Trump is setting up a massive nuclear crisis with Iran

Forget about deterrence. Trump has broken all three cardinal rules about avoiding war.

President Trump.
(Image credit: Illustrated | BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images, NATALIIA OMELCHENKO/iStock, Aerial3/iStock)

Republican analysts and officials spent most the week taking a macabre and unearned victory lap, celebrating President Trump's rub-out of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani and the tepid Iranian response. Lee Smith, in the New York Post, called it "a strategic victory for President Trump," that could result in "a political masterstroke." The Daily Wire's Ben Shapiro, with his trademark magnanimity, declared on Twitter that "deterrence worked, you f---ing numbskulls."

Dead Soleimani Fever even spread to the theoretically sane, with Time columnist Ian Bremmer calling it "a win for Trump" and claiming that negotiations are now more likely. It's all a bit premature. While Iran chose not to further escalate this week, the situation remains combustible. The most significant danger is still an Iranian decision to pursue immediate nuclear breakout, something the president's blundering and blustering has made much more likely.

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David Faris

David Faris is an associate professor of political science at Roosevelt University and the author of It's Time to Fight Dirty: How Democrats Can Build a Lasting Majority in American Politics. He is a frequent contributor to Informed Comment, and his work has appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times, The Christian Science Monitor, and Indy Week.