OPINION:
Retired military Gen. Jack Keane, who now serves as a Fox News contributor, said on national television that President Donald Trump is to be commended for his past few days of foreign policy regarding Iran — specifically, for heading up “the first administration in 39 years to be on the strategic offensive with the Iranians.”
That’s quite a feat.
What a fly in the face of Barack Obama’s “oh pretty please, take our cash and we’ll sign your nuclear deal” work with Iran. You know, the one that led Iran to take American sailors captive, snap their photos and use the images — shamefully, the images of cowed, crying members of America’s military — for propaganda purposes. My, what magnificent billboards they made.
Or, as Zero Hedge marked the occasion in a January 2017 headline: “Iran Commemorates ’Captured U.S. Sailors’-Day With Massive Billboard.”
Good times for Tehran, yes?
But that was supposed to be the sort of stuff that Obama’s besties, i.e., the Iranians, were going to refrain from doing, post-Iran deal.
And it’s Trump who gets criticized for pulling America from the atrocious nuke deal — the one, by the way, that even Congress didn’t want, that even the Senate refused to ratify?
Anyhow, Keane, commenting on Trump’s recent order to stand down on firing at Iran — after Iran downed a $100 million U.S. drone in international air space — said it’s about time a White House leader, well, freaking led.
“Now, he has leverage with the allies to give him some assistance,” Keane said, Fox reported. “And secondly, he’s increased the sanctions. So this thing has just really backfired in the Iranians’ faces.”
True enough.
Iran’s leaders thought they could goad Trump into an aggressive military response — but they failed.
Democrats who’ve been calling out this administration for war-mongering have been shown the fools.
And now?
Now Trump — or, as the Iranians might call him, Trump the Unexpected — holds the cards. Iran doesn’t really know what he will do. And militarily speaking, strategically speaking, that’s a good thing. For all of America.
Let Iran nibble nervously on their fingernails for a while.
“President Trump is really the first administration in 39 years to be on the strategic offensive with the Iranians,” Keane said.
And Iran, mark these words, really doesn’t know what to make of it.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter @ckchumley.
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