NEW YORK, March 3. /TASS/. By authorizing a military operation against Iran, US President Donald Trump has taken a huge gamble on his presidency, The New York Times correspondent Tyler Pager reported.
"With his decision Friday to authorize war against Iran, Mr. Trump is taking the biggest gamble of his presidency, risking the lives of American troops, more deaths and instability in the world’s most volatile region, and his own political standing," the article said. According to it, such US actions could lead to a rise in oil prices, as well as the conflict propagation to the entire Middle East region.
Pager believes that Trump has likely "plunged the United States into what is shaping up to be its most expansive military conflict since the 2003 invasion of Iraq." He emphasized that the US leader had repeatedly violated his promise to voters to "end, not start, wars," having sanctioned seven military conflicts in different parts of the world since taking office. The correspondent also recalled that "interventions in the Middle East have bedeviled generations of American presidents."
The author pointed out that according to Trump, most of his supporters still back him. However, some MAGA supporters and US allies are privately condemning the US decision to start a military operation against Iran.
The United States and Israel launched a large-scale military operation against Iran on February 28. Major Iranian cities, including Tehran, were struck. The White House justified the attack by citing alleged missile and nuclear threats from Iran. At the same time, US leadership openly called on the Iranian population to rise up against their government and seize power. As a result of the strikes, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and several other senior figures in the leadership of the Islamic Republic were killed. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps announced a retaliatory operation, targeting sites in Israel. US military bases in Bahrain, Jordan, Qatar, Kuwait, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia were also hit.