Going Kinetic

We have to recognize that there are those in the world that wish to do us harm. The Obama foreign policy of weakness and apology was a disaster.

The misapplication of strength can also lead to disaster. We are seeing a perfect example of that right now. Iranian-backed forces killed an American. We retaliated and killed twenty-five of them. Protestors took over part of our embassy in Iraq and we booted them out.

That should have been the end of it. Instead, we launched a kinetic (euphemism for assassination) attack against General Soleimani. He was a top general who reported directly to the Supreme Leader. He had been mentioned as a presidential candidate.

There seem to be two justifications. The first is that he is a bad actor. That is without dispute. Apparently anytime an American is killed, we are entitled to kill everyone up the chain of command. The second reason is that there was an imminent attack. How is killing the equivalent of the head of the Joint Chiefs or Secretary of Defense going to help avert an attack.

This accomplished nothing. His replacement is already on the job. We have made a martyr out of Soleimani.

To make matters worse, we did it in Iraq. We now have lost whatever influence we had. It is possible that Iraq will turn into Iran 2.0.
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We need to respond to any provocation. It should be proportional. Apparently, President Trump believe in a disproportional action that will escalate the situation.
An Iranian general is dead. Who knows how many Americans will die before this is over?