Thomas Jefferson warned against entangling alliances. John F. Kennedy was ready to pay any price and bear any burden. Teddy Roosevelt advised us to speak softly and carry a big stick.
And then there’s Donald Trump. Locked, half-cocked, and probably bluffing.
That’s the lesson Iran’s leaders appear to have drawn following a carefully calibrated sequence of escalatory attacks against the U.S. and its allies in recent months.
In May, there were four unclaimed attacks on tankers transiting near the Strait of Hormuz — two Saudi, one Norwegian, and one Emirati. In June, two more tankers were attacked, and U.