What did Donald Trump do today?

He talked tough about Iran while simultaneously backing down to conserve dwindling resources.

In an interview with a French journalist today, Trump said that he would order a full-scale ground invasion of Iran "if we don't get 100% of what we want" out of the peace negotiations both countries have presently abandoned. 

But what he's actually done this weekend is the opposite. Rather than escalating attacks, he called a halt to them on Friday. The most likely reason is that the United States is now running critically low on the missile interceptor used—without perfect success—to defend American bases and ships from Iranian counterattacks. 

A Patriot missile, one of several kinds of interceptors the United States military is running short of

In other words, not only has Trump's war against Iran not achieved any of its stated purposes, and not only has it cost hundreds of billions of dollars and at least 18 American lives, but it's also single-handedly drained American arsenals of their main defensive weapons. Those interceptors can't be replaced instantaneously, and they're expensive—much more expensive than the cheap and effective medium-range missiles Iran has been using.

The problem for Trump now is that Iran clearly understands he's run out of credible military threats. A ground assault on Iran, a country the size and population of the entire eastern seaboard of the United States, is almost unthinkable. Continued bombing of legitimate military targets in Iran yields very little for the United States: the Iranian military is now more like a guerrilla force with an unlimited supply of long-range missiles and drones. And while Trump has enthusiastically promised to commit atrocities against civilians, that still wouldn't make this a winnable war for him.

Meanwhile, the rate at which Trump has burned through money and ordinance is putting a very real limit on how long the United States can keep up a belligerent posture in the region. The shortage is so acute that American military commanders are now letting some Iranian drones and missiles through in an attempt to ration the remaining interceptors for more serious threats. 

Why does this matter?

• It's almost impossible to describe how badly Trump has bungled every aspect of this war. 

• The problem with being both incompetent and a blowhard is that your adversaries very quickly learn they don't have to take any of your threats seriously.