Good evening, I’m British Chris, and this is Raw America.
Tonight, the United States is at war with Iran, and nobody in the White House seems to know how it ends. Trump is telling reporters “the big one is coming.” Benjamin Netanyahu’s son is dodging the draft in Miami. And Trump himself showed up to a Medal of Honor ceremony looking visibly unwell, slurring his words in public for the first time since the bombs started falling.
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Now let’s get into it.
The Pentagon Is Alarmed and Nobody Has an Exit Strategy
Start with the fundamental problem: nobody in Washington appears to know what winning this war actually looks like.
Trump has been telling reporters the military campaign could last as long as four weeks, promising “heavy and pinpoint bombing” until the US achieves what he’s calling “our objective of peace.” That’s a slogan, not a strategy.
Behind the scenes, it’s considerably more worrying. The Washington Post is reporting that the mood inside the Pentagon is, in the words of one insider, “intense and paranoid.” Military officials are privately alarmed that Iran’s retaliatory strikes keep coming, and every one of those strikes requires U.S. air defense interceptors to shoot them down. Those interceptors are not unlimited.
Representative Adam Smith, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, put it plainly: the United States can’t exactly call a timeout mid-conflict to restock. Resources are “stretched thin,” in his words. And there’s no pause button.
Joint Chiefs Chairman General Dan Caine has already reportedly warned the White House directly that weapons shortages and a lack of allied support significantly raise the risks for U.S. troops. Four service members have already been killed. Five more suffered critical injuries.
This is a war that Trump ran specifically against. His “America First,” “no new wars” platform was central to his appeal with MAGA voters who were exhausted by foreign entanglements. Now he’s presiding over an open-ended bombing campaign with no defined endpoint.
Trump Tells CNN: “The Big One Is Coming”
If the Pentagon briefings are alarming, Trump’s own words aren’t exactly reassuring.
CNN’s Jake Tapper spoke with the president by phone and relayed the conversation on air. When Tapper asked whether the United States was doing more than just military strikes, Trump said: “We haven’t even started hitting them hard. The big wave hasn’t even happened. The big one is coming soon.” On Capitol Hill, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters that “the hardest hits are yet to come from the U.S. military.”
This is after U.S. Central Command has already reportedly wiped out more than 1,000 targets. After the U.S. and Israel have already taken out Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei. After four American service members are dead.
Tapper noted that Trump sounded “very pleased.” That confidence is either reassuring or terrifying depending on how closely you’ve been following the stockpile situation.
Netanyahu’s Son Dodges Draft in Miami
Now to a story that cuts right to the heart of who actually bears the cost of war.
While 360,000 Israeli reserve soldiers have dropped everything to mobilize and fight in Iran, Benjamin Netanyahu’s 34-year-old son Yair is in Miami. Doing, reportedly, “non-profit charity work.”
The fury among Israeli soldiers is off the charts. One soldier stationed on the northern front told The Times of London: “Yair is enjoying his life at Miami Beach whilst I’m on the front lines.”
It’s hard to argue with that.
Howard Stoffer, an international affairs expert with 25 years of US government experience, is now warning that Yair’s presence in America is both a security liability and a moral embarrassment. Stoffer told the Daily Express that Yair “will be a target,” calling it “foolish” for him to remain stateside. He said he wouldn’t attend any public event featuring Yair, because he’d consider it a prime target for “angered people that are out there.”
Stoffer believes Yair is almost certainly being watched by Mossad whether he knows it or not. But his point isn’t really about security. It’s about symbolism. “The Prime Minister’s family is as much a part of what is required to defend their country than anybody else is,” he said.
There’s a particular kind of hypocrisy that emerges in wartime, and it tends to involve the children of the powerful. Netanyahu is asking hundreds of thousands of Israeli families to send their sons and daughters into a war with Iran. His own son is on Miami Beach.
The optics couldn’t be worse. The principle couldn’t be clearer. And the soldiers on the front lines already know exactly what it means.
Trump Shows Up Visibly Unwell, Slurring His Words
Finally, a story that’s getting harder to ignore given everything else happening right now.
Trump appeared at a Medal of Honor ceremony at the White House on Monday with a visible red blotch on the right side of his neck. Multiple photos from the event showed a rash-like patch that included what appeared to be a scab mark.
This wasn’t the first time. Trump has previously been photographed with visible bruising on his hands. Aides have attributed that to frequent handshaking.
What’s harder to explain away is what Trump said during the ceremony. It was his first time speaking live and publicly since the strikes on Iran began.
“Finally, we honor one more American soldier, a fallen warria of world. Of wars. And really, terra,” Trump said. Journalist Aaron Rupar shared the video.
This is the commander-in-chief, presiding over an active military conflict with no defined exit strategy, appearing at a public event with a visible wound on his neck, visibly struggling to complete a sentence.
The timing matters. The country is at war. Four service members are dead, and U.S. munitions are already running low.
Corporate media will tiptoe around it and cover it up. Raw America won’t.
Connecting the Dots
These stories aren’t separate. They’re the same story told four different ways.
An open-ended war with no strategy and dwindling resources. A president telling CNN things are about to get worse. And a commander-in-chief who appears unwell at his first appearance since the bombs started falling.
That’s your Raw America briefing for tonight. We’ll keep amplifying the voices that billionaire-owned media wants to bury.
While the corporate press waves the flag and shows you videos of bombs, we’ll ask the questions that matter: who lobbied for this war, who profited from it, and whose kids are coming home in caskets.
A new war launching at the exact moment the CNN is being handed to a Trump donor? That’s not an accident. That’s how the system works. Raw America may be one of the last places you’ll get the full, unvarnished truth. No billionaire owners, no advertisers to protect, no regime to please. If you’re not yet a paid subscriber, now is the time. There may not be a more important moment to invest in independent journalism than right now.
I’m British Chris for Raw America. Thanks for watching.
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