The foolishness continues as sore loser Trump wanted to bomb Iran last week. On the road to the bunker a POTUS proud of trying to end “endless wars” also brags about increasing the size of the military budget. Trump wants to surrender the security deposit on the White House by having one last “melancholy adventure” at being commander-in-chief.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump, with two months left in office, last week asked for options on attacking Iran’s main nuclear site, but ultimately decided against taking the dramatic step, a U.S. official said on Monday.
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Trump has spent all four years of his presidency engaging in an aggressive policy against Iran, withdrawing in 2018 from the Iran nuclear deal negotiated by his Democratic predecessor, Barack Obama, and imposing economic sanctions against a wide variety of Iranian targets.
Trump’s request for options came a day after a U.N. watchdog report showed Iran had finished moving a first cascade of advanced centrifuges from an above-ground plant at its main uranium enrichment site to an underground one, in a fresh breach of its 2015 nuclear deal with major powers.
Alireza Miryousefi, spokesman for Iran’s mission to the United Nations in New York, said Iran’s nuclear program is purely for peaceful purposes and civilian use and Trump’s policies have not changed that. “However, Iran has proven to be capable of using its legitimate military might to prevent or respond to any melancholy adventure from any aggressor,” he added.
Iran’s 2.4 tonne stock of low-enriched uranium is now far above the deal’s 202.8 kg limit. It produced 337.5 kg in the quarter, less than the more than 500 kg recorded in the previous two quarters by the International Atomic Energy Agency.
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A strike on Iran’s main nuclear site at Natanz could flare into a regional conflict and pose a serious foreign policy challenge for Biden.
Economic sanctions have disrupted the import of medicine and food. A travel ban has made impossible almost any travel by Iranians to the United States. And, last year, rather than pinpointing specific culprits, the Trump administration designated the entire Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a branch of Iran’s military, a terrorist group, effectively putting millions of average Iranians who were forcibly conscripted into its ranks on America’s most-wanted list.
The sad truth is that Trump and Pompeo have demonstrated beyond much doubt that “maximum pressure” — a strategy that basically fulfills the wish list long demanded by hawkish foreign policy conservatives — is a total bust.