Last
week,
before
the
United
States
started
bombing
Iran, I
speculated
about
whether
we
would
actually
drop
bombs
and,
if
so,
what
Iran’s
reaction
would
be.
I
must
admit,
I
never
even
considered
the
possibility
that
Donald
Trump’s
strategy
might
work: Drop
a
bunch
of
bunker
busters
in
a
single
bombing
run;
hope
that
Iran’s
response
would
be
insignificant;
proceed
from
there
to
a
ceasefire
and
a
peace
deal.
Ridiculous!
My
bad.
At
first
glance,
it
appears
as
though
Trump
has
pulled
off
a
near-miracle.
Hats
off
to
him.
Not
just
the
Nobel
Peace
Prize. Make
the
man
a
saint.
Thomas
Babington Macaulay
wrote of
James
Boswell
(Samuel
Johnson’s
biographer)
that
Boswell
was:
Servile
and
impertinent,
shallow
and
pedantic,
a
bigot
and
a
sot,
bloated
with
family
pride,
and
eternally
blustering
about
the
dignity
of
a
born
gentleman,
yet
stooping
to
be
a
talebearer,
an
eavesdropper,
a
common
butt
in
the
taverns
of
London
…
.
And
Macaulay
was
just
getting
warmed
up. But Macaulay
concluded:
Homer
is
not
more
decidedly
the
first
of
heroic
poets,
Shakespeare
is
not
more
decidedly
the
first
of
dramatists,
Demosthenes
is
not
more
decidedly
the
first
of
orators,
than
Boswell
is
the
first
of
biographers.
He
has
no
second.
He
has
distanced
all
his
competitors
so
decidedly
that
it
is
not
worth
while
to
place
them.
Eclipse
is
first,
and
the
rest
nowhere.
I
was
thinking
the
same
about
Trump: He’s
a
narcissist
and
a
sociopath. He’s
a
felon
and
a
rapist
(as
that
word
is
commonly
understood). He’s
an
insurrectionist
and
a
fraud. He’s
a
liar
and
a
blowhard. And
he’s
an
asshole.
But
maybe
the
bastard
really
does
deserve
the
Nobel
Peace
Prize. He’s
eliminated
the
threat
of
a
nuclear
Iran,
ended
the
war
between
Iran
and
Israel,
and
brought
Iran
back
to
the
negotiating
table.
That
annoyed
me
no
end
—
he’s
such
a
jerk!
—
but
I
briefly
believed
it.
Then
I
thought
harder.
Iran
can
still
retaliate
against
the
United
States. Iran
could
still
counterattack
against
the
U.S.
in
a
way
that
reveals
Iran’s
involvement
in
the
counterattack
—
for
example,
firing
missiles
directly
from
Iran
or
launching
cyberattacks
easily
traceable
to
the
country.
If
I
were
Iran,
I
wouldn’t
do
that. It
feels
too
much
like
national
suicide.
But
Iran
could
also
attack
in
ways
that
maintain
Iran’s
plausible
deniability. Iran
could
ask
the
Houthis
to
attack
international
shipping
in
the
Red
Sea,
and
Iran
could
deny
that
it
had
anything
to
do
with
the
attacks. Or
a
“lone
wolf”
terrorist
could
bomb
a
shopping
mall
in
the
United
States
or
a
U.S.
embassy
overseas,
and
Iran
could
claim
to
be
shocked
—
shocked!
—
to
learn
of
the
attack.
So
maybe
—
maybe
—
Iran
can
still
retaliate
and
get
away
with
it.
But
Iran
is
very
likely
to
respond
in
another
way.
Iran
almost
surely
moved
some
of
its
enriched
uranium
out
of
the
locations
that
the
U.S.
bombed. Given
the
number
of
times
Trump
threatened
to
bomb
those
locations,
Iran
would
have
been
silly
not
to
act. And
Iran
did
have
trucks
pull
up
to
at
least
one
of
those
locations
before
the
bombing
occurred. Whether
the
U.S.
“obliterated”
the
three
locations
or
merely
“severely
damaged”
them,
Iran
still
possesses
both
enriched
uranium
and
the
know-how
needed
to
build
a
nuke.
Will
Iran
now
negotiate
away
its
capacity
to
construct
that
weapon?
Inconceivable.
Iran
knows
(as
I
would
know,
if
I
were
in
Iran’s
shoes)
that
the
United
States
can’t
be
trusted. Obama
negotiated
a
nonbinding
political
commitment
with
Iran
meant
to
keep
the
peace
—
the
Iran
nuclear
deal. In
2018,
Trump
withdrew
the
United
States
from
that
deal. Trump
was
within
his
legal
rights
to
withdraw
from
the
agreement,
but,
if
you
were
Iran,
would
you
negotiate
with
the
U.S.
again
in
the
future?
Also,
a sixth
round of
negotiations
between
the
U.S.
and
Iran
was
scheduled
to
take
place
on
June
15
but
was
cancelled
when
Israel
attacked
Iran
on
June
13. Moreover,
on
the
afternoon
of
June
19,
the
White
House
press
secretary
read
a
message
that
she
said
came
“directly
from
the
president.” Trump
said
that
he
would
make
a
decision
about
whether
to
strike
Iran
“within
the
next
two
weeks.” Two
days
later,
on
June
21,
the
bombs
were
falling.
Like
the
decision
to
withdraw
from
the
Iran
nuclear
deal,
these
words
may
have
been
technically
accurate. But
they
were
plainly
intended
to
deceive
Iran
into
thinking
that
attacks
were
not
imminent. If
you
were
Iran,
would
you
now
trust
anything
the
United
States
said
about
its
intentions?
I
wouldn’t,
and
I’m
on
our
side.
So,
if
Iran
is
thinking
—
and
it
surely
is
—
it
will
secretly
develop
a
bomb.
Iran
can’t
trust
the
U.S. As
North
Korea’s
experience
shows,
Iran
will
be
essentially
protected
against
an
American
attack
once
it
possesses
a
bomb. So
Iran
should
start
building.
There’s
a
chance
that
Iran
wouldn’t
get
caught
secretly
building
the
bomb. And
if
Iran
did
get
caught,
would
the
consequences
be
any
worse
than
Iran’s
current
state? The
United
States
isn’t
going
to
put
boots
on
the
ground
in
Iran. The
worst
consequence
of
being
caught
in
deception
is
to
suffer
a
few
more
bombs. Iran
might
not
even
suffer
that
fate,
because
Trump
is
now
insisting
that
he
obliterated
Iran’s
nuclear
sites;
it’s
one
and
done. What
would
be
Trump’s
excuse
for
bombing
a
second
time
after
the
first
raid
had
been
so
successful?
What
do
you
suppose
Iran
will
do?
From
my
own
personal
perspective,
I
hope
that
if
Iran
secretly
builds
a
bomb,
that
project
comes
to
fruition
while
Trump
is
still
in
office. It’s
only
right
that
Trump,
and
not
his
successor,
should
have
to
deal
with
the
aftermath
of
the
bombs
that
Trump
ordered
to
be
dropped.
In
any
event,
it’s
a
little
premature
to
be
thinking
of
awarding
Trump
the
Nobel
Peace
Prize.
But
on
all
other
scores,
I
was
right: Trump
is
indeed
a
narcissist
and
a
sociopath,
a
felon
and
a
rapist,
and
all
the
rest.
Mark Herrmann spent
17
years
as
a
partner
at
a
leading
international
law
firm
and
later
oversaw
litigation,
compliance
and
employment
matters
at
a
large
international
company.
He
is
the
author
of The
Curmudgeon’s
Guide
to
Practicing
Law and Drug
and
Device
Product
Liability
Litigation
Strategy (affiliate
links).
You
can
reach
him
by
email
at [email protected].