The Iran conflict, in its low-grade double blockade form, feels like an endless cycle.
Iran has been attacked by a superpower and is technically more able to develop nuclear material than they were a decade ago…they likely want a nuke for defensive purposes more than ever.
The USA is losing its military dominance. It is not adapting fast enough to changing technologies that make killing Americans in war easier. Still, there are many military objectives it could achieve over potential enemies, but the US is not willing to take the casualties necessary to achieve those objectives, and America’s potential enemies know it.
In Iran, Trump is unlikely to achieve anything better than Obama got in his Iran-deal.
Cuban officials may be open to a Venezuela-like deal, but US domestic politics would not support it. Too many in the US want the Cuban regime completely gone.
“Prices rose 3.8% in April compared to a year earlier, marking an increase from a year-over-year inflation rate of 3.3% in the prior month. Annual inflation jumped to its highest level in three years, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data showed.
As recently as February, inflation stood at 2.4%, clocking in just a tick above the Federal Reserve’s target level of 2%.
The jump in prices last month owed in large part to a sharp rise in costs for products impacted by a global oil shock. Gasoline prices were 5% higher in April than March, the BLS report said. Airline fares climbed 2.8% from the previous month.”
The Islamic Republic of Iran has been a brutal dictatorship from its beginning, and the recent massacres were a crazy and organized bloodbath involving the government slaughtering its own people.
This is not the first time the Islamist theocracy has slaughtered its own people.
All realistic deals on the table that Iran might agree to look an awful lot like the deal Obama got without the costs and risks of war. Trump is reluctant to agree to such a deal because it will essentially be an admission that Obama and Kerry were right all along–this was the best deal possible and better than no deal or war.
Reporting was that Trump could have gotten such a deal before the war began, but Trump rejected it because he thought he was a great deal-maker who could do better than Obama. He was wrong, and we got war because of it.
Germany is starting to massively increase its military power. Europe needs German power. Once Germany has this power, some Germans will want to use it in ways that are not in America’s interest. We need Germany to pull its own weight, but we need to keep that weight on our side, and to do this, requires keeping America’s commitment to Europe strong and clear. German power is much less dangerous when embedded in a NATO structure that includes the United States.