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Source: https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/seven-myths-iran-war-michael-doran
Myths about the Iran War
(Tablet) Michael Doran - The media elite refuse to credit President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu with a win. They portray the operation in Iran as aimless adventurism. In doing so, they advance the very arguments that serve America's enemies, undermining the credibility of a successful deterrent action. Opponents of the Trump administration have repeatedly called this "a war of choice," a conflict the president launched without cause or coherent purpose. The administration has, in fact, made a clear and compelling case. As the president has stated repeatedly for years, "Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. It's very simple." Moreover, at the outset of the war, Secretary of State Marco Rubio described another factor that drove America to act. "They are producing, by some estimates, over 100 ballistic missiles a month. Compare that to the six or seven interceptors that can be built a month." Iran would soon have enough missiles and drones to overwhelm the defenses of Israel and every American base in the region. America could let Israel attack alone, in which case Iran would attack American forces and cause significant casualties; or work together with Israel to eliminate an intolerable threat to both countries. During the Biden administration, between Jan. 2021 and Jan. 2025, Iranian-backed forces launched hundreds of attacks on American personnel and assets across the Middle East, including over 170 strikes on U.S. bases in Iraq, Syria, and Jordan, plus dozens of attempts against U.S. Navy vessels in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. In any previous era, a sustained campaign of this magnitude against American bases and naval vessels would have been called open war. The American-Israeli campaign achieved its core strategic objectives: halting Iran's advance toward nuclear weapons capability and significantly degrading its ballistic missile program, which together had posed a growing existential threat to Israel and the region. Prior to the operation, Iran was rapidly advancing both programs, with much of its critical infrastructure on the verge of being buried too deeply underground for effective strikes. The result was a decisive disruption of Iran's most dangerous capabilities, while leaving Iran economically crippled. In the end, Israel and the U.S. entered the conflict facing a severe and imminent threat and emerged with that threat meaningfully and verifiably reduced. That is the fundamental measure of victory in war. The window for effective action was closing. Trump acted before it slammed shut. The writer is Director of the Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East at the Hudson Institute in Washington.