Last week on Feb. 25, Meidas Defense’s Joe Plenzler sat down with former deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh to talk about US defense strategy and how the looming war with Iran was and is being communicated to the American people. Her thoughts, now that Trump has launched a war with Iran, are below.
Guest article by Sabrina Singh, former deputy press secretary at the Department of Defense
Americans woke up this past weekend to the United States at war with Iran. Instead of clear understanding of why, President Trump and members of the administration offer a carousel of explanations.
President Trump - through social media videos - has given the public a shifting set of rationales for why military action against Iran was necessary. At first, the justification sounded like regime change. Then came a new list: crippling Iran’s Navy, destroying its ballistic missile capabilities, disarming proxy groups across the region, and ending Iran’s nuclear program.
Conflicting objectives are dangerous enough. Conflicting messengers make them worse. From President Trump to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth to Secretary of State and National Security Advisor Marco Rubio, each has been offering different explanations, emphasizing different goals, and sometimes contradicting one another outright. Is the aim deterrence or destruction? Containment or transformation? A limited strike or a generational change? When the administration can’t speak with one voice, it should not be surprising that the American people struggle to trust what they are being told.
According to recent polling, nearly 6 in 10 Americans disapprove of the U.S. decision to take military action in Iran and most say they lack trust in Trump to make the right decisions when it comes to use of force in Iran.
That lack of trust matters. The American people deserve an explanation of not just what is being done, but why it is being done, what success looks like, and what it will cost. At every turn, this administration has come up short.
And it’s not like the President hasn’t had the opportunity to make the case to the American people. He could have used the State of the Union address to lay out the threat posed by Iran, explain why diplomacy or sanctions were insufficient, and argue why military action was unavoidable. He did not. He could have gone to Congress before launching strikes to seek authorization for the use of military force. He did not. Instead, Americans were left to piece together the rationale after the fact.
We should be learning lessons from the past as this is not how a country should stumble into war. A clear, consistent explanation would not have tied the administration’s hands; it would have strengthened it and brought the nation along.
And bring the nation along it must, because at the end of the day, Americans will bear the costs. These costs will not be abstract. They are already showing up at the gas pump, where higher prices will ripple through household budgets. If gas prices continue to rise, airline fuel costs will climb, pushing airfares higher. Shipping costs would also increase, likely driving up grocery prices. All of this will hit here at home.
War is not confined to the battlefield; its impact spills through every part of our society. In just the first three days of this war, six Americans have already lost their lives. We honor their sacrifice, and think of the families they leave behind—families whose lives have been forever and irreversibly changed.
In the beginning days, this war has already widened into a regional conflict. Gulf nations are absorbing Iranian retaliatory strikes aimed at Israel and U.S. interests and military bases across the region. The U.S. has urged Americans to leave 14 countries and shuttered its embassies in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait after they were struck by drones.
Americans deserve better than to wake up to war. And now that we are in a war, the biggest question is: How and when does it end?
Sabrina Singh is the former deputy press secretary at the Department of Defense, serving in the role from April 2022 to January 2025.
