Trump's erratic outbursts expose a significant political vulnerability

The New Republic reports President Donald Trump is feeling his rage these days, and it appears to be coming from a predictable source.

“Judging by Trump’s outbursts of late, he can’t seem to decide whether reopening the Strait of Hormuz is easy or hard. He also can’t seem to decide whether he needs international allies to help with this urgent task or not,” said TNR writer Greg Sargent. “Iran’s blockade on oil shipments exiting the strait — done in response to Trump’s attack — is causing worsening global consequences daily. So it would be useful for Trump to settle these arguments in his own mind already.”

“But Trump’s incoherence on the Strait of Hormuz actually reveals something else, as well: a massive political weakness,” Sargent added.

Trump called reopening the vulnerable two-mile bottleneck, through which 20 percent of the planet’s oil travels, “simple.” But he just can’t seem to manage it without sending in ground troops. Sargent said he’s also “raging” at our NATO allies for refusing to help. But why require help for something so “easy” that we’ve already “won?”

“The hidden answer to this is Trump knows that reopening the strait is highly challenging and that the political perils to him — and the GOP in the midterms — of dramatically ramping up military efforts to reopen it are great,” said Sargent.

Additionally, Sargent said Trump needs our NATO allies to sign their names to his disastrous and unrequested Iranian war to legitimize it, and share the blame when it inevitably goes south—which it all already is.

“… Trump himself has confirmed that he didn’t consult with any of our allies before launching his attack. Germany has responded to Trump’s demand by saying, ‘This is not our war,’ and France has responded by declaring, ‘We are not party to the conflict.’ This is not only true, it’s a state of affairs Trump created himself,” said Sargent.

So, now Trump is in a bind and looking down the barrel of very serious retaliation at the polls in November. Sargent said it would be nice for someone in his position if voters could blame NATO for” failing to help us reopen the strait, and thus decide NATO is no longer worth belonging to.”

Only that’s not what’s probably going to happen.

“[I]t’s doubtful that voters will blame our NATO allies for our own faltering commitment to it,” said Sargent. “It’s also unlikely that they’ll blame NATO for failing to bail us out of the disaster Trump has created for us. They’ll blame him for it. Which, ultimately, is why Trump is in such a half-cocked fury — he knows he’s on the hook for this fiasco, and he knows there’s no easy or obvious way out of it.”