War on Iran puts on display limits to US military power

calculus for decades. If this strategy can increase the cost of America’s presence, even without implying a complete military defeat, it could influence Washington’s future behavior.

Ultimately, wars do not always go according to the initial intentions of their planners. A country may enter a conflict with the aim of projecting power, but the result of the war is not to strengthen it but to reveal the limits to that power. The main question now is not whether America is still a great military power. The more important issue is whether America’s rivals still have the same perception of its ability to maintain a military presence and impose costs that they did before the war.

If the answer has changed, the Iran-US war was not just a military confrontation; it could be a point in redefining strategic calculations about the limits of American power. And perhaps that is why the New York Times speaks of the “unintended consequences” of war; A war that was supposed to be a show of power, but it also revealed limits to that power.

MNA