of dollars to the Pentagon budget, and the pudgy old chicken hawk lionized war criminals. Up until now, however, Trump shrewdly calculated that his base was tired of wasting blood and treasure on fruitless Middle Eastern wars, and he avoided taking more than symbolic steps. He dropped a big missile on Afghanistan once, and fired some Tomahawk Cruise missiles at Syria. But he drew back from the brink of more extensive military engagements.

Now, by murdering Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Jerusalem (Qods) Brigade of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, Trump has brought the United States to the brink of war with Iran. Mind you, Iran’s leadership is too shrewd to rush to the battlements at this moment, and will be prepared to play the long game. Myin return for it mothballing 80% of its civilian nuclear enrichment program. That agreement could have formed the basis for reintegrating Iran into the world system and greatly reduced the tensions in the region for a generation.

Although Iran was certified by UN inspectors as abiding by the accord as long as it was in effect, Trump abruptly trashed the agreement. He then not only put the severest economic sanctions on Iran that have ever been applied to any country in peacetime, he went around the world twisting the arms of South Korea, Japan, India, and even China, pressuring them not to buy Iranian oil. There is no UN Security Council resolution imposing economic sanctions on Iran, so this is a rogue unilateral blockade imposed by Trump alone. It