The Donald seems to be taking a page out of his colleague Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s playbook in a way that threatens the wellbeing of every person on the planet.
For nearly three-quarters of a century, American leaders have wisely refrained from becoming directly involved in Israel’s offensive moves, limiting their Middle East involvement with that country’s hostile neighbours to supplying arms and occasionally by the defensive shooting down of missiles aimed at Israel.
No more.
With its bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities in an overt, and illegal, act of war that exceeded his constitutional powers, The Donald, he who promised “no more wars” under his watch (a major reason for his election last November), the POTUS has now inevitably embroiled his nation in what could easily become a forever war.
There is a good reason that the US never got involved in an Iraq-style regime change operation in Iran. It is a vast and well-supplied nation with huge resources. Now, The Donald seems to be channeling his inner Bush.
To be clear, Iran has actively antagonized the Israelis, supplying arms and expertise to its Iran’s proxies, Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Iran has threatened to wipe Israel off the face of the map and does just about everything in its power to make its dream a reality.
On the other side of the ledger, Israel has been and is currently engaged in a war of attrition with Iran’s proxies following the October 7 massacres that much of the world now characterizes as genocidal in effect, if not in fact as claimed by Israel. In those confrontations children and innocent bystanders are being bombed, starved and otherwise victimized as much of the Western world stands transfixed, locked into a Cold War stance that prevents them from intervening.
There were plenty of indications over the past couple of decades that the Middle East could become normalized, joining the rest of the world in peaceful commerce, as one by one many of Israel’s enemies set aside their own genocidal aims towards that nation.
The cut, slash and burn approach to diplomacy of The Donald might be acceptable in the dark underbelly of the kind of business he conducted in the private sector, but in the realpolitik world of multiple nuclear armed adversaries, it is nothing short of madness.
Just as the Russian invasion of Ukraine has cost millions of lives, both Russian and Ukrainian, no good will come of The Donald’s latest adventure in world domination.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres hit the nail on the head when he said on the X social media platform that he was “gravely alarmed” by the use of force by the United States. “There is a growing risk that this conflict could rapidly get out of control—with catastrophic consequences for civilians, the region and the world.”
The Expositor stands in agreement with the secretary general when he said, “There is no military solution. The only path forward is diplomacy.”
Make no mistake, the danger of nuclear Armageddon has never been closer, but even should that Sword of Damocles not drop, the consequences will be severe.
First up, the current truce between the Houthi rebels and the US in the Strait of Hormuz is almost certainly gone. Much of the world’s commerce travels through those waters and the impact of those straits being closed would be catastrophic for many economies.
Second, even without nuclear weapons, Iran is a powerful nation and one whose history shows little love for America. Students of history will know that the US overthrew the democratically elected government in that nation and replaced it with a despotic Shah whose SAVAK police service’s oppression of the people was arguably even worse that of today’s Republican Guard.
Canada has, quite rightly, called on all sides to return to the negotiating table to find a way forward that does not involve a world-consuming nuclear conflagration. Alas, this might be too late.
It is transparently obvious to anyone paying attention to the big picture that the attacks on Israel on October 7 2023 purported, armed and supported by Iran by its proxies, and the subsequent follow up missile assaults by Hezbollah were more about displacing Western aid to Ukraine in its defence against Russian aggression than any humanitarian concern over the plight of Palestinian refugees in Gaza and the West Bank.
The conspiracy-minded among us might even ponder whether the escalation between nuclear-armed states Pakistan and India figures onto that chessboard.
Humanity’s technological advances, which should have by now alleviate all, or at least nearly all, of human suffering, has instead resulted in upping the scale of self-destruction to Olympian levels. It is as though Mother Nature has a built-in self-destruct mechanism for humanity.
To paraphrase what that clever mathematician Albert Einstein once said, if the Third World War is fought with nuclear weapons, the fourth will be fought with sticks and stones.
The Third World War has already begun—some might —it is terrifying that we must rely on the brinksmanship of Putin and The Donald and their proxies Israeli President Benjamen Netanyahu and Iran Supreme Leader Ali Hosseini Khamenei to pull us back from the abyss.
Let us fervently hope that calmer heads can prevail—Canada has often been among those working for peaceful solutions.
The world is in dire need another Lester B. Pearson.
