Wiederholen die USA die Fehler, die zu ewigen Kriegen geführt haben?

The war in Iran is in its fourth week, with the U.S. and Israel using airstrikes to pummel Iran’s leadership and military, hobbling the country’s ability to project power.

Trump has signaled he may be looking for an off-ramp, calling off threatened strikes on Iran’s energy facilities this week so that the sides could negotiate. Tehran will have a say in how the conflict ends, however, and Iranian officials are boasting they have the Americans trapped in a quagmire.

Whatever the outcome of the talks, hopes of a military campaign that is both quick and decisive are fading, and there are early warning signs that the Iran war has succumbed to some of the same pitfalls that plagued Iraq and other overseas conflicts, including questions over [unclear aims](https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/trump-is-rewriting-the-iran-endgame-in-real-time-98f8531f?mod=article_inline), insufficient planning for contingencies, and overly optimistic assumptions.

Read more (free link): [https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/iran-war-iraq-pitfalls-277de612?st=KyviGY&mod=wsjreddit](https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/iran-war-iraq-pitfalls-277de612?st=KyviGY&mod=wsjreddit)

LOl….mistakes….LOL gotta be an opinion piece cuz it isnt a mistake when it is part of policy and the plan. Mistake…no, Everything is playing out perfectly to the people who provide the most funds to policy makers. It isnt a mistake to keep doing the same things over and over. They arent expecting different results, and are insane. No, they are expecting the same results and getting those ..mistake..nah, just someone mis identifying what the real goal is.

As true as it is that previous wars were sometimes mistakes, I wouldn’t give the current administration that much credit — I think it’s operating on a much more primitive level. According to people who have been close to Trump, he has always acted without any consistent worldview or strategy.

If we use an analogy of chess, even grandmasters lose much of the time, but this war is more like an elementary mistake made by a 500-rated player.

No matter how much damage the United States and Israel do, “the people” of Iran cannot assume power unless they possess a rival power structure that aims to overtake the government. Whenever a government is weak enough to be overtaken, it is always a stronger and better-organised force that is capable of replacing it, like a communist party, or the clerics who took power in the 1979 revolution in Iran in the first place.

Israel and the United States don’t seem to understand that, so, much like a mistake made in chess by a beginner, we don’t have the luxury of going back to the way the chessboard was before the mistake. Trump is stuck with the chessboard as it exists now.

Yes and no.

Yes, this war was started on impulse and with no true long-term plan. No NATO coalition this time. A gamble that the entire government and regional “problem” of Iran would collapse under the weight of the death of what Trump thought was a “charismatic leader” in Khamenei.

And that Trump would “totally win” a Nobel peace prize for doing that.

If Trump refuses to deploy troops and would rather just abandon ship and try to ignore everything with even conservative media trying to talk about anything other than Iran, it’s going to bite him in the ass later once American military bases abroad are attacked again by a rearmed and more hardline Iran and I don’t think even conservative media will follow his lead on refusing to discuss the issue when it happens… which I’m sure will cause Trump and other MAGA dummies to claim “betrayal” and “will cost the conservative and MAGA movement control of Congress this November”.

But, this war is not quite going to be a forever war in that there’s a massive supermajority of Iranian civilians willing to accept a broad range of external intervention, even if may cause some collateral damage and deaths in the process and even if it is done by a country whose leader has a few too many fascist and autocratic tendencies for the Western liberal and social democratic establishment’s comfort.

The only population unhappy with any of this are the Shia Muslims (and their very naïve Western Socialist allies), which is perhaps hard to believe for some lesser-informed folks, but is actually a minority in Iran.

I would imagine if Trump finally decides to bite the bullet and authorizes a ground invasion of Iran, and starts supplying weapons via CIA to Opposition partisans to kill plainclothes militia… The IRGC will become a faction in a new civil war… one that will literally throw bodies Russian-style for their cause or literally die trying to keep Iran from returning to secularism.

Only issue is that the Kurds are going to ask for their own country again, something that most Iranians are unhappy about… although I’m thinking they may no longer be in a position to refuse. Borderlines are likely to change in the process if a ground invasion occurs.

I think the issue, will be you can get sucked in slowly, as you fail to achieve your objectives there is the natural temptation to just try a little bit harder, commit just a few more resources. Airpower alone, didn’t do it, well what about a limited ground incursion No? What about more troops.

At each stage of escalation you’re offered the choice admit you made a mistake or double down. No prizes for guessing what Trump will choose but tbf it is a very common human tendency.

Oh man, not at all. In 2003 there was a „run up“ to the war and by run up, I mean from September 2001 to March 2003. We were arguing over whether or not it was a good idea. Supporters treated dissension like treason. There was a grinding hostility. Cheney was saying that pessimism never won a war and there was a post-9/11 outpouring of wrath.

This just happened. We went from Trump threatening Greenland to the military taking Maduro to this. Trump moves faster than any anti-war sentiment can coalesce and then Senate backed him up, with no war powers resolution. If it does turn into another forever war, it’s not one where half the public are frothing at the mouth for it.

As it stands we aren’t arguing anything, just wondering if Trump is going to back out, take Kharg Island, Hormuz Island or try some crazy operation to take a chunk of the mainland. No one is ecstatic. Just apprehensive.