Libertarian commentator and host of Part of the Problem Dave Smith has pointed to what he described as a revealing episode during the ceasefire period as evidence that the United States lacked meaningful strategic control over the conflict. According to him, the President was forced to restrain Israeli military action out of concern that it would collapse the very pause in hostilities that Washington was attempting to maintain.
Smith made the remarks during a heated panel discussion on Piers Morgan Uncensored from 00:24:34, in which he and fellow panellist Will Chamberlain clashed repeatedly over the administration’s handling of the Iran conflict. Smith had argued throughout the discussion that none of the war’s stated objectives — securing Iran’s enriched uranium, ending support for proxy groups, and reopening the Strait of Hormuz were any closer to being achieved than they had been at the outset.
He used the Israeli episode as a concrete illustration of the broader contradiction at the heart of the administration’s position. “Donald Trump had to even start warning the Israelis to stop, because he was so concerned that that was going to blow up this ceasefire, and he needed to take a break from the military action,” Smith said. He presented this not as evidence of American leadership but as a symptom of the extent to which the United States had ceded control over the pace and character of the conflict to a partner whose interests did not always align with its own.
Smith had earlier in the discussion made what he regarded as his most fundamental charge — that Netanyahu had spent the entirety of his career seeking to draw the United States into conflict with Iran, and had finally succeeded by convincing Trump that a swift, aerial campaign could produce regime change…Read_More…