No talks with Trump on Iran attack, say Clinton, Obama, Bush and Biden

US President Donald Trump claimed twice on Monday that he had spoken to former US presidents about the war in Iran and that an unnamed President supposedly approved his attacks on Iran. Howevere all four living former US Presidents have outrightly denied having any conversation with the US President Donald Trump about the attack, according to reports from various US media outlets.

“Every president knew- I’ve spoken to a certain president, who I like actually, a past president, former president, he said, ‘I wish I did it, I wish I did,’ but they didn’t do it. I’m doing it,” said Trump. However, later on Monday at an event at the Oval Office, Trump was being pressed by a Fox News reporter, Peter Doocy, whether he spoke to George W Bush. Trump responded “no”; he also did not want to explicitly mention whether he spoke to Barack Obama or Bill Clinton.

“I can’t tell you that. It would be very bad for his career, even though he’s got no career left,” said Trump

In a fact check by CNN's Jeff Zeleny and Samantha Waldenberg, who reached out to “all four living former presidents.” A spokesperson for Clinton told CNN that no spokesperson for Clinton said that a conversation between Trump and Clinton had not taken place. Similarly, aides close to Bush, Obama and Biden also suggested that no conversation happened with Trump.

Also Read: Israel claims strike on aircraft linked to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at Tehran’s Mehrabad airport

Trump, who had very little domestic support for his Iran war, is desperate as the mid-term elections are fast approaching. His claim that former Presidents come to his aid is far-fetched, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had long been mobilising for a war with Iran, and every other Presidents have somehow managed to dodge a war with Iran, infact Barack Obama in 2015 managed to sign a nuclear deal also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) with Iran which limited Iran's stockpile of enriched Uranium, in exchange of sanction relief. But Trump abruptly walked out of the JCPOA in his first term in office.

Trump now finds himself in a dilemma, as his stated objective of regime change seems increasingly unlikely "without boots on the ground," and deploying troops in Iran will at least be damaging to Trump's political career, and at most result in a civil war within MAGA and probably within the US. Trump earlier admitted that he was “shocked” by Iranian retaliation, which almost every analyst in the world had predicted. Trump is now calling the war a “very high-level chess game”. “These are really smart people and violent people and vicious people. And some very nice people. And some are very nice but violent; they turned violent."