{"source_url": "https://www.alternet.org", "url": "https://www.alternet.org/2020/01/trump-has-no-coherent-strategy-to-solve-the-escalating-crisis-with-iran-conservative-columnist/", "title": "Trump has no coherent strategy to solve the \u2018escalating crisis\u2019 with Iran: conservative columnist", "top_image": "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/iran.jpg", "meta_img": "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/iran.jpg", "images": ["https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/iran-1170x674.jpg", "https://b.scorecardresearch.com/p?c1=2&c2=18904016&cv=2.0&cj=1", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/creditcardlogos.gif", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/supportalternet.png", "https://www.rawstory.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/dcjsmall2.gif", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Impeachment-Process-Poll-.gif", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/iran.jpg", "https://alternetmedia.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/newlogo.png", "https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/scr/pixel.gif", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/alternet-logo-2.png", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/alt_donate_blue.gif", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Impeachment-Process-Poll-Large.gif", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/8176412.png", "https://pixel.quantserve.com/pixel/p-44Kjy7lrEDP7I.gif", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/themes/soledad/images/penci-holder.png", "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/button_close.png"], "movies": [], "text": "On Tuesday \u2014 following U.S. military airstrikes in Iraq and Syria \u2014 hundreds of supporters of the Iran-backed Shiite militia Kataib Hezbollah (not to be confused with the Hezbollah in Lebanon) angrily stormed the U.S. embassy compound in Baghdad, setting fires and chanting, \u201cDeath to America.\u201d The incident was an assertion of growing anti-American sentiment in Iraq, and conservative opinion writer Max Boot asserts in his Washington Post column that President Donald Trump has no real strategy for dealing with Iran.\n\nBoot, one of Trump\u2019s most outspoken critics on the right, recalls that although he was critical of President Barack Obama\u2019s Iran policy in 2015, it was better than Trump\u2019s.\n\nObama\u2019s deal with Iran, Boot writes, \u201cdid nothing to curb Iran\u2019s regional power play and may have even fueled it by lifting economic sanctions \u2014 which is why I and others opposed it at the time. But it did at least stop Iran\u2019s development of nuclear weapons. President Trump blundered by exiting the nuclear deal in 2018 and imposing economic sanctions on Iran in 2019, even though it was complying with the agreement.\u201d\n\nThe airstrikes in Iran and Syria over the weekend were in response to a missile attack on a military compound near Kirkuk, Iraq on Friday that left a contractor dead. And the airstrikes, Boot notes, \u201ckilled 25 members of Kataib Hezbollah.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe United States has only two ways out of this escalating crisis: fight or negotiate,\u201d Boot emphasizes. \u201cA war with Iran, as I have previously argued, could be the mother of all quagmires; it could easily spin out of control with tit-for-tat responses of the kind we have seen in recent days. Better to negotiate. That would mean trying to rebuild a tougher nuclear deal in return for the lifting of U.S. sanctions.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nBoot concludes his column by lamenting that things will only get worse for the U.S. in the Middle East if Trump fails to come up with a coherent Iran policy.\n\n\u201cTrump shows little interest in either seriously negotiating or fighting,\u201d Boot laments. \u201cHe has waged economic warfare on Iran while doing nothing to curb its regional aggression; indeed, by withdrawing U.S. troops from part of northern Syria, he has allowed an extension of Iranian influence. So, we are left with the worst of all possible worlds: Iran is once again waging a low-intensity conflict, and America once again has no effective response.\u201d", "keywords": [], "meta_keywords": [""], "tags": ["Religious Right"], "authors": ["Alex Henderson"], "publish_date": "Wed Jan  1 15:59:22 2020", "summary": "", "article_html": "", "meta_description": "", "meta_lang": "en", "meta_favicon": "/apple-touch-icon.png", "meta_data": {"viewport": "width=device-width, initial-scale=1", "onesignal": "wordpress-plugin", "og": {"site_name": "Alternet.org", "title": "Trump has no coherent strategy to solve the 'escalating crisis' with Iran: conservative columnist", "url": "https://www.alternet.org/2020/01/trump-has-no-coherent-strategy-to-solve-the-escalating-crisis-with-iran-conservative-columnist/", "type": "article", "description": "On Tuesday \u2014 following U.S. military airstrikes in Iraq and Syria \u2014 hundreds of supporters of the Iran-backed Shiite militia Kataib Hezbollah (not to be confused with the Hezbollah in Lebanon) angrily stormed the U.S. embassy compound in Baghdad, setting fires and chanting, \u201cDeath to America.\u201d The i", "image": {"identifier": "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/iran.jpg", "url": "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/iran.jpg", "secure_url": "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/iran.jpg"}, "updated_time": "2020-01-01T16:00:46+00:00"}, "article": {"published_time": "2020-01-01T15:59:22+00:00", "modified_time": "2020-01-01T16:00:46+00:00"}, "twitter": {"title": "Trump has no coherent strategy to solve the 'escalating crisis' with Iran: conservative columnist", "url": "https://www.alternet.org/2020/01/trump-has-no-coherent-strategy-to-solve-the-escalating-crisis-with-iran-conservative-columnist/", "description": "On Tuesday \u2014 following U.S. military airstrikes in Iraq and Syria \u2014 hundreds of supporters of the Iran-backed Shiite militia Kataib Hezbollah (not to be confused with the Hezbollah in Lebanon) angrily stormed the U.S. embassy compound in Baghdad, setting fires and chanting, \u201cDeath to America.\u201d The i", "image": "https://www.alternet.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/iran.jpg", "card": "summary_large_image"}}, "canonical_link": "https://www.alternet.org/2020/01/trump-has-no-coherent-strategy-to-solve-the-escalating-crisis-with-iran-conservative-columnist/"}