On our podcast yesterday, Rich Lowry and I discussed whether it is time for President Trump to resume the intensive bombing campaign against Iran. After all, if anything, Iran is tightening, rather than easing, its chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz, its negotiating position is intransigent (surprise!), and if U.S. intelligence leaks to the New York Times are accurate, “Iran has restored operational access to 30 of the 33 missile sites it retains” along the strait, as well as 70 percent of both its mobile missile launchers and pre-war missile stockpile.
I’ll separately address why I’m skeptical about the Times report — more the tenor of it than what American spy agencies may be blabbing about damage assessments. For now, I am going to continue pounding the dead horse I’ve been beating for nearly three months. What the Trump administration is doing is bass-ackwards, to the dismay of supporters of action against the Death to America regime and, no doubt, to the delight of Trump detractors, who can’t believe their good fortune: a president who has allowed them to highlight his erratic nature while obscuring their hand in making Iran a more formidable threat.
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