Soon after becoming president in 2017, Donald Trump ordered an attack on an Islamic State (IS) underground complex in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province. The strike involved the first-ever use in combat of a GBU-43 massive ordnance air blast (Moab) “bunker buster” bomb – the US’s most powerful conventional weapon. The bombing killed about 90 insurgents but failed to crush IS. It also made zero long-term difference to the US’s losing battle with the Taliban.

Yet that was not the point. Inexperienced Trump, who had famously avoided military service, was keen to show he was in charge, a commander-in-chief unafraid to make tough calls and send troops into harm’s way. He craved a big bang – a spectacular demonstration of unmatched US power. Like a teenager who unexpectedly obtains the keys to the family gun cabinet, he could not resist the temptation to play with all those shiny new Pentagon weapons.

Trump’s latest threats to bomb Iran, prompted by the recent, terrible events across the country, suggest his mindset is unchanged. It’s naive to think he genuinely cares about the killing and brutalisation of unarmed Iranian demonstrators when, on his orders, gun-toting federal militias abuse American citizens in similar ways in Minneapolis and other cities. It’s plain Trump doesn’t give a damn about democracy in the US, let alone in Iran (or newly colonised Venezuela).

On the contrary, Trump sees an opportunity to impose US hegemony on a

© The Guardian