WASHINGTON — As his “four-to-five” week war against Iran is halfway through its eighth week, President Donald Trump is now complaining that polls reflecting the war’s consistent unpopularity are “rigged” while seeming confused about peace talks that appear to be, at best, recreating a deal with Iran he ripped up during his first term.
The two-week ceasefire Trump announced April 7 is set to expire Tuesday, with negotiations to permanently end the fighting now reportedly including terms reminiscent of a 2015 agreement limiting Iran’s nuclear program negotiated by President Barack Obama’s administration. Trump tore up the deal in 2018, and a return to that framework has Obama alums wondering what, exactly, was the point in abandoning it in the first place.
“Exactly,” said Jim Townsend, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense in the Obama administration. “And how many people had to die to gain what we already had?”
Thirteen U.S. service members have died in Trump’s war, with hundreds more injured. At least 1,500 Iranian civilians have been killed.
Robert Kagan, a top State Department official in Ronald Reagan’s administration, said Trump has actually blundered into a far worse situation, making Iran stronger than it has ever been.
