Trump's big gamble

The US president's attack on Iran, just days into his Board of Peace era, had no mandate or legal basis

- By Julian Borger

THE FIRST WAR OF DONALD TRUMP'S BOARD OF PEACE era has begun an unprovoked attempt at regime change in collaboration with Israel, with no legal foundation, launched in the midst of diplomatic efforts to avert conflict and with minimal consultation with Congress or the American public.

Trump's recorded eight-minute address after the first bombs had fallen made clear this would be no limited strike aimed at cajoling Tehran into concessions at the negotiating table.

He warned that if Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) did not surrender they would be killed and the country's armed forces would be smashed.

The way would then be open for the Iranian opposition and ethnic minorities to rise up and bring the regime down.

"It's time for all the people of Iran Persians, Kurds, Azeris, Balochis and Akhvakhs - to shed from themselves the burden of tyranny and bring forth a free and peace-seeking Iran," Trump said.

There are no Akhvakhs in Iran.

They are a small minority in Dagestan, and it is unclear how they were included in Trump's list.

Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said his country had joined the attack "to remove the existential threat posed by the terrorist regime in Iran".

The maximalist aims of the joint attack cast doubt on whether there had ever been any prospect of success for the US-Iranian negotiations in the preceding weeks in which delegates discussed possible limits on uranium enrichment.

Those talks, the latest round of which was held last Thursday, had been conducted under the shadow of what Trump called his "beautiful armada" gathering in the Middle East, the biggest US force in the region since the illfated 2003 invasion of Iraq, and it now seems that only a complete capitulation on Iran's part could have stopped this assembled American might being unleashed.