More than half of those Americans who supported Donald Trump for president in 2024 don’t think the U.S. military should get involved in the conflict between Iran and Israel.
A new The Economist/YouGov poll conducted on June 13-16 found that 53% of Trump voters said the U.S. should not join the war, versus just 19% who said the U.S. military should. Sixty percent of all Americans surveyed agreed that the U.S. should not get involved.
The poll also found that 63 percent of Trump voters said the U.S. should “engage in negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program” while just 18% said the U.S. should not (in total, 56% said the U.S. should talk to Iran).
That result mirrors other recent polling on negotiations with Iran which found that Republicans support talks and comes amid an increasingly bitter battle between those pushing for war with Iran and Trump’s most loyal supporters — including MAGA stars like Steve Bannon and Tucker Carlson — who are furious that the president didn’t stop Israel from launching its attack on Iran last week and is apparently considering U.S. military involvement.
Ben Armbruster is the Managing Editor of Responsible Statecraft. He has more than a decade of experience working at the intersection of politics, foreign policy, and media. Ben previously held senior editorial and management positions at Media Matters, ThinkProgress, ReThink Media, and Win Without War.
To a considerable degree, President Donald Trump won the presidency in 2024 because voters embraced his message of keeping America out of protracted conflicts and his promise to end the war in Ukraine.
The administration has made substantial operational headway, particularly in reopening stable channels for dialogue with Russia, but it has proven difficult to arrive at a framework for a negotiated settlement that enjoys buy-in from all the stakeholders — Ukraine, Russia, and Europe.
A sharp diversion of American resources and attention to the Middle-East threatens to make the goal of facilitating a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine more evasive still.
The Israel-Iran war stimulated an effusion of speculation, most of it unfounded, around Russia’s supposed interests in aiding its “ally” Iran. In point of fact, there is no tangible sense in which Russia is militarily allied to Iran. One has merely to read the text of the Russia-Iran Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, signed in January 2025, to discover that the parties’ only concrete security obligation toward one another if either one comes under attack is to “not provide any military or other assistance to the aggressor which would contribute to the continued aggression.”
Moscow's relationship with Tehran, though it is more than simply friendly and does reach quite far in the fields of economic and political cooperation, is part of a larger portfolio of Middle-Eastern interests that includes maintaining constructive relations with Israel and the Arab states. The idea that Russia had the slightest intention of allowing itself to be drawn into a military confrontation with Israel over Iran was based purely on the ideological framing, popular among certain subsets of the transatlantic foreign policy community but with little connection to reality, that Moscow is duty-bound to support Tehran by dint of shared autocratic affiliation.
No less wrongheaded is the notion that U.S. strikes against three Iranian nuclear facilities sent a “message” to Russia about American resolve, as it’s unclear what that message was supposed to be.
When it comes to potential aggression against NATO countries, there is no indication that the Kremlin doubted or wanted to test the deterrent credibility of American commitment to the alliance’s Article 5 collective defense provisions prior to the American bombing runs. On the issue of Ukraine, the U.S. has repeatedly demonstrated even under a previous administration which was vastly more invested in Kyiv’s victory that it will not fight Russia over Ukraine. It is neither credible nor advisable, considering White House officials’ consistent skepticism of the idea that core U.S. interests are on the line in Ukraine and their desire to deescalate tensions with Russia, to maintain any degree of strategic ambiguity on the prospect of entering direct hostilities with Russia.
Moreover,, the Iranian strikes were conducted in the context of American and Israeli escalation dominance, which made it possible for the U.S. to seize the diplomatic initiative and steer the conflict to its termination with a ceasefire between Israel and Iran after twelve days.
No such conditions exist between Russia and Ukraine, where it is Moscow that maintains the battlefield initiative and holds the capacity to intensify or de-escalate the war as it sees fit.
Yet the linkage between Russia and Iran is significant in other ways. One can easily see how Kremlin officials would fall upon the belief that the White House knew about Israel’s decision to attack Iran and used previous rounds of nuclear talks with Tehran to lull Iranian leadership into a false sense of security. This perception, if left unaddressed, can run a red pen through the work the administration has done to build bilateral trust with Russia and present itself as a good faith negotiator.
The best way to dispel this lingering sense of unease is to make an effort to reengage Iran in substantive negotiations. To the extent that Russia shares and is in a position to contribute to the U.S. goal of achieving a peaceful framework for an Iran without nuclear weapons, the administration should consider taking Putin up on his offer to support the Iran talks.
Russia is already deeply engaged in the region, reportedly including through secret negotiations with Israel over Iran and Syria. Leveraging the Moscow-Tehran-Jerusalem triangle as a vector for reviving the Iran nuclear talks not only advances American interests in the Middle-East but, insofar it establishes larger U.S.-Russia linkages, can generate positive diplomatic momentum toward a negotiated settlement over Ukraine.
The Iran-Israel war has also accentuated the hard limits of U.S. ability to sustain, whether directly or indirectly, multiple high-intensity conflicts.
Previously apportioned U.S. aid packages to Ukraine were slated to run their course by the end of summer. The Pentagon’s reported decision to terminate them prematurely evinces the stark tradeoffs, all too often lost on neoconservative observers, that the U.S. faces in funding foreign war efforts across the world while maintaining its own domestic stockpiles and defense posture.
As Elbridge Colby, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, keenly understands, there is not a bottomless reserve of interceptors and other munitions to sustain an attrition war that Ukraine is slowly losing in a theatre that is not vital to core U.S. security interests. Yet resource constraints, though no doubt real and deeply felt by this administration, are only one piece of this puzzle.
Administration officials repeatedly warned that the U.S. would “walk away” unless progress is made toward a negotiated settlement between Russia and Ukraine. It was always the case that the likeliest, most readily available path to walking away runs not through explosive proclamations of the kind that followed the disastrous February Oval Office confrontation between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, but rather through a slow, deliberate, and initially subtle diversion of resources and attention away from Ukraine that becomes more pronounced as its cumulative effects compound over time.
The U.S. effort to help Ukraine since 2022, with all its multifarious security, diplomatic, and economic prongs, is the most ambitious aid program ever to be undertaken by a non-belligerent on behalf of a third country to which it has no formal commitments. Observers presciently warned that the all hands on deck strategy taken by the Biden administration was unsustainable given the challenges faced by the U.S. in other parts of the world, but anything less than singleminded focus on Ukraine was always bound to lead to the unraveling of the West’s maximum-pressure program against Russia and, with it, Kyiv’s ability to prosecute the war.
The aid decision is yet the latest reminder, as if any more were needed, that time is not on Ukraine’s side. Ukrainian and European efforts to get the White House to recommit to the Biden-era “as long as it takes” approach to this war will only expedite the administration’s divestment from it.
Still, American engagement in the peace process remains critical for both Ukraine and broader challenges surrounding European security. Kyiv and its European partners need, now more than ever, to repair to a viable set of initial war termination proposals that can secure U.S. buy-in and serve as a point of departure for getting U.S.-brokered peace talks between Russia and Ukraine back on track.
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Top photo credit: Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu (Joshua Sukoff / Shutterstock.com)
On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu will arrive in Washington for his third visit of Trump’s second term. Today also marks 21 months of Israel’s war on Gaza. The purpose of the visit remains unclear, and speculation abounds: will Trump and Netanyahu announce a real ceasefire in Gaza? Will Syria join the Abraham Accords? Or might Trump greenlight even broader Israeli action against Iran?
Before Netanyahu’s visit, Trump posted an ultimatum on Truth Social, claiming Israel had agreed to a 60-day ceasefire. He urged Hamas to accept the terms, threatening that “it will only get worse” if it doesn’t. Although Trump intended to pressure Hamas, reiterating a longstanding narrative that portrays the group as the obstacle to peace, Hamas has long maintained that it will only accept a ceasefire if it is part of a process that leads to a permanent end to Israel’s war and its complete withdrawal from the enclave. Netanyahu, for his part, remains adamant that the war must continue until Hamas is eliminated, a goal that even the IDF has described as not militarily viable.
As of Thursday, the purported terms of the U.S.-proposed ceasefire deal were shared on social media, although neither Hamas nor Israel has publicly committed to it.
Trump’s diplomatic theatrics extend beyond a possible Gaza ceasefire. Instead of leveraging U.S. military assistance to end Israel's bombardment and humanitarian blockade of the Strip, Trump signaled he might condition continued American security assistance on Israel halting ongoing corruption proceedings against Netanyahu. “The United States of America spends Billions of Dollar [sic] a year, far more than on any other Nation, protecting and supporting Israel,” Trump posted on his Truth Social. “We are not going to stand for this.”
By publicly linking U.S. military support — Israel’s lifeline — to Netanyahu’s personal legal battles, Trump is effectively exerting pressure on Israel’s judiciary, a remarkable intervention in its domestic affairs on the prime minister’s behalf. Such bold statements are meant not only to influence Netanyahu's decisions, but also to focus public and international attention around Trump’s preferred outcomes.
Meanwhile, the humanitarian crisis in Gaza worsens daily. The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), backed by Israel and the U.S., which this week announced it was providing $30 million to the group, faces severe international condemnation. On Thursday, reports emerged that U.S. military contractors have been firing on starving civilians, echoing previous reports from IDF soldiers that they were ordered to shoot at desperate Palestinians seeking food aid.
Over 170 humanitarian and human rights NGOs, including international heavyweights like Oxfam, Save the Children, and Doctors Without Borders, have called for the immediate shutdown of the GHF, pointing to the deaths of more than 600 Palestinian civilians near GHF aid distribution hubs since the controversial group began operating with IDF support in late May. Adding credibility to these criticisms, the Swiss government recently dissolved GHF's Geneva branch, citing grave operational and legal violations amid ongoing reports of violence at GHF sites. These developments highlight the tragic politicization and increasing danger associated with humanitarian relief in Gaza.
Trump also appears determined to expand the Abraham Accords. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told the press that when Trump met Syria’s new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Saudi Arabia last month, he asked the former Islamist insurgent to normalize relations with Israel and then lifted some targeted U.S. sanctions on Syria. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar echoed this sentiment, publicly supporting expansion of the Accords to include Syria and Lebanon, while firmly reasserting Israel’s claims to the Golan Heights.
Damascus confirmed that it was engaged in both direct negotiations and UAE-facilitated backchannels with Jerusalem. However, much like Trump’s ceasefire messaging, the Syria angle risks being primarily political theater. Expanding the Accords without tangible progress on Palestinian rights or ending the Gaza siege will ring hollow, serving mainly to bolster the domestic political positions of both Trump and Netanyahu while masking the lack of meaningful steps toward peace.
While regional actors, especially America’s Gulf allies, warily watch the fragile ceasefire between Israel and Iran, Israeli media report that Netanyahu intends to seek Trump’s backing for another attack on Iran. The recent 12-day war with Iran has strengthened Netanyahu politically at home, allowing him to emerge as the bold leader who confronted Iran rather than the embattled and widely distrusted prime minister who failed to prevent Hamas’s October 7 attacks or secure the release of Israeli hostages still held in Gaza.
After narrowly surviving a no-confidence vote on June 11 that exposed his political vulnerabilities, Netanyahu leveraged his attack on Iran conflict to consolidate power. Some observers hope this newfound strength could encourage Netanyahu to finally end the war on Gaza, given that he may be less beholden to the most extreme right-wing members of his coalition. However, others fear his renewed confidence might prompt even more aggressive regional actions, further destabilizing an already volatile situation.
Ultimately, Monday’s meeting may amount to political theater — a high-profile, but substantively empty spectacle as Israel continues to use American weapons to blockade and bombard Palestinians in Gaza. Without genuine U.S. pressure to end illegal military aggression, halt ongoing atrocities, and genuinely pursue peace and Palestinian rights, megaphone diplomacy will remain little more than noise, amplifying tensions rather than resolving deep-rooted conflicts.
The Bunker appears originally at the Project on Government Oversight and is republished here with permission.
A pair of stories with contrasting narratives
It was the best of times (“We blew Iran’s nuclear-weapons complex to smithereens!”), it was the worst of times (“Psst — we’re submitting a proposed defense budget for next year even smaller than this year’s”). That’s why last Thursday there was an 8 a.m. all-hands-on-deck for a rare press conference (only the second in five months) by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. And a mere peep later in the day about his proposed 2026 budget.
This is performance politics worthy of the Wallendas. President Donald Trump can declare that the U.S. “completely and totally obliterated” Tehran’s atomic enterprise to bits even before the B-2 bombers that carried it out had returned to their home base in Missouri. Unfortunately, skeptical Pentagon intelligence analysts cast doubts on that certitude. That’s their job. Predictably, Trump came down on the Pentagon reporters who relayed the views of the Defense Intelligence Agency like a petulant kindergarten bully. He predictably commanded that his sidekick — that would be the SECDEF — denounce the doubters.
Which he did with a relish that is decidedly unappetizing: “You cheer against Trump so hard, it’s like in your DNA and in your blood to cheer against Trump because you want him not to be successful so bad, you have to cheer against the efficacy of these strikes.”
Let’s be clear — neither side’s assessment was rock-solid. It’s simply too early to tell. Trump shouldn’t have issued his “completely” claim so soon. And reporters should have treated more gingerly that initial DIA bomb-damage assessment, which apparently turned out to be a “low confidence” worst-case projection.
Just because Trump jumped the gun is no reason for reporters to follow suit.
The same day, the Pentagon rolled out its 2026 budget request seeking $848 billion. That’s actually lower than this year’s $831 billion, when taking inflation into account. Trump’s pledge to spend $1 trillion on defense next year will only happen if Congress approves a $113 billion add-on now under debate. Toting up all administration-wished-for 2026 national-security spending, including that one-time bonus, plus that spent on nuclear weapons by the Energy Department, the total rises — surprise! — to $1.01 trillion. But where such future annual $100 billion plus-ups will come from remains unknown, and unknowable.
Unlike publicly pummeling the press, the Defense Department’s budget unveiling was a decidedly low-key affair. “The announcement was a stark departure from past budget roll-outs, which have traditionally included an overview briefing by the Pentagon’s comptroller, and sometimes the deputy defense secretary and vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, followed by separate briefings by each military department,” Meghann Myers pointed out at Defense One. That’s probably because the Pentagon finds itself too embarrassed to confess to the budgetary sleight-of-math required to reach Trump’s trillion-dollar target.
War of the words
Trump has been ruminating again about returning the Department of Defense to its original name: the Department of War. The Bunker, dedicated to ending decades of defense opacity (“obscurity of sense”) and obfuscation (“to be evasive, unclear, or confusing”), is all for the change.
The U.S. long had a War Department (largely the Army and, later, its fledgling air force) and a Navy Department. But as the threat posed by the Soviet Union grew, Congress combined them and created the National Military Establishment in 1947, along with the Air Force. There was just one problem. The U.S. military loves its acronyms, and the new “NME” acronym sounded too much like “enemy.” So, in 1949, the Department of Defense was born.
The name change has arguably led to an expansive and flabby understanding of the role of the nation’s military. The Lycra-like label has been stretched to cover humanitarian ops, mission creep, nation-building, and forever-rising budgets. In contrast, a cabinet agency laser-focused on waging war could lead to a leaner, cheaper force. And that might not be the only change. The Bunker’s home, here at the Center for Defense Information at the Project On Government Oversight, would also face a tough choice. “Does CDI,” POGO pooh-bah Scott Amey ponders, “become the Center for War Information?”
Varmints pester Air Force base
North Dakota’s Minot Air Force Base, home to nuclear-capable B-52 bombers, is being invaded by growing burrowing brigades of what the locals call dakrats (short for Dakota rat), a type of ground squirrel. “A team of Air Force subject matter experts and representatives from Minot AFB Homes are meeting regularly to coordinate a more active response,” the base posted on its Facebook page June 23. Residents “can continue to use traps in their backyard,” but reinforcements are on the way. The base plans to roll out “a more comprehensive trapping plan” soon, and pledges “increased resourcing for fall and spring mitigation efforts to significantly decrease the on-base [dakrat] population.”
This is not a new problem. “Since the removal of their natural predators on base,” a 2019 Air Force story noted, “their population has significantly increased in numbers, causing damages to mission-essential infrastructure and homes across the base.” The base’s estimated 10,000+ dakrats were “degrading runways, platforms, foundations, and housing.” Deploying gas, other poisons, flooding, and trapping plainly didn’t lead to their complete and total obliteration.
Commenters responding to the base’s post on the latest vermin surge had their own suggestions on how to get rid of the critters. They ranged from bubble gum (Bazooka Joe brand, The Bunker presumes), to “bad donut dough,” to A-10 attack planes, to B-2 bombers. “Trap a few and microchip them to track to the colony,” one recommended, “then use a bunker-buster.”
Congress wants the Pentagon to build an ammunition plant in the Philippines to deal with the threat posted by China, USNI News’ Aaron Matthew Lariosa reported June 24.
The Pentagon has changed the name of the USNS Harvey Milk, named for the assassinated gay-rights activist, to the USNS Oscar V. Peterson, a sailor posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for saving his stricken vessel during World War II, Riley Ceder reported June 27 in Navy Times.
The Air Force is diverting money from its new and troubled $141 billion Sentinel ICBM program to refurbish that Qatari 747 that President Trump plans to use as Air Force One, Rachel S. Cohen reported June 27 in Air & Space Forces Magazine.
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