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    Trump’s not the first US president to fall in love with war. History shows where this is going | Peter Beinhart

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    In his fresh intoxication with global conquest, Trump is following an established pattern – one that promises disasterTo many observers, Donald Trump’s open bellicosity – his threats to attack Greenland and Iran, and his recent kidnapping of Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro – looks like an ideological reversal. “Donald Trump betrayed his MAGA base today [by] launching a war of choice to bring regime change in Venezuela,” tweeted Democratic congressman Ro Khanna on 3 January. The day before, former Republican representative Marjorie Taylor Greene wrote: “President Trump threatening war and sending in troops to Iran is everything we voted against in ‘24.” On 20 January, National Public Radio reported that “Trump supporters share confusion and anger over the president’s focus on Greenland”.The sense of whiplash is understandable. As a candidate, Trump often denounced war. Now he is infatuated with it. But while Trump seems uniquely set on dismantling the postwar order in the service of his quest for global domination, there is precedent for his transformation. Continue reading… More

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      Might is right: US ‘foreign policy’ held hostage to mad king Trump’s whims

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      Increasingly unpopular at home, a president obsessed by his legacy has turned his scattergun on the world stageOne year into the second Trump administration, an actual US foreign policy remains just a nice idea. Instead, the world has been forced to adapt to the world according to Donald Trump: one increasingly shaped by his erratic shifts and unpredictable decisions, his fury at perceived slights and his growing desire to stamp his legacy in the model of an imperial leader from centuries past.Think of it as the mad king’s court, where every day is a carnival. Continue reading… More

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      Why America needs a new antiwar movement – and how it can win | Jeremy Varon

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      Demonstrations against the Iraq war proved protest works. Now we must halt destruction before it more powerfully startsIn spring 2004, Gen Anthony Zinni uttered about Iraq the dreaded words in US politics: “I spent two years in Vietnam, and I’ve seen this movie before.” A year after George W Bush’s declaration of “mission accomplished” – when the war had hit its peak popularity at 74% – the invasion had descended into quagmire, marked by a raging insurgency, the Abu Ghraib torture scandal and US casualties nearing 1,000. For the first time, a majority of Americans judged the war a “mistake”. In this, they echoed what millions of Americans, predicting fiasco, had been saying since before its start.By the summer of 2005, with Iraq exploding in civil war, public support further eroded. Vietnam comparisons abounded. Running against the war, Democrats had blowout wins in the 2006 midterms. The new Congress empaneled the bipartisan Iraq study group, which concluded that the war had to end. Its fate was sealed by the election of Barack Obama, who made good on his pledge to withdraw US troops (though US forces later returned to take on the Islamic State).Jeremy Varon is the author of Our Grief Is Not a Cry for War: The Movement to Stop the War on Terror (University of Chicago Press, 2025) Continue reading… More

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      Trump has pulled back from the brink on Iran – for now | Mohamad Bazzi

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      When he returned to power last year, Trump was eager to negotiate a new deal with Tehran, but a diplomatic breakthrough has been elusiveWill Donald Trump order a US military attack on Iran? That question captivated the world for the past two weeks, as the US president issued bellicose threats warning the Iranian regime not to crack down on nationwide protests demanding economic and social reforms. On Tuesday, as he was scheduled to be briefed by Pentagon officials on various options for a strike, Trump posted a message on social media urging Iranians to continue their demonstrations and take over government institutions. The president signaled that he was leaning toward ordering an attack, telling protesters that “help is on its way”.But by Wednesday, Trump pulled back from the brink of a military intervention, saying he had received assurances from “very important sources” that Iran had stopped killing protesters and was not moving forward with executions. A group of US allies in the Middle East – including Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman and Turkey – seem to have succeeded in a last-ditch effort to convince Trump not to launch airstrikes against Tehran, warning it could unleash a wider conflict in the region. While many Sunni-led Arab states resent Shia Iran’s influence in the Arab world, they are also worried about retaliatory attacks by Iran and its allies, an influx of refugees and a civil war that could lead to the collapse of the Iranian state. Continue reading… More

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      Three US citizens sue Trump with the ACLU over encounters with ICE agents – as it happened

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      This live blog is now closed.Trump news at a glance: The medal may be in Trump’s hands, but peace prize is not his, Nobel officials sayDonald Trump is in Washington today. He’s due to meet with Mariá Corina Machado – Venezuela’s opposition leader – at 12:3opm ET. At the moment that’s closed to the press but we’ll let you know if that changes and bring you the latest.Later, Trump is set to host the champions of the 2025 Stanley Cup, the Florida Panthers, at the White House. We’ll be watching to get his reaction to the news of the day. Continue reading… More

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      US seizes another Venezuela-linked oil tanker – video

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      The US military seized another Venezuela-linked tanker known as Veronica in a pre-dawn action on Thursday. Monochrome video showed a helicopter flying next to the tanker and US troops boarding the vessel. The seizure marks the sixth vessel targeted in recent weeks as part of the effort by the Trump administration to control the Venezuelan oil industryUS military seizes Venezuela oil tanker under Trump sanctions Continue reading… More