There are few situations more real than the one in which an at-the-time-of-writing unnamed US weapons system officer found himself in over the last 48 hours. His F-15E had been shot down over Iran, and he and the plane’s pilot had been forced to eject over enemy territory.
The injured man was forced to hide while the US military ran an enormous search and rescue operation against the clock, trying to deny Iran a hostage and a huge propaganda victory all at once. Thankfully for the injured man, they were successful – shortly after midnight US time on Sunday, Donald Trump posted on social media: “WE GOT HIM!”
That the rescue was successful – and that it hasn’t, according to early reports, involved further US casualties – was also an awfully lucky break for the President himself. He has embroiled the US in exactly the kind of sprawling overseas conflict which Maga was supposed to be a reaction against, and he seems to have no more idea of how to end it as any of his predecessors did theirs.
The very fact an F-15 was shot down over Iran on Friday was itself an embarrassment for Trump. The last time an F-15 was lost to enemy action was during the first Gulf War, in 1991. During the entire war on terror, the US occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, and the other military operations on which they flew, not a single F-15 was lost to enemy action. Trump’s Iranian operation lost three to Kuwaiti friendly fire, and then one to Iran.
That the loss of the F-15 came less than two days after Trump’s primetime address in which he declared he had “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear programme and “annihilated” its military. Trump is a president who is fond of ignoring reality in favour of whatever story he would like to tell.
Wars have a grim way of bringing that kind of delusional rhetoric down to earth. Losing an airman, rather than just a plane, could have risked catastrophic military escalation, if a ground rescue would have been attempted from a defended facility – or else it could risk significant political blowback for Trump himself.
Trump famously called Senator John McCain – who was shot down flying a plane during the Vietnam War, and was then kept as a prisoner of war for five-and-a-half years – a “loser” rather than a war hero, saying, “I like people who weren’t captured”. Amid the relentless bombardment of insults from Trump, this one was long forgotten, but had an American serviceman been captured in a war Trump began, they would have been sure to be aired often, and publicly.
Some presidents would take the opportunity of a near-miss such as this one to pause, and reflect, perhaps even to think of a way out of the situation into which he had got himself. Unsurprisingly, this one has done nothing of the sort. Trump keeps trying his usual playbook with the Iran conflict, and seems surprised when it doesn’t work.
Trump or his top officials have claimed on multiple occasions that Iran has undergone regime change, but its president hasn’t changed, and the new ayatollah is the hardline son of the old one. The regime may have lost many of its leaders and much of its military hardware, but its hold on Iran hasn’t weakened – and it’s still able to taunt Trump through the media. Trump tries to claim victory, but cannot resist turning round and issuing fresh threats afterwards. His reality distortion field doesn’t seem to extend as far as Iran.
By the lunchtime of Easter Sunday, Trump had issued his most bizarre public threats yet. “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran,” he wrote on Truth Social. “There will be nothing like it!!! Open the F**kin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah. President DONALD J. TRUMP”
Trump’s strategy here is as bizarre as his message – with its gratuitous reference to Allah – is offensive. Iran’s regime has no love for its people: just weeks ago it was gunning down peaceful protesters in the streets. Trump has claimed one of the aims of his war is to help Iran’s people rise up. Bombarding civilian infrastructure would not just be a war crime, it would also be utterly counterproductive to such an aim. Doing so while appearing to mock their religion is simple idiocy.
The problem for America is that Trump is a fundamentally unserious President who has blundered his way into an incredibly high-risk conflict whose implications he doesn’t even begin to grasp. America cannot lose militarily to Iran, but it can easily lose a propaganda war, and the US and its allies cannot shrug off the economic consequences of Trump’s decisions for much longer.
There are at most a few weeks left until the real consequences of the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz kick in around the world. The price spikes we have seen to date are nothing compared with what will come if traffic doesn’t return to normal levels soon. Reserves of oil, gas and hydrocarbons could run out. Rationing will have to begin. The cost of flying will skyrocket, and flights will be cancelled. Farmers will be unable to fertilise their fields.
And even if most of that happens thousands of miles away from the US, the consequences on world markets will be impossible to ignore. Trump cannot get lucky every time. The longer the Iranian conflict continues, the closer he will come to political disaster. Eventually, someone will be captured, or Iran will manage a spectacular strike.
Even if that is delayed, the economic consequences of the war will be even harder to dodge. There is no distraction tactic, meme, or culture war issue that can get Trump out of that one. If Teflon don is to survive, he needs this war to end, and fast. Donald Trump’s luck cannot last for ever.
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