In reality, US president’s opposition to foreign entanglements had only ever been partial
Donald Trump ordered the launch of the war on Iran last Friday afternoon while on board Air Force One, as the presidential plane made its descent towards Corpus Christi, Texas.
Trump was on his way to the port city to give a speech titled American Energy Dominance and had spent the three-hour flight chatting to Texas Republican politicians including the state’s two hawkish senators, John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, about his options in Iran.
Also present on the plane in the countdown to Operation Epic Fury was a veteran film star, Dennis Quaid. At some point in the flight, Cruz filmed Quaid sitting next to Trump and persuaded the actor to reprise his role as Ronald Reagan in a 2024 reverential biopic, so that Cruz could frame the encounter as “two great American presidents”.
Speaking as Reagan, Quaid declared Trump was “like me on steroids”. It was a highly stylised passing of the flame from the patron saint of Republican hawks to their current hero.
