Trump was reportedly worried he looked weak on Iran before ordering airstrike against Soleimani

Donald Trump.
(Image credit: JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images)

One of the major questions in the wake of President Trump's order to kill Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani via airstrike concerns the timing of the action. In short, why now?

Soleimani was a powerful strategic adversary of the U.S., who has been viewed as a national security threat and has been accused of orchestrating numerous acts of violence against the U.S. But Washington has held steady in the past.

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Tim O'Donnell

Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.