Can We Now Admit That Trump Did the Right Thing in Iran?

Now that the dust has literally settled in Iran after Israeli and American bombers destroyed the country’s nuclear facilities, it’s safe to deem the mission a success.

As historian and scholar Victor Davis Hanson explains, there really wasn’t much that Iran’s leaders could do. It violated the terms of the deal which prohibited the development of a nuclear weapon, ignored all the warnings to stop, and finally saw all their work go up in smoke. No one would come to the mullahs’ aid because there is no reason to do so. These are backwards theocrats who have blown all their foreign aid and oil profits on funding terrorism and building a nuke. They are the bane of the world as well as their own people.

One way or another, they will need to go. According to Hanson in a more recent article, this will likely come in the form of a military coup or popular uprising since “the theocracy is left explaining the inexplicable to its humiliated military and shocked but soon-to-be-furious populace.” Of course, what’s important is that the Iranians themselves decide the matter, not the Israelis or Americans.

Although President Donald Trump alarmed people with a “politically incorrect” post on Truth Social, recommending a regime change that would Make Iran Great Again (MIGA), he has given no real indication that he would actually meddle in the country’s affairs. In all likelihood, he probably hopes for a small modicum of sanity in Iran so that he can build some resorts there after he finishes the ones he has planned in the Gaza strip.

Whatever the Iranians decide, Trump and his administration deserve an enormous amount of credit for handling a volatile situation with maximum effectiveness. The threat was neutralized, order was preserved, and the world is allowed to move on.

When the Right Is Wrong

However, it is also important to remember the critics who aggressively opposed this measure. Ironically, most of this came from the Right. These people vented their rage against Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu who, in their telling, recklessly launched an attack against innocent Iran for no good reason. They also accused Trump of betraying his supporters and of endangering the world, and they not-so-subtly implied that Israel’s leaders and lobbyists are running American foreign policy.

To be fair, some apprehension was justified. The U.S. and its allies have lost many lives and many billions of dollars in fruitlessly trying to pacify the Middle East. Moreover, they have seen what comes of regime change in these countries: failed states, civil wars, murderous despots, and more Muslim terrorism. If the Americans and Israelis decided to assassinate the Ayatollah, there seemed to be a high probability of a bloody civil war and the persecution of religious minorities. (Somehow in wars between Muslims, it’s always the Christians and Jews who suffer the most casualties.)

But these concerns always needed to be counterbalanced with the current reality. Iran has been funding terrorist groups (Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis) that have wreaked havoc in the neighboring countries, especially Israel. Additionally, the Iranian government was funding the development of a nuclear weapon for the sole purpose of better terrorizing its neighbors. Simply leaving them alone would have resulted in a massive geopolitical crisis.

It was apparent that Trump and Netanyahu needed to find a way to remove Iran’s nuclear capacity without destabilizing the country altogether. So, with the help of modern military technology and Top Gun tactics, they went ahead and ordered what was necessary to meet these parameters.

Even if Trump is denied the Nobel Peace Prize yet again, his critics should at least recognize this triumph. After all, it’s not a stretch to say that this was the hill that many of them eagerly chose to die on. They staked their credibility as serious commentators on the certain disaster that would befall everyone because of Operation Midnight Hammer, and they were wrong.

Perhaps it would be excessive to require these people to commit full-on seppuku, but they do need to eat some amount of crow because words matter. Not only were these critics wrong, but they sowed serious division between Americans and shamelessly fanned the flames of antisemitism. They ended up misinforming their audiences more often than they enlightened them and generally made the whole discussion ugly, spiteful, and personal.

Although some commentators could articulate their disagreement with Israel’s strike on Iran without resorting to a condemnation of the Jewish people, many others couldn’t contain themselves. Of course, they would say they don’t have anything against Jews per say; they just don’t think the October 7 attack was a big deal, that Iran and Hamas have legitimate grievances against the Jews, and that the Jewish state of Israel has no right to do what any other country would do in its position.

All Americans of goodwill should address this hypocrisy before it happens again. Like anyone else, they have a responsibility to learn from their mistakes, but they also need to learn from their successes. Considering Trump’s record, his cabinet, and America’s military capability, he should have enjoyed far more confidence in doing the right thing than he did. As Iranians recover from this event, Americans need to better support Trump going forward and start ignoring the misguided naysayers who got this story so wrong.

Auguste Meyrat is the founding editor of The Everyman, a senior contributor to The Federalist, and has written essays for Newsweek, The American Mind, The American Conservative, Religion and Liberty, Crisis Magazine, and elsewhere. Follow him on X and Substack.