To the editor,

Let’s stop tolerating Donald Trump’s reckless actions. His impulsive behavior impedes his decision making and is responsible for the death and economic disruption that is affecting the world. His unserious self-centered behavior is driving an American policy which is unfocused, and to put it simply, cruel. You have to shake your head at the hubris of a man who would start a Board of Peace, crave the Nobel Peace Prize and start a war at the same time.

Iran is ruled by an authoritarian government that represses its own people and exports terror. Its uranium stores are a serious concern although the Trump administration has whipsawed us with alternate facts. “Iran’s key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated” (June 21). Now we hear from US Envoy Witikoff, who told Fox, “They are probably a week away from having industrial-grade bomb-making material.” Which is it? How does that fit in with the other reasons his administration has put forth like Israeli pressure forced us to strike?

Maybe the war is a necessary option that a functioning democracy would take but we will never know. The decision to strike was done without input from Congress the way the forefathers intended. Congress should have been fully consulted. When it wasn’t, the co-equal third branch of our government should have demanded a say. Given the overwhelming American military superiority, the excuse that there was no time to drill into how this ends doesn’t hold water. The next time you fill up your tank, think how this might have been different if the consequences in the Strait of Hormuz and oil production facilities in the area had been fully discussed before blundering ahead.

It’s too late. The human, economic and environmental catastrophe is a quagmire with no easy way out. This is the exact kind of war Trump promised never to get us into. The American military is unmatched in its capabilities and quickly able to neutralize lesser armed forces in a short period of time. What we should have learned is that in countries like Iraq and Afghanistan the hard part comes in the years after. After enemy military centers are obliterated there remain thousands and thousands of resistance fighters embedded in mountains, deserts and hiding in ruined cities where innocent people become unwilling shields to their presence. Burning with revenge, they constitute a decentralized opposition willing fight to the death via worldwide terrorism and guerrilla tactics. Unless the US plan is to kill everybody in Iran through bombing, there will remain a hidden large underground resistance which can only be rooted out by American soldiers on the ground. Exactly what we were promised would not happen.

This is not going to end quickly or cleanly but trusting an aging egomaniacal president to solve things with bluster, insults and unchecked power is not going to help. Voting out the senators and representatives who have enabled him to turn the world upside down in a little more than a year is the only way out. Trump is not going to change and the country cannot take much more of this. The work of your representatives is yours to evaluate at the ballot box in the midterms. A working Congress, loyal to America rather than to a cultish personality, will make the best decisions to get us back on track.

Vote Trump’s chaos enablers out in November. Make America Normal Again.

Dan Woll

River Falls