Is the Donald Preparing to Bomb Iran?

U.S. President Donald Trump, flanked by hawkish National Security Advisor John Bolton, speaks to the media at a press conference on the second day of the 2018 NATO Summit on July 12, 2018 in Brussels, Belgium. (Photo: Sean Gallup/Getty Images)
Trump Ready to Bomb Iran Within One Month: Australian Govt Sources
New reporting from Australia's ABC news comes amid warning that "Trump's reckless threats" should not be ignored
byAndrea Germanos, staff
Friday, July 27, 2018
Trump's White House is ready to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities, unnamed "senior figures" within the Australian government said to ABC news.
According to the new reporting from the Australian news service, the strike could happen as early as next month, and Australia and the U.K.—both part of the "Five Eyes" spying alliance— could lend a hand in identifying targets, the reporting adds.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, for his part, dismissed the report, saying, "It's speculation, it is citing anonymous sources."
News of the alleged bombing preparation caps off a week President Donald Trump began with an all-caps tweet to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.
"NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED STATES AGAIN OR YOU WILL SUFFER CONSEQUENCES THE LIKES OF WHICH FEW THROUGHOUT HISTORY HAVE EVER SUFFERED BEFORE. WE ARE NO LONGER A COUNTRY THAT WILL STAND FOR YOUR DEMENTED WORDS OF VIOLENCE & DEATH. BE CAUTIOUS!" he tweeted, following Rouhani's warning for the U.S. not to "play with the lion's tail" and saying, "Peace with Iran would be the mother of all peace and war with Iran would be the mother of all wars."
Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, who played a key role in the 2015 nuclear deal Trump "recklessly" pulled out of, shot back with his own tweet, saying in part, "COLOR US UNIMPRESSED."
Trump did, however, tone down the rhetoric on Tuesday, saying, "We'll see what happens, but we're ready to make a real deal, not the deal that was done by the previous administration, which was a disaster."
Still, argues Trita Parsi, author of Losing an Enemy—Obama, Iran, and the Triumph of Diplomacy and the president of the National Iranian American Council, "Trump's reckless threats" should not be ignored.
"Going forward, the moderate voices inside the Trump White House will essentially be absent, while new advisers will likely egg on Trump to escalate tensions further—even though the Trump administration continues to claim that its goal is not regime change," he wrote in an op-ed published Wednesday at CNN.
"All of this amounts to a sobering reality," Parsi continued. "Trump is embarking on a path of escalation without having the exit ramps he had with North Korea. The danger now is not to overestimate the risk of war, but to underestimate it."