It is hard to predict the future, but to me it looks as if the
USA already lost that war. Now, we can say "define losing", but
in my opinion the strategy used by the USA is not clear here.
Yes, they can shift constantly and willy-nilly define new goals,
but everyone ends up being confused. In Iraq it was the lie that
it is about weapons of mass destruction. They don't even seem to
try for anything here now. The strategy used by Israel is clear -
Netanyahu as ultra-right wing politician has the strategy of
escalation. But this does not explain why the USA adopts this
strategy 1:1.
The interesting thing is that Trump is now stuck in the war,
just like Putin is in Ukraine. They start forever wars and have
no real way out of it, at the least not a simple one. That means
the next "logical" step is that there will be US ground troops;
the private media is already starting to prepare the population
aka "we must occupy Kharg" (or any other area). This is somewhat
similar to Lyndon B. Johnson and Vietnam. Step-wise expansion of
the agenda. So WHO is really doing the policy in the USA? Clearly
it is not Trump - he constantly changes his opinion.
> The interesting thing is that Trump is now stuck in the war, just like Putin is in Ukraine.
Trump still has a small bit of time to take an off-ramp. US casualties have been in the single digits; there's not much national pride lost in walking away.
There may be lots of Trump's pride lost in pulling back, though, so yeah, he may be stuck in this war. The US is still better off than Russia, though, because we can get rid of Trump easier than they can get rid of Putin.
> So WHO is really doing the policy in the USA?
Events have their own momentum. Once you start the snowball rolling downhill, it's really hard to stop. Trump may not want to go to troops on the ground, but he's going to have to do that, or stop and pull back and eat his pride with Iran still unconquered (and angry). Since he will do almost anything rather than lose pride, he's trapped by the need to make this a win. In the same way, Iran is also trapped in the need to make this a win. (Not "need to win" - both sides need to make it appear to their people as a win, which is not quite the same thing.)
> US casualties have been in the single digits; there's not much national pride lost in walking away.
Fatalities are in double digits (13) though 6 are from a plane crash with no one claiming the Iranians caused it. Casualties are in the triple-digits, since it includes injured, not just killed.
But yes, the numbers are still small enough we can pull out without that influencing the decision (from a public opinion perspective) substantially.
The interesting thing is that Trump is now stuck in the war, just like Putin is in Ukraine. They start forever wars and have no real way out of it, at the least not a simple one. That means the next "logical" step is that there will be US ground troops; the private media is already starting to prepare the population aka "we must occupy Kharg" (or any other area). This is somewhat similar to Lyndon B. Johnson and Vietnam. Step-wise expansion of the agenda. So WHO is really doing the policy in the USA? Clearly it is not Trump - he constantly changes his opinion.