“There is a rank due to the United States, among nations, which will be withheld, if not absolutely lost, by the reputation of weakness. If we desire to avoid insult, we must be able to repel it; if we desire to secure peace, one of the most powerful instruments of our rising prosperity, it must be known that we are at all times ready for war.” —George Washington (1793)

The endless loop of churn being spun on the “Iran Deal,” mostly by Democrats and their Leftmedia talkingheads and scribes, is much more consequential than just political disingenuity.

It’s deadly.

Donald Trump had one objective in launching a limited war with Iran. When he entered office in 2025 for a second term, he declared that Iran’s tenure as a rogue Islamist State was coming to an end, and its quest to build nuclear weapons would be crushed.

And he became the first American president to deliver on that promise since our “Cold War” with Iran started in 1979, after our peanut-farming President Jimmy Carter enabled the Iran hostage crisis.

I outlined the consequences of a nuclear-armed Iran in my recent column, “If You Thought 9/11 Was Bad, Consider an Islamic Bomb Detonation in the U.S..” Despite Iran previously having the immediate capability to develop and deploy a nuclear warhead deep into Europe, the threat to our homeland is not ballistic; it’s the detonation of a nuclear weapon transported to a major American harbor or city by one of several sea and air transport options.

Now, four months later, all the mainstream media’s armchair national security experts are questioning Trump’s “memorandum of understanding,” the pros and cons of which our Nate Jackson objectively outlined last week. This agreement is a nonbinding document to frame negotiations to end kinetic actions — a 60-day ceasefire to determine a path forward for rebuilding that nation of 90 million noncombatant Iranian men, women, and children.

Of this MOU, our analyst Jack DeVine asks, “Is it even possible to put in place a functional agreement with an untrustworthy opponent?” He concludes, “Yes, but very carefully, with eyes wide open and with Plan B at the ready.”

There is a not-so-old adage about warfare — an adage coined by former Secretary of State Colin Powell and now known as The Pottery Barn Rule: “You break it, you own it.” That was true with massive reconstruction efforts in Germany and Japan after World War II. And though not always a hard rule, it is true with Iran — if we are to win the hearts and minds of the Iranian people, more than 70% of whom are under age 35.

The substance of the agreement, now that Iran’s nuclear development programs have been decimated along with most of its offensive military capabilities, is to verifiably ensure, as the MOU notes, that Iran will “not procure or develop nuclear weapons” in the future.

As Trump made clear, “If they don’t behave, we’ll go right back to dropping bombs right smack in the middle of their head.” And nobody doubts he means that.

It is going to take a lot of capital to rebuild infrastructure, and among the things Trump is doing to entice the regime to behave is lifting a number of economically crippling sanctions against Iran. He is also proposing a $300 billion reconstruction and development fund underwritten by private investment from the U.S., Gulf Arab states, Asia, South America, and Africa — half of which has reportedly already been secured. Those funds will pass through a Treasury escrow account, meaning it will be subject to U.S. control of where and how it is allocated.

That notwithstanding, apparently, the breathless critics believe Trump, JD Vance, and all our military and intelligence leaders just fell off a turnip truck — and somehow failed to realize that three-dimensional chess negotiations with Iran would be complicated by the fact that Iran’s mullahs can’t be trusted.

The Trump administration knows the only way to herd these squirrels is through incremental steps. The optics are bad, but I think the process is not as bleak as the mainstream media and commentators project it to be. That being said, the administration can influence public opinion with clear messaging, but the MSM propagandists largely dictate the direction of public opinion. The good news is that public trust of the MSM is low.

Notably, among opinions that matter, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, speaking on behalf of his alliance, declared this week: “I think the president is doing exactly what is needed, degrading Iran’s nuclear capability. Could you imagine if Iran would get its hands on [a] nuclear weapon? This is an exporter of chaos. It is an exporter of terrorism. It would be devastating for the region. It would be devastating for the whole world. … He is right … to move to this deal. In essence, what it means is that Iran will not be able to develop this nuclear capability.”

The consequences of destroying Iran’s imminent development and deployment capabilities of nuclear weapons have had significant side effects in terms of the impact on global oil supply and, by extension, the global economy. It has also taken a toll on our military reserves.

But what was the alternative? Allow the perpetuation of Iran’s nuclear threat in order to keep gas prices low?

For context, let’s take a quick walk down history lane…

Not one of the last six presidents, other than Donald Trump, has been willing to confront Iran with regime-destabilizing kinetic action.

To be clear, Ronald Reagan did not have to take any action other than his oath of office to secure the release of American hostages taken by Iran under Jimmy Carter’s watch.

Until Trump, no president since Reagan could conjure up the political will to take on Ruhollah Khomeini, or his Shia cleric successor, the second Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Since Khamenei’s rise in 1989, Iran has been the perennial disruptor of Middle East peace as the region’s primary state sponsor of Islamic terror proxies, including Hamas and Hezbollah.

Reagan’s successor, George H.W. Bush, drew Middle Eastern lines in the sand, including the Desert Shield/Storm offensive to remove Saddam Hussein from Kuwait. But he did not have the resolve to go beyond the UN mandate and decapitate Saddam, leaving Iran’s status as a rogue Islamic regime intact.

Bush’s successor, Bill Clinton, was an appeaser of Islamists. He had several opportunities to capture or kill al-Qa'ida’s leader Osama bin Laden prior to the 9/11 Islamist attack on our nation, but he refused.

In response to that attack, George W. Bush launched Operation Enduring Freedom against Afghanistan, followed by Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. For the record, one in every six American combat fatalities in Iraq was killed by Iran-backed militias, just part of Iran’s targeting of Americans over the last four decades.

Bush 43’s successor, Barack Obama, became Khamenei’s great appeaser, codifying the Iran nuke deal in 2015 and effectively paving the way for Iran’s development of the Islamic Bomb.

Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) dropped this political BIG Lie again last week: “President Obama masterfully negotiated an agreement that prevented Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.” That has been endlessly echoed by Demo Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY).

In 2017, Trump took on Iran and largely held the line in defense of Israel. But Iran’s state-terror-sponsor status surged back in 2021, when the feckless appeasers Joe Biden and Kamala Harris took office.

The Biden/Harris regime white-flagged Islamic terror with its surrender and retreat from Afghanistan in August 2021, and they empowered the 2023 Hamas (read: Iranian) attack on Israel, leaving Israel to defend itself alone.

As noted previously, when Trump entered office in 2025 for a second term, he made clear that Iran’s quest to build nuclear weapons would be crushed.

In June 2025, as Israel endeavored to contain the threat from Hamas, confident of America’s support under Trump, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched Operation Rising Lion, a 12-day war against Iran to protect the civilized world from that rogue nation’s development of nuclear weapons. Eleven days later, President Trump launched Operation Midnight Hammer, destroying Iran’s deep-underground processed uranium and enrichment facilities to further incapacitate its construction of nuclear weapons.

In the eight months that followed Rising Lion and Midnight Hammer, Israel and the U.S. attempted to negotiate a peace settlement with Iran’s Khamenei and President/Dictator Masoud Pezeshkian, but to no avail.

What Khamenei and his brutal regime did do on January 8 and 9 is murder more than 35,000 mostly young protesters threatening their theocratic dictatorship.

In late February of this year, I was asked by a colleague, GEN B.B. Bell (USA Ret.), what I thought were Trump’s strategic and tactical options in Iran. I responded to Part A and Part B of his question with one word: “Decapitation.”

A day later, on 28 February, the U.S., in collaboration with Israel, launched Operation Epic Fury. I labeled it “Operation Epic Decapitation” because among the targeting objectives were Ali Khamenei and almost 50 of his key regime leaders.

Of the ayatollah’s demise, Trump said: “Khamenei, one of the most evil people in history, is dead.” That was followed by sustained air attacks on Iran to leave its nuclear capabilities in ruins, along with its military capabilities.

Now, moving forward, I have to ask: Does anyone with an IQ higher than their age actually believe that a deal to end hostilities with a bunch of mullahs and military tyrants running a rogue Islamist state was going to be squeaky clean?

Do they really believe that Iran’s current Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei’s lapdog, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, would not constantly refute the terms of negotiation?

Clearly, the Trump administration understood that the threat of Iran’s nuclear capability was imminent.

Clearly, the Trump administration understands that supporting the rise of a legitimate government from the ruins of a rogue regime will take years. And as with most of Trump’s strategic moves, this one is pragmatic.

But the Schumer/Jeffries clown show will dominate the messaging about the Iran MOU/deal, and at great peril to the national security of our nation.

Semper Vigilans Fortis Paratus et Fidelis
Pro Deo et Libertate — 1776

Follow Mark Alexander on X/Twitter.

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