Donald Trump has once again backed down. This is the fifth time, multiple times now, that during the war he has initiated against Iran, he issues harsh and severe threats only to retreat shortly thereafter. It is unlikely anyone would attribute these retreats to Trump's compassionate personality. Nor is it acceptable to view these delays as "tactical procrastination" or "giving diplomacy a chance." When a pattern repeats five times, we are no longer dealing with an instantaneous decision or an incidental event, but rather a "behavioral logic." Gradually, from these back-and-forths and continual retreats, one can extract a kind of personal pattern in Trump's behavior, a pattern based on four phases: maximum threat, verbal saber-rattling, approaching the brink of conflict, and then retreating at the last moment.
Military Roots of a Retreat
Trump is not fundamentally a politician who fears military force. Experience shows he has no qualms about bloodshed and destruction, even the shedding of schoolgirls' blood or the destruction of hospitals, schools, and synagogues. He has an open and insatiable appetite for displaying hard power. His personality feeds on the image of the "strongman," the "global bully," and the "unpredictable leader." Therefore, the notion that he is inherently opposed to using force does not align with his behavioral evidence. The main issue lies elsewhere: Trump welcomes military attack only when he is certain the outcome will be swift, theatrical, low-cost, and victorious, something like a Hollywood scenario with a short and controllable ending.
But the issue of Iran has complicated matters for him precisely at this point. What has happened over recent months has gradually reinforced in Trump's mind the proposition that he is facing an adversary that not only possesses the capacity to respond but also has a high threshold for enduring pressure, sustaining conflict, and complicating the battlefield. That is why, the closer the threats get to the point of decision, the more prominent the option of retreat becomes. In truth, Trump does not fear war itself; he fears the "failure of the image of victory." This is the lens through which his recent behavior must be understood.
On the military side, initial assessments about the possibility of a limited, swift, and controlled operation against Iran have gradually given way to a far more complex picture. Published reports about Pentagon warnings regarding Iran's upgraded air defense, concerns over the conflict becoming protracted, and the likelihood that Iran's response could expand across the entire region have effectively reduced the attractiveness of the military option for Trump. He knows full well that if an attack is launched but fails to produce an immediate and decisive victory, the entire project of "America's strong leadership" will backfire against him. Trump is interested in military operations, but only when the outcome resembles a hunt, not an entry into a quagmire.
The experience of the Forty-Day War also appears to have affected his calculations within this same framework. At that time, parts of the US political and media establishment imagined that Iran would experience internal turmoil under the combined pressure of economic, security, and military strain. But Iran's sustained response and structural cohesion undermined that hypothesis. Now, from the perspective of some US decision-making bodies, the issue is no longer merely Iran's missile or military capability; the main issue is Iran's "resilience", the very point Robert Malley had noted. The chronic error of many American wars, from Vietnam to Afghanistan, has been the inability to understand the capacity of the other side for resistance.
Economic and Political Background of the Retreat
On the political side, conditions are also unfavorable for Trump. He has entered this phase of the crisis while facing erosion of his partisan-political position at home and has been unable to build a powerful international consensus around the project of pressure against Iran. Disagreements in Congress, the narrowing gap between pro-war and anti-war votes, the depletion of his administration's political capital, and the failure or stalemate in cases like Gaza and Ukraine have effectively limited his room to maneuver.
On the other hand, America's regional allies, contrary to initial assumptions, are not eager to enter a full-scale conflict. The message from the Arab countries of the Persian Gulf to Washington is clear: war with Iran is not just a military operation; it is a chain reaction of insecurity across the world's energy region. The Arab countries know better than any other actor that the first targets of reciprocal responses will be energy infrastructure, ports, transmission lines, and the regional economy. For this reason, unlike some extremist currents, they are more focused on containing the crisis than igniting it.
But perhaps the most significant pressure on Trump is economic. Markets, unlike politicians, do not lie. Every time the probability of war has increased, energy markets, capital markets, and global transportation have become volatile. Trump's acute sensitivity to the yield on ten-year US Treasury notes is understandable in this context. When that rate crosses critical thresholds, it effectively means higher borrowing costs, pressure on the government budget, investor anxiety, and a weakening of America's economic outlook. That is why, whenever markets have moved toward severe tension, news about negotiations, agreements, or de-escalation has suddenly become active, as if diplomacy is not merely a political project but an economic sedative for anxious American markets.
The issue of the Strait of Hormuz is also vitally important in this equation. Even if Iran itself suffers from a naval blockade, the reality is that the global economy, especially energy markets, cannot sustain a prolonged disruption in this region. Trump knows well that a sharp spike in energy prices could destabilize not only the global economy but also his own domestic position.
Unfulfilled Dream of Social Collapse
In the meantime, another important factor appears to have changed White House calculations: the failure of the internal collapse scenario in Iran. Some of the architects of maximum pressure imagined that a combination of military war, sanctions, economic strangulation, psychological pressure, and media operations could lead to severe erosion of internal cohesion. But the persistence of political and social cohesion, the absence of serious signs of structural collapse, and the preservation of the country's ability to govern under pressure have diminished some of the hopes for changing Iran's behavior from within.
Even the World Cup is not without effect in this equation. Trump knows that the smooth holding of this event could somewhat restore the psychological and social atmosphere in America and provide a temporary respite for his administration. But an expanding war in the Middle East could shift all global attention from the football celebration to a global security crisis, a situation that is favorable neither for the economy, nor for public opinion, nor for Trump's electoral project.
Therefore, what we are witnessing today is not merely a temporary retreat. This is the fifth time Trump has advanced to the brink of military decision only to stop at the last moment. This repetition indicates that he has reached an important conclusion: the cost of entering a war with Iran may be far greater than the cost of keeping Iran under perpetual threat. Trump still wants to preserve the image of the strongman, but he is now more concerned than ever that entering a war would precisely destroy the image he has spent years building.