Twenty eight hours or so into the new war against Iran, and America’s Vice President J.D. Vance has yet to declare his support in public. His social media account on X, which is normally so lively, has been conspicuously silent for the last two days.
He seems keen to position himself apart from the administration’s more ardent hawks when it comes to the Middle East
It’s likely that will all change today and Vance, as he did after the Venezuela operation, will take to the airwaves for the big Sunday news shows in order to once again repeat that administration’s line that Donald Trump, the ultimate decider, has boldly done what no other US president would do, and that the evil Iranian regime could never be allowed to have weapons of mass destruction. But for now, nadda. Almost all Trump’s senior cabinet have issued at least one message of support for the operation, on social media or elsewhere. But not the man who is one heartbeat away from the presidency.
The White House official account yesterday posted pictures of Donald Trump monitoring Operation Epic Fury from a room in Mar a Lago, Florida alongside his Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Vance’s strongest rival for the Republican presidential nomination in 2028, and chief-of-staff Susie Wiles. The White House also posted a picture of Vance, sitting underneath the vice presidential seal, in a Washington situation room alongside Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and the director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, a well-known war skeptic, and someone who has been sidelined and humiliated by Trump on matters of national security in recent months.
Vance’s latest public comment on Iran appears to have been his interview with the Washington Post, published on Thursday, in which he said there was “no chance” America was about to embroil itself in another long war in the Middle East. “I think we all prefer the diplomatic option,” he said, calling himself a “skeptic of foreign interventions.” “But it really depends on what the Iranians do and what they say.”
Asked if, as a veteran and critic of the disastrous Iraq adventure, he could ever have foreseen himself supporting another regime change war in the region, Vance laughed and said: “Look, life has all kinds of crazy twists and turns … I do think we have to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past. I also think we have to avoid overlearning the lessons of the past. Just because one president screwed up a military conflict doesn’t mean we can never engage in military conflict again. We’ve got to be careful about it, but I think the President is being careful.”
But Vance also angered figures inside the administration by refusing to condemn his friend Tucker Carlson over his long and combative interview with the US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, in which Carlson suggested that America was about to initiate war on Iran on behalf of the Israeli government rather than the American people. “I guess my takeaway is it’s a really good conversation that’s going to be necessary for the right, not just for the next couple of years but for long into the future,” said Vance.
It’s clear that the vice president is not about to fall out with Trump over Iran. But he also seems keen to position himself apart from the administration’s more ardent hawks when it comes to Israel and the Middle East. He’ll also have an eye on the opinion polls showing concern among a majority of Americans about the consequences of war on Iran, and what that could mean for his bid for the presidency in 2028.
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