I read an asinine analysis about the Iran war and a problematic prediction of Iran’s drone warfare and cyber capabilities in the New York Times. The article was entitled, “America Is Used to Hiding Its Wars. Trump Is Doing the Opposite,” which was written by Charles Homans on April 4.
Mr. Homans seems problematically perturbed that President Trump can chew gum and walk at the same time. Simultaneously overthrowing mad Maduro in Venezuela, presently preparing to oust Communist Cuba, and decisively defeating Iran within the next two months is well within the military capability of the president or the Pentagon.
That truly bothers Mr. Homans. He truly has difficulty in believing this trifecta.
One major reason why Iran will not become an endless war is simply that the Congressional Republicans are facing a formidable and most obstinate opposition in the midterm elections on November 3. This April and May will give President Trump just enough time to begin decreasing inflation, slowing down shrinkflation, and reducing the price of gasoline to $2.50 per gallon or less.
If not, the Democrats will seize control of the House of Representatives.
Homans’ so-called war(s) of “disjointed foreign adventures” will require very few ground troops because Venezuela, Cuba, and Iran are totally ready to implode or perhaps explode from decades of oppressive and repressive brutal dictatorships.
Of course, I believe that the Venezuelans, Cubans, and Iranians must liberate themselves with US military aid, which needs to come quickly.
This obviously excludes Greenland, which is Trump’s annoying amateurish attempt at becoming a foreign policy comedian.
Homans’ associating Trump with the Proud Boys, who are nothing more than a cabal or bund of far-right, neo-fascist militant punks, is a political cheap shot. Homans’ defamatory comparison might have caught traction in 2015 to scare voters, but not in 2026.
Regardless of what the most astute Megyn Kelly has to say about who sinisterly pushed Trump into this present war, we are fighting Iran primarily because Iranian negotiators told both US special envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witcoff that they had enough enriched uranium for eleven nuclear warheads on February 28.
Israel did not “push” the US into this war. Iran’s claim to possess eleven nuclear warheads pushed both the US and Israel into this war.
The Iran war is a classic war of necessity and the prevention of a potential nightmarish nuclear conflict. Nobody pushed Trump into this war except for the Iranians.
Another foreign policy “genius” and Megyn Kelly wannabe, Joe Kent, as reported by Homan, anti-semitically blamed “Israel and its powerful American lobby” for our war against Iran, which clearly is untrue. Our war against Iran is clearly not going to be another unruly repetition of George W. Bush’s never-ending war in Iraq from 2003 to 2011.
According to Michael O’ Hanlon, to conclude that “Trump 47 is almost a different president from Trump 45” is, at this early stage of his second term, hyper-hyperbole and historically non-applicable. If Trump needs to act in the “unapologetic empire-building of James Polk and James Monroe or like the “petro-political intrigues and Latin American chess games of Dwight D. Eisenhower’s spooks,” then so be it.
President Trump will never be as predictable a pacifist as Jimmy Carter, who should have headed a Christian evangelical association instead of occupying the Oval Office in the White House from 1977 to 1981. However, Carter does deserve full credit for the Camp David Accords in 1978, bringing peace between Egypt and Israel.
However, nowhere in the US Constitution does it state that Trump needs to be a feckless isolationist, and allow Communist China and Putin’s Russia to make effective in roads within the Western Hemisphere, the Panama Canal, and the Middle East.
The Strait of Hormuz is clearly a European and Asian problem, along with our Arabian Gulf allies. Only multiple oil pipelines extending across Saudi Arabia to the Red Sea or an Israeli seaport in the future is ultimately going to bypass the Strait of Hormuz and solve this problem at least for Europe.
Unfortunately, a pipeline could take years to build.
The White House must constantly adjust to the changing conditions of what occurs abroad. Ever since President Jefferson reluctantly authorized the use of military force to subdue the Barbary pirates in May 1801 until 1805, the US has had to be prepared to defend American interests abroad.
However, Mr. Homan does make an excellent point that since 1945, presidents have gradually shifted the financing of wars toward borrowing and printing money and away from a direct “war tax.” That is one major reason why the US has a national debt of approximately $39.1 trillion.
Unfortunately, the average American simply feels no financial pain or otherwise in constantly going to war.
Homans rightfully pointed out how only 1% or less of all Americans now serve in the armed forces. Hence, another draft could affect a greater percentage of the American population, and potentially cause more domestic discontent, like from 1965 to 1973.
Homans is correct that the US has been an imperial nation since its inception in 1783. It is in our nascent DNA.
If you do not believe me, just ask a native American or Mexican-American. Except for Iraq in 2003, the War Powers Act of 1973 has been mostly a failure.
Besides, Homans thinks that aerial and underwater drones, especially drone swarms, will increasingly be both a friend and foe of the American military, which could potentially make the killing of the enemy much less face-to-face and more inhumane. I think that he is mostly correct.
Homans’ discussion of Alexander Karp’s 2025 book “The Technological Republic” is the subject of another column. Most Americans do not realize that Karp is the chief executive of the data analytics firm Palantir, which has greatlyhelped the US in Iran.
However, Homans rightfully concluded his column with a blunt warning to future civilian Americans that “once the links between citizen and conflict have been severed [by drone or high-tech technology], you can tell yourself whatever story [my emphasis] you want about who you are, and what you are doing in the world.”
That is potentially both dehumanizing and worrisome for all Americans.
Robert L. Maronic
