What is President Donald Trump really up to? Over five months after he and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unilaterally launched their war against Iran February 28, with sensational assassination of Tehran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on the first day, the war is nowhere near an end.
After blitzkrieg-like aerial attacks by the US and Israel on Iran’s military and infrastructure failed to achieve its objectives, as Iran countered hard at the Gulf Arab states hosting US military bases, America and Iran signed an interim memorandum of understanding in June to halt mutual-retaliatory attacks and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a final peace deal still proves elusive. The negotiations have hit fresh hurdles over control of the Strait of Hormuz, and on shipping terms and tariffs. Meanwhile, as the war becomes increasingly unpopular in the US, President Trump’s desperation to get out of the Iran-mess grows by the day, particularly with the midterm elections looming.
The questions continue to be intriguing. Why is the world’s sole superpower still addicted to fighting wars across continents, far from its homeland, and why does it see ghosts in its imaginary adversaries? Why the insatiable hunger for bloodshed and why doesn’t it cease its endless invasions and interventions in Asia, South America, Central America and North Africa after seven decades? Why does POTUS continue this “gunboat capitalism” as a “tool of state power”, which will make no nation richer or safer?
Declassified CIA documents revealed how the US had targeted Iran’s sovereignty in a 1953 coup, which was widely known but acknowledged only in 2013. Before that, the world had already seen the Korean War (1950-1953). The list of America’s forward deployment and divisive diplomacy grew with breakneck speed, resulting in all-round destruction in terrain “far from mainland USA”. There was the Lebanon intervention (1953); Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba (1961); Vietnam (1955-1975); the invasion of Grenada (1983); strikes on Libya (1986); the Panama invasion (1986); the first Gulf War (1990-1991); the intervention in Somalia (1992-1995); Kosovo (1999); Afghanistan (2001-2021); the Iraq invasion (2003-2011); the Libya intervention (2011) and now the Iran war, beginning February 2026.
Contextually, one must also peruse the words of scholar Nathan Robinson: “Between 1946 and 2000, the US undertook over 80 election-interference ops around the world”. The most startling, however, is former secretary of state Mike Pompeo’s admission at Texas A&M University on “Why Diplomacy Matters” in April 2019: “What’s the cadet motto at West Point? You will not lie, cheat, or steal, or tolerate those who do. I was CIA director. We lied, we cheated, we stole. We had entire training courses. It reminds you of the glory of the American experiment.”
That’s the transparent and profound declaration of an inherently disruptive policy which has practical application in every nation of the world. One can, therefore, conclude that the present assault launched by the US and Israel will continue to torment Tehran as long as it takes to fulfil the “glory of the American experiment” and “mission success”.
The world knows that it is an unequal contest between the US-Israel duo and the Islamic Republic. The likely outcome is the inevitable flattening of Iran’s territory (like in Vietnam and Afghanistan). In the prolonged conflicts in the Far East, Southeast Asia and poverty-afflicted landlocked Afghanistan, all three were ravaged, but could not be vanquished, conquered or captured. All three forced the US to vacate their soil and make an ignominious retreat. True, the warriors of Wall Street wrecked the wretched, poor but fearless Afghans, the valiant and valorous Vietnamese and courageous Koreans, but the outcome was zero. And now Iran is the fourth Asian target. It will be impossible not to believe that the Persians won’t do what they have been doing for thousands of years with unmatched bravery and enviable self-pride.
The battered, unbent but a charged Iran has openly challenged Mr Trump: “We want a land invasion”. Tehran has claimed that “Iran has the advantage: It has been accumulating missiles and drones for decades now. We are prepared for a land war.” For Tehran, that is the preferred option because air power alone can never win a war on its own. The only exception perhaps was the August 1945 use of nuclear weapons on Japan’s Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the US Air Force. Similarly, conquest or capture of land can’t be done solely by the Navy, no matter how strong and versatile the fleet. Boots on the ground are the ultimate reality of any war even today.
In Korea and Afghanistan, American boots had to be left behind, and Vietnam proved to be a super death-trap for land warriors. The US lost 300,000 soldiers in the Second World War, the lowest among the Allied powers, compared to the Soviet Union’s 30 million fatalities.
The 58,220 deaths and 153,372 “wounded in action” in Vietnam taught American leaders some hard lessons. Tragically for the US, most of those killed in Vietnam were incredibly young: over 60 per cent fallen soldiers were under 21. Far worse was the February-June 1945 invasion of Okinawa and Iwo Jima, where the US suffered the highest war casualties while putting boots on the ground.
Today, a galaxy of pressure groups and lobbyists exist in the US coordinating the business of bloodshed in remote lands between Wall Street, the military-industrial-complex, the Pentagon and the White House, overshadowing the best of brains of Ivy League universities and erudite scholars of think tanks talking sense.
Therefore, the prospect of a sensible solution to the reckless US-Israeli trampling upon Tehran’s sovereignty are not bright. It’s not that the diplomats and warmongers in both Washington and Tel Aviv do not realise the cost of a land war and all-out assault on the Strait of Hormuz; but who will counsel wisdom when the top leaders are fixated on the spoils of war?
If the US-Israel duo were to intensify the great Shia-Sunni divide any further and keep the Middle East perennially on the boil, to capture resources and control the “choke points” of the seas, let them reconsider. Like Russia, Iran’s geography does not allow a successful attack by any neighbour, and the Persian Gulf is most unsuitable for any large Navy to repeat the 1942-1945 Pacific Ocean operations against worn-out Japan. Finally, with both Moscow and Beijing firmly on Tehran’s side, Iran can’t be defeated even in worst-case scenario. The use of air power, at which the United States excels, is not the way out in Iran.
The writer is an alumnus of the National Defence College, New Delhi. The views expressed here are personal.