Trump seals his President Badass cred and makes US foes think twice

The word “badass” was bandied about a lot after the first assassination attempt on Donald Trump last year.Famously, the bloodied Republican candidate raised his fist in defiance.In a different context, the same pungent word applies to his 2 a.m.strike on Iranian nuclear facilities.Trump the TV star has a knack for the theatrical and grand gesture.That obviously matters in domestic politics, but in international affairs, too, where projecting strength and command are just as important.We don’t know where the war heads from here, and need to learn more about the damage that was inflicted.Still, it was an operation with a distinct and very useful element of Trump badassery.It’s not that Trump always follows through on his threats: He doesn’t, with his on-and-off “liberation day” tariffs an ongoing example of backing off and recalibrating.But when he makes good on a threat, it leaves a mark.He’s said how foreign adversaries in his first term didn’t always believe his threats 100%; they might believe him some percentage less than that, but it’d still be enough to make them wonder.After this, whatever that number is just went up another 30% or so.Trump’s signature military operations haven’t been particularly complex: smashing ISIS, killing Iraqi Gen.

Qassem Soleimani, bombing Fordow and other Iranian nuclear facilities.They haven’t required mustering big international coalitions or launching, say, amphibious landings.But they achieve an outsized effect, thanks to the stark terms in which they are promised (e.g., bombing “the s–t” out of ISIS), or the sheer audacity of the operation.Killing Soleimani was a very limited action, but one that was shocking all the same.Bombing Fordow and the other sites was also quite focused, but the operation came as a strategic thunderclap.One way to put it is that the “shock and awe” bombing campaign before the second Iraq war was much less awesome than advertised, and a prelude to a grinding, drawn-ou...