This Awful Iran War Belongs to Trump—and It’s Going Horribly
Original article by Steven Harper republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).
The absence of any US strategy becomes clearer by the day. Trump has thrown everything at the wall in the hope that something will stick. So far, nothing has.
President Donald Trump is a victim of his own success. After a quick strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities last June and the capture of Venezuela’s president and First Lady in January, the US military, the illegality of those operations notwithstanding, made war look easy and Trump feel omnipotent.
Three weeks into a more daunting excursion into Iran, Trump is now a desperate leader.
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With Trump, everything is personal. A growing body of evidence suggests that a principal objective in attacking Iran was the assassination of the country’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. For example:
- When the CIA learned that the Ayatollah and top Iranian officials would be meeting in a militarily accessible location, a previously planned nighttime strike was moved up to the middle of the day.
- On Sunday night, March 1, shortly after reports that the US-Israeli attack had killed the Ayatollah, Trump said, “I got him before he got me.” He was referring to an alleged plot to kill Trump during the 2024 presidential campaign as retribution for the January 2020 US strike that killed Iran’s military leader Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps,
- The desire to downplay Trump’s desire for vengeance explains why he and his minions have offered more noble—and contradictory—justifications for the war, including:
- To help the Iranian people secure their freedom (Trump);
- To attack Iran because Israel was going to do it and that would result in Iran’s attack on US assets in the Middle East (Secretary of State Marco Rubio);
- To attack Iran first, not because Israel was going to do it anyway, but because Trump had a gut feeling that Iran was going to attack the US (Trump). But Pentagon officials informed Congress that no intelligence supported Trump’s opinion;
- To eliminate Iran’s nuclear capability (although Trump claimed to have done that with the June attack).
Mission Accomplished?
Whatever his motivations, deploying the might of the military force was the beginning and the end of Trump’s thinking. He and his advisors are now flailing in the aftermath.
Iran has divided its global adversaries by holding the world’s economy hostage. Closing the Strait of Hormuz to the US and its allies sent world markets reeling as the price of oil increased by 40 percent and the price of gasoline in the US rose by almost $1.00 per gallon. Trump is trying to sell the line that such costs in the short run will pay off in the long run, but few are buying it.
Trump’s Desperate Ploys
The absence of any US strategy becomes clearer by the day. Trump has thrown everything at the wall in the hope that something will stick. So far, nothing has.
- He floated a $200 million insurance guarantee for ships traveling through the Strait of Hormuz – but not everyone lives in Trump’s world in which everything has a price.
- He suggested using US military escorts for the tankers but offered no timeline; the risks to US military personnel and equipment would be enormous.
- He tried shaming oil tanker crews to “show some guts” and continue sailing through the Strait – even as tankers burst into flames when trying to do so. Maybe Trump should go first.
- He pleaded with world leaders to join his “team” to reopen the Strait for shipping, saying, “Some are very enthusiastic about it, and some aren’t. Some are countries that we’ve helped for many, many years. We’ve protected them from horrible outside sources, and they weren’t that enthusiastic. And the level of enthusiasm matters to me.”
- He ridiculed allies refusing his requests to join a war that he started without consulting them: “We have some countries where we have 45,000 soldiers, great soldiers, protecting them from harm’s way, and we have done a great job. And when we want to know, ‘Do you have any mine sweepers?’ ‘Well, would rather not get involved, sir.’”
- He made threats that are not-so-veiled: “If there’s no response or if it’s a negative response I think it will be very bad for the future of NATO.”
Attacking the Messenger
In a futile effort at damage control, Trump accused media outlets of dispensing “fake news” about the growing Iran debacle. They “should be brought up on charges of TREASON,” he posted. In the same tirade, he said that he was “thrilled to see Brendan Carr, the Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), looking at the licenses of some of these Corrupt and Highly Unpatriotic ‘News’ Organizations.”
Hearing and heeding his master’s voice, Carr shared another Trump post criticizing news coverage of the Iran war and issued this hollow threat: “Broadcasters that are running hoaxes and news distortions – also known as the fake news – have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up… Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will lose their licenses if they do not.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s lengthy criticism of Iran war coverage included a special message for CNN: “The sooner David Ellison [the son of billionaire Trump supporter Larry Ellison] takes over that network, the better.”
This much is certain: Trump will never take responsibility for any failure of his policies, including the Iran war. When his deportation operation became a scandal and one of his worst political liabilities, Kristi Noem became a casualty. If Trump’s Iran war continues to go badly, he’ll need another scapegoat. Hegseth has been living on borrowed time since the Signalgate scandal. He should have been fired long ago.
But make no mistake. Hegseth is just Trump’s useful idiot. This is and always has been Trump’s war. It began as his personal war of retribution, ignored predictable consequences for the world, and never had an endgame strategy.
And now it has gone terribly wrong.
Original article by Steven Harper republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).
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Cuban President Vows ‘Impregnable Resistance’ to Any Trump Attempt to Seize the Island
Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).
“The US publicly threatens Cuba, almost daily, with overthrowing the constitutional order by force,” said Miguel Díaz-Canel.
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel on Tuesday condemned US President Donald Trump’s open threat to forcibly seize control of the island nation and vowed that any such aggression would be met with “impregnable resistance.”
“The US publicly threatens Cuba, almost daily, with overthrowing the constitutional order by force,” Díaz-Canel wrote on social media. “And it uses an outrageous pretext: the harsh limitations of the weakened economy that they have attacked and sought to isolate for more than six decades.”
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“They intend and announce plans to seize the country, its resources, its properties, and even the very economy they seek to strangle to make us surrender,” the Cuban president added. “Only in this way can the fierce economic war be explained, which is applied as collective punishment against the entire people. In the face of the worst scenario, Cuba is accompanied by a certainty: Any external aggressor will clash with an impregnable resistance.”
Díaz-Canel’s statement came a day after Trump said from the Oval Office of the White House that he believes he will have “the honor of taking Cuba” as it faces a grave humanitarian crisis fueled by the administration’s oil embargo, which began shortly after the US abducted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in early January.
“I think I can do anything I want with it,” Trump said of Cuba on Monday.
The New York Times reported earlier this week that Trump administration officials are demanding Díaz-Canel’s ouster as part of any negotiated deal between the two countries.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants and a longtime supporter of regime change on the island, said publicly on Tuesday that Cuba “has to get new people in charge.” Trump said earlier this month that he’s “going to put Marco over there and we’ll see how that works out.”
A YouGov poll out this week shows that more Americans disapprove than approve of the US embargo on Cuba. The same survey found that only 13% of US voters would support attacking Cuba, and a mere 18% would support using military force to overthrow the country’s government.
Trump’s threats came as his oil embargo and the broader, decadeslong, and illegal economic warfare against Cuba continued to take their toll on the island’s population, most recently in the form of an island-wide blackout that lasted nearly 30 hours.
On Wednesday, the first delegation of the Nuestra América Convoy arrived in Havana as part of an effort by individuals and organizations to deliver critical humanitarian aid to the Cuban people as the US besieges the island’s economy and threatens its sovereignty.
Nathan J. Robinson and Alex Skopic, editors of the left-wing magazine Current Affairs, announced Wednesday that they are heading to Cuba to cover the mission, which they characterized as part of a “proud tradition of internationalism” on the American left.
“Beyond food, medicine, and energy infrastructure, this mission sends a message,” Robinson and Skopic wrote. “As Americans, we want to make it crystal clear that the Trump administration does not speak for us when it talks about ‘taking over’ Cuba, and we’re sickened by what Trump and Rubio are doing to the Cuban people in the name of U.S. foreign policy. But we’re determined to do what we can, and we’re going to make sure the people of Cuba do not stand alone.”
Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).
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Original article by Brad Reed republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).
Sixty percent of respondents blamed the energy demand of large users like AI data centers for higher household electricity costs.
It’s been two weeks since Big Tech companies gathered at the White House to sign a nonbinding pledge saying they will not pass on higher utility costs to consumers as the rapid build-out of energy-intensive artificial intelligence data centers sends electricity bills skyrocketing—but polling out Wednesday showed a majority of Americans reject President Donald Trump’s plan to leave corporations responsible for tackling the affordability crisis.
Those same companies, said most respondents to a survey by Data for Progress and Groundwork Collaborative, are responsible for higher costs that have hit households across the country, and can’t be trusted to ensure life is more affordable for families.
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Instead, said 61% of respondents, “cracking down on price gouging” from both utility and energy companies would be the most effective way to lower the cost of electricity. In comparison, just 35% said building more energy infrastructure to meet demands was the answer to high costs.
While Trump has been forced in recent weeks to acknowledge that “energy demands from AI data centers could unfairly drive up” people’s energy costs, as he admitted in his State of the Union address while announcing AI companies would sign his “ratepayer protection pledge,” the president has largely deflected blame regarding the affordability crisis—or denied its existence altogether.
Trump claimed at a rally in Kentucky last week that “the economy is roaring back,” even as his $1 billion-per-day, unprovoked war on Iran inflamed tensions across the Middle East and drove up oil prices.
Groundwork said in its analysis of the poll that following Trump’s announcement of the ratepayer protection pledge, “Americans reject this reliance on corporations to do the right thing.”
Elizabeth Pancotti, managing director of policy and advocacy for Groundwork Collaborative, said that “utility prices are up and consumers know the truth: These price increases are being driven by corporate greed and unchecked AI data center growth.”
Trump has pushed to accelerate the construction of new data centers by fast-tracking the permitting process.
Two-thirds of those surveyed said their monthly electricity payments have gone up in the past year, with nearly a quarter of respondents saying they had increased by “a lot.” More than 40% of people said they are now paying between $101-$200 per month for electricity.
As Common Dreams reported last November, Trump’s demand for AI companies to build massive, energy-sucking data centers in communities across the US has been linked to rising costs of consumers, with the average overdue balance on utility bills surging by 32% in the last three years and states with high concentrations of AI data centers seeing electricity prices skyrocket by as much as 16% from 2024-25.
Sixty percent of respondents told Data for Progress and Groundwork Collaborative that the energy demand of large commercial users like AI data centers is to blame for higher consumer prices, and the same percentage of people also blamed high compensation for utility company executives. Sixty-three percent of those polled said high profits for utility companies and their investors were to blame.
Joint Economic Committee Democrats revealed Tuesday that the average annual US electric bill increased by $110 last year.
A 2022 analysis by Accountable.US found that the nine largest US energy utility companies raked in nearly $14 billion in combined profits in the first three quarters of that year and handed out $11 billion to shareholders while tens of millions of households struggled with rising utility bills.
Nearly 60% of the 1,149 people polled by the two progressive think tanks also said the public sector must take a leadership role on providing energy, “because the public sector doesn’t collect profits and can pass on savings to customers,” and 60% said the public sector should be responsible for upgrading and modernizing the electric grid because it is a “public resource that should serve all Americans equally, not generate profits for shareholders.”
Alex Jacquez, chief of policy and advocacy for Groundwork and a former Biden administration official, said the poll revealed that “the people believe in public power.”
The groups also polled respondents on their opinions of “energy superusers,” including cryptocurrency companies, AI data centers, and AI firms.
Crypto companies were the least popular, with 54% disapproving compared to 26% who approved. Voters disapproved of AI data centers by a 16-point margin and AI companies in general by an 8-point margin.
Nearly two-thirds said they believe new AI data centers would raise their energy costs, and voters across the political spectrum opposed new data centers in their communities.
Grassroots efforts have taken off in states including Michigan, Wisconsin, and New Jersey as community members have rejected the construction of data centers on the grounds that they would consume massive amounts of water as well as electricity, threaten jobs, and take up space that could otherwise be used for affordable housing and small businesses.
“Voters feel ripped off by the corporations who hold their utilities hostage and are calling on lawmakers to put an end to the profiteering racket,” said Pancotti. “It’s time for regulators and policymakers to answer the call to protect working families from predatory utility corporations and Big Tech.”
Original article by Brad Reed republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).
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MoD refuses to apologise after Declassified called ‘extreme’
https://www.declassifieduk.org/mod-refuses-to-apologise-after-declassified-called-extreme/
‘D-Notice’ committee secretary privately briefed Australian officials against Declassified
The Ministry of Defence is refusing to apologise for an official describing Declassified as “extreme” in a private briefing given to the Australian Attorney General’s office.
Brigadier Geoffrey Dodds was found to have described Declassified as an “extreme, non-msm [mainstream media]” organisation by The Grayzone, following a Freedom of Information request the media outlet made last year.
Dodds’ depiction of Declassified is contained in notes prepared by him for Australian officials in 2022.
As secretary of the Defence and Security Media Advisory (DSMA) Committee, Dodds was outlining instances in which some UK media organisations have refused to accept the advice of his committee.
Better known as the ‘D-Notice’ committee, the DSMA exists supposedly to prevent media disclosing information that could compromise national security. It operates a purely voluntary system and there are no obligations for journalists to censor material after receiving a request from it.
In February 2022, Declassified refused to comply with a request from the DSMA Committee to censor the name of a British military official, Lieutenant Colonel Sid Purser, who was supporting Cameroon’s dictator, Paul Biya.
Biya, 93, has ruled the police state for more than four decades with British support even while our reporting has revealed that the UK government is well aware of his regime’s human rights abuses.
…
DSMA is a government body meaning its officers must comply with the civil service code. The code states that “You must not act in a way that unjustifiably favours or discriminates against particular individuals or interests”.
This quote is important since it relates to Declassified’s blacklisting by the MoD in 2020. The code was explicitly highlighted in the MoD’s review of that blacklisting to show that MoD media officers were wrong to discriminate against us.
…
https://www.declassifieduk.org/mod-refuses-to-apologise-after-declassified-called-extreme/
