Ben Rhodes

Not the true social post, but the actual truth, which is that Donald Trump launched a war against

thinking that there would be quick and easy regime change.

None of that happened.

He killed thousands of people with this war.

He spent hundreds of billions of dollars.

He probably wiped out trillions of dollars in price increases.

You've got countries where people can't even access fuel.

He decimated what was left of our international relationship.

The rest of the world kind of looks at us warily like a rogue state that could knock anything over at any time.

And now he's trumpeting the fact that

He has reopened the very strait that was open before he launched the war.

And perhaps he will get Iran to ship out its highly enriched uranium stockpile.

And we can talk more about how that's not necessarily at all getting rid of their nuclear program.

And yet the regime is in place.

They have demonstrated their capacity to close the Strait of Hormuz, which gives them extraordinary deterrence and leverage going forward over the global economy.

And...

No suggestion that they're going to change their approach to supporting proxy groups across the region.

No indication that they're going to abandon a ballistic missile program.

I guess we sunk a bunch of Iranian ships and destroyed a bunch of ballistic missiles, but they can manufacture those.

So,