For those that don’t know already, last friday President Trump launched a drone strike killing Iranian general Qassim Suleimani. Suleimani was a prominent figure in the Iranian government, responsible for the death of many American troops but also extremely influential in the fight against ISIS in the middle east. On Tuesday, January 7, Iran retaliated with a ballistic missile attack on two US military bases in Iraq which according to US officials did not kill any American or Iraqi forces.
The Iranian response led to President Trump’s televised speech on Wednesday the 8th in which he revealed he would back away from any further military actions, calling on NATO allies to become more involved in the turmoil in the middle east. Early in his term, Trump backed out of the Iranian Nuclear Deal signed by President Obama, claiming that it was too weak on Iran. Because the deal was an executive order, Trump was easily able to revoke the deal once in office.
To me, the timing of the whole fiasco in Iran is particularly interesting. There seems to be little evidence revealing the necessity for Suleimani...but that is a whole other blog post in itself. My questions right now fall along the lines of why Trump decided that at this moment, a time where he has just been impeached in the House, when he is on the verge of a re-election campaign later in the year, to take the politically risky move of removing a prominent military official of a US adversary.
Is it possible that this whole ordeal was simply to distract from his impeachment proceeding in congress? Or was it a political move for the upcoming election? What is your opinion? What do you believe the motives behind the Sulimani attack were?
3 comments:
There is a lot going on in the world of politics recently, which has lead to conspiracies that Trump did this to make a diversion. Whether he did so thinking of this or not, I'm sure this had been an idea thrown around long before Trumps problems were this large. Iran was an issue we have been dipping our feet in for years, and slowly fighting a war that we the people really have little knowledge on whats really going on. The plans to kill Suleimani were probably not made to the haste of election help or diversion but, still, we may never know the true reason. I think that if we really needed him taken out of the equation to bring progress to a long fought war (over a decade) then it was solely to help in that way.
I think there is potential that Trump is attempting to distract from his impeachment. I think he may also be trying to reassert power, in some sick tyrannical manner. The reaction to his assassination order, however, I think has showed him that he really needs to back off and chill. I wouldn't find these actions very attractive as a voter, so I'm unsure about how his campaign will result. My opinion is very strongly against Trump (if not already obvious). I honestly have no idea how the assassination decision came to be and my prior opinion against Trump doesn't really allow me to step into his shoes and see from his perspective. I definitely need someone to help me see how this could have been a good idea?
I feel like there is a pattern happening here - Bush ordered the Iraqi president Saddam Hussein to be killed and was reelected, Obama did the same with Osama bin Laden and was also reelected. Now, Trump's order to kill Suleimani seems like a tactic for being reelected. I could be wrong that these previous presidents only won again because of the people they killed - there could be other factors involved - but I definitely see this as a political move.
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