Listening to the critics of the latest Middle East war, one might assume that President Donald Trump has made a catastrophic mistake by backing the Israelis in the conflict. Other than cowardice, there was no reason to ignore a lawless nation, Iran, with a mass-murdering leader intent on building nuclear bombs.
For their own survival, the Israelis cannot afford to be cowards, and Trump learned not to be one. An attack on Iran was both justified and necessary. It would be disingenuous and a significant mistake for Democrats to be overly critical of military action that has already made the world a safer place.
Implying, as some Democrats seem to be doing, that the elimination of a foreign administration committed to terrorism might be unjustified or wrong is political folly. The necessity and justification for the execution of this war is not debatable, nor is it sensible to deny the need for the American-Israeli alliance to prevail.
— Lloyd Litwak, New York City
Avoiding political disaster
Columnist Steve Chapman is right (“For Trump, the war against Iran will not be a political winner,” March 4). Operation Epic Fury will never count as a political win for President Donald Trump. Tragically, American lives have already been lost, and more loss may come.
If Trump is at all interested in avoiding further excoriation at home, brevity must be his priority. Americans averse to the attack on Iran may be more forgiving if U.S. involvement ends relatively soon. If Iran’s military can be softened enough by U.S. assaults so that Israel and others can finish the job, some Americans may become satisfied that the operation was a worthy cause.
Unleashing fury, getting out and letting America’s allies mop up are the only recipe for Trump to avoid political disaster at home.
— Terry Takash, Western Springs
Feeding the war machine
Imagine this: A foreign nation decides the U.S. is a rogue nation because of its blatant disregard for the human rights of its people, its disdain for the sovereignty of other nations, its warmongering ways. its nuclear capability and its leader’s desire to rule the world. So that foreign nation decides a regime change in the U.S. is in order and kills the president along with his constitutional successors and 40-odd members of the Cabinet and Congress.
How would that be different from what the U.S. just did in Iran? How many times over the last 250 years has the U.S. stepped in on one pretense or another and found itself embroiled in yet another mess?
We need not be isolationists, but neither should we be haphazard interventionists. If President Donald Trump wanted to deny Iran nuclear capability, he had an opportunity to negotiate a resolution of that issue years ago. He shut down those negotiations. Instead of a compromise that could have been reached then, we will now have death and destruction.
The present attacks in Iran will likely make Ali Khamenei a martyr and only solidify the resistance to freedom and democracy. If we put boots on the ground, it will be Vietnam or Afghanistan all over again.
How many soldiers, Marines, sailors, airmen and innocent bystanders must die or be horribly wounded to satisfy our hubris? Instead of helping our own citizens who struggle to pay for food, housing, education, medical care and retirement, we will feed the war machine.
“Regime change” is like fool’s gold. Will we never learn our lesson?
— Karen Meehan, Chicago
Many manufactured crises
It is becoming apparent that the reasons to go to war with Iran were questionable at best and that there isn’t any coherent war plan in place. The U.S. is winging it. This follows President Donald Trump’s usual three-step process: Manufacture a crisis (for maximum public relations effect), watch as chaos ensues (creating uncontrollable consequences) and declare victory (and leave).
We’ve seen Trump use this playbook time and time again. Some examples: Despite crime consistently dropping (the lowest in many of our lifetimes), Trump declared Chicago in need of deployment of federal agents. After two months of havoc, Trump’s agents left, declaring victory, citing the already-lower crime figures recorded before the agents arrived. Similar story in Minneapolis. After agents killed two U.S. citizens, their leader hightailed it out of the city, declaring “mission accomplished.”
Citing the false fear of a Chinese or Russian takeover, Trump demanded that the U.S. take control of Greenland. After needlessly bringing NATO to the brink of collapse, Trump declared a breakthrough agreement (that’ll be announced in “two weeks,” his usual timeline). “Problem” solved.
After falsely claiming the Kennedy Center is dilapidated, Trump took over, even slapping his name on the building. When artists canceled their appearances and membership plummeted, Trump declared that the center will close and reopen better than ever.
The reality is Trump doesn’t actually accomplish anything. He makes up crises, then sits back and watches as the unintended consequences of his actions create havoc, human suffering and, in some cases, death, usually to the detriment of our country. Then having achieved nothing and often leaving a worse situation than before he arrived, he tells anyone who’ll listen what a great job he did and leaves.
Unfortunately, as we head into another one of Trump’s manufactured crises, I fear the result will be another mess.
— Frank Kern, Chicago
Where do candidates stand?
Congress, acting on our behalf, will consider a resolution concerning whether President Donald Trump’s authority to conduct the war in Iran should be curtailed. There are open primaries for congressional seats. None of the websites I checked for candidates in the 7th Congressional District provide a position statement on whether the candidate supports the justification offered for the U.S. attacks on Iran, specifically whether the attack was a justified preemptive attack to prevent Iranian retaliation before Israel attacks Iran.
We are entitled to know where these candidates stand on the resolution and whether Israel should be allowed to dictate American foreign policy this way.
Tribune reporters should contact the candidates and report on their positions.
— William Piper, River Forest
The many costs of a war
War is expensive. Human life is irreplaceable.
It seems the harshest criticism of President Donald Trump’s decision to attack Iran is the increased price of oil. The cost of a day’s work at war is hardly ever quantified. The cost of losing three pilots and three high-performance fighter jets to friendly fire in Kuwait was not reported in the news. However, the halting of insurance coverage for the delivery of oil is of grave concern.
Whatever the additional war premium might be should be the responsibility of the Pentagon just as providers of all necessary goods and services are paid. If the price of coverage increases by double, our government should either pay the premium or more easily underwrite the loss occasioned by the increased risk.
There’s so much to be discussed discussing the advisability of starting a war, the cost of insurance coverage or loss of cargo is likely insignificant.
— Sheldon I. Saitlin, Boca Raton, Florida
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