Let this moment sink in.

[kurtcagle]

27. The distinction here is important

The closest analogy that I can give would be if Donald Rumsfeld, while Secretary of Defense, had been deliberately assassinated by an Iranian missile while in Iraq. Rumsfeld, it could be argued, caused the death of hundreds of thousands of people, some Iranian. He could be labeled an American terrorist by the Iranians. Personally, I wouldn't have missed him. However, because Rumsfeld was a senior representative of the United States, his death would have been considered by international convention an attack upon the United States, and most of the global community would have come to the defense of the US (albeit reluctantly).

This is one reason that diplomats enjoy diplomatic immunity - they are considered to be representatives of their respective countries. What Trump did was a deliberate attack by the United States upon Iran. This was made even worse because Trump unilaterally abrogated a peace treaty that both the US and Iran had signed. There is no question that the US is the aggressor here.

What may very well happen because of this is that countries around the world will start treating the United States like a rogue state incapable of keeping its word. Its credit rating will continue to decline because countries will conclude that it is too likely to become aggressive. Its moral authority will also continue to erode. Trump's little stunt will all but guarantee that we will be in a recession by the end of this year, and this is even before we start considering the fact that as a country we are not ready for the kind of asymmetric warfare that is about to descend.