Has Donald Trump finally run out of patience with Ahmad Vahidi and the IRGC in Tehran? Or is Trump flexing for leverage?
The Iranian regime has given Trump plenty of reasons to walk away from the negotiating table, starting from the very first hours of the so-called ceasefire in the Persian Gulf. Vahidi violated the agreement from the very start, imposing an extortionate "fee" system for sailing through the international waters of the Strait of Hormuz and firing on commercial vessels that refused to comply. Trump ordered a naval blockade of Iran, which has been very effective, but has claimed for the last two months that Iran was ready to sign a deal that would end its threats to the region. Last week, Trump remained so committed to that explanation that he publicly and privately tore into Benjamin Netanyahu for responding to missile attacks from Hezbollah in Lebanon, and then unsuccessfully demanded that Netanyahu ignore missile attacks from Iran, lest the mythical deal get disrupted.
In other words, Trump has invested a lot of his credibility and trust in the IRGC's negotiations. This morning, though, Trump sounds as though he suddenly woke up to the Sunk Cost Fallacy:
Iran’s Military is a complete and total mess. Much of it, like their Navy and Air Force, doesn’t even exist anymore - They have been completely defeated. Iran is all talk and no action. The Bully of the Middle East is DEAD!!! They’ve taken too long to negotiate a deal that would have been great for them, now they will have to pay the price!!! President DONALD J. TRUMP
At about the same time, Trump spoke with Fox News' Trey Yingst to express his displeasure at Iran "tapping the United States along" on talks regarding nuclear weapons and terrorism. The refusal of the regime to negotiate in good faith means that the long-planned second wave of attacks on the IRGC's energy and transportation infrastructure is now back on the table, Trump told Yingst:
BREAKING: President Trump exclusively tells @TreyYingst that the U.S. is getting close to ordering new strikes against Iranian power plants and bridges in response to “tapping the United States along” when it comes to drawn out negotiations.
— Fox News (@FoxNews) June 10, 2026
The U.S. launched overnight strikes… pic.twitter.com/Eh3zZBWh7q
The U.S. launched overnight strikes against Iranian-linked targets after a U.S. Apache helicopter was downed near the Strait of Hormuz, hitting roughly 20 sites.
Trump also revealing new details about the helicopter incident - saying an Iranian drone became lodged between the helicopter's two pilots as they maneuvered to avoid an explosion.
So should we get ready for some earth-shattering kabooms? Should the Iranians start running for their shelters?
Not so fast. The White House followed up with a statement that talks are still ongoing with Iran:
U.S. peace talks with Iran continue Wednesday despite President Donald Trump's threats to escalate attacks on Tehran, a senior White House official confirmed to Fox News Digital.
"The talks still continue," the official said.
"The U.S. responded to the attack on the Apache helicopter and he’ll keep exerting maximum pressure to get a deal done," the official added.
Ah yes, the mythical Grand Deal that Trump has spent the last two months assuring everyone was only a couple of days away from concluding. The Wall Street Journal offers a more realistic assessment of the situation, which is that neither side has even agreed on a framework on which to build an eventual deal. That's why both sides are escalating attacks in order to produce leverage:
Mediators say diplomatic efforts to negotiate a deal between the U.S. and Iran to end the war have yet to bear fruit, with the two sides still hammering out key issues of how soon Iran can expect financial relief and how specifically restrictions on its nuclear program will be addressed. The goal is minimal, a memorandum of understanding to stop the fighting, open the strait and set up talks on more difficult issues.
The lack of progress means the U.S. and Iran remain locked in a low-level conflict in which neither side wants to be seen as retreating by accepting an unfavorable deal. ...
Tehran’s desire to reassert deterrence with the U.S. and Israel, along with calls from hard-line leaders within Iran’s political power structure, have pushed the country into a riskier military posture of responding aggressively to perceived threats while hoping not to trigger a return to full-scale war.
“It is a very fragile situation. This equilibrium is not stable because of the risk of miscalculation and unwanted escalation,” said Hamidreza Azizi, a visiting fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs. “The pattern on the Iranian side has been to keep the escalation below a certain threshold, and that threshold has been killing American soldiers and personnel during the ceasefire.”
The Iranians came very close to pushing past that line yesterday. Trump is reminding them today that our "restraint" is not unlimited. That might be a cautious way to approach negotiations that have any chance of succeeding, but the Iranian regime has spent the last 47 years "tapping along" the world, both directly and through its proxies Hezbollah and Hamas. They have never negotiated in good faith, ever, and have never complied with concessions in agreements. Trump has not yet escaped the Sunk Cost Fallacy of two months of talks with terrorists, but perhaps the next Iranian provocation will push him past the fantasy that any sort of deal can be made or stick with the IRGC. Let's just hope that the next provocation doesn't come at the cost of American lives.
Update: Trump made his language more precise in the Oval Office at a press avail. He declared that the US will resume full kinetic operations in the war after exhausting the possibilities for negotiation with the IRGC:
BREAKING: President Trump says the U.S. will resume bombing in Iran.
— FOX & Friends (@foxandfriends) June 10, 2026
"We're going to be attacking them and attacking them very hard." pic.twitter.com/muBeAW7til
President Trump said the U.S. would resume attacks on Iran later today after a Shahed drone fired by Tehran slammed into the canopy of a U.S. Apache helicopter, prompting several waves of American strikes in retaliation for the downing of the aircraft.
Any renewed attacks would follow strikes by both the U.S. and Iran on Tuesday following the downing of the helicopter.
“We’re gonna be attacking them, attacking them very hard,” Trump told reporters Wednesday. “We hit them hard yesterday, and we’re going to hit them again hard today,” he said.
He said the flare up in fighting comes as efforts continue to find a lasting peace deal. “We were really close to a deal, but they keep tapping us along, they keep playing us for suckers,” Trump said.
As CNN reports, it does indeed look like Bridge and Power Day is back on the menu:
“I’ve been working with Iran for a number of months,” he said. “They should sign the deal. It’s a good deal.”
“It was just tap, tap, tap,” he said. “I don’t know what they’re doing.”
Later, he declined to rule out strikes on civilian infrastructure, including power plants and bridges, venting frustration that Iran hasn’t yet signed off on a deal.
“They’re tapping and tapping, and they say, ‘All right, let’s give them a couple of more days,’” he said. “They’re tapping because it’s a meaningful paper.”
I suspect that Trump is announcing this ahead of time in order to get Iran to change its position and sign the deal. After two months of useless talk, Iran probably thinks the same thing and won't budge. We'll see if Trump's ready to get back to the mission and realize that the IRGC will never sign a deal that curtails their hegemonic and eschatological ambitions. Never.
Editor's Note: For decades, former presidents have been all talk and no action. Now, Donald Trump is eliminating the threat from Iran once and for all.
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