Opinion - Is Trump fleeing Armageddon?
Mark Toth and Jonathan Sweet, opinion contributors
Thu, May 28, 2026
President Trump is struggling to understand modern asymmetrical warfare. He keeps trying to define victory in Iran as the defeat of the country’s conventional navy, air force, and army, as if they were the only source of the regime’s power.
They are not, yet Trump keeps trying to prematurely declare victory on those terms. He did it again on Tuesday, with a word-for-word reposting of his May 18 rant on Truth Social slamming the media and his opponents for claiming Iran is winning its war against the U.S. and Israel.
Conventionally speaking, Iran is not winning. Nonetheless, Iran –– as it has for decades –– defines winning differently.
For 47 years, Iran has predicated its regional and global military defense by aggressively expanding its proxy armies, including Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and other Shia militias across the Middle East. These are designed to push the front lines of any future war with Israel or the U.S. away from Iran itself.
However, their primary purpose was always to protect the development of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, including its production of intermediate-range ballistic missiles –– and its pursuit of intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Now, under immense economic and political pressure at home, Trump is in danger of fleeing without resolving Iran’s nuclear Armageddon-in-the-making. Yes, he keeps denying that is the case, as when he said on Memorial Day that Iran “will never have a nuclear weapon.” But his negotiating tactics are beginning to suggest otherwise.
Initially, Trump said that all of his negotiating redlines stem from destroying Iran’s nuclear weapons program. That is what he claimed on March 15 aboard Air Force One, when he declared, “There were will be no nuclear weapons. That’s where it starts.”
Trump is now apparently willing to initially enter into a memorandum of understanding that starts with reopening the Strait of Hormuz, provides potential sanctions relief for Iran and leaves the nuclear issue unaddressed, save for some vague Iranian assurances that they will not pursue a nuke.
Iran, in that vein, has flipped Trump’s negotiating script. He appears to be in danger of falling for it. Up until Vice President JD Vance walked away from Islamabad on April 12, Washington had controlled the narrative. That is no longer the case. Iran, in the aftermath of Trump’s latest offer, is defining the narrative, at least within the media ecosphere.
Yesterday, Iranian state media claimed that the memorandum of understanding, before it takes effect, must be ratified into a binding agreement by the United Nations Security Council. Likewise, it stated that U.S. forces would have to pull back from Iran and that the regime, alongside Oman, would control maritime shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. The White House was forced to shoot this idea down, calling it a “complete fabrication.” But it is represents just one more example of how Iran is on offense and Team Trump is stuck on defense.
Nor, alarmingly, is Iran’s offense limited to media disinformation. Last week, Iran struck the Barakah Nuclear Power Plant in the United Arab Emirates. Tehran wasn’t just thumbing its nose at Trump — it was also messaging to Gulf allies of the U.S. that Trump cannot protect them as he chases an elusive peace deal.
Meanwhile, the U.S. is limiting itself to defensive military operations. On Tuesday, U.S. Central Command announced that it had destroyed four Iranian boats attempting to lay mines in the Strait of Hormuz. It also hit Iranian air defense systems in nearby Bandar Abbas that had threatened U.S. air assets.
Trump must recognize that he is being played by Iran. Its leaders are attempting to avoid further military action by asymmetrically creating new regional lines of defense.
Blockading the Strait of Hormuz was one way. Threatening its Gulf State neighbors, including irreplaceable water desalination plants, is another.
Demanding Israel stand down in Lebanon to protect Hezbollah –– the indispensable member of Iran’s Axis of Resistance –– is yet one more way that Iran is attempting to get Trump to abandon his efforts to end Tehran’s nuclear weapons program.
So too is Iran offering to down-blend its stockpiles of enriched uranium. The facilities needed to do that were likely destroyed by U.S. and Israeli strikes on Isfahan. If Trump agrees to this, Iran will simply run out the clock out until he leaves office.
Trump, if he is to truly defeat Iran and put a permanent end to its quest for nukes, must not prematurely exit the fight. Unless, and until, there is true regime change in Iran, that threat will never go away no matter what memorandum or peace deal Tehran may sign.
Plus, if Trump flees, he will create a strategic opening for China, which would effectively end or severely weaken U.S. hegemony in the Middle East. If that happens, Iran will become America’s greatest strategic defeat.
Mark Toth writes on national security and foreign policy. Col. (Ret.) Jonathan Sweet served 30 years as a military intelligence officer and led the U.S. European Command Intelligence Engagement Division from 2012 to 2014. They are the cofounders of INTREP360 and the INTREP360 Intelligence Report on Substack.
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