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MORNING GLORY: Will President Trump go full Sherman in the war on Iran?
If James McPherson’s 1988 classic history of the American Civil War, Battle Cry of Freedom, has been translated into Farsi, the remaining leadership of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps may want to read it quickly, especially the chapters about General William Tecumseh Sherman’s two famous marches.
The first was the fabled “March to the Sea” from Atlanta to Savannah. The second was the less well known but longer, more difficult and far more devastating for the locals march from Savannah to North Carolina, a march that ravaged the home of secessionist fanaticism, South Carolina, and did so in a way that the state’s people did not think possible given the geography of its marshy lowlands.
Of course America has waged and won wars against tyrants before, but we do not love to wage war. We have never been a conquering empire, but when necessary, our leaders have been ruthless when it comes to concluding war.
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“If we can march a well appointed army right through Jefferson Davis’ territory,” Sherman appealed to a skeptical General Ulysses S. Grant and President Abraham Lincoln, it would be “a demonstration to the world, foreign and domestic, that we have a power that Davis cannot resist.”
“I can make the march and make Georgia howl,” Sherman added to the doubters Grant and Lincoln. Sherman was proposing something not done before in the long years of war to preserve the Union and free the enslaved — abandoning his lines of supply and living off the land his army would despoil.
Like Lincoln, Sherman “believed in a hard war and a soft peace,” writes McPherson, and once approved by his chain of command, Sherman delivered on the “hard” in devastating fashion.
“War is cruelty and you cannot refine it,” Sherman said.
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“It takes a simple, direct and ruthless man to wage war,” wrote a different American general in a different war.
General George Patton recorded that blunt statement in his diaries, according to another great popular historian, Rick Atkinson, in his “An Army At Dawn” about Operation Torch in WW2.
Sherman had anticipated Patton by nearly 80 years.
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“We must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war,” Sherman argued, saying of the Confederacy’s elite that his armies would make them “so sick of war that generations would pass away before they would again appeal to it.”
“It is mercy in the end,” he concluded.
Throughout Sherman’s two marches, Lincoln was open to peace on his terms. The greatest president even took a surprise trip to Grant’s headquarters to meet the South’s peace commissioners in person on February 3, 1865.
Because Lincoln was adamant about preserving the Union and freeing the slaves, his offers were rejected by Confederate President Jefferson Davis when they were returned to him. Lincoln had even offered some level of compensation to the Southerners who would see their enslaved freed, but that was not enough for the fanatics in Richmond.
The South was already shattered at that point. The value of the confederate dollar had plummeted to 2% of its 1861 value and there was no more meat for General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia which continued the doomed effort to save Richmond. But the leadership of the Confederacy had devolved into denial of reality.
Davis addressed the Congress of the Confederacy three days after Lincoln’s offer, and press reports at the time relayed to the North that the tone of the Confederacy’s president was one of “unconquerable defiance.”
“We will never submit to the disgrace of surrender,” Davis thundered.
But, of course, the South effectively did submit on April 9, 1865, when Lee surrendered the largest of the Confederate forces to the Union, accepting defeat. Those two unnecessary months of war that occurred between Lincoln’s offer and Appomattox saw Sherman’s “70,000 Blue avengers” ravage South Carolina where the Civil War had had its start. “I almost tremble for her fate” Sherman said, but he did not hesitate to unleash his forces.
“The war in South Carolina wasn’t pretty and hardly glorious,” concluded McPherson, “but Sherman considered it effective. ‘My aim then was to whip the rebels. To humble their pride, to follow the to their inmost recesses and make them fear and dread us.’”
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Sherman did just that. As did the relentless Grant to his long time foe Lee. Presiding over the long and bloody war from Washington, D.C. was a man of supreme vision and moral clarity, the indomitable Lincoln, misjudged by almost everyone from before the beginning of the war. He had never demanded emancipation before the war was begun by secessionist fanatics who imagined an empire of slavery from the old South into Mexico and extending into Cuba.
Lincoln ordered done what had to be done to break the will of the fanatics in Richmond and spread throughout the confederacy. Like Presidents Wilson, FDR and Truman in the next century, Lincoln had his terms and would accept nothing less.
Lincoln’s price for peace grew higher as the cost in Union lives grew higher too. The 20th century presidents were far from Lincoln in wisdom and eloquence. It is arguable that Wilson was our worst president despite his vast intellect and refinement. Wilson could not win the peace after America won World War I, and in the failure was the seed of the Second World War.
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FDR of course was a deeply flawed man when it came to character but a superb leader in the Second World War, and like Churchill, ruthless when necessary. Truman did what had to be done and didn’t lose any sleep over the atomic bombs which saved tens of thousands of American lives. Presidents do what they think best in wartime. History assesses and often second-guesses them, but they are obliged to act in the moment.
Lincoln was a man of great soul and sorrow but also of indomitable spirit. Like Sherman and Grant and Lincoln’s famed “Team of Rivals,” Lincoln persevered even when a significant peace party sprang up in the North and even when he lost 25 of his 123 Republican seats in the midterms of 1862.
We have no idea what will follow President Donald Trump’s deadline to the IRGC tonight — we can dispense with the fiction that the mullahs are running Iran now — but there is a very hard core at the heart of the American experience of which we have to hope the IRGC generals are aware. If Trump taps into that and decides to do to Iran’s oil and energy and transportation infrastructure from the air what Lincoln allowed Sherman to do to the Confederacy in Georgia and South Carolina via an army on the ground, it will not be unprecedented. It could in fact eventually result in freedom for an enslaved people.
Trump’s critics are legion and they are especially enraged when he posts what they conclude to be vulgar and unnecessarily provocative posts. What the impact of those posts are on the IRGC we cannot know. Eventually we will. In the meantime, Iran’s people yearn for a freedom that only Trump can deliver and probably only through hard measures.
Hugh Hewitt is a Fox News contributor and host of “The Hugh Hewitt Show” heard weekday afternoons from 3 PM to 6 PM ET on the Salem Radio Network, and simulcast on Salem News Channel. Hugh drives Americans home on the East Coast and to lunch on the West Coast on over 400 affiliates nationwide, and on all the streaming platforms where SNC can be seen. He is a frequent guest on the Fox News Channel’s news roundtable, hosted by Bret Baier weekdays at 6 p..m ET. A son of Ohio and a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School, Hewitt has been a Professor of Law at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law since 1996, where he teaches Constitutional Law. Hewitt launched his eponymous radio show from Los Angeles in 1990. Hewitt has frequently appeared on every major national news television network, hosted television shows for PBS and MSNBC, written for every major American paper, has authored a dozen books and moderated a score of Republican candidate debates, most recently the November 2023 Republican presidential debate in Miami and four Republican presidential debates in the 2015-16 cycle. Hewitt focuses his radio show and his column on the Constitution, national security, American politics and the Cleveland Browns and Guardians. Hewitt has interviewed tens of thousands of guests from Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to Republican Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump over his 40 years in broadcasting. This column previews the lead story that will drive his radio/ TV show today.
Vice President JD Vance arrived in Pakistan early Saturday, where he is leading high-stakes negotiations with Iran aimed at preserving a fragile ceasefire and preventing a broader regional war.
Vance is joined by U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, as part of a senior delegation engaging Iranian officials in Islamabad.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Speaker of Parliament Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf will be negotiating for Iran.
The talks, scheduled for Saturday, come over a month after the U.S. launched Operation Epic Fury on Feb. 28 — a sweeping military campaign targeting Iran’s military infrastructure following the collapse of nuclear negotiations.
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That operation pushed the U.S. and Iran to the brink of a ground war before a tenuous diplomatic breakthrough in recent days.
Trump announced a two-week ceasefire Tuesday, agreeing to suspend further U.S. strikes on the condition that Iran reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a critical global shipping route.
While Iran signaled it would allow passage through the strait as part of the agreement, traffic remains severely disrupted, with shipping companies hesitant to resume normal operations amid ongoing security concerns and uncertainty over enforcement.
Vance struck a cautious tone before departing, warning Iran not to test the U.S. negotiating posture.
“If they’re gonna try and play us, then they’re gonna find that the negotiating team is not that receptive,” Vance said, adding he still expects the talks to be “positive.”
The outcome of the talks could determine whether the ceasefire holds or collapses into renewed hostilities, as both sides remain deeply divided after weeks of conflict.
Iranian officials have struck a cautious and conditional tone ahead of the talks.
Iran’s Supreme National Security Council said it accepted the two-week ceasefire but warned “this does not signify the termination of the war,” adding that “our hands remain upon the trigger” if the agreement is violated.
Vance described the agreement Wednesday as a “fragile truce.”
Iran also has tied the success of the ceasefire to developments in Lebanon, insisting that Israeli strikes on Hezbollah must stop as part of any broader agreement. Tehran has warned that continued attacks could jeopardize the talks, highlighting a key dispute with Israel and the U.S., which have argued Lebanon is not covered by the truce.
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Pakistan has emerged as a key intermediary, positioning itself as a neutral venue between Washington and Iran after helping broker the initial truce. But that role is already facing scrutiny.
Pakistan’s defense minister, Khawaja Asif, sparked backlash recently after calling Israel’s actions a “curse on humanity” in a now-deleted X post and, in a separate exchange, saying critics should “burn in hell.”
The remarks drew a sharp response from Israeli officials, who questioned Pakistan’s credibility as a neutral broker. Israeli leaders described the comments as “outrageous” and warned such rhetoric was incompatible with serving as a mediator, while Israel’s ambassador to India publicly said, “we don’t trust Pakistan.”
Pakistani officials have not directly addressed the controversy surrounding Asif’s remarks but have defended their broader role, emphasizing Islamabad’s efforts to broker the ceasefire and facilitate talks. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has called for “dialogue and diplomacy,” while officials say both Washington and Iran have expressed confidence in Pakistan’s mediation.
The talks are also unfolding against a challenging security backdrop.
U.S. officials have long treated Pakistan as a high-threat environment for official travel, with strict movement controls and layered security measures typically required for American personnel.
Bill Gage, a former Secret Service agent who traveled to Islamabad with President George W. Bush, told Fox News Digital the threat environment in Pakistan historically has ranked among the most severe faced by U.S. protective teams, requiring constant coordination and heightened precautions.
“The threat environment in Pakistan was one of the worst the Secret Service had ever operated in,” Gage said of his experience in 2006. “We were briefed that al-Qaeda wanted to kidnap an agent, so we always had to be in pairs.”
Pakistan continues to grapple with persistent terrorism threats.
The State Department currently classifies the country as a Level 3 travel risk, warning of potential attacks, crime and kidnapping, and noting that extremist groups have carried out strikes in major cities, including Islamabad.
Still, U.S. officials view the Islamabad meeting as a rare opening for diplomacy, with discussions expected to include nuclear restrictions, sanctions relief and broader regional security issues.
Whether the talks produce a lasting breakthrough or plunge the Middle East back into conflict may hinge on whether both Washington and Iran are willing to move beyond decades of mistrust.
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Kai Trump shares photos from Augusta National after Tiger Woods’ DUI arrest, treatment departure
Amateur golfer Kai Trump was on hand for one of the sport’s premier events this week. The granddaughter of President Donald Trump traveled to historic Augusta National Golf Club, where she had the opportunity to get an up-close look at some of the world’s top golfers competing for the coveted Masters green jacket.
But Trump traveled to Georgia knowing five-time Masters champion Tiger Woods would be absent. Woods was arrested after a rollover crash in Florida late last month.
He later announced he would not compete at this year’s Masters. A Florida judge allowed the golfer to travel outside the U.S. to enter a “comprehensive inpatient treatment facility,” court records showed.
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Trump’s mother, Vanessa, has been publicly linked to Woods and showed support after his DUI arrest, writing “Love you” in an Instagram Stories post featuring the pair.
The 18-year-old Trump shared highlights from her visit to Augusta National in a post on Instagram Thursday, including a photo with LIV Golf’s Bryson DeChambeau and his caddie, Greg Bodine.
“What a special place,” Kai, who is set to take the next step in her golf career at Miami, captioned an Instagram post with a heart emoji.
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The Martin County Sheriff’s Office in Florida said Woods was traveling at “a high rate of speed” when his vehicle collided with another car, causing it to roll over onto the driver’s side.
Authorities said Woods “exemplified signs of impairment.” He blew “triple-zeroes” for alcohol but refused a urine test.
“DUI investigators came to the scene here, and Mr. Woods did exemplify signs of impairment. They did several tests on him. Of course, he did explain the injuries and the surgeries that he had. We did take that into account, but they did do some in-depth roadside tests,” a sheriff’s department spokesperson said.
Woods entered a not guilty plea in response to the DUI charges. Before his arrest, he indicated that playing the season’s first major was a possibility.
In the 14 majors since he won the green jacket in 2019, Woods has failed to muster a top 20 finish. It’s his longest such streak since failing to finish in the top 20 in the first six majors of his career in 1995 and 1996. In his last 26 majors, he has only four top 20 finishes.
Since finishing tied for ninth at the 2020 Farmers Insurance Open, his best finish in his 18 official events since then has been a tie for 37th at the 2020 PGA Championship.
Woods has not competed in a professional golf tournament since 2024, when he competed in just five events — the Genesis Invitational and the four majors. He withdrew from the Genesis, finished dead last in the Masters and missed the cut in the other majors.
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New York Times investigating NFL reporter Dianna Russini after photos with Patriots coach Mike Vrabel emerge
Photographs emerged showing New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel with The Athletic/New York Times NFL reporter Dianna Russini at a resort in Arizona earlier this week, and now that reporter is the subject of an internal investigation.
Athletic executive editor Steven Ginsberg initially gave a statement to the New York Post’s Page Six April 7, calling the photos “misleading.”
“These photos are misleading and lack essential context,” Ginsberg initially said. “These were public interactions in front of many people. Dianna is a premier journalist covering the NFL, and we’re proud to have her at The Athletic.”
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Now, sources at The Athletic familiar with the controversy told Fox News Digital Russini is being investigated, while standing by Ginsberg’s initial statement.
The sources responded to Fox News Digital after Page Six and Front Office Sports reported on the internal investigation into Russini.
“After Page Six reached out to Dianna for comment on Tuesday, The Athletic immediately began an investigation. While the apparent conduct in the photos raised questions for Steven and leadership at The Athletic, an initial review suggested the images provided lacked context, specifically the presence of a larger group of friends,” a source said.
“New details from the Page Six report and information from the investigation raised additional concerns that are now being further reviewed. The investigation is ongoing.”
The source added Russini’s coverage is being reviewed, which is expected to take time, and she will not be reporting for the outlet in the meantime.
The New York Times declined to comment.
The photos, originally published by Page Six, show the coach and journalist holding hands and hugging on the roof of a resort bungalow in Sedona, Arizona.
Vrabel addressed the photos, telling Page Six, “These photos show a completely innocent interaction, and any suggestion otherwise is laughable. This doesn’t deserve any further response.”
Russini told the outlet, “The photos don’t represent the group of six people who were hanging out during the day. Like most journalists in the NFL, reporters interact with sources away from stadiums and other venues.”
The photographs and subsequent responses became the topic of immense national debate in the sports world this week.
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