what i'm getting at is that all evidence suggests that the americans actually signed this 10 point list the iranians are publishing, despite their refusal to admit it. why would they do that? it's not because they were going to lose the war. nobody questions that they would succeed at a ground invasion if they tried, but they made it clear shortly after this started that they didn't want regime change at all, they wanted to maintain the existing system, and capture it. he wants a hostile corporate takeover, not a revolution.

could it be that trump actually thinks that the iranian demands are in america's self-interest and more so than anything the arabs or jews are proposing?

the iranian demands are clearly not in the interests of the arab countries, but we know how trump thinks about this, and we know trump tends to agree with right-wing authoritarian states when given the choice. it's entirely plausible that trump would side with iran and tell the arabs to fuck off.

what we've been hearing from trump the last few days is suggestive of the idea that he thinks the iranian demands are beneficial to the united states and he wants a cut and not that he's seeking to maintain imperial position or the status quo in the region. he may consider the idea of closing the bases in the area, or moving them around, to be in america's self-interest, he may actively seek to personally profit from any tolls in the gulf and he may be happy to agree to pay for reconstruction, then hire himself to do it, at american taxpayer expense. 

of course, this is stupid of him. he's going to have to move to russia to pull this off. but he is stupid. we know that.