Wendy Sherman, who worked for Barack Obama ‘s administration as Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, believes that Donald Trump ‘s decision to kill Iranian General Qassem Soleimani could have “unbelievably horrific consequences,” Newsweek reports.
Sherman made the comments Thursday on MSNBC’s The Last Word and warned that the fallout of the assassination could place targets on United States officials “all over the world.”
“There will be terrible, terrible reprisals. They will likely happen in the Middle East, but they could happen really anywhere in the world.”
While Sherman acknowledged that Soleimani is a “ruthless killer” that wrought terror on the world, she nevertheless said that the Obama administration — to her knowledge — did not pursue an assassination due to an understanding of the consequences. According to Sherman, her former administration was working on diplomacy and had its eye on a “peaceful path” amid the “many issues” that required attention outside of their nuclear program.
“I pray with all of my heart that the Trump administration has a plan and a strategy. But all I’ve seen to date in their Iran policy is one-off actions. And this one-off action can have unbelievably horrific consequences.”
The escalation Sherman is warning of may already be on the horizon. As The Inquisitr reported, Iranian military Gen. Gholamali Abuhamzeh said on Thursday evening that 35 potential American targets could be hit in retaliation. Abuhamzeh noted that the targets — reportedly in The Strait of Hormuz — have been on Iran’s radar for some time. The comment came not long after Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said that “revenge awaits” the U.S. for their attack and killing of Soleimani.
In response to Abuhamzeh’s comment, Trump threatened to attack at Iranian cultural sites, which the progressive think tank The Gravel Institute noted would amount to war crimes .
“We are not dealing with a sane president carrying out a policy devoted to minimizing death and promoting peace. We are dealing with a dangerous lunatic,” the think tank tweeted in response to Trump’s threats before calling him a “dangerous lunatic.”
The White House claims that the drone strike that killed Soleimani was a decision made with the intelligence that the Iranian general was crafting plans to attack U.S. diplomatic staff and service members. But New York Times correspondent Rukmini Callimachi noted in a Twitter thread that the evidence used to justify the attack was not very substantive and that killing Soleimani was considered to be a “far out option.”
