How to Ignore a War |
On Wednesday night, President Trump told Americans — once more — that the war in Iran has (almost) been won.
The month-old conflict has been a fount of “Mission Accomplished” moments from the president. “The war is very complete — pretty much,” he said ten days after the first missile strike. The “fight is Militarily WON,” he said 11 days and thousands of strikes after that. On March 27 — day 28 of the war — Trump notified the nation, “We’re two weeks ahead of schedule.” Last night’s speech was more of the same. “We are on track to complete all of America’s military objectives shortly, very shortly.”
The president is scrambling to capitalize on the twisted ways that Americans have learned to process war since 9/11. His fear is that we will rebuke his presidency en masse if he drags the U.S. into another dead-end conflict. But a lifeline is coming into focus: If he supplies us with enough time and distractions, we might simply forget a war is happening.
Trump’s logic of foreign policy in his second term has mirrored his domestic PR: Break so much, so fast, that no one can really keep track or — for the average exhausted American — care. We might bomb Cuba; we may attack Greenland. There’s a dizzying sense of constant discord and vague details. All is negotiation and leverage, and therefore accepted as a gambit, rather than a cogent argument for bombs or sanctions. Whether or not it’s purposeful, it’s familiar. We may be at war, but it’s either too vague or too chaotic to really follow what’s happening.
Yet it’s starting to look like his framing of the war in Iran could benefit from a softer touch. A Pew survey conducted in mid-March found that 59 percent of Americans think Trump’s decision to use military force there is wrong. Respondents were twice as likely to say the war is not going well than going well. An Ipsos survey conducted the same week found that 55 percent of Americans would not support sending ground troops. These findings chime........