Can the World Be Dragged Back from the Brink?

by Jason Ross (EIRNS) — Jun. 15, 2025 EST - The army of Israel attacked parts of Tehran at dawn on Friday, June 13, 2025. Credit: CC/Mehr News Agency

In the worsening situation in Southwest Asia—the strikes and counterstrikes between Iran and Israel following the latter’s illegal attack on Friday, June 13—the role of President Donald Trump appears increasingly ambiguous.

There are reports that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is requesting direct U.S. involvement, on the basis that only U.S. firepower to take out Iran’s hardened underground nuclear enrichment facilities. Despite Trump administration claims that the initial Israeli attacks were made without U.S. involvement, Iran’s foreign minister insists that the U.S. was indeed involved—at a minimum, by accepting the attack and for supplying Israel with weaponry—and has called upon the U.S. to publicly condemn the Israeli strikes.

In an ABC interview on Sunday, June 15, Trump stated that the U.S. is not involved in Israel’s war with Iran but admitted it “could get involved,” and said he would be open to Vladimir Putin mediating the conflict. Trump is offering himself as a dealmaker ready to secure peace, and proposing trade with the U.S. as a key factor in achieving that. But Trump’s claim that trade could bring Iran and Israel to the table rings hollow against a backdrop of missile strikes and rising death tolls.

Trump also threatened Iran with unprecedented U.S. military retaliation if Tehran targets American assets.

In contrast to the Israeli demands for the U.S. to become more involved, Trump vetoed an Israeli proposal to assassinate Iran’s Supreme Leader, according to a White House source. (Iran has not killed any Americans.) The White House said killing political leaders should not be on the table.

The contradiction between Trump’s diplomatic proposals and bellicose warnings reflects a presidency that is not projecting a coherent strategy.

Why did Trump change his demand that Iran not be able to produce a nuclear weapon (a position acceptable to Tehran) with the demand that Iran cease all uranium enrichment (which Tehran has repeatedly said would be unacceptable)? That change in condition all but doomed the negotiations.

Iran may abandon its decision not to build a nuclear weapon, and move in earnest to build bombs in a search for deterrence and safety. Which countries would then follow? Saudi Arabia? Türkiye? Egypt? Would this outcome make Israel more secure? Would it make the world a safer place?

On all of these issues, one must ask: Has Trump changed his mind? Was he simply lying? Or is he not entirely in control?

Are the “No Kings” rallies across the U.S., which included participants calling for Trump’s death, intended to contribute to an atmosphere in which Trump fears assassination? Consider his recent spat with the volatile Elon Musk from this perspective.

The British Empire has long exercised its power indirectly, through shaping political geometries that led to their desired ends. Nobody sane would want a world in which Russia-Ukraine, Iran-Israel, and Taiwan-China are all potential flashpoints for global warfare. But the British Empire, based on a degraded view of the human species, has never been sane.

The unprecedentedly perilous world situations demands true leadership, of the sort demonstrated by Lyndon LaRouche over his campaigns, and carried on today by the movement he founded.

Will you qualify yourself to provide the leadership the world sorely needs today?