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I don't want to accuse Trump or his administration of having rational or intelligent decision-making processes, but it's hard to really have any productive thought or conversation about theit decisions if I just assume they are irrational or stupid. So bear with me as I try to make sense of something that might be senseless.
There have been a handful of odd discrepancies from the Trump administration piling up. Mueller, for all his flaws, did prove that a good chunk of Trump's campaign in 2016 had illegal ties to Russia and Putin. Even though Trump avoided direct consequences and pardoned some of them, they were still convicted and the ties to Putin are solid. Heck, there were ties between Trump and Russia going back to the 80's.
Musk also has ties to Russia and Putin. So it was not all that surprising to see Musk throw his full support behind Trump last summer and then do the whole DOGE thing. It was a bit odd to see someone so thoroughly tied to electric cars support someone so pro-fossil fuels, but I could see Musk deciding that defense contracts for SpaceX, Starlink, and other businesses might outweigh reduced EV subsidies for him.
Allegedly, Trump and Musk had a falling out. The back-and-forth on social media, Musk stepping back from DOGE, and later walking back some of his statements. Speculation as to whether that was real or not. Was it really over the spending bill? Was Musk really leaving DOGE? Was this all a ploy to manipulate the stock market and do some insider trading? Was this just Musk on drug-induced psychosis?
Then the tensions between Israel and Iran flare up again. Trump sides with Israel as the US traditionally has, Putin sides with Iran as Russia traditionally has. There was the recent Tucker Carlson interview of Ted Cruz, and we've seen some discord among the far-right over whether to support a US war against Iran or not. The US struck Iran and didn't appear to do a whole lot of damage, and Iran struck back in the most polite way possible and did pretty much no damage.
Other wonderful folks have dug up old Trump tweets from the Obama years, speculating that Obama was appearing weak and would strike Iran as a show of strength.
So was this all just political theater? Trump doesn't actually care whether Iran has nukes or not. He wants Trump to appear strong and willing to go to war. He wants to show his support for Israel and reaffirm America as the World Police.
So my guess is that Netanyahu keeps pushing what he can get away with. Allegedly, there was tension between Netenyahu and Biden over the line between counter-terrorist operations and genocide. Biden, the consummate centrist neoliberal, allowed the genocide as long as it didn't hurt businesses, but seemed to have been pressuring Netenyahu to keep restrictions on it. Trump abandoned those and Palestine seems to be suffering far more since he took office. Then you add the Israeli strikes on Iran on top of that- I don't think they had anything to do with new intelligence Israel received, just that Netenyahu felt he could get away with it while still maintaining US support from Trump, which he could not have done under Biden.
Where I start to really speculate- I don't think Trump cares about Iran. He doesn't care about of they have nukes or not, he doesn't care about Islam vs Judaism vs Christianity. He care about the media narratives, especially in the US. Same thing with the tarrifs- it was more about appearing powerful to his base than actually being powerful.
I think you're looking at this the correct way - these people are totally impulsive and incompetent, but they're not acting randomly
I think Trump genuinely wants to be peacemaker, he was advancing talks and holding back the MIC (who have wanted was with Iran for decades)
So he goes to camp David, and in a matter of hours "Iran can't have a nuke, they're close, they can't have it"
I don't know what they told him, but I think Trump's plan was to do a big bombing run, declare success, and force Israel to back off before working towards a peace deal
And yes, Trump just tweeted out a cease fire and expected it to work, but the US does have that much power over Israel's ability to wage war... He told Netanyahu to cut it the fuck out, and we'll see
The MIC wants this to go forward, they love supplying arms to Israel, but theoretically Trump could cut off arms shipments to them
But to be clear, this is not about the nuclear program itself one way or the other... It doesn't matter if the sites were destroyed or moved beforehand. Peace talks were ongoing, Iran wants back into the fold
What matters is if a peace deal can be reached, and I think Trump genuinely wants it. The money behind both Israel and the US definitely want war
We'll see who's in control
Trump's never given a flying fuck about anything other than Trump, and never will.
He is enough of a narcissistic idiot to believe he could achieve peace in the middle east by bombing Iran, though, not because he cares about peace but because he genuinely believed it would get him the Nobel peace price, which he needs because Obama of all people got one, and extremely narcissistic Trump's never gotten over Obama making fun of him at the 2011 White House Correspondents' dinner.
When both Israel and Iran immediately violated his unilateral ceasefire (to the surprise of no one but Trump) he saw his prospects for said Nobel price, which he already considered in his pocket, evaporate, which explains his tantrum.
I think it's more than just the peace prize
Think of how long making peace in the middle east has been this near impossible goal. It's even a trope in media to display super intelligence
He wanted his wall, not because he gave a shit, but he wanted a landmark. He wants the model Nobel peace prize, but he really wants to be remembered as this mythical deal maker, the peace president
And honestly? Aside from Gaza, for a little while it seemed like he was about to do it, through the power of open bribery and having a melty soup brain