Tthe Trump administration he has returned to war. He just doesn’t want to admit it.
In the 10 days since the United States resumed airstrikes against Iran, neither President Trump nor any other high-ranking administration official has publicly addressed the campaign. US forces began by attacking Iranian military facilities but later expanded to attack civilian infrastructure that the regime says is used for military purposes. As of today, congressional officials had yet to receive a briefing on the latest phase of the battle, aides told us.
The Pentagon, whose leadership went on camera in the weeks following the start of the war, at the end of February, has not held a press conference since May to answer even the most basic questions: Why is the resumption of war necessary? What is it strategic goalsand how have they changed? How many losses have the American forces suffered? What would define success?
The president, who has repeatedly claimed that the war has already been won, planned a television address to the nation last week. Instead of talking about war, however, he focused on election security and mentioned Iran in passing, telling the nation that “we are also winning big in Iran, and you will see the fruits of that labor soon.” (This is difficult to reconcile with the record of several months ago.)
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and General Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, were on Capitol Hill this afternoon to request $67.1 billion in emergency military funding to replenish weapons and meet other needs, on top of the Pentagon. 1.5 trillion dollars a typical budget request. And he didn’t utter a word Iran in their opening statement. Hegseth, in his testimony, referred to the war as an “operation.”
Even the deaths of American soldiers have been treated as if they belonged to another conflict. After two US soldiers were killed in Jordan by an Iranian missile on Friday, the Pentagon initially said they died supporting Operation Inherent Resolve, the decade-long campaign against Islamic State. It then issued another statement saying that the two soldiers, along with a third killed in Iraq when a drone was shot down, died while “supporting operations abroad” – but still did not specifically name Operation Epic Fury, the Pentagon’s name for the conflict with Iran. (Another service member, who had been reported missing in Jordan, is believed to be dead, the Pentagon said today.)
Including those deaths, at least 18 U.S. service members have been killed in combat since the war began—more than were killed in combat in Afghanistan in 2016, 2017, and 2018 each, and just short of the total recorded during the 12 years of Operation Inherent Resolve against ISIS. About 1,700 Iranians have been killed, according to Iranian officials, including several in the past 10 days.
Trump is scheduled to attend a memorial service for fallen soldiers at Dover Air Force Base tomorrow. But his brief salutation to the fallen soldiers was quickly followed by his usual insistence that the war was going well. Trump has lashed out on social media against Iran, vowing to punish his government for killing Americans. But one senior official admitted to us that early intelligence assessments have revealed that the new wave of US strikes may have done little to change Iran’s behavior.
Trump expected a quick victory, and therefore the army was not prepared for a long conflict. There was no build-up of forces of several months and no large-scale deployment of troops. Although the military increased its strength in the region, many assets – especially Navy ships – were diverted from other theaters of war rather than trained for this conflict. The Pentagon has since expanded the deployment of nearly half of those ships, taxing an already depleted force.
The United States joined Israel in starting the war but did not ask for prior support from other allies. No country has offered to intervene with US forces or share the burden of Trump’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz and the protection of US troops in the area.
On Capitol Hill, Hegseth and Caine did not receive a favorable reception to their request that taxpayers pay for the “certain things” of the war, which they put at $37.5 billion.
The leadership “chose to break every rule and say that everyone in front of them was stupid by using the playbook of talking to the nation, talking to allies, and setting goals,” one former senior military officer, who asked not to be named for fear of retaliation, told us. “And now we’re at war with no good options and no US and international support. It’s a little trap we made for ourselves.” Given that it is visible there is no escape from that trap rather than admitting defeat, the administration is expected to continue fighting, hoping that doing so will bring better results.
Even some of Trump’s closest allies have privately admitted that he is in dire straits. His choice: Escalate the conflict and risk losing more U.S. troops and depleting the weapons stockpile while hurting Republicans’ chances in this election, or leave now to minimize his political losses while leaving Iran in a stronger strategic position than it has held in decades. That will be a form of humiliation that Trump hates. But one Trump associate pointed us to the change of words on Fox News; in recent days, a number of influential hosts, including Laura Ingraham, have floated the possibility of dropping the war in an eleventh-hour effort to help the GOP at the ballot box. Trump, a noted ally, often uses his favorite cable channel as a gauge of public opinion.
Two people close to the president told us that at some point Trump might consider that kind of exit. But for now, despite the mounting costs, he continues to fight. Sitting next to the Lebanese leader in the Oval Office today, the president appeared committed to the kind of perpetual war he once mocked: “We’re not quite done,” Trump told reporters. “We’re not leaving right now.” He also said that the United States is planning to bomb Mount Pickaxe on the suspicion that it is part of Iran’s nuclear program.
Military planners often say that hope is not strategy—and neither is fighting war, treating it as anything less than that. One possible outcome is a long back-and-forth in which the U.S. eventually backs out, hundreds of billions of dollars later. “This photography game has turned into a marathon that we were never inspired to do the first time,” Bryan Clark, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and an aquatics specialist, told us. “Now we have to mobilize for this quickly.”
The administration’s clear objective is to increase Iran’s cost of disrupting through traffic Strait of Hormuzwhich was an open waterway until Tehran closed it in the early days of the war. At the same time, Iran is trying to increase the cost of the US military presence in the region while using force to prevent ships from crossing the sea without its permission. Earlier today, the British shipping agency said that an oil tanker operating in the strait was hit by an unidentified missile, causing its crew to abandon ship. Iran has also increased its targeting of US military vessels, US officials told us; both countries continue to climb the ladder.
As the war continues, Tehran seems to be adapting. In the early days, Iran was able to block US air defenses and cheap drones. But more and more, the country is turning to cheap, quickly produced missiles. These missiles travel faster than drones and can do more damage. In the past 24 hours, Iran fired at least three ballistic missiles towards Jordan. One video from the attacks shows a missile hitting a Jordanian base where the United States operates, with no attempt to intercept it, raising concerns within the Pentagon that commanders are saving air defense weapons at the expense of protecting troops. Hegseth told the Hill on Tuesday that “everything our soldiers need on the battlefield, they’re getting in a hoe and more.” But the army also urgently needs more money replenish his reserves.
Over the course of the conflict, Trump has allowed deadline after deadline to slip, while Iran has learned not to panic bellicose threats. The president, his advisers have told us, understands that the war is hurting him politically but is angry at those who say his proposed plan on Iran’s nuclear program is weaker than the one President Obama put in place a decade earlier.
The Houthi rebels in Yemen, who are supported by Iran, announced yesterday their intention to withdraw from the war and close parts of the Red Sea to ships, which could further fuel the global energy crisis. If anything, the war shows signs of widening, not ending, whatever the White House says—or doesn’t say.
