President Donald Trump has long insisted that the US is done with nation-building and endless wars in the Middle East. He campaigned on “America First”. That did not last long.
By ordering the strikes over the weekend that killed Ayatollah Ali Khamanei and decimated Iran’s military leadership only a few weeks after the capture of Venezuela’s leadership, Trump has embarked on a new doctrine of American power; regime decapitation at will, without even a semblance of legal or UN cover, and without any discernible plan for the morning after.
A new doctrine of impunity
Until recently, Trump presented himself as the antidote to America’s ill-fated and unpopular adventures in Afghanistan and Iraq. Surrounding himself with anti-interventionist populists like JD Vance, he was stridently anti GOP (Republican Party) neoconservatism.
That has changed.
What he has unleashed is the opposite of isolationism. This is interventionist neoconservatism stripped of its (albeit rickety) legal and diplomatic scaffolding. Previous administrations at least tried to obtain UN resolutions, however cynical and unconvincing the effort. Trump can’t even be bothered with the charade, apart from the ghouls gallery that is the Orwellian “Board of Peace”.
The message to the rest of the world is stark. Any non-ally of America sans nuclear deterrent is vulnerable. The incentive for all states – especially those at loggerheads with America – is to acquire nuclear weapons, as soon as possible. Ironically, Iran’s nuclear programme and failed negotiations may prove the ultimate cautionary tale. This war would not be happening if Trump had not ripped up the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, or Iran had managed to get a bomb. This is not to say they should have tried in the first place – just a statement of reality.
In this new world, might is not only right – it is essential for survival.
But why change course?
The broader question is why Trump has chosen this path. He campaigned, successfully, on ending foreign wars. A Reuters/Ipsos poll released this weekend found that only one in four Americans approves of the strikes that killed Khamenei, and roughly half – including a quarter of his own Republican voters – say he is too inclined to use military force. This escalating military adventure now looms over the midterm elections, in which his party was already expected to lose ground amid persistent cost-of-living pressures.
Within his own coalition the cracks are widening. Marjorie Taylor Greene, once a reliable supporter, has accused him of betrayal. Tucker Carlson, whose influence over the Maga base rivals Trump’s own, has been scathing. A president who built his career on not repeating his predecessors’ foreign-policy errors now seems determined to repeat them.
Nor is the case easily made that Iran is an imminent threat to the American homeland. Trump himself was adamant that he destroyed their nuclear programme with B-2 bomber strikes last year. Few experts believed that Iran posed anything close to an imminent threat to the US.
Unthinkable, too, is that Trump and Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu hold much regard for Iranian human rights; any pretence of that went up in smoke with the bombing of a girls’ elementary school in Minab that killed 165.
This is more likely just a continuation of US foreign policy being dictated by Israel. Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State, said as much when he admitted that the attacks were pre-empted by Israel. Netanyahu has made no secret of his determination to enact regime change in Iran and cement Israel’s place as the regional hegemon. Skilfully he seems to have persuaded Trump to do this now, given that the Mullahs were at their weakest for decades.
Or could there be more nefarious realities at play? Could the timing of these strikes, in the midst of the furore of the Epstein files being released, be mere coincidence? Does Netanyahu know something we do not?
Implications for the global economy
The economic consequences are already apparent. The Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s seaborne oil and gas passes, has seen shipping slow markedly as Iranian missiles strike Gulf targets and threaten tankers. Dubai’s travel-, tourism- and real-estate-dependent economy is particularly at risk. According to aviation analytics firm Cirium, more than 11,000 flights have been cancelled since Saturday, 28 February 2026, with more than one million passengers affected in the largest flight disruption in history.
Brent crude, already up 20% this year, spiked a further 11% to about $80 a barrel when markets opened this week. Bloomberg Economics estimates that a full closure of the strait could push oil to $108 a barrel. European gas prices are up 50%, after Qatar closed the world’s largest liquid natural gas export facility when it was targeted by Iranian drones on Monday. Gold, the dollar and Swiss francs have all strengthened. Equity markets everywhere have fallen. Investors are, in trader shorthand, in “haven-first” mode.
What this means for SA
South Africa, where the currency is perennially sensitive to global risk sentiment and where fuel price shocks hit the broader economy, is exposed. A sustained oil price spike would widen the current-account deficit, further weaken the rand, put upward pressure on inflation and complicate the Reserve Bank’s room to cut rates. An economy already struggling to escape from prolonged stagnation can ill afford a prolonged energy price shock of this kind.
Geopolitically, SA has increasingly aligned itself, through the ANC’s foreign policy, with Iran’s broader axis. Its support for Palestinian causes, its case at the International Court of Justice against Israel and its deepening ties with the BRICS group place it firmly in the camp of states that have resisted American hegemony. That posture now carries greater risk.
Trump has also shown an appetite for interference in South African domestic politics, amplifying claims of “white genocide” and criticising Black Economic Empowerment. Whether the current escalation in the Middle East leaves him more or less willing to turn his attention to SA is unclear. What is certain is that SA’s non-aligned posturing – straddling the West and its rivals – is harder to sustain when the world is dividing more sharply.
A foundation-less world
In 1945, the UN charter declared that: “We, the peoples of the United Nations, are determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind.” It may have been imperfect and violated repeatedly, but it was all we had; a framework within which even cynical actors felt obliged to operate.
Trump is the first US president to abandon not just the framework, but any obligation to justify his actions within it. That precedent, once set, will be available to others. China is watching Taiwan. Russia is eyeing a fragmenting Nato and the Baltics. Regional powers are calculating their options.
The most powerful country on the planet is taking out regimes without warning and without rationale, like bowling pins, and with absolutely zero plan for what happens next.
Some analysts see this as being a short, sharp conflict with no lasting economic ramifications. That seems wishful. If it is going badly now, it looks likely to get worse. DM