Trump's Two-Week Deadline Wasn't Real

Several outlets are offering behind-the-scenes accounts of how and when President Trump gave the green light to bomb Iranian nuclear sites, and they're unanimous about one key point. When Trump said on Thursday that he would make a decision within two weeks, the deadline was a deliberate deception to give cover to the military action.

• "It was a headfake," one Trump adviser tells Axios. "He knew the media couldn't resist amplifying it."
• The New York Times reports that Trump had largely made up his mind to send the bombers on Tuesday, having been impressed by the success of Israel's airstrikes on Iran.

• One senior administration official tells the Washington Post that there "was not really a moment" when Trump decided—it was more a steadily growing feeling that diplomacy wasn't going to work. The Post suggests Trump appears to have shifted his thinking in favor of an attack by last Monday, the day he visited the Group of Seven meeting in Canada. That day, Trump tried to coordinate a high-level meeting between US and Iranian officials from the summit, but the effort fell through, per Axios.
• He returned to DC early and began meeting with a "small" team to finalize the strikes, according to the Post. But Trump also made clear that he could abort the strike plan up until the last minute should Iran agree to come to the negotiating table.
• The B-2 bombers took off from Missouri very early Saturday while Trump was at his golf resort in Bedminster, New Jersey, and the president gave the final go-ahead from the resort as they neared their targets. "To onlookers at the club, Trump showed little anxiety about his decision to authorize airstrikes on three Iranian nuclear facilities that could have profound ramifications both on US national security and his own presidential legacy," per CNN. Trump then flew back to DC and arrived in the Situation Room as the first bombs fell.

(More US strikes Iran stories.)