Iran Sells Russia Drones And Missiles To Kill Ukrainians And Trump Doesn’t Care

While the president brags about his “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran and throttling its oil exports, its weapons sales to Russia get a pass.

WASHINGTON — While Donald Trump brags about his “maximum pressure” campaign to impoverish Iran and force its leaders to give up its nuclear program, there remains one source of revenue that the president appears to be OK with: Iran’s sale to Russia of deadly drones, missiles and technical expertise to help slaughter Ukrainian civilians.

Iran has earned at least tens of millions of dollars, perhaps many hundreds of millions, from its agreement to supply weapons to Russia over the past two years. And while that deal drew new sanctions against both countries under former President Joe Biden, it appears to have received no pushback from Trump.

“Not sure why specifically the Trump administration is not making this an issue with Russia,” said Steven Pifer, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine in its early years after the breakup of the Soviet Union.

“The Trump administration has not addressed the ‘Axis of Upheaval’ as it was called under Biden — the increasing cooperation between Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea — in a forceful way,” said Liana Fix, a Ukraine analyst with the Council on Foreign Relations.

When asked by HuffPost why he has not done anything to stop Iranian drone and missile sales to Russia, even as the U.S. cracks down on Iranian oil sales, Trump — who has long defended Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and who initially called Putin’s 2022 invasion a “genius” move — did not answer the question and instead offered a rambling explanation acknowledging the lethality of Iranian drones.