Iran: Should we turn it into a parking lot?

The answer is no.  Most Iranians hate the mad mullahs who run the country more than we do. But because the government has all the guns there's not much the Iranian people can do.

They hate that money that could be used to improve life for Iranians is being funneled into terrorism and attacks on Israel.  But once again because they're disarmed, like Democrats want Americans to be, they can't do anything.

So any sort of large attack on Iran that resulted in lots of Iranian casualties would actually work to the benefit of the Iranian theocrats.

But limited strikes against military targets, like the Iranian fleet or Iranian nuclear weapons sites, would result in few casualties but really hurt the Iranian regime.

Similarly non-lethal attacks, say disrupting the power grid, would make Iranian lives miserable but not kill anyone and if we use smart psychological warfare the Iranian people would blame their government for inciting the US.

Given that even Germany is now admitting that the Iranians attacked the tankers Trump should be able to get some countries to agree to at least publicly support limited strikes.  Even though the Europeans might know that Iran is behind the attacks they may be more interested in making money trading with Iran than in stopping Iranian aggression.  After all since WWI European countries have been much more in favor of ignoring evil than addressing it.

Even the radical neo-cons aren't calling for "liberating" Iran.  But odds are Democrats will condemn whatever Trump does so from a political perspective limited proportionate counter strikes won't hurt Trump.

Trump's saying that it may have been an act by a rogue Iranian is a brilliant move. It buys time for him to get Germany et al lined up in support of the US while making America look responsible and not weak.  Irrespective of what the Europeans eventually do the US can execute a limited attack in a week or two and not appear weak.