“I’m not going to war. I’m going to stop wars.” Trump, 2024 A cartoon shoes a bedraggled Trump standing in a devastated battlefield, holding a tattered American flag. He is saying, "We're really destroying them." A Department of Defense Inspector General’s report on the Iran war was released on September 14th. The U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) reportedly said that “Iranian strikes damaged and destroyed hundreds of buildings and structures at U.S. bases in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Oman, and Jordan during the conflict.” Also, “dozens of U.S. aircraft were destroyed or damaged. ” The report covers the period up to June 30. More damage may have been done since then. Pete Hegseth’s July estimate of $37.5 billion for the cost of the war thus far does not include the damage documented in the new report that would add tens of billions of dollars more. Trump and Hegseth repeatedly claim that Iran’s air defenses and military infrastructure has been devastated. But Iran has fought the US to a stalemate, with no end in sight. Trump said he would not go to war, but he was too stupid or arrogant to heed his own counsel. And now we are all paying.