American Surrender

Trump Achieves "Peace for our time."

We are in a different, dangerous place now. We have spent several generations losing foolish, peripheral wars…or, at best, not winning them. Korea was a draw, because of MacArthur’s arrogance. Vietnam was a defeat based on a fundamental misapprehension: it was a civil war that we imagined was part of a global struggle against communism. The “Domino Theory” didn’t exist. The Cold War was a victory, which should have taught us a lesson: You don’t need kinetics to win. You need a strong culture and value system and patience—it was the triumph of freedom over idealism, the ideal of economic equity imposed by the state was a chimera. Having achieved that, we became careless about the world. The first Gulf War was a restrained victory—Kuwait was liberated!—but left a villain, Saddam Hussein, in place. The Iraq War was a loss. Afghanistan was a loss and an embarrassment.

And now this: We are in a different place because never before has an American President signed a document that was, in fact, a surrender. Trump’s signature on the Memorandum of Understanding with Iran is a moment of great historical significance. It may even signal the end of Pax Americana, a period we entered as the most powerful country in the history of the world. We may well still be that—but power requires, among other things, moral standing, a sophisticated geostrategic sense and a reputation for serious intent. We have squandered all those.

The world does not take us very seriously anymore—except as a blundering, naive, Goliath that can wreck things. We are tapped out. We have frittered away trillions of dollars and worse, the incredible advantages that freedom and democracy gave us. Trump’s America is juvenile and unreliable. His minions at Fox News and in the Congress can pretend otherwise, but Trump has weakened us in the world. As the New York Times reported, this is the President of the United States speaking:

“It’s a very strong deal.” he said. “Nobody knows what it is, but it’s very strong. Most people seem to be very happy. Who’s really happy is the market,” he added, referring to a surge in stocks in recent days.

If the Iranians did not behave properly, he said, “we’ll go right back to dropping bombs right smack in the middle of their head.”

That is the way a playground bully talks. And Trump has suffered a bully’s fate: he has folded in the face of determined opposition. He has been hosed—spectacularly—by the Iranians. He has rescued a failing and disgraceful regime. He has given them a $400 million (estimated) lifeline. He has given them leverage that was only theoretical before: after 60 days, they can begin charging tolls in the Strait of Hormuz. They probably won’t, but the world knows the possibility exists now, which strengthens Iran. They may not pursue a nuclear weapon, but they now know that they can—and they certainly won’t negotiate away that possibility. And Trump has signed a document that “requires” American forces to retreat from the “proximity” of Iran in 30 days, whatever that means. In plain English, he has signed a document that assumes reparations and retreat. He has signed a document that even our primary allies, the Israelis who tricked him into the fiasco, can ignore.

Again, no American President has ever signed a document that ratifies such an embarrassing defeat.

And his fraudulence stands naked before the world. As Elliot Abrams put it in The Free Press:

In January, when the Iranian people rose up, Trump posted “Iranian Patriots, KEEP PROTESTING—TAKE OVER YOUR INSTITUTIONS!!! Save the names of the killers and abusers. They will pay a big price. I have cancelled all meetings with Iranian Officials until the senseless killing of protesters STOPS. HELP IS ON ITS WAY. MIGA!!!” On Sunday Trump said, “As far as regime change, I never cared about regime change. This is the third group we’ve dealt with, and this is the most rational group yet.”

Trump’s lies have become so blatant, and so damaging to the national spirit, that one wonders why his followers still hang on for this pathetic funhouse ride. Actually, one doesn’t have to wonder all that hard: cults be cults.

There are two arguments that can be made in Trump’s defense, both weak. One is that he and the Israelis did fundamental damage to Iran’s economy and war-making ability. True enough, but he didn’t scratch the surface of Iran’s ability to withstand enemy attacks. If I’m a freedom-loving Iranian—as so many, but not enough, are—am I more or less optimistic than I was in January? The Regime may be weaker militarily, but it successfully called Trump’s bluff. It may be weaker economically, but won’t be for long. It successfully exposed the vulnerabilities of its Gulf neighbors. Dubai doesn’t seem as secure a place to park money anymore; Qatar hosts a vulnerable American military and a natural gas supply that depends on the Strait of Hormuz. Arsenal, the football club, advertises Emirates on its shirts—it used to be a superb airline—but who would risk flying those guys nowadays? Who’ll be willing to put corporate headquarters and hardware—AI data centers, for example—in Dubai and Abu Dhabi and Qatar?

The second argument, relegated to J.D. Vance, is that maybe, after all this, after 47 years of villainy, the regime will change its ways:

“What the agreement does is fundamentally set up a structure whereby if the Iranians behave like a normal country, then we want to treat them like a normal country and welcome them to the world economy…[Y]ou see people, both the hard-liners but also the more political people, saying ‘our relationship with the U.S. over the past 47 years has been a mistake, let’s turn over a new leaf.’”

Good luck with that.

The Obama Administration’s hard-won and patiently negotiated nuclear deal—the JCPOA—seems far more respectable than this Memorandum of (Mis)Understanding. The incompetence of the effort changes our status in the world. Our rivals, Russia and China—whom Trump actually thanked yesterday—now have a better sense of what a feckless, doddering tiger we’ve become. China isn’t going to worry as much if it decides to move against Taiwan; we won’t stop them. Russia doesn’t have to worry as much about the consequences of its failure in Ukraine. (Although Putin personally does if brutal Russian tradition holds—leaders who lose face the guillotine.)

Which raises a question: What about Ukraine? That war could have been the sort of victory that would have reinforced the international perception of American strength—and Russia’s weakness—in the world. It could have been the sort of victory that Americans love: Goliath humiliated by David, no American lives lost. But then, again, we are Goliath now. Big and dumb and clumsy.

Can Trump slither out of this humiliation? Sure he can. He’s Trump and we’re us. Zelensky could help him with a victory; it needs only the slightest nudge from us, the promise of unlimited munitions and supplies. Cuba is a luscious fruit, ripe to be picked. History may remember Trump as that island’s liberator. The Iranians will happily allow these talks go on forever, shoved to the proverbial back pages by a media seeking more dramatic fare, and forgotten by the public. Inflation will remain, another unnecessary Trump failure, but the price of gas may well “come down” by this fall’s election. Trump will brag about that. And the Democrats will help in every cultural and identitarian way they can. By November, Venezuela may outshine Iran in the public memory; Trump excels at producing shiny objects.

But he has lost this war and damaged America. He has exposed himself, asleep at the wheel. He is still a threat to our democracy, but one senses the jig is up. His strength was always a Potemkin thing; stripped of the appearance of bellicosity, he seems pathetic. He has lost more than a war; he has lost his presidency. The only relevant question now is: what have we lost by electing, and then re-electing, this fraud. . .and how long will it take to regain it?

The Sanity Clause American birthday sale continues: