By Abe Greenwald
Tuesday, May 13, 2025
Donald Trump kicked off his Middle East trip today with a
speech at an investment forum in Riyad. On X, I saw a lot of people claim that
he gave Iran a particularly stern warning about its nuclear program. That’s not
really what I heard. In fact, Trump reserved his harshest words for
Americans—namely neoconservatives.
First, on Iran. Yes, he called regime “the biggest and
most destructive” of the “few agents of chaos and terror that are left” in the
region. But that was preface to this: "I'm here today not merely to
condemn the past chaos of Iran’s leaders, but to offer them a new path and a
much better path toward a far better and more hopeful future." If Iran
won’t take up his offer, in the form of a new nuclear deal, he said the U.S.
would assert “massive maximum pressure” on the regime. Maximum pressure was the
name the of the first Trump administration’s economic campaign against
Iran. Don’t get me wrong—it was a very good policy. But it’s about sanctions,
not a military attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
Trump described the neocons as deluded and failed “nation
builders” who “wrecked far more nations than they built.” To be clear: Neocons
supported the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan—to prevent terrorists from attacking
the U.S. again after 9/11. That both countries were wildly better off after the
American-led coalition toppled their leaders was a bonus. Iraqis were freed
from the clutches of one of the worst mass murderers on the planet, and their
per-capita income doubled in the years following the invasion. And the Afghans
who were clinging to American planes as we stupidly left didn’t seem eager to
get back to the good, old, prewar days.
The strange thing about the administration’s fixation on
neocons is that neocons, for the most part, aren’t obsessively opposed to the
administration; they like some things it’s doing and don’t like others. Former
neocons are vehemently opposed to Trump, but they became neoprogessives almost
a decade ago.
In Trump’s court, you’re worshipful or you’re an enemy.
So he attacks neocons for foolishly believing that dismal, anti-Western
countries could, with American help, blossom into democracies. Meanwhile, in
the same speech, he announced that he’ll be lifting sanctions on Syria, which
is currently led by Ahmed al-Sharaa—a former member of al-Qaeda in Iraq and
still a U.S.-designated terrorist. Why is he doing this? Because, in Trump’s
words, Syria needs “a chance at greatness.” I’d say Trump is pretty foolish to
believe in that prospect, but I doubt he’s being honest about his reasons.
Al-Sharaa recently proposed erecting a Trump Tower in
Damascus, and Trump said he will be meeting with him tomorrow. So add Sharaa to the list of terrorists who
are successfully courting the American president—and, therefore, Washington.
That list also includes Hamas, the rulers of Qatar, and the mullahs in Iran.
Which raises a final, important inaccuracy in Trump’s
speech. There are more than a “few agents of chaos and terror that are left” in
the Middle East. And Trump seems to be cozying up to all of them.
Is there any doubt that if Joe Biden didn’t pull the U.S.
out of Afghanistan, Trump would now host the Taliban at Camp David, as he
proposed (but scuttled) during his first presidency?
If they offer to build a Trump Tower in Kabul, he might
do it yet.
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