‘No clear strategy’: how Trump went from shock and awe to wait and see in Iran

Lack of a sustained plan to end the war has convinced US allies that the White House is running out of ideas Nearly eight weeks after Donald Trump launched his assault on Iran, the White House has shifted from a strategy of shock-and-awe bombardments and leadership decapitation to a plan of sustained economic pressure as it tests the will of a regime practiced over decades at wars of attrition. Since the negotiations stalled, the White House has begun to shift its messaging to say it is willing to wait to strike a more durable deal with Iran – despite the growing economic toll inflicted on the world economy by the closure of the strait of Hormuz. The reason, senior officials have said, is because the joint US-Israeli strikes were so successful that they have fractured Iran’s leadership and prevented a new consolidation of power. “Don’t rush me,” Trump told reporters on Thursday when asked how long he was willing to wait for Iran to respond to the US’s latest ceasefire proposal. “We were in Vietnam, like, for 18 years. We were in Iraq for many, many years … I’ve been doing this for six weeks.” Reminded that he told people in the US that the war would end in four