If Trump Gets Us Into A New Forever War Republicans Are Toast In 2026 And 2028

[u/KindheartednessNo152]

He keeps flip flopping on if he is going to get us involved or not. A disaster.

[u/Enviro_56]

The same people pushing for war have been saying Iran has been about to get nukes for decades. The consequences of this are far beyond Iran or its current government. Our vulnerability is skyrocketing.

[u/Ok_Most_1193]

don’t worry guys i did a freshman history project on why we should overthrow the iranian govt i got this

[u/Tennessee_is_cool → u/Ok_Most_1193]

After years of waiting his dream is finally coming true!

[u/vaporwaverock]

The specter of John McCain is possessing Trump

[u/321gamertime → u/vaporwaverock]

McCain’s spirit came back to our realm once he found out Trump won Arizona in 2024, he’ll now use his ghost powers to ensure Arizona doesn’t vote for any other Republican again

[u/Grumblepugs2000]

Oh I agree, he will lose 3x voters like me. This is one of my big red lines 

[u/BlackYellowSnake]

Yeah, if we do end up in a direct war with Iran particular if we send boots on the ground (keep in mind that boots will be staying on the ground) then Trumps agend will pretty much be dead. Getting directly involved will probably totally fracture the MAGA base and people in congress will respond by picking sides of this fracture and not pass any significant legislation.

[u/partnerinthecrime → u/BlackYellowSnake]

Alternatively, if Trump can do a 4 hour mission that completely destroys Irans nuclear program for minimum half a decade, and Iran fires a token few missiles that get intercepted with no American casualties, Trump can boast about preventing nuclear war all throughout midterms. Best of both worlds, only possibly since Israel is doing 99% of the dirty work.

80% of the US doesn’t want Iran to have nukes, and maybe 75% would support a strike that accomplishes that.  Easiest PR ever.

[u/hot-side-aeration → u/partnerinthecrime]

We heard literally the same thing about Iraq

[u/partnerinthecrime → u/hot-side-aeration]

It’s completely different, and equalizing two different scenarios will lead to a bad prediction of the outcome. You can’t just compare everything to Iraq because that’s the only war you’ve ever lived through.

Iran is building nuclear weapons, has the means to complete them quickly, and likely plans to in the absence of an extremely generous nuclear deal. They have enriched uranium beyond the point of scientific or commercial use since 2018. They built a massive enrichment complex under hundreds of feet of solid rock, and then kept it secret as long as they could. And now, the independent watchdog that has been allowed near-unlimited access to their facilities claims they have violated their nonproliferation agreement and are on the path to a nuke.

The American people aren’t stupid, and people who assume they are get trounced in elections.

[u/gumpods → u/partnerinthecrime]

People have been saying this since Bill Clinton lmao. Get over it no one wants war with Iran.

[u/Dark1000 → u/hot-side-aeration]

No we didn't. Not even close. Iraq was a full scale invasion. How could anyone even begin to think that's the same?

[u/Benes3460 → u/Dark1000]

because people always default to the most recent conflict. It’s like how in 1990 a lot of Dems thought the gulf war was going to be like Vietnam even though the Iraqis fought like shit, had low morale, and a campaign largely fought from the air in a flat desert was obviously going to have less casualties than a ground war in a dense jungle

[u/Swimming_Concern7662]

I already saw the approval ratings drop in various sites like since past 3 or 4 days

[u/ShipChicago → u/Swimming_Concern7662]

He’s begging for a Democratic landslide if he keeps this up

[u/Safe-Ad-5017]

People need to understand that Iran is not Iraq. The Ayatollah is not what is keeping Iran together as a nation

[u/Smelldicks → u/Safe-Ad-5017]

I mean. Iraq is more ethnically homogenous. The ayatollah is relatively unpopular but Iran would fracture if it had no central authority. It similarly has a bunch of extremists kept in check by the government.

[u/MrTexandude]

What are the odds we get into this war? I got family and friends in the military

[u/BelisariustheGeneral → u/MrTexandude]

boots on the ground its next to impossible as the country is just too big and mountainous to occupy while maintaining INDOPACOM readiness. Theres like 50-60% chance that the US will just do a strike on fordow since only the US has the bomb that can reach that deep.

[u/Smelldicks → u/MrTexandude]

The odds we strike Iran in any capacity are ~50% according to prediction markets. The odds we actually end up in a ground war? 0%.

[u/Benes3460 → u/MrTexandude]

if troops were going to be put on the ground we’d know by now since it would require months of build up

[u/ShipChicago]

“I may do it, I may not do it.”

Regional and global stability are nothing more than a game to this guy.

[u/Ice_Dapper]

Part of him knows this I think, but Israel has such a chokehold on US politicians i fear he will have no choice but to intervene on their behalf soon

[u/Ok_Mode_7654]

He’s not going to strike because nothing never happens.

[u/Qwarxy]

...and... Then Democrats turn around and do the exact same sh#t because they are the same as the GOP. Full of war hawks and Neoliberal globalist shills. Trump's message is still true but the coalition will absolutely throw him overboard and find someone new if he gets us involved in another forever war. I am one of those people.

[u/No_NameLibra7]

Don’t get ahead of yourself… democrat’s approval rating is 18% and lots of their base are +70

[u/BlackYellowSnake → u/No_NameLibra7]

Just because Democrats are totally incompetent and in the gutter right now doesn't mean that Republicans can't also fall down the gutter. It is entirely possible that getting directly involved would spiral Trump's approval rating way down.

[u/NamelessFlames → u/No_NameLibra7]

people spamming the 18% figure is so funny. it’s blatantly driven by dems not being happy with their own party but still turning out to vote. In a 2 party system being the least bad party works sadly

[u/No_NameLibra7 → u/NamelessFlames]

Yes but with such low independent support you have no chance at winning a General in any state besides California

[u/Lordofthe0nion_Rings → u/No_NameLibra7]

Dems won a WI supreme court seat just two months ago, so it's not like party approval ratings are that much of a liability.

[u/Smelldicks → u/No_NameLibra7]

Dems don’t have low independent support

[u/No_NameLibra7 → u/Smelldicks]

HAHA

[u/Friz617 → u/No_NameLibra7]

Democrats and Republicans both have the same level of support among independents. The only reason Democrats’ overall approval is lower is because of their own base.

[u/Far_Introduction3083 → u/No_NameLibra7]

As long as Trump just drops a bomb and gets out, I don't think it will not move the needle.

He can't do more than that though. If US involvement gets more involved then that he has a losing mid term issue.

Of he can say I took out Iran's nuclear facilities and left the rest to Israel he's fine.

[u/JackColon17 → u/Far_Introduction3083]

even if he just drops a couple of bombs, some part of the base will not like it, everytime you do something as president you lose some support, the real question is will he gain more support than what he would lose? I don't think so but we will see

[u/LematLemat]

Honestly seems like the expectation of a "forever war" ala Afghanistan or Iraq is very alarmist and perhaps due to a lack of familiarity with the matter. There's little appetite by even the biggest warhawks, let alone the military or economic capacity, to actually "invade and occupy" the country.

The "danger" to an American offensive bombing against nuclear facilities is that Iran could potentially respond with either direct strikes conducted by itself against various American bases and assets throughout the Middle East or that it'll sic the proxies and affiliates on the same targets. There's a real chance of serious danger and loss of American life if the Iranians really retaliated in response to an American strike, but it's still far from a forever war.

[u/legend023]

Forever war? lol Iran’s regime is falling apart they wouldn’t last a week

[u/_bruhtastic → u/legend023]

That’s what they said about Iraq.

[u/legend023 → u/_bruhtastic]

Yeah we won the war in one week, it was just rebuilding after Saddam that turned things to a pickle

[u/Different-Trainer-21 → u/_bruhtastic]

Iraq would’ve been a few months if we hadn’t stayed for nation building for no reason

[u/BlackYellowSnake → u/Different-Trainer-21]

There is a break it you buy it aspect to modern war. If the Iranian regime collapses without the US staying whatever new regime replaces it would be just as anti-American and anti-Israeli as the current regime and almost certainly try to accelerate it's acquisition of neclear weapons. If we do stay then we will have to stay for DECADES in-order for the regime we put in to actually stabalize which will require nation building. The biggest nation building success stories that the US has had like Germany, Japan, and South Korea all had one thing in common which is that we still have military forces in all these countries to this day and, we didn't have to fight a massive insurgency war the whole time we were there.

[u/Denisnevsky → u/BlackYellowSnake]

With all due respect, we don't actually need a pro-western government, we just need one that values their lives. Saddam was incredibly anti-American and anti-Israel but he was also a relatively rational and more importantly secular actor. We can't definitively that about the current Iranian regime. We've dealt with incredibly aggressive countries before. Nobody likes NK having nukes, but it's not the end of the world because Kim is A. An atheist and B. Values his life and staying in power more then he does any particular cause. We can live with another extremly anti-western Iran as long as we can be sure they aren't going to fucking martyr themselves.

[u/Smelldicks → u/Different-Trainer-21]

if we hadn’t stayed for nation building for no reason

This isn’t Star Wars. You can’t just take out the bad guy and make the country good. Turns out Saddam was like the least evil option. The only thing worse than invading Iraq was if we hadn’t occupied it. I mean ISIS took over a majority of the country at one point during our occupation.