CNN is reporting on Tuesday that the Trump regime has reached out to unnamed senior Iranian officials regarding an end to the war with Iran launched by the U.S. and Israel on Feb. 28, with the caveat that the outreach is “nothing that has reached the level of full-on negotiations.”
This would seem to expose as a lie what Donald Trump insisted to reporters on Monday, that his administration had “very good talks” with Iranian leaders, who the POTUS declined to name because “I don’t want him to be killed.”
The Iranian leadership, through whatever remains of its media communications team, pushed back on Trump’s claims within a few minutes of the claim getting out into the public discourse, and denied that there were any ongoing talks – which now appears to have been accurate.
What’s actually going on here is, Trump, on Saturday, posted to his socials a 48-hour deadline for Iran to stand down its defense of its homeland from the U.S.-Israeli attacks, under threat of a new set of attacks that Trump promised would be aimed at Iran’s energy infrastructure, in blatant violation of international law.
The claim from Trump that there were new talks between the two sides was clearly an effort from the president to give himself an out from having to make good on his threatened war crimes.
Trump is clearly frustrated that the war, nearly a month in, did not result in regime change in Iran, and that the Iranians have been able to mount a decent counteroffensive that has effectively shut down the Strait of Hormuz, forcing oil and gas prices up dramatically nationwide and worldwide, with Trump backing himself into a corner there that had him deciding over the weekend to lift years-long U.S. sanctions on Iranian oil.
Economists are projecting that the lifting of the U.S. sanctions will give the Iranian regime in the area of $14 billion in fresh revenues.
No wonder Trump wants to sue for peace.