THE NEW YORK TIMES: The branding of the U.S. military operation against Iran is a quintessentially Trumpian choice for a leader whose tenure has been marked by anger.
By his own account, President Trump was asked to personally pick the name of the military operation against Iran and was bored by all the choices presented to him. “They gave me, like, 20 names, and I’m like, falling asleep,” he said last week. “I didn’t like any of them.”
Then at last he was offered another option: Operation Epic Fury. That woke him up. “I like that name,” he told supporters at a rally in Kentucky. “I like that name.” And so it was selected.
After all, Epic Fury captures the Trump presidency in its essence. Everything Mr. Trump does, at least as he sees it, is epic — the biggest, the most, the first, “like we’ve never seen before,” as he likes to say. And much of what he does seems to be driven by fury, a deep and abiding enmity toward the forces arrayed against him or those he blames for what he considers the downfall of the country under other presidents.
Operation Epic Fury, therefore, is a quintessentially Trumpian choice for the name of a war. Not for him an Operation Just Cause (Panama), Operation Restore Hope (Somalia), Operation Uphold Democracy (Haiti) or Operation Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan). While other military operation names in modern times have evoked broader American values or uplifting sentiments like freedom and hope, Mr. Trump prefers rage.
This is in a way the Anger Presidency. Anger defines Mr. Trump’s decade on the political stage. Anger at foreigners who come to this country and change its nature. Anger at allies who take advantage of America. Anger at Democrats who cross him. Anger at Republicans who cross him. Anger at appointees he deems insufficiently loyal. Anger at prosecutors, F.B.I. agents, judges, journalists, law firms, elite universities, cultural figures, corporate leaders, pollsters, central bankers and the Norwegian Nobel Committee. » | Peter Baker | Peter Baker, the chief White House correspondent, covered Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom in Iraq during the early months of those wars. He reported this article from Washington. | Monday, March 16, 2026
Trump will go down in history as the warmonger non plus ultra. As the president who was lacking in compassion and who was full of anger and bile. The president who destroyed democracy. The president who caused chaos and who turned the world upside down. In fact, he will be remembered for all the Cs: cruelty, corruption, chaos, callousness, carelessness, catastrophy, censoriousness, cheesiness, and childishness. – © Mark Alexander
