For the first time in decades, the Iranian regime is defenseless. Will President Donald Trump seize on the moment and finally depose of the brutal theocracy before it gets “the bomb” or instead pursue another “maximum pressure” campaign, cutting the ayatollah off from the rest of the world? Victor Davis Hanson lays out these options and what role the MAGA worldview may play in the Trump administration’s decision-making on today’s edition of “Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words”

“Remember that fable of our youth when the mice got together and they say, ‘The cat is picking us off one by one. We need to put a bell around his neck so we could be warned.’ And everybody said, ‘That's a great idea.’

“The next item of business among the mice assembly was, who will bell the cat? What I'm getting at is the Europeans, I think even the Chinese and Russians, don't want on their border a nuclear Iran. The Americans, the Israelis, everybody knows they should not—that theocratic regime should not get the bomb. But who bells the cat? ...

“Maybe the correct stance of the incoming Trump administration is to go back to the maximum-pressure campaign of Mike Pompeo and Donald Trump and have strict sanctions on oil exports, maybe even a blockade, put the pressure on so the people then throw the theocracy out itself.

“But on the other hand, people are going to argue, ‘Wait a minute, there are no Iranian air defenses. For one of the few times in history, that regime is naked. There is no Assad. There is no Hezbollah. There is no Hamas. There is no Houthis that are capable of, as surrogates, attacking the Israeli state. 

“‘So, maybe you could attack Iran—just this brief window—because Israel, in a series of brilliant air responses, has destroyed its ability—Tehran's ability to defend itself.’”

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