Fox News host Tucker Carlson ripped President Trump’s decision to order an airstrike that killed one of Iran’s top military figures, warning that “America appears to be lumbering towards a new Middle East war.”
“There’s been virtually no debate or even discussion about this, but America appears to be lumbering towards a new Middle East war. We have to say, it’s one that officials in Washington wanted for decades,” Carlson said on his prime-time program Thursday night.
Carlson said that “disgraced national security adviser John Bolton has made it his life’s mission to start a war with Iran and Bolton might be getting his wish” following the airstrike that killed Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, considered one of Iran’s most powerful military leaders.
Bolton parted ways with the Trump administration last year due to differences on foreign policy with the president, but on Friday lauded the airstrike at Baghdad International Airport that killed Soleimani as well as Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy commander of the Iranian-backed Iraqi militia Popular Mobilization Forces.
The former national security adviser sent a tweet calling the elimination of Soleimani “the first step to regime change” in the Islamic country.
Carlson blasted Bolton’s hawkish foreign policy views during his program Thursday night, saying that “the last time we took John Bolton’s advice in the region, Iran became far more powerful than it was before.”
“The ones telling you the Persian menace is the greatest threat we face, are the very same ones demanding that you ignore the invasion of America now in progress from the south, the millions — tens of millions of foreign nationals living among us illegally,” Carlson argued.
“They are liars and they don’t care about you, they don’t care about your kids. And you should keep all of that in mind,” the host concluded.
Carlson has repeatedly called for the U.S. to avoid any future conflict or intervention in the Middle East, most recently regarding Syria and Trump’s decision to pull remaining American troops out of the war-torn country in October.
“For once, Americans are coming home from a Middle Eastern tar pit, rather than staying forever, and we ought to be celebrating that,” Carlson said at the time. “Across the country people are. But in Washington, people are apoplectic. They’re telling us we’re not allowed to leave Syria. It’s immoral, they say. It’s a betrayal. Not a betrayal of Americans — that wouldn’t be a problem here in Washington. It happens here every day.”
The Pentagon confirmed Thursday night that Trump ordered an airstrike killing Soleimani, the commander of Iran’s elite Quds Force who was considered one of Iran’s most powerful generals. The Defense Department characterized the strike as a “defensive action.”
“At the direction of the President, the U.S. military has taken decisive defensive action to protect U.S. personnel abroad by killing Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force, a U.S.-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization,” the Pentagon said in a statement. “The United States will continue to take all necessary action to protect our people and our interests wherever they are around the world.”