Trump’s ‘risky gamble’ in Iran, $2,000 cheques for all (or no one), and an AI ‘clash of egos’

A participant in a rally in Los Angeles in support of regime change in Iran on March 1. Keystone/Swissinfo

Welcome to our press review of events in the United States. Every Wednesday I look at how the Swiss media have reported and reacted to three major stories in the US – in politics, finance and science.

This week media – old and new – were filled with images of explosions in the Middle East after the United States and Israel started bombing Iran, triggering ferocious retaliation against Iran’s neighbours. “Trump had no choice,” argued one Swiss newspaper, while another feared the negative consequences of the US president’s “risky gamble”.

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An Iranian man sits next to the damaged remains of his residential building in central Tehran on March 4. Keystone

On Saturday the United States and Israel launched strikes on Iran, plunging the region into a renewed military conflict. Swiss newspapers agree on balance that something had to be done about the Iranian authorities, but they are concerned that events could rapidly spiral out of control, with chilling consequences.

“Help is on the way,” US President Donald Trump told Iranian protestors on January 13. A month-and-a-half later he launched Operation Epic Fury, which the US government said targeted the Iranian regime’s security apparatus.

“This long period of time suggests that Trump hesitated and at the same time became a slave to his own communication,” the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ) wrote on Monday. “A sentence that was intended as a threat against Tehran increasingly piled pressure on the American president himself. […] In this situation, there were only two options for him: Iran renounces its nuclear programme or he starts a war himself,” the NZZ said.

“On the face of it, Donald Trump’s campaign of strikes against Iran is a political victory,” the Tribune de Genève declared on Sunday. “The Supreme Leader [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei] is dead, and even if the interim government is quickly put in place to discourage the opposition, the regime is wavering.”

The Tribune de Genève said the fall of Tehran was crucial for Trump, who had chosen to attack Iran without consulting Congress. “For the moment, Americans support him. Although a few voices, including within his own camp, are critical of the intervention, they are closing ranks behind the war leader, USA cap firmly on his head,” the paper said.

“But this staging doesn’t hide the risky gamble Washington has embarked on. If Operation Epic Fury fails or gets bogged down, the Republicans could lose control of Congress in November’s mid-term elections. A blitzkrieg – lightning war – would be their best outcome. On the other hand, if global oil trade is affected, continuing a war would be disastrous.”

Three days later, Le Temps in Geneva noted that “following the death of Ali Khamenei, a certain amount of confusion has also spread to Washington”. It reported that the Democratic minority was denouncing a decision that violated the Constitution “without an exit plan” and wanted to vote on a war resolution as soon as possible. “While Donald Trump has defined the aims of the operation – to wipe out Iran’s navy, missiles and nuclear programme, while preventing the country from supplying weapons outside its borders – the White House’s ambitions concerning the regime in power remain unclear, as does the timetable,” Le Temps wrote.

The NZZ noted that the US and Israel were now being criticised for their violation of international law because there was no immediate reason for a defensive war. “That is true, but it is equally true that international law doesn’t provide a way to domesticate a movement of religious fanatics that threatens to destroy Israel and is pursuing a secret nuclear weapons programme. The idea that we should stand by and watch until there is an ultimate and immediate – nuclear – danger is unrealistic. Because by then it will be too late.”

• Coverage on SRFExternal link, RTSExternal link, RSIExternal link (German, French, Italian)

• Trump had no choice: the Iranian regime dug its own graveExternal link – NZZ editorial (German, paywall)

• The attack on Iran could completely divide US conservativesExternal link – Tages-Anzeiger (German, paywall)

• Iran, Trump’s risky gambleExternal link – Tribune de Genève editorial (French)

• Iran: the great doubt about Donald Trump’s strategyExternal link – Le Temps (French, paywall)

“Liberation Day”: US President Donald Trump during a tariff announcement at the White House on April 2, 2025. Keystone

Where, demanded the Tages-Anzeiger in Zurich, are the $2,000 cheques that US President Donald Trump promised every US household on so-called Liberation Day?

“It’s slowly becoming clear that Americans will never receive this tariff dividend,” the paper concluded.

On April 2, 2025, Trump introduced sweeping 10% base tariffs on nearly all imports (plus an eye-watering 39% on most Swiss goods). This, he said, was not only a day of liberation, but also the “beginning of an era of prosperity” thanks to “trillions of dollars less in taxes”. The country’s 165 million inflation-plagued taxpayers were delighted by the promise of a cheque for $2,000 (CHF1,560).

“Yes, it really is like that in the US,” the Tages-Anzeiger said. “At some point you find an envelope with a government seal in your letterbox, as was the case with the Biden administration’s $1,400 Covid cheques. Trump first mentioned the $2,000 promise in November, and around New Year taxpayers’ questions became more grumpy: where’s the dough?”

Now, following the US Supreme Court’s decision on February 20 to strike down Trump’s tariffs (as reported in last week’s press review), the Trump administration faces thousands of lawsuits from companies wanting payback.

For his part, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent recently said he “got a feeling” that Americans wouldn’t get any tariff dividend cheques.

• Where are the $2,000 cheques?External link – Tages-Anzeiger (German, paywall)

The chatbots Claude, ChatGPT, Llama, Gemini, Perplexity, Copilot and Meta AI on a smartphone in Zurich. Keystone / Christian Beutler

The ‘clash of egos’ between the two artificial intelligence giants OpenAI and Anthropic over war will have consequences for us all, says Le Temps in Geneva.

“It’s one of the most important fundamental questions of our time,” Swiss public radio SRF said on Friday. “How and to what extent may AI be used in war, in conflicts, in weapons? What are the limits of surveillance of the population? An open conflict has recently broken out in the US Department of Defense over this issue.”

At the weekend, just as the United States and Israel attacked Iran, a “spectacular rupture” occurred in the world of AI, wrote Le Temps. When Anthropic refused to relax its security restrictions for the Pentagon, the company was immediately banned and deemed a “supply chain risk”. Rival OpenAI jumped at the chance to win the contract, and now its models will be deployed on the Pentagon’s classified networks.

Anthropic’s refusal to work with the US military “could quickly turn the AI industry upside down”, Le Temps said on Wednesday. “While Anthropic is betting heavily on ethics, its competitor OpenAI is focusing on a purely commercial strategy.”

“Two camps are facing each other, and it’s not David against Goliath. Anthropic, valued at $380 billion (CHF300 billion), has nothing to be ashamed of compared with OpenAI’s $730 billion,” Le Temps said. Anthropic could even benefit from this recent conflict, it reckoned. It noted how uninstallations of OpenAI’s ChatGPT app in the US jumped by 295% on Saturday. “Meanwhile, US downloads of Claude, Anthropic’s chatbot, jumped 37% on Friday and 51% on Saturday.”

SRF warned that, depending on how the dispute plays out, it could even mean the end of Anthropic. “The US government certainly has no interest in this, as it sees itself in constant competition with China in the development of artificial intelligence,” SRF concluded.

• Clash between Anthropic and Open AIExternal link – Le Temps (French, paywall)

• Anthropic: too woke for TrumpExternal link – SRF explainer (German)

• Dispute between US military and AI company escalatesExternal link – SRF (German)

The next edition of ‘Swiss views of US news’ will be published on Wednesday, March 11. See you then!

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