‘Of course there’s going to be retaliation,’ says one expert. ‘It may be that this is what Trump’s interested in’
For decades, the US and its allies have painted Iran as the world’s biggest sponsor of state terrorism – invoking its Islamic rulers’ supposed revolutionary fanaticism and determined support for militant proxies.
Now a long-standing but mainly latent threat is coalescing, with the war waged on the country by the US and Israel, to raise the risk of an attack on American soil to levels unseen since the murderous al-Qaida assaults of 11 September 2001, experts say.
In an election year, opponents of Donald Trump are warning that such an event could rebound to his advantage – providing him with a pretext to crack down on critics by declaring a state of emergency or even cancelling November’s congressional midterm elections.
Two attacks on Thursday alone illustrated the heightened dangers.
You’re still assuming that legality means anything to them. So far, they have been trying to maintain a fig leaf of legitimacy, but that could change at any point. If the military obeys Trump’s illegal orders, he can override or ignore any law, up to and including the Constitution. Laws only have meaning if they are enforced. That has not been happening for a while now.
Trump has the capability to send troops to seize state capitals, or to bomb them, or to arrest state governors and legislators. We all hope he won’t, but what is going to prevent it if he tries?
The thing we don’t know though is how the general public would react to these types of actions.
The general public is still largely unaware of most of what has been happening, and they still believe they live in a democracy and will continue to do so until they can’t vote in mid terms. That will be the first major wake up call for a huge percentage of Americans and we will see what happens if the regime does take that action.
I fear it’ll be too late then
I agree. If that happens, things will change, but there’s no telling in what way. All I can do is cross my fingers and make sure the filters in my painting mask are current.