It’s become increasingly clear that the Iran war has been a spectacular failure. There is just no plausible military outcome that produces the political result Washington says it wants.
Which raises an important question: If the United States has overwhelming military superiority, why has it become so difficult for Washington to turn military power into political victory?
The sad reality is that time and again the U.S. chooses objectives that are either unattainable, poorly defined, or disconnected from the political realities of the country it is fighting. For Washington has a long record of fighting the wrong war for the wrong objective. Why does this keep happening?
Stephen Walt is a columnist at Foreign Policy magazine and professor of international relations at Harvard University. Read his latest column here: https://foreignpolicy.com/2026/08/05/iran-trump-lost-wars-us-military-history-strategy-geopolitics/
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