SNAFU being the basic operating system of the Trump administration.

Helps keep any delay between final release and translation release to a minimum or non-existent.

withdrawal was being considered. The release might have been accidental, but composing the draft was not.

To him, as you know, orders from a "shithole" country were made to be disregarded.

Like a bratty toddler, left with his weak-willed grandmother.

keep troops in Iraq if he wants to. Actually, they probably are necessary there for containing Isis. Our traditional European allies think so and so do some Iraqis from interviews I have heard. So he might get away with ignoring the Iraqi parliament vote, which, as I understand, is not a binding decision.

But if he continues to ignore international norms and laws, the time will come when other nations will band together against him, maybe with sanctions. When he has to face the rest of the world alone, his bluster will make him powerless and look even more.like a moron than he already does.

Several weeks ago, I feared that Trump would start a war during election year. I almost posted a thread about it, but I dismissed the idea because of his constant comments about avoiding future wars and getting out of the ones we were in. Impeachment and hawkish advisors changed the scene and now here we are.

I think it is quite possible now that he will push this to all out war to crush Iran. It would be horrific, with ME nations lining up on one side or the other. Russia and China would back Iran. Europe would be reluctant to get involved. They have been down a path like this before, in WW1, which no one really wanted to fight, except perhaps Germany.

Soleimani was a monster, but Trump bungled the whole thing and ratcheted up the stakes with his sanctions and withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal - all because of his hatred of Obama.

For sure Iran will retaliate. Trump will not back down then.

In the couple of hours since you wrote this very thorough and well-considered reply, wnylib, Iran retaliated against on the U.S. Al-Asad air base in Iraq. I'm sure you're heard.

They're fools. This is exactly what the fat bastard wanted - and he'll soon regale us with some Idi Amin-style harangue on television.

A sad day for the world.

As for this being what the "fst bastard" wanted, my take is different.

Iran knows our military power is superior. They would not take this step without having some powerful backing from somewhere, probably both Russia and China.

Iran, Russia, and China met very recently. I suspect they wanted the US to get bogged down in a ME war and Trump's volatility and ego are easy to manipulate. I think it is Trump who is playing into their hands.

smashmouth.

The above letter was intentionally written to play with Iran in a malevolent way. Trump knew that the letter would be sent, and knew that he'd take the intent of the letter away as soon as the letter made its way through the Iranian leadership. This is Trump's version of being unpredictable. Instead of being smart, Trump denigrates his own country as a totally disingenuous monster, just like Trump himself.

Wannabe-dictators operate this way, they keep people confused, they do things that look stupid just to divert the attention, they really have no pride, it doesn't hurt their ego when they are criticized as incompetent because that was the goal, mission accomplished.

Be very aware, my real concern right now is that the military is willingly obeying these crooks, if we loose the military, we loose everything, if what we have believed to be the ultimate patriotism which we have always expected from the military is gone, or was never there, then brace yourselves because this will be a very long road.

Once again, I hope I am wrong.

We are dealing with a moron who couldn’t find his ass with both hands...