Iran shoots down an American drone….
We actually have no idea where the drone had been…
He huddles with his hawkish national security team….
They tell him to strike back…
He ok’s the strike….
He cancel’s it…(10 minutes before the execution of the strikes)
After action report?
Donald Trump AGAIN threatens actions….
Then stops at the edge….
Dissing President Obama and pounding his chest with HIS power to do this…
While looking for a sit-down for his adversary….
He IS getting savaged….
Donald Trump seems the President that seldom follows thru with his policy flexing…
He’s about the SHOW.…
President Trump approved military strikes against Iran in retaliation for downing an American surveillance drone, but pulled back from launching them on Thursday night after a day of escalating tensions.
As late as 7 p.m., military and diplomatic officials were expecting a strike, after intense discussions and debate at the White House among the president’s top national security officials and congressional leaders, according to multiple senior administration officials involved in or briefed on the deliberations.
Officials said the president had initially approved attacks on a handful of Iranian targets, like radar and missile batteries.
The operation was underway in its early stages when it was called off, a senior administration official said. Planes were in the air and ships were in position, but no missiles had been fired when word came to stand down, the official said.
The abrupt reversal put a halt to what would have been the president’s third military action against targets in the Middle East. Mr. Trump had struck twice at targets in Syria, in 2017 and 2018.
It was not clear whether Mr. Trump simply changed his mind on the strikes or whether the administration altered course because of logistics or strategy. It was also not clear whether the attacks might still go forward.
Asked about the plans for a strike and the decision to hold back, the White House declined to comment, as did Pentagon officials. No government officials asked The New York Times to withhold the article.
The retaliation plan was intended as a response to the shooting down of the unmanned, $130 million surveillance drone, which was struck Thursday morning by an Iranian surface-to-air missile, according to a senior administration official who was briefed on the military planning and spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss confidential plans.
The strike was set to take place just before dawn Friday in Iran to minimize risk to the Iranian military and civilians….
His full explanation, via Twitter:
President Obama made a desperate and terrible deal with Iran – Gave them 150 Billion Dollars plus I.8 Billion Dollars in CASH! Iran was in big trouble and he bailed them out. Gave them a free path to Nuclear Weapons, and SOON. Instead of saying thank you, Iran yelled Death to America….
Image…Vox.Com
Could you imagine if Obama had been so impulsive?
Republicans would be demanding his head!
I’m sure Susan Collins will be “concerned” and Mutt Romney will offer some milquetoast comment, but neither will display Justin Amash balls on this.
Some of us old greybeards can still remember the U.S.S. Maddox and the U.S.S. C, Turner Joy being attacked by North Viet Nam (DRV) in the Gulf of Tonkin in the summer of 1964, allegedly in international waters. [Later studies showed that there was only one attack, not two, and that it’s very unclear whether the two U.S. Navy warships were in North Vietnamese waters or international ones.]
This provided the Johnson administration’s rationale for seeking extensive war powers from Congress under the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. It passed 98-2 in the Senate, with the only 2 dissents coming from Senators, Ernest Gruening of Alaska (D) and Wayne Morse of Oregon (D, formerly R). This resolution (unlike the Authorizations of the Use of Force in Afghanistan [2001] and in Iraq [2002] ) was eventually repealed in 1971.
Trump isn’t gonna ask Congress for shit…..
He and Bolton do NOT operate that way….
Congress NEVER says no anyways….
I need to head off for the day and weekend, leaving for client meetings in Boston tomorrow and I have lots to do.
Two interesting stories just hit. Boris Johnson was involved in a domestic altercation with his live in girl friend (her house I think) and someone who is 23 years his junior. It seems these Tories cannot keep their hands of women after another Tory Minister physically attacked an environmentalist last night (choking her).
And, the New York Magazine is reporting that a writer named Carroll is claiming Trump tried to rape her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room. She made a very pointed reference to the size of his manhood.
He’s not gonna like this……
opp research on ole Boris, eh?
ah Keith?
a Trump sex assault story just dropped