Will Trump join in Israel's crusade for Iran's total surrender? Is US intervention imminent?

Straits Times

4 hours ago

Protesters demonstrating in Los Angeles on June 18. The chances of a US intervention in the Israel-Iran conflict remain very high. PHOTO: AFP
News analysis Will Trump join in Israel's crusade for Iran's total surrender? Is US intervention imminent?
– A week since Israel launched its strikes on Iran, all eyes are now focused on whether the United States will join the war by administering the decisive blow to Iran's nuclear capabilities.
President Donald Trump is enjoying the suspense he has created around his future actions.
'I may do it. I may not do it. Nobody knows what I'm going to do,' Mr Trump told journalists on June 18, as he supervised the planting of a massive flagpole on the lawn of the White House in Washington.
And at least in theory, there is still some scope for diplomacy to bring the current fighting to a halt. Iranian officials are darting in and out of Oman, the neighbouring Gulf state most involved in mediating between Iran and the US.
Yet it is clear that all the key protagonists in this conflict – Israel, Iran and the US – are now facing significant time constraints that require their far-reaching decisions.
It is equally clear that the Americans and Israelis are no longer aiming just to reduce Iran's nuclear and broader military capabilities; they seek Iran's total surrender. The chances of a US intervention in the conflict remain very high.
As he ordered his first strikes on Iran on June 13, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was still unsure of the extent and duration of the US support for Israel's operations.
For although the Israeli leader gained Washington's tacit approval for the action, Mr Trump still appeared to believe that a limited Israeli attack would be followed by Iran's swift return to the diplomatic negotiations with the US, which have been held on and off since April 2025.
That's why officials in Washington were initially at pains to describe Israel's offensive as 'unilateral action', in which the US wasn't and supposedly won't ever be involved.
And that's also why Israeli military commanders were under orders to inflict as much damage as possible on Iran and as quickly as possible before the US President made any calls for a ceasefire.
The US position appears to have changed radically on June 16, as Mr Trump faced the handful of leaders of the G-7, the world's most industrialised nations, at a summit in Canada.
The US President startled his summit counterparts by refusing to apply any breaks on Israel. French President Emmanuel Macron, who claimed that the US was still looking for a ceasefire, was promptly dismissed by Mr Trump as just a 'publicity-seeking' politician.
'Whether purposely or not, Emmanuel always gets it wrong,' Mr Trump wrote on June 17 in his Truth Social post, published while the American President was still in the air on his way back to Washington.
Since then, US officials have increasingly given the impression that only the manner and timing of American intervention in the war are now in question.
It is unclear what caused the shift in Mr Trump's position. Still, the most plausible explanation is that the US leader is impressed by the early success of the Israeli operation and wants to portray himself as the real architect of a new Middle East.
Mr Trump presents himself as part of the Israeli operation: 'We now have complete and total control of the skies over Iran,' he claimed in one of his social media postings.
The White House has released an extensive list of quotes from Mr Trump going back more than a decade, documenting his opposition to Iran's nuclear programme. This is designed to present the war as an example of what happens to those who defy the American leader's wishes.
Mr Trump is keen to maintain strategic ambiguity about his next moves. However, everything points to an imminent US military intervention.
First, there is the massive US military buildup. An aircraft carrier strike group led by the USS Nimitz has departed the South China Sea and is en route to the Middle East, where it will meet with the USS Carl Vinson strike group, which is already in the Gulf region.
Tellingly, other ships belonging to the US Navy's Fifth Fleet stationed in the Gulf have left their port in Bahrain and dispersed throughout Gulf waters, a move intended both to reduce Iran's ability to hit back at the US fleet but also offer the US the ability to escort oil tankers through the Gulf, should the war expand.
Meanwhile, scores of US Air Force mid-air refuelling tankers have arrived in Britain and several other US bases in Europe.
These tankers will be crucial for extending the reach of America's B-2 stealth bombers equipped to carry the 13,600 kg-heavy GBU-57, the 'bunker buster' bomb allegedly capable of penetrating Iran's critical nuclear site at Fordow, dug deep inside a mountain.
Although there is plenty of talk about an impending Israeli commando operation on Fordow, and Israel's air force has repeatedly bombed the entrances of this Iranian nuclear installation, the consensus remains that only the Americans are capable of destroying it.
Equally telling is Mr Trump's determination to silence critics within his Make America Great Again (Maga) movement, who are unhappy with the prospect of a new US military entanglement.
Mr Tucker Carlson, the influential political commentator, was dismissed by Mr Trump as 'kooky' after he dared oppose the President and subsequently withdrew his criticism.
And Vice President J.D. Vance, known as the leader of the non-interventionist camp, is also falling in line. The US President, Mr Vance, claimed, 'may decide he needs to take further action to end Iranian enrichment'.
Meanwhile, time is running short for everyone.
Although Israeli defences continue to intercept the bulk of Iranian missiles fired at Israel's cities, the rate of such interceptions is declining.
An estimated 30 per cent of Iran's missiles are now getting through, perhaps an indication that Israel may be running low on stocks of its Arrow-3 interceptors. A US entry into the war will provide Israel with a considerable boost.
Meanwhile, Iran has no chance of regaining control of its airspace. It possesses a dwindling number of missiles, probably not more than a quarter of the 2,000 ballistic missiles it originally had.
It also faces grim choices. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the country's supreme leader, may be moving from bunker to bunker. Still, most of his military and intelligence advisers were killed in Israeli air strikes or targeted assassinations.
The Iranians desperately need a ceasefire to save their regime, but dare not opt for the only diplomatic option now on offer: a humiliating and wholesale surrender of their nuclear capability.
And although Mr Trump still enjoys keeping everyone guessing about what he may do, he also knows that keeping the US military on high alert for too long costs a great deal of money and brings diminishing political returns.
Jonathan Eyal is based in London and Brussels and writes on global political and security matters.
Join ST's Telegram channel and get the latest breaking news delivered to you.