DePetris’ Chicago Tribune commentary on Iran war stunning in its obfuscation of Trump’s unfolding criminal catastrophe

DePetris’ Chicago Tribune commentary on Iran war stunning in its obfuscation of Trump’s unfolding criminal catastrophe 

Chicago Tribune foreign affairs correspondent Daniel DePetris in Tuesday’s commentary “The war in Iran is beginning to grate on Donald Trump” tells Trib readers nothing of value on Trump’s criminal war on Iran. 

Iran, Israel and US bases in the region are being bombed night and day with missiles and drones. Over 1,500 are dead including 13 Americans. The Strait of Hormuz is shut down spiraling the world economy downward with no end in sight. The US may be on the cusp of being pushed out of the region because our Gulf State partners have lost all confidence America can protect them from its senseless war engulfing them. Also gone is help from any country America has called upon to prop up its failed regime change offensive. Worst of all, Trump is now a pariah worldwide for launching a criminal war, the supreme international crime. In a just world he’d be headed to the dock at The Hague.  

Yet DePetris spends over 900 words focusing on how Trump is both surprised and flummoxed by his utter failure to cruise to victory within 3 days. No mention how the war is essentially lost. No condemnation of the war being an international crime. Indeed, DePetris signals his tacit support for the war by helpfully repeating US propaganda touting the war’s successes. “According to the Pentagon, Iranian ballistic missile launches are down by 90%. Iranian drone attacks have been reduced even more. Approximately 100 Iranian vessels have been destroyed”. 

DePetris’ statement that “the war is not going according to plan” is a colossal understatement. But claiming “Inexplicably, the White House seemed caught off guard that Iran, with its leaders seeking sheer survival, would quickly escalate by taking shots at the Middle East’s oil infrastructure and clogging up the region’s key waterway” is nonsense. 

There was nothing inexplicable about the unfolding catastrophe Trump blundered into. Any independent, honest analyst would have predicted that. As Joe West, America’s top counter terrorism expert said in announcing his resignation: “I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby” Nothing inexplicable about Trump being “caught off guard” by his decision to invade that backfired spectacularly when the Israeli and American war promoters were the only ones in the room planning it. 

Chicago Tribune readers need and deserve thorough, reasoned analysis of the ongoing war on Iran. They will never get it from Daniel DePetris. 

Walt Zlotow  West Suburban Peace Coalition  Glen Ellyn