Trump: We’ll Know More

According to a report from The Times Of Israel we won’t have to wait long before we know more about Gaza:

US President Donald Trump says “there’s a lot of talk going on about Gaza right now, so you’ll be knowing probably in the next 24 hours.”

What that actually means is not known, but Trump likes to tease things before he actually gives us the full story:

Trump makes the comments to reporters in the Oval Office in response to a question he appears to have only partially heard about whether he’s planning on introducing a new hostage deal proposal before he heads to the region next week.

As for those involved in his administration, they are only talking about aid issues:

The State Department said yesterday that there would likely be an announcement later this week pertaining the resumption of aid into Gaza.

Trump then talked about Iran next and whether they can have just a civilian nuclear program:

Asked whether the US position is to allow Iran to have a limited nuclear enrichment program, Trump responds, “We haven’t made that decision yet. We will.”

Earlier this week, Trump said that the aim of his administration’s nuclear talks with Iran is to achieve “total dismantlement” of Tehran’s nuclear program, but that he is open to letting the Islamic Republic pursue civilian nuclear energy.

But he then said this about Iran’s centrifuges in another article from The Times:

Asked whether the US has given Iran a choice between turning over its nuclear centrifuges and uranium or “get bombed,” US President Donald Trump responds, “It’s that simple.”

So will he allow Iran to keep their nuclear program or not? I guess it depends on when you aske him or maybe he is teasing us on this as well:

“I would much prefer a strong, verified deal where we actually blow them up… or just de-nuke them,” Trump tells conservative talk show host Hugh Hewitt in an interview, apparently referring to Iran’s nuclear centrifuges.

“There are only two alternatives there, blow them up nicely or blow them up viciously,” the president adds.

What do I think is going here? I think there are people in his administration that want a nuclear deal and some that want all the nuclear program destroyed, period. I pray that Trump realizes that Iran can’t be trusted and for that matter neither can the Houthis which he seems will honor their deal. Israel knows better and will probably have to deal with both of these issues before it’s all said and done.

Bad Information

We see in a report from World Israel News that President Trump is working with bad intelligence while dealing with Iran on the nuclear negotiations:

With the Trump administration seemingly intent on negotiating a new nuclear deal with Iran, it is vital that the White House first make a realistic assessment of the current state of Iran’s nuclear program, which most Western intelligence experts believe is aimed at producing nuclear weapons.

Iran, for it’s part doesn’t feel comfortable about the talks so far:

After US and Iranian officials met for a third round of talks in the Gulf state of Oman at the weekend, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi openly said that Iran remained extremely cautious about the success of the negotiations to resolve a decades-long standoff.

And Trump maybe pushing too hard for a deal as well perhaps because he wants to show previous President Obama he’s a better negotiator:

US President Donald J. Trump has invested a substantial amount of political capital in agreeing to a new deal with Tehran, aimed at preventing Iran from acquiring its own nuclear weapons arsenal.

Trump, a staunch critic of the original nuclear deal negotiated in 2015 by President Barack Obama, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), dramatically ended American participation in 2018.

Justifying his decision, Trump argued that the JCPOA failed to address key issues such as Iran’s continued research into producing weapons-grade nuclear material, development of ballistic missiles and Tehran’s support for Islamist terror groups in the Middle East.

Trump could be making the same mistakes, though. And he is the one who brought up the talks in the first place. But initially he said that the choice was to end their program or the US would:

After commencing his second term at the White House in January, Trump initially indicated that, by seeking to restart nuclear negotiations with Tehran, his ultimate objective was the complete dismantling of Iran’s nuclear program, the only realistic means of preventing the ayatollahs from acquiring nuclear weapons.

Trump initiated the dialogue with Tehran after sending a letter to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on March 7, making it clear that the US could not allow the Iranians to acquire nuclear weapons.

Trump even went so far as to warn Tehran that it would face direct US military action and further tariffs if it did not abandon its quest for nuclear weapons.

“If they don’t make a deal, there will be bombing,” was his blunt warning ahead of the opening of talks with Tehran.

Now it appears he is backing off his goal and is talking about letting Iran keep their nuclear program for commercial use only, but that is foolishness since Iran could make their uranium weapons grade in weeks.

Why The Change?

The question now is why is Trump backing down:

Several factors help to explain why Trump has suddenly decided to modify his objectives in the nuclear negotiations, not least the influence a number of anti-Israeli advisors, who have been appointed to key positions in the administration, can bring to bear on the president.

The article thinks that Trump isn’t working with good intel:

Another important factor that is undermining Trump’s efforts to address the threat Iran’s nuclear ambitions pose to world peace is that his negotiations are based on out-of-date intelligence provided by Washington’s intelligence community.

A recent report by the highly-regarded Institute for Science and International Security, for example, found that Iran has now developed the technology to enrich enough uranium to fuel one nuclear weapon in less than a week, a significant advance given that in 2020 it would take Iran more than five months to achieve the same target.

And Trump’s DNI head seems to think Iran is working at getting nuclear weapons based on an incorrect assessment from the previous administration:

Yet, despite compelling evidence that Iran has continued work on its clandestine program to produce nuclear weapons, American intelligence chiefs such as Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard continue to insist that there is insufficient evidence to conclude that Iran is actively attempting to build nuclear weapons.

This is evident from the conclusion reached by this year’s Annual Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community, which said:

“We continue to assess Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and that [Iranian Supreme Leader] Khamenei has not reauthorized the nuclear weapons program he suspended in 2003.”

But an international watchdog says that the US is wrong about that:

Even though this conclusion fails to acknowledge the conclusions reached by the IAEA and other international bodies, the fact that US intelligence chiefs remain in denial about the true extent of Iran’s nuclear activities might at least partially explain why Trump is prepared to take a less confrontational tone in his negotiations with the ayatollahs.

The Ego Of Trump

Some think Trump wants the Nobel Peace prize:

There are also suggestions that Trump might be hoping to be hailed as a president of “peace” — a word he often tellingly repeats — and perhaps be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Many thought he had been cheated of it in recognition of his historic Abraham Accords during his first term.

That’s fool’s gold. He would be better served by being the world leader who ended the Iranian nuclear threat:

Sadly, the Norwegian Nobel Committee will most likely never reward Trump with the Nobel Peace Prize, no matter how much peace he delivers. To them, a worthy recipient was Yasser Arafat, among other leaders now known more for their failures than for success.

Trump instead would do well to focus on becoming the greatest leader of the 21st Century, another Churchill, by ridding the world of Iran’s nuclear weapons threat for once and all, as well as its ballistic missile program and its ability, through its proxies, to keep exporting terrorism.

As for the bad information, one source has little confidence in it:

One former CIA director has described the assessments previously provided on Iran’s nuclear program as “stupid intelligence”.

Trump should ask for a current assessment of the Iranian nuclear program as well as for Gabbard:

This has led to calls for the administration to undertake an immediate reappraisal of Washington’s intelligence assessment regarding Iran’s nuclear ambitions to acquire nuclear weapons as a devastating matter of urgency, and for the Trump administration to undertake an urgent reappraisal of Gabbard.

The assessment also should include all the terrible implications that an Iranian regime with the capability of building and delivering nuclear weapons will have for an inevitable international arms race.

The article then sums things up this way

If Trump is to stand any chance of ending Iran’s nuclear ambitions, it is essential that the White House has the most up-to-date assessment of the true state of Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

Failure to do so will simply enable the ayatollahs to fulfil their long-held goal of global hegemony.

Or maybe just let Israel clean up this mess by taking out the Iranian nuclear program in the first place.