Distrust of Trump inflames skepticism of his Iran motives

Timing ripe for questions

When President Donald Trump told on Friday why he ordered the killing of Qassem Soleimani, he said the Iranian general had a record of terror going back 20 years, and "what the United States did yesterday should have been done long ago."

The remark was taken as Trump indulging his habit of portraying himself as tougher than his two predecessors, George W. Bush and, especially, Barack Obama. But Trump's time frame for when lethal action should have been taken includes 2017, 2018 and 2019 — all years when he was president. So why not until 2020?

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo went on six Sunday talk shows defending the killing as a preemptive strike against imminent new attacks on U.S. targets. But Pompeo also looked to mine political capital for Trump against a prospective 2020 opponent, Democrat Joe Biden.

"The risk of terror is increased by appeasement. That's what the Obama — Obama-Biden — administration did. It's what President Trump will never do," Pompeo said.

Yet Trump's timing, in an election year and with the president facing an impeachment trial, has Democrats and other Trump critics openly dubious. Trump's unmatched record of more than 15,000 false and misleading statements on matters big and small have made the ground for planting doubt more fertile.

“I think the question people reasonably ask is next week Donald Trump faces the start potentially of an impeachment trial,” said another prospective 2020 foe, Elizabeth Warren, on NBC's "Meet the Press." The Democratic lawmaker replied: “ … I think people are starting to ask why now did he do this?"

Biden also suggested a link to impeachment while campaigning in Iowa Saturday night. He accused Trump of taking reckless action as “the walls close in on this guy.” He added: “No president has a right to take our country to war without the informed consent of Americans ... And right now we have no idea what this guy has in mind."

Trump: I have targets galore

Trump kept poking at Iran with new threats delivered via Twitter through the weekend, and put Congress on notice as well.

"These Media Posts will serve as notification to the United States Congress that should Iran strike any U.S. person or target, the United States will quickly & fully strike back, & perhaps in a disproportionate manner," Trump tweeted as he wound up a visit to his golf course near Mar-a-Lago. "Such legal notice is not required, but is given nevertheless!" he concluded.

Congressional leaders were not informed before the hit on Soleimani and the Democrats among them at least will not likely regard a tweet as a sufficient substitute for a classified briefing.

On Saturday, Trump tweeted that he had a target list of "52 Iranian sites (representing the 52 American hostages taken by Iran many years ago), some at a very high level & important to Iran & the Iranian culture."

That last phrase set off alarms that Trump was considering flouting international law that deems targeting cultural sites a war crime. Pompeo, on his talk show rounds, said any U.S. action would be "consistent with international law."

But Trump, pointing to Iranian complicity in torture and the deaths of Americans from roadside bombs, told reporters on Air Force One: “And we’re not allowed to touch their cultural sites? It doesn’t work that way."

Janison: Suspicious minds

Who could possibly think an American president's judgment would be so warped by political self-interest as to risk taking the nation to war? Trump thought so. Of course, he was projecting, as Newsday's Dan Janison recalls.

In a video made in 2011, Trump said, "Our president will start a war with Iran because he has absolutely no ability to negotiate. He's weak and he's ineffective. So the only way that he figures he's going to get reelected and as sure as you're sitting there is to start a war with Iran."

The president then, Obama, did not start a war with Iran. He got reelected. He negotiated a nuclear deal with Iran. Trump threw it out.

Evidence is lagging the justifications the Trump administration is offering for intensifying the conflict with Iran, an unsettling echo of the run-up to the Iraq War, Janison writes.

Extreme miscalculation?

The idea of killing Soleimani was presented to Trump by top U.S. military officials as one of a range of options to respond to growing Iranian provocations in Iraq, reports The New York Times. Only they didn't encourage Trump to choose it, and they were flabbergasted when he did.

It's been the usual practice of Pentagon officials since the 9/11 attacks to offer improbable or even extreme alternatives to presidents to nudge them toward responses the military sees as more measured and appropriate. 

Pompeo and Vice President Mike Pence were two of the most hawkish voices during the discussions. Military officials scrambled to carry out Trump's order even as they were immediately alarmed about the prospect of Iranian retaliation against American troops in the region, the report said.

Leave Iraq? Trump wants breakup fee

Trump’s response to calls from Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi and his parliament for the 6,000 U.S. troops in the country to leave following the killing of Soleimani on its soil: We won’t leave unless you pay us.

Trump told reporters on Air Force One that the U.S. spent billions to build an air base in Iraq, and “We’re not leaving unless they pay us back for it.” He said an unfriendly move to expel U.S. forces could result in sanctions that will “make Iranian sanctions look somewhat tame.” The base was actually built by Saddam Hussein in the 1980s. The U.S. paid for improvements.

Earlier, Pompeo shrugged off the Iraqi demands. He said Mahdi, who is due to leave office soon, is under "enormous threats from the very Iranian leadership" and "we are confident that the Iraqi people want the United States to continue to be there to fight the counterterror campaign."

U.S. participation in operations against ISIS was put on hold, however, as American forces hunkered down and braced for potential Iranian attacks.

Pompeo asserted the elimination of Soleimani made "the world a safer place" despite anticipated reprisals. "It may be that there's a little noise here in the interim,” he said. For more from Pompeo, see Newsday's story by Laura Figueroa Hernandez.

Trying times

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Sunday that he is “hopeful” that Democrats can secure support from at least four Republicans to force a vote on calling witnesses for Trump’s looming Senate impeachment trial.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Schumer remain at an impasse over the rules governing the trial. House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff said he didn't think Speaker Nancy Pelosi will hold back indefinitely on delivering the articles of impeachment to the Senate.

The tactic, Schiff said, "thus far flushed out where Mitch McConnell’s coming from," and is "showing that he is working in cahoots with the president, that he has made himself an active participant in the president's cover-up." For more, see Newsday's story by Figueroa and Scott Eidler.

What else is happening:

• Iran announced it will no longer abide by the limits contained in the 2015 nuclear deal. Though Trump pulled the U.S. out, other countries had remained in the agreement.
• Three Americans were killed in an airstrip raid by the extremist  al-Shabab group in Kenya. U.S. officials said they are pursuing the attackers. The airstrip is used for aerial missions against al-Shabab in neighboring Somalia.
• While Soleimani was responsible for multiple acts of Iranian-sponsored terrorism against U.S. forces and interests, Pence's tweet that he aided some of the 9/11 hijackers doesn't match accepted historic accounts, The New York Times writes.
• The European Union invited Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif to visit Brussels. U.S. officials have complained that European allies have not shown sufficient support for the U.S., Politico reports.
• Biden has insisted lately he never advised Obama to hold off before ordering the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden. That contradicts past accounts in which he said he advised the president to wait for further confirmation of bin Laden's whereabouts, according to CNN.
• It's not just Central American migrants stuck on the Mexican side of the border by Trump's asylum crackdown, Politico reports. There are thousands from all over the world seeking refugee status, including Jews fleeing persecution in Hungary, Syrians escaping their country's civil war and LGBTQ people fleeing homophobic policies in Russia.
• Two New York Times notes from Trump’s Palm Beach vacation: He screamed on the phone at World Jewish Congress president Ron Lauder that he wasn’t doing enough to support him, and congratulated Keith Hernandez as the Mets announcer and ex-first baseman was getting married at Mar-a-Lago.