President Donald Trump campaigned on a promise: no new wars. But like most politicians, he hasn’t had a problem throwing those campaign mottos aside when it suits him.
The notion that Trump was a realist or a restrainer, the polar opposite of former President George W. Bush’s neoconservatism or former President Joe Biden‘s liberal internationalism, was always a mirage. Trump isn’t immune to dropping ordnance. Nine months into his second term, his administration has already unleashed two military engagements in the Middle East: the first a monthslong bombing campaign against the Houthis in Yemen and the second a U.S. operation to destroy Iran‘s three major nuclear sites. Both could be charitably described as kicking the can down the road. The Houthis continue to threaten civilian shipping in the Red Sea and the Iranians aren’t any closer today to giving up on their nuclear enrichment program than they were before the U.S. bombs fell.
Now we can add a new war to the mix: the war against narcotraffickers in Latin America.
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