In December 2020, Donald Trump told his inner circle that he feared Iran would try to assassinate him in retaliation for the killing of Qasem Soleimani in a US drone strike almost a year earlier
Trump feared being assassinated by Iran in retaliation for the killing of Soleimani, a new book on the former president’s concern says.
The new book ‘The Divider’ by Peter Baker and Susan Glaser, husband and wife who write for the New York Times and the New Yorker. The book deals with Trump in the White House between 2017-2021 and will be published in the US next week. The British ‘Guardian’ received a copy before everyone else.
Baker and Glaser describe Trump’s policy on Iran, from talks about the nuclear deal signed under Barack Obama to the U.S. withdrawal in May 2018 and the point in June 2019 when Trump agreed to airstrikes but canceled them at the last minute. Trump said then, “I thought about it for a second and said, ‘You know what, they shot down an unmanned drone, and here we were sitting with 150 (Iranian) dead probably within half an hour after I said go ahead and attack’. And I didn’t like it, I didn’t think it was proportional.” It later emerged that Fox News host Tucker Carlson was among those who advised Trump not to order the strikes on Iran.
Trump feared assassination by Iran as revenge for Suleimani death, book says https://t.co/QAFZjJkKLh
— The Guardian (@guardian) September 14, 2022
Six months later, Trump approved the assassination of Soleimani. The commander of the elite Quds Force of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, which the US designated as a terrorist group in April 2019, was killed on January 3, 2020 as he left Baghdad airport. The Pentagon said Soleimani “actively developed plans to attack American diplomats and soldiers in Iraq and throughout the region “.
Trump bragged about the strike, saying at a rally in Toledo, Ohio after the assassination, “We arrested him and we arrested him quickly and we arrested him cold. He was a bad guy. He was a bloodthirsty terrorist, and he’s no longer a terrorist. He’s dead.”
But according to Glasser and Baker, less than a year later, at least privately, Trump was not so relaxed. On December 16, 2020, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran, tweeted: “Those who ordered the assassination of General Soleimani, as well as those who carried it out, should be punished. This revenge will certainly occur at the right time.”
Baker and Glaser report that Trump and his advisers considered new strikes but backed off because the end of Trump’s time in power was too close. The authors also write: “At a cocktail party, Trump told some of his friends in Florida that he feared Iran would try to assassinate him, so he had to return to Washington where he would be safer.”