Will Kaback (10:01)
Here's what the left is saying the left opposes the strikes, arguing that they're a political ploy. Some suggest Trump favors foreign military engagement only when it suits his domestic priorities. In Ms. Now, Nicholas Grossman said Trump sending bombs into Nigeria was a Christmas show for his evangelical base. Nigeria has been plagued by sectarian violence, but that violence hasn't primarily targeted Christians and certainly not at historically unprecedented levels. America's logic here isn't clear, but the strikes appear driven more by Trump putting on a show for his evangelical base than trying to reduce violence in Nigeria or even advance US national interests, grossman wrote. It's not clear what prompted the timing of the strikes. The US Campaign in Yemen came after the Houthis fired at shipping in the Red Sea, and the strikes in Syria followed an ISIS linked attack in the country that killed three Americans. But there hasn't been a recent attack on Americans or US Interests in Nigeria. This professed concern for persecuted Christians looks absurd in the context of the Trump administration's policies. For example, the U.S. department of Homeland Security recently announced the end of temporary protected status for nearly 4,000 people from Myanmar, many of them persecuted Christians, Grossman said. But bombing on Christmas did give Donald Trump a chance to tell his base that he's standing up for Christianity even as he and many of his Christian supporters, in direct contrast to Jesus teachings, openly champion violence, money and cruelty to strangers. In November, Joshua Keating wrote in Vox about Trump's potential humanitarian intervention. Maga style. The Nobel Peace Prize aspirant and advocate of America First Foreign policy, is more than willing to use the threat of military force to accomplish his foreign policy goals and to interfere in the domestic affairs of other countries when doing so aligns with his domestic political priorities, Keating said the threat against Nigeria is similar to that against Venezuela, although the latter appears far more likely to actually be carried out. In both cases, the president appears to be contradicting his frequently expressed opposition to military interventionism. But these are interventions linked to the priorities of his political base. Trump is essentially a globalist, someone who believes the US plays an indispensable role on the world stage and should play a role in solving global crises. But the big difference between Trump and the liberal internationalists or neoconservatives who came before him is the degree to which his foreign interventions are aligned with his domestic political priorities, keating wrote. In the case of Nigeria, it means reviving the supposedly discredited notion of humanitarian military intervention, but only in a case where it aligns with the priorities of one of Trump's important constituencies. Now, here's what the right is the right generally supports the strikes, saying they show America's enemies that Trump is true to his word. Some caution that these strikes alone won't change the situation in Nigeria, National Review's editors wrote. Trump targets the Islamic State in Nigeria Just last month, Trump had raised alarms about the treatment of Christians in Nigeria. Since 2009, estimates say that as many as 100,000 Christians have been killed and 19,000 churches have been destroyed. Trump warned that if it didn't stop, the US may very well go into that now disgraced country, guns a blazing the editor said Trump is right to focus attention on the treatment of Christians in Nigeria, a persistent problem that has gotten insufficient attention. That said, these militant groups thrive in uncovered spaces beset by all sorts of lawlessness. The strikes were carried out in cooperation with the Nigerian government, but the sort of sustained government campaign on the ground it would likely take to re establish order is not immediately in the offing. Nor presumably, would we have the appetite to participate in such an effort, the editors wrote. The Christmas strikes are yet another sign that rather than being a quasi isolationist like some of his most vociferous supporters, Trump is a hyperactive foreign affairs president. He makes a lot of threats, more than he ever carries out, but enemies completely discount them at their peril, the Wall Street Journal editorial board argued. Stopping the growth of ISIS in Africa will require more than bombing from afar. Skeptics are taking issue with Mr. Trump's framing of the strike as intended to save Christian lives, and no doubt that framing is aimed at evangelical Christian audiences who support Mr. Trump in the US but it's not as if the terrorists aren't killing others. In Nigeria and across much of the Sahel region, the terrorists are a justifiable target, the board said. It's also encouraging that the US and Nigerian governments say they worked together on the strikes. This suggests local cooperation that is essential to stopping the growth of ISIS and Al Qaeda offshoots. The US has carried out similar attacks in Somalia for years, as it also has in Yemen and Pakistan at times in the past 25 years. This is a long time fight, and periodic bombing raids won't end the threat any more than Bill Clinton's missiles from a distance stopped Osama bin laden in the 1990s, the board wrote. Dismantling the jihadist threat will take more sustained involvement with regional governments that are themselves threatened by Islamic radicals. That means sharing intelligence and perhaps deploying US special forces on the ground if need be. The US learned the hard way in 2001 that a distant jihadist group can carry out or inspire attacks on the American homeland. And finally, here's what Nigerian writers are saying. Some Nigerian writers say the strikes could undermine Trump's efforts to protect Christians. Others argue the US Intervention is welcome after years of government inaction. In the Guardian, Onidikachi Madueke suggested the strikes may only fan the flames of insurgent violence. Ironically, it was Trump's redesignation of Nigeria as a country of particular concern in November that deepened Muslim Christian tensions. Many northerners who are predominantly Muslim, blamed southern Nigerians for championing a narrative that ultimately resulted in in the US sanctions and international stigma. Madiwica said the geographic and operational focus of the strikes has complicated the Christian genocide framing Sokoto is the spiritual heartland of Islam in Nigeria, but armed violence in the area disproportionately affects Muslim communities. By contrast, attacks against Christian farmers are most prevalent in north Central states such as Benue and Plateau. The strikes against IS came at a time of public fatigue, with insecurity caused by insurgency terrorism, banditry and communal violence. Nigerians were ready to accept almost any intervention that promised relief, madueke wrote. Despite the support, Nigeria's insecurity will not be resolved through air power alone. Airstrikes may yield short term tactical gains, but they risk generating longer term strategic setbacks. Framing the intervention as the defense of persecuted Christians may strengthen extremist narratives of foreign crusader aggression, potentially attracting more external funding and support for jihadist groups, the this Day editorial board wrote about the strike on terror in Nigeria. The Christmas Day strike on terrorist targets in Sokoto state is a bold undertaking with many positive meanings. The collaboration between Nigeria's armed forces and their United States counterparts is a strategic gain. The identification of ISIS as the target of the strike brings Nigeria's campaign in line with the global thrust of counterterrorism, the board said. This campaign has seen the US Collaborate with governments in diverse countries to go against ISIS terrorists. To this extent, the involvement of the US in the Sokoto strike is part of the global anti ISIS campaign that has been waged in the aftermath of the 911 attacks in the US whatever may be the shortfalls of this specific strike, it is a fitting but long overdue diplomatic signal to all terror merchants, sponsors and foot soldiers in Nigeria that their days are numbered. However, it is crucial to dispel the dangerous strands in narratives surrounding the strike. The board wrote it was not targeted at any faith, nor was it designated to derogate any section of the country. Instead, it is aimed at eroding and ultimately eliminating the capacity of ISIS and affiliates like Boko Haram to continue destabilizing Nigeria by perpetuating insecurity through terrorism. Alright, that is it for what the left, the right and Nigerian writers are saying now we'll move into my take. As has been apparent for some time, President Trump's promise to, quote, put an end to endless wars has become one of his most hollow campaign statements. While the airstrikes in Nigeria are not the same as full scale wars like in Afghanistan or Iraq, they are part of a pattern of consistent, intermittent military operations. Simultaneously, the administration's explanation fits an equally distressing pattern of incoherency. After a year of covering the second Trump administration, I find myself viewing the president's actions through what I call an even if lens. The administration takes a bold and unusual action, experts and pundits criticize or question it, and White House officials or the president deploy arguments about why this action represents a critical national interest. The justification seems hard to square. But even if you take the administration's rationale at face value in these cases, the corresponding action still doesn't make sense. The strikes against alleged drug boats near Venezuela are a perfect example. The administration calls this a national security issue and says it is taking bold action to protect Americans from, quote, narco terrorists bringing deadly drugs into the country. Set aside the flaws in this justification like that these boats are primarily trafficking cocaine, which is a significant threat but much less pressing than synthetic opioids. Let's just take it at face value. Even if the administration wants to stop the flow of cocaine into the country, it doesn't make sense to prioritize Venezuela, which isn't a major trafficking hub, or to rely on airstrikes over proven Coast Guard interdiction efforts, or even to focus on the Caribbean at all, when most drugs from Venezuela are transported through the Pacific. Instead, the strikes against these boats make far more sense under a different reasoning, one that White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles recently said to Vanity Fair when she said that the boat strikes are really about making Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, quote, cry uncle. The Even if exercise typically reveals the administration's ulterior motive, you can repeat it for a litany of issues. Tariffs, the National Guard, deployments, overtures about annexing Greenland, and now the Nigeria strikes. Trump said that the strikes were against Islamic State terrorists who have, quote, been targeting and viciously killing primarily innocent Christians at levels not seen for many years and even centuries, end quote. And it's true that Christians have regularly been attacked and killed by jihadist terrorists, particularly by Muslim herders competing with Christian farmers over land. But that initial claim is deeply flawed, mostly because Christians are far from the only victims of spiraling regional violence in Somalia and Africa. As the 2025 US Commission on International Religious Freedom report on Nigeria stated, quote, those targeted include Christians, Muslims, traditional practitioners, and humanists. Case in point, just last week, terrorists bombed a crowded mosque in Nigeria's northeastern Borno state, killing five people. In August, a separate mosque attack killed 50. According to data from Armed Conflict Location and event data, approximately 53,000 civilians in Nigeria have been killed in targeted political violence since 2009. Between 2020 and 2025 Christians were targeted in 385 attacks, resulting in 317 deaths. Comparatively, Muslims were targeted in 196 attacks, resulting in 417 deaths. In other words, the Trump administration is taking an extremely narrow view of this situation, a view that's even then explicitly challenged by Trump's own senior advisor on Arab and Middle Eastern affairs. Still, taking Trump's justification at face value, even if Christians in Nigeria face an outsized threat from terrorist groups, and even if the administration had articulated a clear reason to protect this specific group, these strikes don't seem to help persecuted Christians at all. Airstrikes, Even a protracted campaign of airstrikes are not going to put an end to extremist violence in Nigeria's north. As the Wall Street Journal editorial board wrote, the US has carried out similar attacks in Somalia for years, as it also has in Yemen and Pakistan. At times in the past 25 years, periodic bombing raids won't end the threat. Time and time again, in every administration since the fall of the BERLIN WALL, the U.S. government has tried to achieve its goals through brute military force. Time and time again, it has failed. There's no reason to believe Nigeria will be any different. Furthermore, almost a week later, whether the Christmas strikes have had any impact is still unclear. While a local official of a town near the bombings in Sokoto said that he believed the strikes killed some terrorists, an assessment the US shares the number of casualties is still unconfirmed. At the same time, residents of villages in Sokoto said they observed bombs landing in empty fields and expressed confusion about who or what was being target. Meanwhile, the US and Nigerian governments are relaying competing stories about the results of the strikes and how they were coordinated. All of this ambiguity underscores the broader problem. The administration communicated no clear goal for this operation and no clear theory of success. Even the best case outcome, say dozens of terrorists killed and their bases destroyed, changes very little about the reality on the ground. This conflict spans an entire region, of which northern Nigeria is only a part, comprising hundreds of millions of people, complicated histories and struggling governments and militaries. This strike doesn't resolve the situation. So what is our endgame? Keep up the bombings until the Defense Department determines Nigerian Christians have been sufficiently protected. Expand our military operations throughout the Sahel to try to crush the widely dispersed terrorist groups. For that matter, why is it the purview of the United States to protect Christians abroad? And how could we possibly do that without ensnaring our military into more forever wars? The only answer to these questions is that the premise Trump's justification is wrong. If you put aside Trump's justification, there is a conceivable case for US Involvement in Nigeria. The Islamic State affiliates operating in the country are part of a broader regional insurgency that has destabilized large swathes of of the Sahel. Left unchecked, these groups can strengthen cross border networks and further erode already fragile governments. A future in which these groups attempt to project violence beyond the region, including against the US Is not difficult to imagine. Addressing this situation might be possible, but only if the US Committed to aiding the Nigerian government in the long term through things like economic assistance, intelligence sharing and, yes, joint military activity that isn't happening in Nigeria. Yes, Thursday strikes were carried out in coordination with the government, but the Trump administration hasn't shared any plans for a more substantive engagement. On the contrary, Trump actually threatened to pull aid to the country in November if it continued to allow the killing of Christians. As I said earlier, when the even if test fails, it implies an ulterior motive at play. In this case, the strikes are best explained as a political ploy rather than a genuine attempt to defend a persecuted religious group abroad. In the months leading up to the Christmas strikes, the administration positioned itself as a defender of Christians worldwide, willing to take action where others weren't. Now, this message obviously appeals to the Republican evangelical base and, more broadly, voters who want to see tangible action against Islamic terrorist groups. It's reminiscent of Trump's designation of white South Africans as special refugees that granted them priority admittance to the US In a vacuum, Trump can point to evidence of some persecution to justify the decision, but the rationale falls apart when you consider the situational context. Again, the question here is not about whether Christians are being persecuted in Nigeria. They are. The problem is that the Trump administration has myopically chosen to focus on a small issue that it thinks it can sell to its base, and that its response to that issue is narrow, incoherent, and untethered from any discernible strategy for its actual resolution. If the administration continues down this path, the most likely outcome is not the protection of vulnerable communities, but another open ended US Military engagement justified on tenuous grounds. That is precisely the kind of endless war Trump once promised to end.
