Politics
UChicago Terrorism Expert on Iran and Growing Concerns About Political Violence Within the US
On Day 1 of a ceasefire agreement between Iran and Israel that has already been violated, President Donald Trump vented his frustration with both countries. On his way to the NATO summit, Trump commented, “We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f--- they’re doing.”
This ceasefire comes a day after Iran launched an attack on a U.S. air base in Qatar — a retaliation to the U.S. bombing Iran’s nuclear sites. University of Chicago political scientist Robert Pape fears the U.S. attacks on Iran could further escalate the violence in the Middle East.
“We’ve seen a high-risk mission with very little benefit,” Pape said. “The ceasefire is an effort to dig us out of this hole. Once you start bombing, this is going to provoke a hornet’s nest of conflict.”
Pape doubts the U.S. airstrikes destroyed Iran’s nuclear stockpile or ended the nation’s nuclear ambitions.
A U.S. intelligence report found that Iran’s nuclear program has been set back only a few months after the U.S. strike and was not “completely and fully obliterated” as Trump has said, according to two people familiar with the early assessment.
The intelligence report issued by the Defense Intelligence Agency on Monday contradicts statements from Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about the status of Iran’s nuclear facilities. The people were not authorized to address the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
According to the people, the report found that while the Saturday strikes at the Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan nuclear sites did significant damage, they were not totally destroyed.
“There’s no evidence whatsoever we knocked out any nuclear material, any of the centrifuges,” Pape said. “We dug some holes, and that’s about it.”
Pape thinks Iran is unlikely to trust a negotiated ceasefire with Israel or the United States.
“It looks like Israel and the United States colluded and perhaps even colluded with Israel’s first strike on the Iranian nuclear program about two weeks ago,” Pape said. “The Israelis and Americans double-crossed the Iranians twice, lied directly to their face and have lost tremendous credibility.”
In addition to the violence in the Middle East, Pape worries that we’re on the brink of an extremely violent era in domestic American politics.
“This is not normal,” Pape said. “You have to go back to the 1960s to remember the chaos of anything like this before. And we’re just getting started with the summer season. We’re just getting started with protests. We’re now really teetering on the brink of some quite serious violence.”
Earlier this month, a gunman fatally shot former Democratic Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, in their home in the northern Minneapolis suburbs. Before that, authorities say, the suspect also shot and wounded another Democrat, Sen. John Hoffman, and his wife, Yvette, who lived a few miles away. Vance Boelter was charged in the case following what authorities have called the largest search in Minnesota history; he could face the death penalty.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
