'Mother of All Distractions': Amid Covid-19 Failures, Trump Threatens War With Order to 'Shoot Down' Iranian Boats
"If the xenophobia isn't doing the trick and providing a good enough distraction, there's always the classic authoritarian move: gin up a war."
by
A picture taken during a guided tour by the U.S. Navy (NAVCENT) on June 19, 2019. (Photo: AFP via Getty Images)
This is a developing story... Check back for possible updates...
President Donald Trump tweeted Wednesday morning that he has instructed the U.S. Navy to "shoot down and destroy" any Iranian vessels that "harass" American warships in the Persian Gulf.
Critics slammed the threat as an effort to distract from the president's abysmal response to the deadly coronavirus pandemic, which has now infected more than 800,000 people and killed at least 40,000 in the United States.
"If the xenophobia isn't doing the trick and providing a good enough distraction, there's always the classic authoritarian move: gin up a war," said Matt Duss, foreign policy adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
Trump's tweet came a week after the U.S. Navy accused Iranian gunboats of making "dangerous and harassing approaches" to American warships in the Persian Gulf.
"I have instructed the United States Navy to shoot down and destroy any and all Iranian gunboats if they harass our ships at sea," Trump wrote.
I have instructed the United States Navy to shoot down and destroy any and all Iranian gunboats if they harass our ships at sea.
"The mother of all distractions," Trita Parsi, executive vice president at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, said of Trump's tweet.
The president's threat closely followed a "Fox & Friends" segment on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' successful launch of a new military satellite on Wednesday.
John Bolton, the ultra-hawkish former national security adviser who has pressed for war with Iran for years, tweeted that "Iran's launch of a military satellite is proof we are still not applying enough pressure, deterrence has not been restored, and coronavirus is not slowing down the ayatollahs."
Fox & Friends, which Trump watched this morning, had a lengthy discussion of Iran launching a new military satellite about 90 minutes before Trump posted his tweet threatening to shoot down their [squints at notes] boats
1,125 people are talking about this
Our work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. Feel free to republish and share widely.
posted by Satish Sharma at
19:55
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home