Analysis: Tracking Trump's mixed messages on Iran
The United States is closer to a potential major military confrontation than we have ever have been in the Trump era. But discerning where President Donald Trump's head is at is proving a very difficult exercise.
Since Israel launched attacks on Iran on Friday, Trump has offered a series of mixed messages about what he wants from Iran and just how involved the United States is or will be.
This is a familiar story with Trump, who often vacillates between positions even in fraught circumstances. (In the last week alone, Trump reversed a policy on immigration raids targeting undocumented workers in the hospitality and farm industries, before reversing it again on Monday.) And there can be strategic value in being unpredictable.
But the ever-shifting commentary from the president also means even our adversaries and allies might not know precisely how to deal with and placate him. And Americans concerned about getting involved in another Middle Eastern war won't have a clear sense of whether that's about to happen.
Let's run through some of the big mixed messages.
Trump's big initiative with Iran has been trying to craft some kind of nuclear deal. Trump had pushed this for weeks – even suggesting at various points that such a deal was close – and kept talking about it even after Israel struck Iran last week.
But he's quickly seemed to move away from that emphasis.
On June 12, Trump said, 'We've had very good discussions with Iran.'
On June 15, Trump said Iran would 'like to make a deal. They're talking. They continue to talk.' He even said there was 'no deadline' on the talks.
On June 16, while at the G7 summit in Canada, Trump assured that Iran 'basically is at the negotiating table. They want to make a deal. And as soon as I leave here we're going to be doing something.'
But just a day after those comments and two days after saying there was no deadline, Trump quickly shifted. Early Tuesday morning, he suggested his appetite for negotiating has waned.
'They should have done the deal,' Trump said on Air Force One on his way back from Canada. 'I told them, 'Do the deal.' So I don't know. I'm not too much in the mood to negotiate.'
On June 15, Trump expressed optimism about peace.
'Likewise, we will have PEACE, soon, between Israel and Iran!' Trump posted on Truth Social. 'Many calls and meetings now taking place.'
By June 16, CNN reported Trump told his counterparts at the G7 meeting in Canada that ceasefire discussions were underway and that he wanted US officials to meet with their Iranian counterparts.
But by Tuesday morning, Trump suggested peace talks were not a priority.
'I have not reached out to Iran for 'Peace Talks' in any way, shape, or form,' he posted on Truth Social.
Trump also disputed France President Emmanuel Macron's comments that the US president was trying to negotiate a ceasefire.
'He has no idea why I am now on my way to Washington, but it certainly has nothing to do with a Cease Fire,' Trump posted.
By early Tuesday, Trump also suggested he wants a 'complete give-up' by Iran.
He said he wants 'an end, a real end, not a ceasefire. An end. Or giving up entirely. That's OK, too.'
Trump later Tuesday sent his clearest signal that his goals have moved away from any deals, posting two words on Truth Social in all caps: 'UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER.'
Trump has not only started downplaying the potential for a peace or a nuclear deal, but he also has increasingly flirted with the idea of more direct US involvement. CNN reported Tuesday afternoon that Trump is growing increasingly warm to using US military assets to strike Iranian nuclear facilities and is souring on a diplomatic solution to end the conflict.
Initially, Trump spoke mostly about US involvement if Iran struck American targets, but in recent days he's left open the possibility that it could be necessary to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon and upped the saber-rattling.
On June 15, he said, 'It's possible we could get involved. But we are not at this moment involved.'
On June 16, he declined to address a possible US role in Israel's strikes, saying, 'I don't want to talk about that.'
By Tuesday, Trump suggested the US could get involved if that's what it took.
'Well I hope their program's going to be wiped out long before that,' Trump said when asked about a US military role. 'But they're not going to have a nuclear weapon.'
By late Tuesday morning, Vice President JD Vance proactively floated the possibility.
He said Trump had shown 'remarkable restraint' on using the US military to this point. But then he added: 'He may decide he needs to take further action to end Iranian enrichment. That decision ultimately belongs to the president.'
Trump soon ratcheted up his rhetoric even more, posting on Truth Social, 'We now have complete and total control of the skies over Iran.' He added that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is an 'easy target,' and said, 'We are not going to take him out (kill!), at least not for now.'
Depending upon your interpretation, the administration has either waffled or walked a very fine line on its role in the initial Israeli strikes against Iran.
On June 12, Trump cautioned Israel against the strikes.
'I don't want them going in because I think I would blow it,' Trump said, referring to US prospects of cutting a nuclear deal with Iran. The president added that it 'might help it actually, but it also could blow it.'
After Israel nonetheless struck Iran early June 13 local time, Secretary of State Marco Rubio sought to distance the administration from the strikes. 'Tonight, Israel took unilateral action against Iran. We are not involved in strikes against Iran,' Rubio said in a statement Thursday evening in the US.
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But later on Friday, Trump seemed to praise the strikes in comments to CNN's Dana Bash, calling it 'a very successful attack.'
Trump went to indicate he was well aware of Israel's plans, even citing in a Truth Social post 'the next already planned attacks,' which would be 'even more brutal.'
The administration's coordination with Israel became even clearer on June 15, when CNN reported that the two sides had discussed an Israeli plan to kill Khamenei, which Trump opposed and wasn't launched.
CNN also reported that the US has offered Israel defensive support in the case of Iranian retaliation.
The administration's line seems to be that because the US hasn't militarily participated in the strikes on Iran, it's not really involved. But Trump has been happy to play up US involvement when it serves his purposes.
His most recent social media posts, for instance, refer to 'we' in ways that suggest the United States and Israel are working together.
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Washington Post
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- Washington Post
Trump debates bombing Iran in pivotal moment for presidency
President Donald Trump faced one of the most monumental decisions of his presidency on Tuesday as he debated whether to join a war against Iran that risked sucking Washington into a new Middle Eastern conflict but also offered the chance to eliminate a rival's nuclear program. In a string of social media posts across the day, the president said that the United States has 'complete and total control of the skies over Iran,' warned Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khameini that he was an 'easy target,' and demanded 'UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER' without defining what that would mean. As the day closed and after an 80-minute meeting with top aides in the Situation Room, he spoke to Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu, a White House official said. The tough language came at a moment of extraordinary weakness for Tehran, whose power is at a low ebb following a year of Israeli attacks against its allies and proxies in the Middle East. Trump has long taken an aggressive approach toward Iran, although he also campaigned on ending global conflicts and as recently as last week continued to seek a new agreement to restrict its nuclear program. Trump's current posture could rebound in unpredictable ways. If he succeeds in wresting concessions from Iranian leaders to dismantle their nuclear program or destroys it by military force without provoking major retaliation, he could be hailed as a president whose unpredictable approach to foreign policy yields results. Mishandling the situation could pull Washington into a major war, with dangerous and unpredictable consequences for U.S. citizens. And it could also lead to a nuclear-armed Iran, if strikes fail and the government resolves to develop the nuclear weapon that it has long declared it does not seek. 'We now have complete and total control of the skies over Iran. Iran had good sky trackers and other defensive equipment, and plenty of it, but it doesn't compare to American made, conceived, and manufactured 'stuff,'' Trump said Tuesday, before meeting with his advisers in the Situation Room for 80 minutes. 'Nobody does it better than the good ol' USA.' Leaders who met with Trump at a Group of Seven summit of like-minded industrial democracies in Canada on Monday said that the U.S. leader had floated the possibility of joining Israeli strikes against Iran — an extraordinary departure after months in which he had pushed for a diplomatic solution to Tehran's nuclear program, sometimes over the objections of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who accompanied Trump to Canada, was calling counterparts on Monday to discuss the situation, but told some of them that the United States did not intend to join the Israeli attack on Iran, according to three officials familiar with the calls who spoke on condition of anonymity to talk frankly about the private discussions. By Tuesday, those officials said they believed the U.S. position had changed, and that Trump was considering joining the attack. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina), long one of the GOP's most vocal Iran hawks, said he spoke to Trump Monday night and believes Trump wants to help Israel to 'finish the job' in destroying the country's nuclear program, including a key facility in Fordo, south of Tehran. 'I think he's very calm, very resolved," Graham said. 'I don't think Israel can finish Fordo without our help, and it's in our interest to make sure this program is destroyed, as much as it's Israel's. And so if there's something you need to do to help Israel, do it.' Trump was supposed to remain in Canada on Tuesday, but he dashed back to Washington a day early, saying that he needed to be in Washington to monitor the situation in the Middle East. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who met with Trump in Canada, expressed gratitude on Tuesday for Israel's attack on Iran, saying that Israel was doing 'the dirty work … for all of us.' 'We are also affected by this regime,' Merz told Germany's ZDF broadcaster on the sideline of the summit. 'This mullah regime has brought death and destruction to the world.' While some of Iran's nuclear facilities have been attacked in recent days by Israel, the most significant is the Fordo enrichment plant, which is buried deep underground and inside a mountain. U.S. officials have said the center can be effectively attacked only with massive, 'bunker-busting' bombs, including the GBU-57, a 15-ton round known as the 'massive ordnance penetrator,' or MOP. The 20-foot-long bomb is carried by the B-2 Spirit, the bat-wing-shaped stealth bomber. The fleet is based at Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri and previously has been deployed for global bombing runs in which they rely on aerial refueling to fly to and from targets without stopping. Should the Pentagon use other kinds of bombs to attack Iran, it could rely on an array of other aircraft, including fighter jets already in the region and B-52s. The Pentagon temporarily relocated some of these aircraft recently to Diego Garcia, an island with a joint U.S.-British military base in the Indian Ocean. Trump's claim of control over Iran's skies may be an indication that U.S. officials have assessed that most of Iran's air defense have been destroyed by Israel in recent days. Since Israel launched the attack on Iran late last week, U.S. officials have bolstered their extensive presence in the region but have repeatedly stressed that they are doing so for defensive purposes only. Trump has contradicted that messaging, however, warning Iranians in Tehran, a city of about 10 million people, that they should evacuate. While the U.S. military had not launched any strikes on Iran as of Tuesday afternoon, defense officials said, it has assisted Israel in other ways, including using Navy destroyers off the coast and fighter jets to shoot down Iranian munitions fired toward Israel. Gen. Michael 'Erik' Kurilla, the top U.S. commander overseeing operations in the Middle East, who has advocated a hawkish approach toward Tehran, told the House Armed Services Committee last week that he has presented a 'wide array of options' to Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth if they choose to pursue military force against Iran. Kurilla told lawmakers that the United States 'now stands in a strategic window of opportunity to secure its national interests' in the Middle East – including preventing a nuclear-armed Iran. Most experts assess that Iran would need a week to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a bomb. But they say that it would take months, up to a year, to turn the uranium into a weapon. In Canada, while Merz backed Israel, other leaders were less outspoken or spoke in thinly-veiled disagreement. French President Emmanuel Macron told reporters in Canada on Tuesday that a ceasefire and ongoing negotiations were the only solution. 'I think that people are sovereign, they change their leaders by themselves and all those who have wanted in the past to change regimes through strikes or military operations have made strategic errors,' he said. Kaja Kallas, the top European Union diplomat, said that EU foreign ministers who held an emergency virtual meeting Tuesday morning were united in their call for de-escalation. 'When it comes to the United States getting involved, then it will definitely drag the region into a broader conflict, and this is in nobody's interest,' Kallas said. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, in a telephone call Monday night, 'emphasized that it is also not in their interest to be drawn into this conflict,' she said. Elsewhere in the Middle East, Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty urged de-escalation and negotiations in phone calls Tuesday with both Araghchi and U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff. In Qatar, Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari said his government was one of many in the region exerting efforts to 'reach calm that spares the region the repercussions of this dangerous escalation of the Israeli aggression against the Islamic Republic of Iran.' Israel continued to pummel Iran Tuesday, using about 60 fighter jets to target 12 missile launch and storage sites, many in western Iran, Israel Defense Forces spokesman Effie Derfin said Tuesday night. Israel's military also claimed Tuesday to have killed Ali Shadmani, whom it described as Iran's wartime chief of staff. Israel did not present evidence of the assassination, and Iran did not immediately confirm his death. Iran's supreme leader appointed Shadmani to his position four days ago after his predecessor, Gholam Ali Rashid, was killed in Israeli attacks on Friday. Iranian media reported explosions and heavy air defense fire in Tehran and explosions in the northwestern city of Tabriz on Tuesday. Iranian civilians streamed out of the capital overnight and into Tuesday. Israeli strikes also appear to have made 'direct impacts' on the underground section of Iran's Natanz nuclear enrichment site, the United Nations nuclear watchdog said Tuesday, citing analysis of high resolution satellite imagery. It was the International Atomic Energy Agency's first assessment that the centrifuge halls buried deep underground may have been damaged. Iran's retaliatory barrages against Israel carried on for a fifth day, triggering Israel's air defenses on an 'hourly basis,' the military official said. The Iranian attacks have killed 24 people in Israel and injured more than 600, the Israeli government said Tuesday. Iranian authorities said that 224 people had been killed by Israeli strikes as of Sunday, the most recent figures available. They did not differentiate between military and civilian casualties. Parker reported from Cairo. Susannah George in Doha, Qatar, Ellen Francis in Brussels, Kate Brady in Berlin, Yeganeh Torbati, Joshua Yang, Lior Soroka in Tel Aviv, Abbie Cheeseman and Mohamad El Chamaa in Beirut, Annabelle Timsit in London, Evan Hill in New York, Gerry Shih in Jerusalem, Cat Zakrzewski in Calgary, Alberta, and Abigail Hauslohner, Matt Viser, Natalie Allison and Nilo Tabrizy in Washington contributed to this report.
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