Facing jittery global markets and drooping poll numbers since launching a war on Iran, President Donald Trump has cycled from calls for “unconditional surrender” to sounding amenable to an end state in which Iran trades one hard-line ayatollah for another.
Shifting comments from the Republican president and his top aides are adding to the precariousness of the 12-day-old conflict, which is impacting nearly every corner of the Middle East and causing economic tremors around the globe. With neither side budging, the war is now on an unpredictable path — one in which a credible endgame is still unclear.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Tuesday told reporters it’s up to Trump “whether it’s the beginning, the middle or the end” of the war. Trump, during the course of one speech at a House Republican gathering on Monday, went from calling the war a “short-term excursion” that could end soon to proclaiming “we haven’t won enough.”
The vacillation has fueled criticism from those who say Trump lacks a clear goal.
“They didn’t have a plan,” Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., told reporters. ”They have no timeline. And because of that, they have no exit strategy.”
A constantly shifting goal line
Since ordering the Iran bombardment, Trump has continually shifted his timelines and goals for his war against Iran, a crosscurrent of rhetoric that has delivered more questions than answers.
Over the last few days, Trump has called for the “unconditional surrender” of Iran’s leaders, while suggesting he’s already succeeded in achieving his objective of decimating Iran’s military.
At the same time, Trump’s team has sought to soothe anxious Americans that this won’t be a long, drawn-out conflict, even as the president has insisted he hasn’t ruled out the option of putting U.S. boots on the ground.
The U.S. military says that it has effectively destroyed the Iranian navy and made huge strides in defanging Iran’s ability to launch missiles and drones at its neighbors throughout the region.
And yet, the critical Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly 20% of the world’s oil passes on a typical day, remains effectively closed to business, and Iranian leaders remain unbowed.
The Revolutionary Guard vowed Iran would not allow “a single liter of oil” through the vital waterway until the United States stops its bombing campaign. And Ali Larijani, Iran’s top national security official, offered a menacing message on Tuesday after Trump had threatened to attack Iran “TWENTY TIMES HARDER” if Tehran stopped oil flowing through the strait.
“The sacrificial nation of Iran doesn’t fear your empty threats,” Larijani wrote on X. “Even those bigger than you couldn’t eliminate Iran. Be careful not to get eliminated yourself.”
Making the case to Americans
Trump has struggled to make his case to Americans about why preemptive action against Iran was necessary and how it squares with his pledge to keep America out of the “forever wars” of the last two decades that he’s bemoaned for costing too much money and too many American lives.
Thus far, seven U.S. troops have been killed and about 140 injured in the retaliatory salvos from Iran throughout the region. An eighth service member died on March 6 following a non-combat incident, the Pentagon said.
One of several reasons Trump has offered to justify launching the war is that he had a “feeling” that Iran was getting set to attack the United States.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt slightly amended that position, telling reporters that the president “had a feeling” that was “based on fact.”
However, Pentagon officials in private briefings have told congressional staffers that the U.S. does not have intelligence indicating that Iran was planning to preemptively attack the U.S.
Recent polling shows Trump’s decision to attack Iran hasn’t come with the rallying-around-the-flag effect that has typically accompanied the start of recent U.S. wars.
About half of voters in Quinnipiac and Fox News polls said the U.S. military action in Iran makes the U.S. “less safe,” while only about 3 in 10 in each poll said it made the country safer. A CNN poll found about half of U.S. adults thought the military action would make Iran “more of a threat” to the U.S., while only about 3 in 10 thought it would lessen the danger.
In that CNN poll, about 6 in 10 U.S. adults said they trusted Trump “not much” or “not at all” to make the right decisions about the U.S. use of force in Iran.
European allies are treading carefully after British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez faced the wrath of Trump, who deemed them not sufficiently supportive in backing his war of choice.
But even German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who has been broadly supportive of the U.S.-Israeli campaign against Iran, said on Tuesday that “more questions arise with every day of war.”
“Above all, we’re concerned that there is apparently no joint plan for how this war can be brought quickly to a convincing end,” Merz said.
Merz stressed that “Germany and Europe have no interest in an endless war” or in Iran’s territorial integrity disintegrating.
Deflecting responsibility for school bombing
The president has chosen to deflect responsibility for the bombing of a girls’ school in southern Iran on the first day of the conflict, a strike that killed at least 165 people.
Trump on Saturday blamed the attack on Iran, saying its security forces are “very inaccurate” with munitions.
On Monday, after the investigative group Bellingcat posted verified video that showed a U.S. Tomahawk cruise missile hitting a Revolutionary Guard facility near the school, causing the explosion, Trump again insisted it could have been Iran’s fault but said that he would accept whatever an ongoing U.S. investigation into the matter might find.
The president erroneously claimed that Tehran had access to Tomahawks, a U.S.-manufactured weapon system that is only available to the U.S. and a few close allies.
Asked by a reporter, Leavitt didn’t directly answer why Trump falsely asserted that Iran has access to the U.S.-made missile.
Instead, she responded in part that “the president has a right to share his opinions with the American public” while noting “he has said he’ll accept the conclusion of that investigation.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., told reporters that Trump’s claim “is beyond asinine.”
“Again, he says whatever pops into his head no matter what the truth is,” Schumer said. “And we all know he lies, but on something as formidable as this, it’s appalling.”
Sen. Kevin Cramer, a North Dakota Republican, was among Trump allies gently making the case that it was important for the Trump administration to clarify what happened to the school.
Cramer said the military must “do everything you can to eliminate those mistakes going forward.”
“But you also can’t undo it,” he added.
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