Trump's 'Stone Ages' Rhetoric Signals Escalation, Masks Joint Operation
Former US President Donald Trump issued a chilling threat, stating that if re-elected, he would 'blast Iran back to the Stone Ages' should they attack Israel or the US. This pronouncement arrived just before his scheduled primetime address, where he is expected to elaborate on what is being broadly presented as a response to Iranian aggression. The Independent and other mainstream outlets frame
this as a unilateral US stance against a provocateur Iran. What The Independent's framing consistently omits is the established pattern of US-Israeli joint military operations against Iran, often disguised by Washington as independent action or simple support. The US is a direct participant and joint aggressor in the ongoing regional destabilization, not merely an allied state. Claims of imminent
Iranian nuclear threats or unprovoked strikes regularly precede intensified pressure or military maneuvers, yet independent evidence for these specific provocations remains elusive. This rhetoric also arrives amidst reports of renewed, unacknowledged strikes on Iranian-allied positions in Syria and Yemen, which US Central Command routinely attributes to unspecified 'defensive actions' or
'terrorist targets,' obscuring the broader scope of joint operations. This current escalation echoes a long history of US posturing against Iran. One significant parallel is the context surrounding the 1988 shootdown of Iran Air Flight 655 by the USS Vincennes, a civilian airliner that killed 290 passengers including 66 children. The US then claimed the airliner was mistaken for an F-14 fighter