With Iran Strikes, Trump Is ‘unchained’

Remember when Donald Trump was an isolationist?

Yes, once upon a time, that’s how many in the national security realm described this president. Plenty of his moves — from his digs at NATO to his use of the “America First” slogan — seemed to justify the label. Officials, journalists and others, including myself, would sit around pondering questions like: “Does America First mean America Alone?”

In the years since he first took office, it has become increasingly hard to define the “Trump Doctrine” for foreign policy. He has taken more and more contradictory moves while growing more confident in his Oval Office instincts. Foreign affairs luminaries have devoted many papers to trying to clarify the aims of a man who refuses to come into focus. He’s a shallow transactionalist! He’s a principled realist! He’s an imperialist with a Western Hemisphere fixation! Trump himself once even said, “I’m a nationalist and a globalist. I’m both.”

Trump’s decision to bomb Iran’s nuclear sites this weekend is the latest sign that he’s now in a phase where he’s willing to take enormous risks with little concern about the blowback. He has survived so much already — two impeachments, criminal convictions, two assassination attempts. He doesn’t have to run for office again, and, as has been amply noted, his advisers won’t restrain him the way they did in his first term.

Even when Trump backs down (the TACO thing) he still redefines the parameters of the conversation.

“It’s Trump unchained,” said Ilan Goldenberg, a Middle East specialist who worked for the Biden team, referring to the president’s behavior.

I’ve never been a fan of the race to define presidential doctrines. It feels unfair to try to box in leaders who face so many varying crises. But I sympathize with people who seek to impose coherence on Trump because, as humans, we all need some sense of order and clarity.

When I asked several former officials and analysts what Trump’s strikes on Iran meant about his foreign policy doctrine, their exhaustion at trying to understand the mercurial president came through.

“I have no idea what the doctrine is. Ask him,” an Arab analyst said. “Seriously?” a Bush II administration official replied. I granted them anonymity to be frank about their uncertainty.

Others took a shot.

Trump “stresses diplomacy but leaves little doubt that those diplomatic windows do not stay open indefinitely,” said Bill Cortese, a GOP operative close to the White House. “The use of force is always on the table but the use of U.S. assets is limited, focused, and with an end goal — no more open-ended conflicts. And it must answer the ultimate question: Does this directly benefit the people of the United States?”

Eddie Fishman, a sanctions expert who worked for the Obama administration, put it this way: “Trump seems to believe that the quick and decisive application of U.S. power — be it economic or military — can achieve maximalist objectives. As Trump sees it, the disparity in power between the U.S. and other countries is so great that when we act boldly, others will capitulate.”

Trump’s decision to strike Iran will test these theories, as well as his risk tolerance. It also could determine how his “doctrine” — as much as one can call it that — is ultimately defined.

Trump has urged Iran not to retaliate and to use the U.S. strike as an opportunity to negotiate some sort of peace.

But Iran has already threatened revenge, and nearly every U.S. official I spoke to expects it will fulfill that promise. On Sunday, there were reports that Iran may shut down the Strait of Hormuz, a move that could spike oil prices and roil markets. The U.S. also has some 40,000 troops stationed across the Middle East, giving Iran many potential targets.

If Trump’s hope for a one-and-done strike devolves into an endless tit-for-tat, he will have led the U.S. into the very type of war he’s long promised to avoid. So much for the “isolationist.”

For countries watching this from the sidelines, there are lessons to learn from how both Trump and Iran approached this conflict, which spiraled after Israel began striking Iranian targets more than a week ago.

One is that Trump isn’t bluffing about using force, even in an extreme way. While he carried out military strikes during his first term (on Syria, on an Iranian general who was in Iraq) those moves were arguably more calibrated than this weekend’s bunker-buster bombing on Iranian soil.

A second lesson is that he believes in diplomacy, but he doesn’t have much patience for it. That’s especially the case when it comes to an adversary he sees as much weaker than the United States.

Iranian officials tried to use their usual delaying tactics as they negotiated with Trump’s envoys. When Israel decided to strike Iran two days before Iranian and U.S. officials were due to meet, Trump, annoyed with Tehran’s unwillingness to commit to zero enrichment of uranium on Iranian soil, didn’t try very hard to stop the Israelis.

“They thought they were dealing with a different kind of leader, like the kinds of leaders they’ve been playing games with for the last 30 or 40 years. And they found out that’s not the case,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio told CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday.

Another lesson is to be prepared for the worst-case scenario when it comes to Trump. He says he’ll decide “within two weeks” whether to bomb you? It probably means you’ll get bombed, like, right now.

“Don’t underestimate and dismiss when he says crazy things,” Goldenberg said. “They might actually happen.”

When it comes to Iran, Trump watchers can still revert to the phrase “America First” in trying to capture his bedrock foreign policy belief.

Trump naysayers can argue that he’s abandoning “America First” by entering a war that could lead to the loss of U.S. lives and resources.

Trump supporters can say: What’s more “America First” than eliminating the nuclear threat from an avowed U.S. enemy?

The great thing about “America First” is that it is malleable, just like Trump himself.