21 Mar 2026
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2026/03/seeing-trump-clearly/

What if Trump's apparently chaotic thought processes and intuitive decision
making are all a blind, a charade? What if we are really witnessing, in the
Middle East and more widely, a carefully constructed plan with very definite
objectives? Has Trump in fact "planned each charted course, each careful step
along the byway", while flinging the chaff of apparent chaos? I realise that
this is not intuitive, but bear with me...

What kicked off my thinking was the revelation by Lockheed Martin that they had
been instructed by Trump, months in advance of the attack on Iran, to massively
increase production of interceptor missiles, with a short term goal of
quadrupling capacity of THAAD. In January, before the start of the current
conflict, Fox News was already reporting on various deals, including a trebling
of PAC3 MSE interceptor deliveries, having been finalised between Lockheed and
the Department of War.

While obviously there are supply chain and production line constraints on the
ability to ramp up production within months, the urgency of this activity -
almost entirely focused on interceptor missiles - that started in 2025 is in
hindsight a clear indication that early war with Iran was expected. It is plain
evidence of premeditation.

The second thing that triggered my thought that this is all carefully planned,
is the nature of the breakdown of the nuclear deal talks. It appears there was a
broad consensus that Iran offered concessions which made a deal very practical,
in particular giving up its stocks of enriched uranium into trust (a proposal
Iran had historically rejected when Putin offered to hold the material). Both
the hosts, Oman and the British thought a deal was there.

The failure of the talks is being spun as due to the incompetence and lack of
technical knowledge of Witkoff and Kushner. But I just don't buy this. The
sending of unqualified negotiators was part of a ploy to use the negotiations as
cover for an attack - the second time in a year that the United States had
pulled the same trick.

They didn't need competent negotiators, because they had never intended a good
faith negotiation.

The attack on Iran was always planned by Trump. He was not "bounced into it" by
Israel. It had been in gestation for months. That fact had been held within a
very tight circle to avoid both political opposition and institutional
opposition from the US military and intelligence community.

January's protests in Iran found ordinary people genuinely ready to protest,
motivated by economic hardship caused by sanctions. But they were guided and
abused by Mossad and CIA agents among the Iranian people, who committed and
encouraged violence and initiated pro-Shah chanting.

There was never the slightest possibility the protests would bring regime
change, but that was not the intention. The purpose was to incite an
over-reaction by the Iranian government that could "justify" the planned attack
on Iran. The dead protestors have been great martyrs for Trump's - and Israel's
- wider cause.

The planting by Western state-sponsored individuals and organisations of
ludicrous claims throughout Western state and corporate media of thirty to forty
thousand killed, was a deliberate and considered plan to reduce domestic
opposition in the West to the forthcoming war against Iran.

Now factor in another apparently random act by Trump - the astonishing
kidnapping of President Maduro of Venezuela on 3 January, a month before the
attack on Iran.

Trump's naval blockade of Venezuela's oil has secured a US monopoly of its sale
and distribution. As with Iraq, only US-approved contractors can buy the oil and
payments are made to a Trump-controlled account in Qatar, from which revenue is
given to the Venezuelan government entirely at Trump's discretion.

This audacious imperialist grab of the world's largest oil reserve further
insulated the USA against the effects of the forthcoming closure of the Strait
of Hormuz.

Again, the narrative is being spun that Trump did not foresee the closure of the
Strait by Iran. That is plainly a nonsense - every commentary on a potential
Iran war for half a century has focused on the Strait of Hormuz. The only
possible explanation is that Trump does not mind the closure.

While, as Trump says, the United States does not need the oil that comes through
the Strait, the apparent weakness in his case is that higher oil prices are
universal and hit Trump's support, particularly as Americans fill their Gas
tanks. But to concentrate on this is to make the fundamental error of imagining
that Trump cares about what is good for the American people. He does not. He
cares about what is good for Donald J. Trump and his immediate circle.

Cont'd ...