Trump's Doctrine offers a grim choice for the world: Obey or suffer

Alain Gabon

25 January 2026 

Venezuela and Iran are just the latest examples of this twisted approach, which prioritises US interests above global security

https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/trumps-donroe-doctrine-offers-grim-choice-world-obey-or-suffer

The prospect of US military intervention in Iran seems to have been avoided for the time being, thanks to vigorous diplomatic action from the Gulf states and Turkey, and more surprisingly, Israel itself.

Given US President Donald Trump’s declarations that there would be no mass executions of protesters in Iran, and that the killings had stopped, it appears that Iran will for the moment be spared the Venezuela treatment or worse. 

Yet even without military action in the form of targeted assassinations or bombing campaigns, it would be safer - especially for the Iranian regime - to consider such interventions as having only been put on hold, at best. 

This sudden change of heart might simply be a sort of psy-op ploy to reassure Iran’s regime, encouraging the nation to lower its guard before an actual strike. It’s also possible that Trump was genuinely convinced to shelve that option, at least for awhile. 

Many factors might have contributed to this about-face, including the resolute opposition of Trump’s regional allies; the still-fresh example of the Iraq disaster; the lack of preparation among the US and its regional allies for a major operation in Iran; the likely destabilising consequences for the region, especially Lebanon; the possibility of “mission creep”; the uncertainty over the ultimate outcome in Iran itself; and the lack of viable opposition figures.

On the latter point, Trump neither respects nor trusts Reza Pahlavi, the son of Iran’s last shah, who claimed to lead the protests from Los Angeles.

Domestic factors in Trump's decision not to strike include a probable increase in the price of oil, which would hurt Trump’s own voters in the run-up to this year’s crucial midterm elections; deep divisions on this issue, even within Trump’s closest circle; and the fact that the overwhelming majority of both Democrats and Republicans strongly oppose military intervention in Iran.

Cynical calculations

Trump likely favours a “Venezuela solution” for Iran: namely, a show of military might and threats, followed by quick de-escalation (a tactic he previously adopted in his June 2025 bombing campaign against Iran). 

Trump’s now-recognisable strategy of alternating between threats and dialogue, also visible not only in his dealings on the Russia-Ukraine war but also on Greenland, amounts to a tacit promise that the enemy regime will be allowed to survive - as long as it cooperates, or at least no longer threatens, US and Israeli interests.

Trump remains, first and foremost, a businessman. In his estimation, a good deal with a dictatorial and deeply antagonistic, yet stable and coherent, regime is preferable to a messy war with uncertain consequences. 

The Gulf states themselves, in their typically cynical and pragmatic calculations, might also greatly prefer a regional situation where the Iranian regime has been weakened to the point where it no longer represents a credible threat - political, economic or military - yet remains in charge domestically, to prevent the emergence of a genuine democracy that could represent a model for their own populations.

Despite the incendiary rhetoric between Israel and Iran, Tel Aviv’s priorities are to eliminate Iran’s nuclear programme and to destroy its ballistic missile capabilities, to the point where it no longer represents an existential threat. Yet despite a series of US-Israeli attacks on Iranian nuclear and military facilities last June, major questions remain about the extent of damage that was actually done.

Iran’s “axis of resistance”, meanwhile, is essentially dead for the foreseeable future, or at least no longer operational.

Another credible scenario that we might see unfolding involves genuine attempts to eliminate Iran’s current regime through a mix of covert Israeli-US destabilisation operations (as we’ve already witnessed this January), alongside support for anti-regime elements in an effort to foment or support an internal coup. Targeted bombings and assassinations could then be deployed in a campaign to eliminate the last major “irritant” and obstacle to full Israeli-US regional hegemony.

Supremacist manifesto

All of this comes in the context of Trump’s seminal November 2025 National Security Strategy. The slim document, which is around 30 pages, reads like a typically Trumpian “America uber alles” manifesto on steroids, triumphantly supremacist and imperialistic. 

Page after page, it repeats that the US must dominate all the regions of the world where it has interests - and Washington’s tentacles are spread over much of the globe. On the other hand, it rejects “global domination” and declares that “not every country, region, issue, or cause - however worthy - can be the focus of American strategy”. 

The document forcefully asserts that the US must avoid getting sucked into foreign conflicts that are “peripheral or irrelevant” to its national interests. It also advocates for a dramatically refocused definition of national interests, and encourages a “predisposition to non-interventionism”.

This is not to be confused with isolationism or disengagement from world affairs. Indeed, interventionism in the name of “protecting national interests” has for decades been the major - if not the main - foreign policy practice of the US.

As the National Security Strategy makes abundantly clear, Trump wants a relatively stable and secure Middle East, where he can do business and access its natural riches. The region may fall short of being pro-US, but it must serve its interests, even if that means via threats and coercion. At the very least, it cannot be allowed to endanger them. 

Democratisation and human rights do not matter any more than the Iranian people themselves. On the contrary: while the National Security Strategy places a historically low priority on the Middle East and advocates relative disengagement from the region, this in no way signifies a recognition of those nations’ sovereignty, or even autonomy from the US.

Both the regimes and the peoples of the region remain, like every other nation on earth, subject to the perceived interests of the US, living with that Sword of Damocles above their heads. In that world order, there can be no real, substantive sovereignty or self-determination anywhere. 

Trump’s “Donroe Doctrine” can thus be summed up in two options: obey or suffer. Venezuela and Iran are just the latest two examples.