Trump has now bombed more countries than any president in history.
“Tonight, at my direction as Commander in Chief, the United States launched
a powerful and deadly strike against ISIS Terrorist Scum in Northwest Nigeria,
who have been targeting and viciously killing, primarily, innocent Christians,
at levels not seen for many years, and even Centuries!” Trump said Thursday in a post on his Truth Social network.
“I have previously warned these Terrorists that if they did
not stop the slaughtering of Christians, there would be hell to pay, and
tonight, there was,” the president continued. “The Department of War executed
numerous perfect strikes, as only the United States is capable of doing.”
A US Department of Defense official speaking on condition of
anonymity told the Associated Press that the United States
worked with Nigeria to conduct the bombing, and that the government of Nigerian
President Bola Tinubu—who is a Muslim—approved the attacks.
It was not immediately known how many people were killed or
wounded in the strikes, or whether there are any civilian casualties.
The Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that “terrorist violence in any form, whether directed at Christians, Muslims, or other communities, remains an affront to Nigeria’s values and to international peace and security.”
The US bombings followed a threat last month by Trump to attack Nigeria with
“guns-a-blazing” if the country’s government did not curb attacks on
Christians.
Northwestern Nigeria—including Sokoto, Zamfara, Katsina, and
parts of Kaduna State—is suffering a complex security crisis, plagued by armed
criminal groups, herder-farmer disputes, and Islamist militants
including Islamic State West Africa Province
(ISWAP/ISIS) and Boko Haram. Both Christians and Muslims have been attacked.
Since emerging in Borno State in 2009, Boko Haram has waged
war on the Nigerian state—which it regards as apostate—not against any
particular religious group. In fact, the majority of its victims have been
Muslims.
“According to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data
Project, more Muslims than Christians have been targeted in recent years,”
Chloe Atkinson recently wrote for Common Dreams. “Boko Haram has
massacred worshipers in mosques, torched markets in Muslim-majority areas, and
threatened their own coreligionists.”
“It is true that Christian communities in the north-central
regions have suffered unimaginable horrors as raids have left villages in
ashes, children murdered
in their beds, and churches reduced to rubble,” she said. “The April massacre in Zike and the June bloodbath in Yelwata are prime examples of the
atrocities taking place in Nigeria.”
“The crisis in Nigeria is not a holy war against
Christianity,” Atkinson continued. “Instead, it’s a devastating cocktail
of poverty,
climate-driven land disputes, and radical ideologies that prey on everyone and
not just any distinct group.”
“By framing Nigeria’s conflict as an existential threat to
Christians alone, Trump is not shining a spotlight on the victims,” she added.
“Instead, he is weaponizing right-wing conspiracy
theories to stoke Islamophobia,
the same toxic playbook he used to fuel his ban on Muslims, and which left refugee families shattered at America’s borders.”
Former libertarian US Congressman Justin Amash
(R-Mich.) noted on X that “there’s no authority for strikes on
terrorists in Nigeria or anywhere on Earth,” adding that the 2001 Authorization
for Use of Military Force (AUMF)—which was approved by every member of Congress
except then-Rep. Barbara
Lee (D-Calif.)—“is only for the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks.”
“The War Powers Resolution doesn’t grant any authority
beyond the Constitution,” Amash added. “Offensive military actions need
congressional approval. The Framers of the Constitution divided war powers to
protect the American people from war-eager executives. Whether the United
States should engage in conflicts across the globe is a decision for the
people’s representatives in Congress, not the president.”
In addition to Nigeria, Trump—who says he deserves a Nobel
Peace Prize—since 2017 has also ordered the bombing of Afghanistan, Iran,
Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen, as well as boats
allegedly transporting drugs in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean. Trump has
also deployed warships and thousands of US troops near Venezuela, which could
become the next country attacked by a president who campaigned on a platform of
“peace through strength.”
That’s more than the at least five countries attacked during
the tenure of former President George W. Bush or
the at least seven nations attacked on orders of then-President Barack Obama during
the so-called War
on Terror, which killed more than 940,000 people—including at least 432,000
civilians, according to the Costs of War Project at Brown
University’s Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs.
Trump continued the war on ISIS in Iraq and Syria started by
Obama in 2014. Promising to “bomb the shit out of” ISIS fighters and
“take out their families,” Trump intensified the US campaign from a war of
“attrition” to one of “annihilation,” according to his former defense secretary, Gen. James
“Mad Dog” Mattis. Thousand of civilians were killed as cities such as Mosul, Iraq and Raqqa, Syria were flattened.
Trump declared victory over ISIS in 2018—and again the following year.
Some social media users
suggested Trump’s “warmongering” is an attempt to distract from the Epstein
files scandal and alleged administration cover-up.
“Bombing Nigeria won’t make us forget about the Epstein
files,” said one X user.
