2026-07-14T22:57:46.741Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/14/politics/trump-worst-predictions-iran-war
有关伊拉克战争最臭名昭著的言论之一，是时任副总统迪克·切尼在开战前几天做出的预测，称美军将“作为解放者受到欢迎”。
多年来，这番言论不仅成了乔治·W·布什政府违背承诺的典型代表，也成了其未能为发动的战争做好准备、未能理解战争的明显失败的缩影。当时怎么能如此大胆地直接做出后来被证明完全错误的预测呢？
特朗普政府在伊朗战争问题上的记录充斥着类似的案例。
在过去四个半月里，总统唐纳德·特朗普及其身边人士信心满满地做出了诸多预测，但很快就纷纷落空。
尤其是特朗普本人，似乎几乎完全不了解这场他发动的战争的进展情况。但失言的情况绝非仅限于他一人。
以下是其中几个最典型的例子。
特朗普周一震惊了全世界，他自信地宣布美国将很快接管霍尔木兹海峡，成为其“守护者”，并向过往船只收取20%的通行费。
但这与美国政府此前有关海峡收费的立场完全相悖。
“我们一直表示，在海峡设立收费制度是不可接受的。我们不仅这么说，全世界都这么认为，”国务卿马可·卢比奥在5月说道。他还补充说，这“顺便说一句，完全是非法的”。
特朗普周一的言论还意味着，美国需要长期驻军来控制该海峡，持续数年之久。
换句话说：这看起来完全不切实际。果然，仅仅一天后，特朗普就收回了自己的言论。
总统竟然会提出如此极端且不切实际的想法，这表明他根本不清楚哪些是可行的。美国有线电视新闻网（CNN）周二报道称，顾问们急忙劝阻他放弃这个想法。
特朗普早前预测这场战争会很短暂，多次表示将持续“四到五周”。
开战两个多月后的5月1日，他还说这场战争“应该不会持续太久”。
如今已经过去了四个半月，而且看不到尽头。
许多早期预测并非板上钉钉，政府方面辩称，在特朗普宣布结束停火之前，战争并未处于进行状态。但官员们早期的预测表明，政府原本预期的是一场完全不同的战争。
上个月美国与伊朗达成谅解备忘录后，特朗普和副总统J·D·万斯表现得仿佛伊朗领导人突然幡然醒悟。
“我认为我们正在打交道的是非常理性的人，”特朗普在6月16日说道，还补充说伊朗领导人“很好打交道”，“并未被极端化”。
万斯在接受CNN记者杰克·塔珀采访时表示：“过去几周我们取得的进展中，最棒的一点是，你能看到伊朗体系内部的人士，包括高级领导层，甚至伊斯兰革命卫队的官员都说，‘你知道吗，我们或许存在一些敌意，或许存在一些不信任，但我们认识到，47年来我们与美国打交道的方式是错误的。’”
没过多久，政府就自打耳光。上周停火和谅解备忘录破裂后，特朗普称伊朗领导人“疯疯癫癫”“邪恶”“病态”“不择手段”和“人渣”。
目前尚不清楚特朗普和万斯是真的相信了他们早前的言论，还是只是在说漂亮话。
但无论如何，他们的言论很快就显得过于乐观——正如当时许多人所预测的那样。
2月底首次对伊朗发动空袭时，特朗普的核心思路是伊朗民众会起来起义，推翻本国政权。
他甚至在当晚的声明中以这一思路收尾。
“我呼吁所有渴望自由的伊朗爱国者抓住这一刻——勇敢、大胆、英勇地夺回你们的国家，”特朗普说道。“美国与你们同在。我曾向你们许下承诺，如今我已经兑现。余下的将取决于你们，但我们会在那里提供帮助。”
但民众起义并未发生，特朗普很快就不再提及此事——仿佛这从一开始就不是他的目标。如今，他谈起此事时仿佛这根本不可想象。
“除非他们能得到全面武装，否则我从未想过他们会发起那样的起义，因为这些人很暴力，”特朗普周一在接受电台主持人休·休伊特采访时说道。“他们所谓的领导层非常暴力。”
但特朗普显然曾一度认为这是有可能的。事实上，这曾是他强调的一个重点。
当伊朗采取重大举措，通过封锁霍尔木兹海峡来获取谈判筹码时，政府最初对此不屑一顾，认为这不可能持续太久。
“我们正在处理这件事，我们一直在处理，”国防部长皮特·赫格斯瑟在3月13日说道。他还补充说，人们“不必为此担心”。
几天前的3月9日，特朗普曾表示海峡“其实不会影响我们”，因为“我们有这么多石油”。
“霍尔木兹海峡将保持安全，”特朗普补充道。
海峡并未保持——也没有一直保持——安全。虽然确实有其他国家受伊朗封锁海峡的影响更大，但此次封锁也对美国经济造成了重大打击。
这也让伊朗掌握了制衡特朗普的重要筹码。
与对海峡局势的天真看法相一致，政府还就油价问题做出了诸多失实承诺。
在3月8日接受塔珀采访时，能源部长克里斯·赖特表示，汽油价格将“很快”回落至每加仑3美元以下。
当被问及具体时间时，赖特表示，即使在“最糟糕的情况”下，也只需要“数周”而非“数月”。
如今的情况比赖特设想的最糟糕场景还要糟糕。四个多月过去了，汽油价格仍未降至每加仑3美元以下。根据Gas Buddy的数据，全国平均油价从未低于3.70美元，而在新一轮敌对行动爆发后，油价目前再次飙升。
这个错误的预测凸显了政府似乎完全没有预料到伊朗封锁霍尔木兹海峡会造成多大的破坏。
特朗普曾数十次表示，德黑兰“恳求”达成协议，它们“ desperate”（ desperate此处结合语境译为“走投无路”），“快要撑不住了”，迫切想要达成协议，“非常迫切”。
他还经常预测协议即将达成。
但过去三个月的事态发展却恰恰相反。伊朗不仅坚持要求大幅让步，还破坏了上个月谅解备忘录中看似相当有利的条款。
这或许是特朗普的一厢情愿或说辞，但这表明他并不了解对手的动机。
从战争初期开始，特朗普和赫格斯瑟就声称伊朗的军事失败已经彻底到美国可以几乎随心所欲地在任何空域飞行而不会有风险。
在3月4日的简报会上，赫格斯瑟声称美国和以色列将在一周内“完全掌控伊朗的天空”。
“伊朗对此无能为力，”赫格斯瑟说道。
在接下来的几周里，特朗普也重复称伊朗“对此无能为力”。
“他们没有任何防空装备。他们的雷达已经100%被摧毁，”特朗普说道。“我们作为军事力量是不可阻挡的。”
但到了4月初，伊朗成功击落了两架美国军机。
The Trump team’s worst predictions about the Iran war
2026-07-14T22:57:46.741Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/14/politics/trump-worst-predictions-iran-war
One of the most infamous comments uttered about the Iraq War was then-Vice President Dick Cheney’s prediction, just days before it began, that US troops would be “greeted as liberators.”
Over the years, that comment came to epitomize not just the George W. Bush administration’s broken promises, but also its apparent failures to prepare for and understand the war it launched. How could it be so brazen as to directly predict something that turned out to be so wrong?
The Trump administration’s track record on the Iran war is rife with similar examples.
Over the last four and a half months, President Donald Trump and those around him have confidently made predictions that quickly fell apart.
It often seems as if Trump, especially, has little to no understanding of what’s happening with the war he launched. But the wayward comments are hardly limited to him.
Here are some of the biggest examples.
Trump shocked the world on Monday by confidently announcing the United States would soon take over the Strait of Hormuz as its “guardian” and charge countries 20% cargo fees for passage.
Except this ran counter to what the administration previously said about anyone charging tolls in the strait.
“We’ve always said a tolling system in the strait would be unacceptable. But we don’t just say that; the world has said that,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in May. He also said it would be “completely illegal, by the way.”
Trump’s Monday comments also raised the prospect of the United States needing a sustained military presence to control the strait for years to come.
In other words: It seemed wholly impractical. And sure enough, just a day later, Trump reversed himself.
That the president would even float something so extreme and difficult suggests he’s not terribly clued in on what’s feasible. CNN reported Tuesday that advisers scrambled to talk him out of the idea.
Trump predicted early on that the war would be brief, repeatedly projecting it would last “four to five weeks.”
More than two months in, on May 1, he said that it “shouldn’t be too long.”
It’s now been four and a half months — with no end in sight.
Many of the early predictions weren’t hard and fast, and the administration argues the war wasn’t ongoing during the ceasefire, which Trump has since declared over. But officials’ early projections suggested the administration anticipated a much different type of war.
After the US and Iran agreed on a memorandum of understanding last month, Trump and Vice President JD Vance spoke as if Iran’s leaders had suddenly seen the light.
“We’re dealing with people that I think are very rational people,” Trump said on June 16, adding that Iran’s leaders were “nice to deal with” and “not radicalized.”
Vance said in an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper: “The coolest thing about the progress we’ve made over the last few weeks is that you see people within the Iranian system, senior leadership, even IRGC officials say, ‘You know what, we may have some animosity, we may have some mistrust, but we recognize the way that we’ve done business with the United States for 47 years is a mistake.’”
It didn’t take long for the administration to eat those words. After the ceasefire and the memorandum crumbled last week, Trump called Iran’s leaders “cuckoo,” “evil,” “sick,” “dirty players” and “scum.”
It’s not clear whether Trump and Vance believed what they were saying earlier or whether they were just saying nice things.
But either way, their comments quickly came to look pollyannaish — as many predicted at the time.
When he first launched strikes on Iran in late February, Trump was focused on the idea that the Iranian people could rise up and change their regime.
He even concluded his announcement that night by focusing on the idea.
“I call upon all Iranian patriots who yearn for freedom to seize this moment — to be brave, be bold, be heroic, and take back your country,” Trump said. “America is with you. I made a promise to you, and I fulfilled that promise. The rest will be up to you, but we’ll be there to help.”
But when the popular uprising didn’t happen, Trump quickly dropped the subject — as if it was never his goal to begin with. And today, he’s talking as though it were unthinkable.
“Unless they could be completely armed, I never thought they’d have that kind of an uprising, because these people are violent,” Trump told radio host Hugh Hewitt on Monday. “Their so-called leadership is very violent.”
But Trump clearly thought it was a possibility at one point. In fact, it was a major point of emphasis.
When Iran made its big move to gain leverage by shutting the Strait of Hormuz, the administration initially shrugged it off and suggested it couldn’t possibly last.
“It’s something we’re dealing with; we have been dealing with it,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on March 13. He added that people “don’t need to worry about it.”
A few days earlier, on March 9, Trump said the strait “doesn’t really affect us” because “we have so much oil.”
“The Strait of Hormuz is going to remain safe,” Trump added.
The strait has not remained — or been consistently — safe. And while it’s true that other countries have been more impacted by Iran shutting it down, the closure has also wrought significant damage on the US economy.
It’s also giving Iran major leverage over Trump.
Related to its naiveté about the strait, the administration has made many wayward assurances about gas prices.
In an interview with Tapper on March 8, Energy Secretary Chris Wright said gas prices would be back under $3 per gallon “before too long.”
Pressed on precisely when, Wright said that, even in the “worst case,” it would be “weeks” rather than “months.”
It’s been even worse than Wright’s worst-case scenario. More than four months later, gas still isn’t under $3 per gallon. Prices haven’t fallen below $3.70 in the national average, according to Gas Buddy, and they’re now spiking again after renewed hostilities.
The bad prediction underlines how the administration didn’t seem to fully anticipate just how much damage Iran could do by closing the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump has said dozens of times that Tehran was “begging” for a deal, it was “desperate” and “dying” to make one, and that it wanted a deal “so badly” and “very badly.”
He also routinely predicted a deal was just around the corner.
But the events of the past three months have shown the opposite. Iran has not only held out for very significant concessions, it’s also scuttled what seemed to be pretty favorable terms in last month’s memorandum of understanding.
Perhaps it’s some wishful thinking or spin from Trump, but it suggests he doesn’t understand the motivations of his adversary.
From the war’s earliest days, Trump and Hegseth claimed Iran’s military defeat was so absolute that the United States could basically fly anywhere it wanted to without risk.
At a March 4 briefing, Hegseth claimed the US and Israel “will have complete control of Iranian skies” within a week.
“And Iran will be able to do nothing about it,” Hegseth said.
Trump repeated in the weeks that followed that Iran “can’t do a thing about it.”
“They have no anti-aircraft equipment. Their radar is 100% annihilated,” Trump said. “We are unstoppable as a military force.”
But by early April, Iran managed to take down two US aircraft.