.There is indeed no way to sell it, but Donald Trump will try. His ego is too great, his feelings too fragile. He can't allow himself to be known as the president who took a knee before an insurmountable enemy. He and his allies will spin surrender so that it doesn't look like Iran got everything while America got nothing, except perhaps some relief from the pain of high gas prices. In the end, Trump is what he accuses his enemies of being: old, weak and ineffective.
