At this time of their presidencies, Trump’s two predecessors had started wars in the Middle-East, he hasn’t. The apocalyptic commentary these last few days has completely ignored Trump's famous reluctance to use force, especially for broad, value-based objectives.
The Suleimani killing was about brutally but punctually re-establishing escalation dominance after Iran stepped up nefarious activities (drone destruction, strike on Saudi Arabia, attack against US embassy) and broke an explicit red line with the killing of an American citizen.
The Iranian response and especially the Zarif tweet seem to show Iran got the message. It had no choice but to respond but calibrated it in a way that would not cross red lines and communicated that explicitly.
I’m seeing commentary saying Trump is « backing down ». Actually the message has been clear: we don’t want war, but are ready for it. I’m always surprised the same analysts describe Trump as a calculating selfish cynic and as an irrational crazed madman. You have to choose.
The rest is pretty standard. Peace through strength; more burden sharing from allies in the Middle-East (reference to NATO probably means that he wants to scale down US presence run Iraq but get allies to step up against terrorism); JCPOA, etc.
Europeans should 1/ welcome no escalation 2/ step up troops presence in anti-terror in Mideast which will also increase their diplomatic weight 3/ try to put some meat in Trump’s little diplomatic opening, the mention of common interests with Iran against ISIS.
Getting questions on the war under the Obama administration I am referring to, it’s Libya in 2011.
