'Nobody else is responsible': Trump to blame for Iran crisis, ex-CIA chief says

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: The Guardian

Sun 22 Mar 2026 07.00 EDT
Last modified on Sun 22 Mar 2026 22.30 EDT


Donald Trump is stuck between “a rock and a hard place” after three weeks of war in Iran and “sending a message of weakness” to the world, Leon Panetta, a former US defence secretary and Central Intelligence Agency director, has told the Guardian.

Panetta, who served in the Bill Clinton and Barack Obama administrations, recalled that national security officials were always keenly aware of Iran’s ability to create an energy crisis by blocking the strait of Hormuz. That very scenario is now unfolding, leaving Trump with no exit strategy beyond wishful thinking.

“He tends to be naive about how things can happen,” Panetta, 87, who supervised the operation to find and kill Osama bin Laden, said by phone. “If he says it and keeps saying it there’s always a hope that what he says will come true. But that’s what kids do. It’s not what presidents do.”

Trump’s war began on 28 February with what it hoped would be a knockout blow. A surprise strike by Israel killed Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The US and Israel soon gained air supremacy. But the longer the conflict has raged, the more that initiative appears to be slipping away.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/22/trump-iran-leon-panetta

[no_hypocrisy]

1. To Trump, if it's how HE imagines something should happen,

then that's the way it should happen.

No filter.

Not even Magical Thinking.

Bending reality to his will.

[gab13by13]

2. Isn't this what the right wants?

Of course Krasnov owns this war, he fucking started it, bypassed Congress, why are we even debating it? Doesn't debating it give it credence?

[tanyev]

3. "He's deliberately delusional about how things can happen."

Fixed it.

[NNadir]

4. I saw Leon Panetta interviewed live in Bethlehem PA at Lehigh University last year.

He is, without a doubt I a very deep thinker and patriot.

If you compare the quality of Panetta with any member of the orange pedophile's cabinet, you will want to throw up.

[BumRushDaShow]

5. Panetta was the Swiss army knife of government employees

far surpassing James Baker III by a long shot.

[NNadir]

6. I like that locution, "swiss army knife." I didn't realize his age.

He struck me as a younger man then in his late eighties. (It was maybe a year ago that he spoke at Lehigh.)

It was a fascinating evening.

[BumRushDaShow]

8. Oh geez he goes back a long time

He was in Congress for years (starting under Carter) before joining the Clinton Administration for multiple roles, and then coming back under Obama.

His name would always keep bubbling up over and over all those many decades!

I remember Baker was a Chief of Staff, Treasury Secretary, and then Secretary of State. Meanwhile Panetta was a Congressman, OMB Director, Chief of Staff, Secretary of Defense, and finally head of the CIA. Talk about a classic "government issue" guys!

[travelingthrulife]

10. James Baker III. Isn't he the one who defended Saudi Arabia against the 911

survivors?

[BumRushDaShow]

14. My reference to him

was regarding taking on multiple roles in the cabinet of multiple Presidents. He was still a Republican (and is still around)!

Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11" (which I have on DVD) delved into Baker's law firm.

[Botany]

7. 'Nobody else is responsible' well one person who is not here right now is responsible.

[BComplex]

9. THIS IS A FUCKING LIE!!! 'Nobody else is responsible':

NOBODY could do this alone!!!! The entire republican party and the Heritage Foundation Supreme Opus Dei Court has decided to destroy America for the nazis and billionaires, and abandon the democracy this country was founded on.

Fuck every single one of them. ALL republicans are responsible for this!!!!! Quit trying to save the fucking republican party by trying to pin all this on trump. He's a senile, incontinent, demented sex pervert...nothing more.

[Botany]

11. Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society are cancers on America

https://thiswillhold.substack.com/p/she-won-they-didnt-just-change-the

Along with Musk and Peter “let’s all go crypto” Thiel too.

[travelingthrulife]

12. Trump and the GOP Congress and other GOP enablers are responsible.

Republicans in Congress could end this nightmare today.

[BComplex]

15. Exactly! And you can tell how brainwashed we all are by 10 YEARS of the media

trying to save the fucking republican party by trying to pin the government takeover on trump alone.

The republican party is, and always has been, a cesspool of pollution, bigotry, greed, misogyny, racism and corruption. They have almost never made a right decision for the good of the American people. They are all sociopathic, detestable grifters that have brainwashed America through their ownership of the media.

The Homeland Security bill was the idea of republican fascists, and the republican media helped sell it to the get-along-to-go-along democrats. All of this has to stop if we are going to survive.

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

13. My take on this

[pat_k]

16. Trumpublicans (and turncoat Dems) who voted against the War Powers bill in the House and Senate own it 100% too.

Had they passed the resolution to reign him in, it wouldn't have ended the war overnight, but it would have given the markets and the world hope that his insane and destructive impulses were being reigned in.

[mdbl]

17. Ya sure.. the Repuglicans in congress couldn't do anything could they

More gaslighting from spineless weasels.