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In the waning days of 1990, a few months after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait<\/a>, I sat on a sunlit terrace in the neighbouring United Arab Emirates, overlooking the glittering waters of a Persian Gulf once again turned to a theatre of war.<\/p>\n The lunch before us was extravagant: the host, whom I was interviewing for The Wall Street Journal, was a senior Emirati government official. I had asked him if the Gulf states were going to contribute forces in the effort to oust the Iraqis.<\/p>\n \u201cYou think I want to send my teen-aged son to die for Kuwait?\u201d he replied, then chuckled. \u201cWe have our white slaves from America to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n I almost choked on my lobster claw. This was an on-the-record interview, and the quote was going right into the newspaper.<\/p>\n I recalled that conversation when reports emerged<\/a> last week that Saudi Arabia\u2019s leader, Mohammed bin Salman, was urging Trump to send United States ground forces to Iran. It was the only way, he reportedly argued, to assure that the region was not left with an unstable, desperate, unpredictable and even more radicalised Iran.<\/p>\n Like every government except Trump\u2019s and Netanyahu\u2019s, the Saudis hadn\u2019t wanted this war. But what they want even less is a TACO move (Trump Always Chickens Out) by a president realising he\u2019d catastrophically miscalculated Iranian grit and guile, watching his already dismal approval ratings tanking, along with the world\u2019s economies. He had made a feckless decision to wage war. He might make an equally feckless decision to declare \u201cmission accomplished\u201d, leaving an unholy mess. It was on-brand for this president.<\/p>\n Yet Saudi Arabia has one of the best funded and equipped militaries in the world, along with more than a quarter of a million active-duty troops. The UAE, having learnt from the 1990s example of Kuwait, has since developed a high-tech, highly trained military, introduced compulsory military service, and is said to be potentially the most lethal force in the Middle East, after Israel.<\/p>\n Yet it is the \u201cwhite slaves\u201d (including, of course, many Americans of colour) who may once again be put in harm\u2019s way in an attempt, most likely doomed, to clean up the mess Trump has created. Thirteen have already died, dozens suffered injuries, but those numbers would soar if the Saudis were to get their wish for a ground war.<\/p>\n And they very well might. On Easter Sunday, of all days, came Trump\u2019s profane post on social media<\/a>, threatening that the US would commit the war crime of obliterating Iran\u2019s civilian infrastructure if the Strait of Hormuz were not reopened.<\/p>\n Related Article The F-bomb and its adjacent profanities brought back another memory: Barack Obama\u2019s tan suit, worn at a 2014 press conference discussing Islamic State terrorism<\/a>. That sartorial choice was \u201cunpresidential\u201d, fulminated Fox News. One commentator on Fox went so far as to claim it \u201cconfirmed he was a Marxist\u201d.<\/p>\n There has been no fulmination from Fox about the unpresidential nature of Trump\u2019s deranged post on Truth Social. On Monday, Fox buried scant mentions amid saturation coverage of the successful rescue of the downed airman. An airman who was placed in mortal peril because of an illegal war, whose plane was shot down even though the president had told the world only days before that Iran\u2019s air defences were \u201cliterally obliterated\u201d and that Iran was left with \u201cno air defence whatsoever\u201d.<\/p>\n When Trump was elected, I expected the worst. I expected, for example, that he would implement the draconian policy objectives of Project 2025 \u2013 the far right\u2019s blueprint for eviscerating civil rights, social and environmental programs, and indeed more than half of its stated objectives have already been realised.<\/p>\n But this war I did not expect. It was the one thing Trump was clear on: no more costly, lethal foreign wars on his watch. And so now he has done the near impossible: exceeded my worst expectations with a war based on the lie of imminent nuclear threat. A war of extreme cruelty and massive incompetence.<\/p>\n Related Article I hope that somewhere in our own government, behind all the cautious, carefully worded public calls for de-escalation, some real conversations are going on. This is no longer the United States with which we allied in World War II. No longer the country we\u2019ve long (maybe too long) looked to for security. It\u2019s become a dangerous, destabilising force, doing grave damage to our economy and threatening, through the dreadful deal that is AUKUS, to suck us into future wars we should have no part of.<\/p>\n AUKUS was the Morrison government\u2019s bad deal. The best time to have ordered a review \u2013 of its flimsy costings (including the opportunity costs of such vast expenditure), its unrealistic assessments of shipbuilding capacity in both the US and the UK, and its dire strategic implications \u2013 was right after the Albanese government was first elected. The second-best time? Right now.<\/p>\n Geraldine Brooks is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and journalist.<\/p>\n Get a weekly wrap of views that will challenge, champion and inform your own. Sign up for our Opinion newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n Save<\/p>\n You have reached your maximum number of saved items.<\/p>\n![\"Donald](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/f2ec48df63c58297d77f70e7d31acb5332922fcb.jpeg\")
Donald Trump leaves the press briefing room at the White House on Monday.AP<\/p>\n![\"Saudi](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/a36f90d75eff93f928e205aba26fdeb53f730732.jpeg\")
Saudi Arabian leader Mohammed bin Salman reportedly has urged Trump to send US ground forces to Iran.AP<\/p>\n![\"Artwork](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/f2d5f2bf1e3b86e970a7c7c8827a1de9aae840c85091df379b400bd0f7fa6d3b.jpeg\")
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