The dirty little secret here is that the Democratic establishment and thus many Democratic politicians like what's happening. They just don't like how it's being done.

What's they're doing is both bad policy (IMHO) and bad politics. Why is it bad politics? Because this military action is deeply unpopular and you cannot outflank the Republican Party on the right about American imperialism. Remember when Kamala Harris promised the "most lethal" military? What does that mean? And why?

But hte other reason this is bad politics is for the reason you state: it cedes the political ground of being the "peace president" to Trump. Memories are short because he did exactly the same thing in 2015 eg [1][2] and again in 2020 eg [3]. The last one is particularly funny because Biden did exactly what Trump promised to do but the Trump still beat Biden over the head for it.

There's no consistency in any of this. Trump was never a peace president. We knew it was a lie at the time. We know it's a lie now. Nobody cares.

But when the supposed opposition party mirrors his policy positions and offers no resistance to anything that's happening, who are voters going to listen to? The guy who talks about peace, even though he's lying, or the guy who says nothing about peace and just thinks Trump should've consulted with Congress but nothing otherwise should change? Or, worse, sometimes Trump isn't being tough enough?

Then Senator Joe Biden in 1986 called Israel "the best $3 billion we make" and if Israel didn't exist we'd invent on to protect our interests [4] while Ronald Reagan's Secretary of State called Israel an unsinkable aircraft carrier in the region.

The JCPOA was a rare W for Obama (who was otherwise the Deporter-in-Chief and the Drone King). Trump of course dismantled it at the behest of the Adelsons. Did Biden reinstate it? Of course not.

The best case for an establishment Democratic administration now is to do nothing while promising nothing and reversing nothing that ultimately brings in the next Trump, just as Biden/Harris did in 2024.

That's the long version of why I say there's no difference. In the short term there might be. Even that's debatable of course. But long term the ratchet effect only gets worse.

[1]: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/12/donald-...

[2]: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/13/donald-trump...

[3]: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/08/donald-trump...

[4]: https://www.c-span.org/clip/senate-highlight/user-clip-joe-b...