DUBAI, United Arab Emirates— President Donald Trump campaigned on keeping the United States out of foreign wars, but it didn’t take long to convince him to come to the direct aid of Israel, hitting Iranian nuclear targets with bunker-buster bombs dropped by B-2 stealth bombers and Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from a submarine.
Beyond the attack’s immediate impact on helping bring the 12-day war to a close, experts say Trump’s decision to use force against another country also will certainly be reverberating in the Asia-Pacific, Washington’s priority theater.
“Trump’s strikes on Iran show that he’s not afraid to use military force — this would send a clear message to North Korea, and even to China and Russia, about Trump’s style,” said Duyeon Kim, a senior analyst at the Center for a New American Security based in Seoul, South Korea.
“Before the strikes, Pyongyang and Beijing might have assumed that Trump is risk averse, particularly based on his behavior his first presidency despite some tough talk,” Kim said.
China, North Korea and Russia all condemn US strike
Ten days into the war between Israel and Iran, Trump made the risky decision to step in, hitting three nuclear sites with American firepower on June 22 in a bid to destroy the country’s nuclear program at a time while negotiations between Washington and Tehran were still ongoing.
The attacks prompted a pro forma Iranian retaliatory strike the following day on a U.S. base in nearby Qatar, which caused no casualties, and both Iran and Israel then agreed to a ceasefire on June 24.
North Korea, China and Russia all were quick to condemn the American attack, with Russian President Vladimir Putin calling it “unprovoked aggression,” China’s Foreign Ministry saying it violated international law and “exacerbated tensions in the Middle East,” and North Korea’s Foreign Ministry maintaining it “trampled down the territorial integrity and security interests of a sovereign state.”
While the strikes were a clear tactical success, the jury is still out on whether they will have a more broad strategic benefit to Washington’s goals in the Middle East or convince Iran it needs to work harder than ever to develop a nuclear deterrent, possibly pulling the U.S. back into a longer-term conflict.
