The world is facing catastrophe. Donald Trump can help stop a new hellscape forming - Paul Embery

He understood the importance of the nation state and sovereignty. He saw that mass and uncontrolled immigration could be economically and socially disruptive. He spoke the language of reindustrialisation and was willing to face down the green zealots. He had no time for woke dogma and recognised the damage and divisions it had caused. He promised an end to US-inspired “forever wars” which had caused death and mayhem across the globe. And he represented, for many, a welcome counterweight to the doctrine of technocratic liberal internationalism that had come to dominate Western political institutions. All of that was rather refreshing.

But it looks increasingly like the Iran escapade will go down in history as a colossal foreign policy blunder, and one from which his reputation is unlikely to fully recover. And he has nobody to blame but himself.

Let me be clear: I have no time for the mullahs in Tehran or their brutal henchmen in the Revolutionary Guards, who have made life a misery for millions of ordinary Iranians. Like many across the world, I will cheer the day when opposition forces inside Iran dislodge the appalling regime.

But, as the examples of Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya showed us, Western-led interventions designed to impose our own brand of “democracy” can slowly turn into calamitous wars of attrition.

Moreover, does anyone truly know the US and Israel’s objective in this offensive? They can’t seem to make up their minds.

First, we were told it was the overthrow of the despotic leadership and liberation of the Iranian people – even though, as military experts have pointed out, regime change is rarely, if ever, achieved through a campaign of aerial bombardment alone. And, of course, when a nation is being pounded from the skies – its infrastructure destroyed and innocent citizens incinerated – the populace will often unite and rally around whoever is in charge.

Then we were told it was to smash Iran’s nuclear capability – a capability which just eight months ago Trump announced had been “completely and totally obliterated” and which even his own intelligence chief, Tulsi Gubbard, admitted the ruling regime had made “no efforts” to rebuild.

Now it seems to be to secure the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz – which was operating perfectly freely until the bombs started falling.

Is it too much to ask, with the stakes so high, that Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu get their message straight? Because, from where I’m sitting, it looks as though they are making it up as they go along.

Fears about the prospect of Iran acquiring a nuclear bomb are certainly justified. Religious fundamentalists and weapons of mass destruction do not go well together. But the truth is that this war was wholly unnecessary. The 2015 deal agreed between Tehran and the world’s major powers, which restricted Iran’s nuclear programme in return for sanctions relief, was working effectively. That was until Trump decided to rip it up in 2018.

Now the President plays fast and loose with international security by going all-in for war. Only it plainly isn’t working out as he had hoped. Fighting for its existence, the Iranian regime seems not to be going away any time soon. And its chokehold over the Strait of Hormuz risks plunging the global economy into recession, threatening the jobs, earnings and living standards of billions.

If reports that US troops are amassing on Iran’s doorstep are accurate, and if they have been moved there to act as something greater than mere leverage in negotiations, then things may be about to take a very dark turn indeed. Boots on the ground in Iran would turn the country into a hellscape and likely create a flood of refugees, many of whom would head to Europe for sanctuary.

If Trump genuinely cared for peace and prosperity in the world, he would end the war now, no matter the embarrassment he might suffer. Instead, he will doubtless try – very possibly in vain – to manipulate events so that he and the US do not come out of the affair looking defeated.

This is what happens when hubristic leaders puffed-up by their own sense of infallibility are surrounded by aides who lack the courage to tell them they have got it wrong. Presumably buoyed by his recent military operation in Venezuela, Trump appears this time to have bitten off more than he can chew – and now we all stand to pay the price.

He should have stuck to his pledge of “no new wars”. If he had, the Middle East and the world would not now be facing a catastrophe.