U.S. President Donald Trump attends the commencement ceremony at West Point Military Academy in West Point, New York, U.S., May 24, 2025. REUTERS Nathan Howard
President Donald Trump's hardcore MAGA supporters often say they love the fact that he never apologizes for his actions. Trump's refusal to back down from his positions, they insist, is a major plus.
But Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman, in a May 4 column posted on his Substack page, argues that Trump's stubbornness is a political liability — and that he doubles down on his political "humiliations" when he needs to be changing course.
Krugman cites the Iran war as a recent example.
"So, what has the Trump Administration learned from its humiliation in the current war?" Krugman writes. "Silly question. This administration doesn't learn. After all, the war in Ukraine had entered its fifth year by the time the U.S. began bombing Iran. Drones have turned the entire front line of that war into an ever-widening 'kill zone.' So, nobody should have been surprised by the lethality — (Defense Secretary Pete) Hegseth's favorite word — of inexpensive drones in the Persian Gulf."
Krugman continues, "Yet Hegseth and co. were evidently caught completely off guard. Many reports indicate that U.S. military sites have suffered far more damage than the Pentagon has acknowledged."
The liberal economist and former New York Times columnist notes that in a variety of ways, the Iran "debacle" is going badly for Trump. But instead of considering other options, Krugman laments, Trump keeps digging in deeper.
"In fact, Trump fired his Navy secretary, not because of poor performance in the Iran war, but because he wasn't delivering the new ships on Trump's impossible timeline," Krugman explains. "As far as I can tell, there is an overwhelming consensus among military experts that giant battleships are as obsolete as, well, coal power. Ukraine sank the Moskva, Russia's Black Sea flagship, with missiles early in the war. Since then, Ukraine has used drones, both airborne and seaborne, to effectively drive Russian forces from that sea despite not having a navy of its own."
Krugman continues, "There's every reason, then, to believe that Trump-class battleships would, at best, be expensive pieces of junk. At worst, they would be floating coffins for U.S. sailors. And I do mean expensive. Current projections are that each of these ships would cost $17 billion. That's not the cost of a whole fleet, it's the cost for each individual ship."
Referencing the 1977 movie "Star Wars," Krugman jokingly adds, "Somehow, I don't have the sense that the force is with us."