A War Begun on Instinct

"a new element of Trump's foreign-policy doctrine that we're seeing here, because he and the people around him are willing to take risks and they're willing to kind of go with their gut in a new way. The advantage of a gut-driven war decision is that it can yield sudden dramatic results. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had been a brutal Iranian dictator for nearly four decades. After Trump ordered strikes, Khamenei was dead within 24 hours."

"The disadvantage is that following your gut doesn't account for the past or the future. Trump did not confer with most of our allies, and barely alerted Congress, let alone sought their approval. He did not seem to think through who would succeed Khamenei, or at least, what would happen if certain successors aren't available."

Trump's stated reasons for military strikes against Iran—nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles, protester killings, or Israeli coordination—lack individual persuasiveness, similar to Iago's varied justifications for destroying Othello in Shakespeare's play. The underlying motivation appears to be a gut-driven foreign policy approach that prioritizes risk-taking and instinctive action. While this approach can produce rapid dramatic results, as evidenced by Ayatollah Khamenei's death within 24 hours, it neglects crucial considerations including allied consultation, congressional approval, succession planning, and adequate personnel deployment. The administration's lack of preparation for potential consequences demonstrates the significant disadvantages of bypassing traditional deliberative processes in military decision-making.

Read at The Atlantic