‘It’s Not Working’: Victor Davis Hanson Argues Trump’s Stop-and-Start Iran Deal Talks Are Pointless

President Donald Trump needs a new game plan on Iran, according to Victor Davis Hanson.

The veteran conservative pundit weighed in on the war on Tuesday, two days after Trump said a new deal to wrap it up was “imminent.”

Trump said the two sides would work to hammer out a deal this week after he canceled launching the “biggest attack since World War II”; Hanson gave the president kudos for following through on some of his threats to bomb Iran, but he said calling off strikes whenever Iran hints it wants to make an agreement is futile.

“It’s not working, because you cannot trust a theocratic government, a radical Islamist government,” Hanson said on his podcast for The Daily Signal. “They’ve lied continuously. They don’t view it as lying; they view it as [being] in service to their religion or ideology.”

Rather than a fresh round of negotiations, Hanson said it made more sense to pummel the enemy into submission.

“People feel the time has come to hit the dual-use targeting — the bridges, the power plants if you have to — and inflict a level of damage that disgraces them, humiliates them,” Hanson said.

After that, Hanson said the U.S. could pull back some of its military vessels which have been used to keep the Strait of Hormuz open. He said Phase II of his plan to squeeze Iran could then go into effect.

“Keep the embargo, freeze their bank accounts, they’re really hurting, and it would just sort of be turning the burner up to 7 out of 10. And let it simmer,” he said. “In other words, what I’m suggesting is, you turn time from a weapon of [Iran’s] to a weapon of ours.

If Trump follows that approach, Hanson said he could have the war wrapped up in August — and allow him to shift his focus to helping Republicans in the midterms.

Watch above.

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