How fortunate for peace and stability to have an American president who knows how to use American power to achieve positive change in supposedly intractable international problems.

Aside 1: Thank the U.S. Air Force, its B-2 bombers and Operation Midnight Hammer for destroying the Iranian nutcase ayatollahs' nuclear weapons threat. U.S. conventional deep penetration bombs destroyed the psycho ayatollahs' nuclear threat to humans throughout the Middle East -- humans Arab, Israeli, Turk, Azeri, Armenian, Nilotic, you name it.

Aside 2: Can the USAF win a Nobel Peace Prize? Before you scorn the idea, think about the positive political impact of Midnight Hammer.

OK. Back to the column: How fortunate the president -- Donald Trump -- also respects the deep American values, work ethic and constitutional order that collectively produce, protect and maintain the creative sources of U.S. power. Economic. Military. Diplomatic. Rock 'n' roll.

The U.S. is exceptional. Only powerful and creative America could have produced the new Middle East deal.

Another source of U.S. power: energized, responsible young Americans who join the U.S. military. Military service is the toughest job in a democracy.

Back to the gut issue: Today, Israel and what may or may not evolve to be a stable Palestine have a chance to live in prosperous peace because of the wise and forward-looking use of American power by an American president who managed to get four dozen countries and ethno-tribal entities to agree to back his Middle East peace deal.

The prez's name, once again: Donald Trump. He didn't win the Nobel Peace Prize.

Here are the two key elements of Trump's peace deal:

1. Get the living Israeli hostages back, human beings held underground for two years while being starved and tortured. Release happened Oct. 13. Living hostages returned. But, as of Oct. 14, all the bodies of dead hostages have yet to be returned. Why not return the remains of the dead? Take your worst, most macabre and grotesque necro-sexual psychopath estimate as the most likely reason. (Necro in the Greek usage.)

2. A done deal must ensure Hamas is disarmed -- completely disarmed. Trump told the press Oct. 14 Hamas would be disarmed by force, if necessary. (Doubters: Operation Midnight Hammer is evidence he means it.) Ensuring disarmament may mean killing a few more Hamas psychopaths. But psychopaths are slow learners. On camera, Hamas thugs murdered Palestinian Arabs they called collaborators. The psychopaths forced the accused to kneel. The psychopaths shot the kneeling in the head. To protect Palestinians, peace enforcers need to arrest, try and execute the Hamas murderers.

Arguably, Hamas' mass execution breaks the peace deal. Again, Trump asserts Hamas will disarm or be disarmed. Let's see what happens.

On the U.S. domestic front, a jealous, condescending former president, Barack Obama, won't give Trump credit for his momentous, decadal diplomatic achievement. Understand Obama got a Nobel Peace Prize for doing nothing. Barack isn't stupid. He knows his prize was a sham -- and Trump's success turns his sham into a historical wound.

Recall Obama smeared his predecessor President George W. Bush as a stupid and maladroit gunslinger. Obama -- preening as a global sophisticate, a boring but common elitist facade -- touted his own "smart diplomacy."

Diplomacy as practiced by professionals is the architectural pursuit of agreements and rewarding "deals" that eventually achieve long-range objectives. International diplomatic "breakthroughs" are rare. Those that occur require energetic leaders who 1) recognize converging immediate interests affecting disparate actors; 2) have the creativity to structure intelligent deals that leverage those interests; and 3) can establish their own national and personal commitment to long-term reliable political support for the breakthrough.

Establishing requires the convincing use of decisive power to challenge if not resolve the common problem or threat.

So we're back to Operation Midnight Hammer. Decisive U.S. military power devastated the regional destabilizers' biggest threat: Iran's nuclear weapons program. The nuke threat also propped up Iran's puppet armies, Hamas, Hezbollah and Yemen's Houthis. Midnight Hammer knee-capped the puppets.

Bottom-line lesson: Appeaseniks like the Obama-Biden crowd encourage evil actors. Terrorist and totalitarian fanatics interpret apologies as signs of weakness, the bleats of a corrupt culture wallowing in self-doubt.

Little wonder America's vicious enemies -- in Chicago and abroad -- fear Trump and his energized, "get it done in the right way" America.

To find out more about Austin Bay and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com .

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