President Donald Trump’s intransigence on Iran should not be underestimated.
From the beginning, his approach followed a clear sequence: strike, weaken, test, and enforce. American power changed the balance of force. Diplomacy then tested whether what remained of the Iranian regime could recognize reality and choose restraint. Tehran answered with escalation. Enforcement became unavoidable.
Trump weakened Iran’s military confidence and damaged key elements of its nuclear and strategic infrastructure. Then he gave the remnants of the regime a final chance: step back, accept restraint, and choose coexistence over confrontation. Iran failed that test.
The resumption of American strikes against Iranian military targets is not a contradiction of diplomacy. It is the consequence of diplomacy being betrayed.
Several weeks ago, I argued that President Trump’s opening to Tehran should be understood neither as naïveté nor as surrender. It was a test. It was designed to determine whether a weakened regime still had enough strategic sense to stop before destroying itself.
The answer is now clear.
The regime did not moderate. It did not reassure its neighbors. It did not abandon its hostility toward Israel. It did not choose prosperity for the Iranian people. It returned to its usual methods: missiles, drones, threats, blackmail, and violence. Trump did not abandon diplomacy. Iran destroyed it.
Iran’s renewed aggression in the Gulf is part of the same strategic pattern: pressure the Gulf, threaten Israel, intimidate international trade, and test American resolve. United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Kuwait have faced direct attacks, but the entire Gulf remains under Iranian threat.
In such moments, leadership matters. Some leaders have responded with clarity, courage, and dignity. The United Arab Emirates has shown that firmness and composure can go together. Others continue to rely on ambiguity, hoping that caution will protect them from a regime that respects only strength. That illusion has failed many times before.
The regime was offered a way out. It chose escalation.
The Strait of Hormuz now makes this a matter far beyond the Gulf. Protecting Gulf states, freedom of navigation, and international trade cannot be left to the United States alone. These are European interests. They are NATO interests. They are the interests of every economy that depends on the movement of energy, goods, and commerce through one of the world’s most important waterways.
Europe and NATO must maintain a serious military presence alongside the United States to secure the Gulf and protect maritime trade. When Iran threatens Hormuz, it threatens Washington, Jerusalem, Manama, Abu Dhabi, Kuwait City, Riyadh, Doha, and Muscat. It also threatens Paris, Berlin, Rome, London, and every capital that depends on global commerce. Maritime security is a collective responsibility.
The question of the Iranian regime itself is different. That has now become a matter of American national security.
A dictatorial regime that publicly tolerates calls for the assassination of the President of the United States cannot be treated as just another difficult adversary. A red line has been crossed. No dictator, militia leader, or revolutionary movement should believe that threatening an American president and his family can be dismissed as propaganda or answered with another warning. This is deterrence.
The United States must send a clear message to every dictatorship watching: America may negotiate. America may show restraint. America may offer a path away from confrontation. But if a regime mistakes restraint for weakness, attacks American allies, threatens global trade, and incites violence against the President of the United States, it will face consequences beyond temporary strikes.
That is why the objective cannot be another pause before the next crisis. It cannot be another memorandum, another negotiation, or another diplomatic photo that allows Tehran to regroup. The objective must be to ensure that this regime can no longer threaten Israel, the Gulf, Europe, or the United States with impunity.
President Trump understood this. He used force. He opened a diplomatic door. He waited to see whether Iran’s remaining leadership had the judgment to step back. They did not.
The survival of this regime, in its current form, is incompatible with regional peace, nuclear restraint, freedom of navigation, Israel’s security, Gulf stability, and American interests. A political transition in Iran is no longer a radical idea. It is the most reasonable strategic outcome.
This does not require occupation. It does not require nation-building. It does not require repeating past mistakes. It requires pressure, clarity, and political will.
The United States has options. It can continue to degrade the regime’s military capabilities. It can isolate the Revolutionary Guard. It can intensify pressure on the financial networks that sustain repression and proxy warfare. It can support the Iranian people’s access to information. It can work with allies to protect Gulf states from missile and drone attacks. And it can make clear that threats against American leaders and their families will be treated as acts of strategic hostility, not slogans.
Trump gave Tehran a chance. Tehran failed. Now he must finish what he began.
President Trump broke that psychological barrier. He proved that American power can be used directly against the regime’s military machine when American interests and allies are threatened.
That achievement should not be wasted.
This is now about the security of the United States, the safety of its allies, the protection of global trade, and the credibility of American deterrence. Every dictatorship is watching. If Iran can threaten an American president, attack American partners, endanger international trade, and survive with limited consequences, others will draw the wrong lesson.
President Trump has reached a defining moment. He can be remembered as the leader who temporarily contained Iran, or as the president who broke the regime’s ability to threaten the region and America itself.
He has already shown the courage to begin. Now he must show the resolve to finish.
