The Idea That Trump Was Antiwar Was Always Delusional

In 2023, JD Vance, then a freshman senator from Ohio, endorsed Donald Trump for president in a Wall Street Journal column headlined, “Trump’s Best Foreign Policy? Not Starting Any Wars.” It suggested that despite his impolitic rhetoric, Trump was a statesman who understood that “the U.S. national interest must be pursued ruthlessly but also carefully, with strong words but great restraint.”

If Vance really believed his own words — with him, it’s always impossible to say — he shared the strangely widespread delusion that Trump was antiwar. So, evidently, did Tulsi Gabbard, who once sold “No War With Iran” T-shirts. Endorsing Trump in 2024, Gabbard, now Trump’s director of national intelligence, said........

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