One week into Iran war, the dangers for the US and Trump multiply

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WASHINGTON - One week into the US-Israeli war against Iran that has plunged the Middle East into turmoil, US President Donald Trump faces a growing list of risks and challenges that raise questions about whether he will be able to translate military successes into a clear geopolitical win.

Even after the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and devastating blows against Iranian forces on land, at sea and in the air, the crisis has quickly widened into a regional conflict that threatens a more prolonged US military engagement with fallout beyond Mr Trump’s control.

That is a scenario that Mr Trump had avoided in his two terms in the White House, preferring swift, limited operations like the Jan 3 lightning raid in Venezuela and June’s one-off strike on Iran’s nuclear sites.

“Iran is a messy and potentially protracted military campaign,” said Ms Laura Blumenfeld of the Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies in Washington. “Trump is risking the global economy, regional stability and his own Republican Party's performance in the US midterm elections.”

Mr Trump, who came to office promising to keep the US out of “stupid” military interventions, is now pursuing what many experts see as an open-ended war of choice unprompted by any imminent threat to the US from Iran, despite claims to the contrary by the President and his aides.

In doing so, analysts say he has struggled to articulate a detailed set of objectives or a clear endgame for Operation Epic Fury, the biggest US military operation since the 2003 Iraq invasion, offering shifting rationales for the war and definitions of what would constitute victory.

White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly rejected that assessment, saying Mr Trump has clearly outlined his goals to “destroy Iran’s ballistic missiles and production capacity, demolish their navy, end their ability to arm proxies, and prevent them from ever obtaining a nuclear weapon”.

However, if the war drags on, American casualties mount and the economic costs of interrupted Gulf oil flows multiply, Mr Trump’s biggest foreign policy gamble could also hurt his Republican Party politically.

MAGA support holding, for now

Despite criticism from some Trump supporters opposed to military interventions, members of his Make America Great Again movement have largely backed him on Iran so far.

But any softening of their support could imperil Republicans’ control of Congress in the November midterm elections, given opinion polls showing opposition to the war among the broader electorate, including a crucial bloc of independent voters.

“The American people are not interested in repeating the mistakes of Iraq and Afghanistan,” said Mr Brian Darling, a Republican strategist. “The MAGA base is split between those who relied on ‘no new war’ promises and ones who are loyal to Trump’s judgment.”

High on the list of analysts’ concerns is the mixed messaging from Mr Trump and his aides on whether he is seeking “regime change” in Tehran.

At the outset of the conflict, he suggested that overthrowing Iran’s rulers was a goal, at least by fomenting internal rebellion. Two days later, he stopped short of mentioning that as a priority.

But then on March 5, Mr Trump told Reuters he would play a role in picking Iran’s next leader and encouraged Iranian Kurdish rebels to launch attacks. That was followed by his demand in a social media post on March 6 for Iran’s “unconditional surrender”.

Across the region, the dangers have escalated with Iran’s retaliatory strikes on Israel and other neighbours as it seeks to sow chaos and raise the costs for Israel, the US and its allies.

Showing that Iran may still be able to activate proxy groups, Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia has renewed hostilities with Israel, expanding the war to another country.

American casualties have been low so far, with six service members killed, and Mr Trump has largely shrugged off the prospects for more to come while declining to completely rule out deployment of US ground troops.

Asked whether Americans should worry about Iran-inspired attacks at home, Mr Trump said in a Time magazine interview published on March 6: “I guess... Like I said, some people will die.”

But Mr Jonathan Panikoff, a former deputy US national intelligence officer for the Middle East, said: “Nothing is likely to hasten an early end to the war more than American casualties... That’s what Iran is counting on.”

Venezuela miscalculation?

Many analysts believe Mr Trump, who has shown an increasing appetite for military action in his second term, miscalculated that the Iran campaign would unfold like the Venezuela operation earlier in 2026.

US special forces captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, opening the way for Mr Trump to coerce more compliant former loyalists into giving him considerable sway over the country’s vast oil reserves – without any extended US military action needed.

By contrast, Iran has proved a much tougher, better-armed foe with an entrenched clerical and security establishment.

Even the joint US-Israeli “decapitation” strike that killed Mr Khamenei and some other senior leaders has failed so far to prevent Iran from mounting a military response and has raised questions whether they could be replaced by even more hardline figures.

Looming over the conflict, however, is whether Iran could slide into chaos and break apart if its current rulers fall, further destabilising the Middle East.

Mr Mark Dubowitz, chief executive of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a non-profit research institute considered hawkish on Iran, praised Mr Trump’s overall war strategy, but said the President needs to make clear publicly that he does not want to see the country disintegrate.

Oil chokepoint

For now, however, one of the most pressing concerns is Iran’s threat to the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow chokepoint through which a fifth of the world's oil passes. Tanker traffic has halted, which could have grave economic consequences if it lasts.

Though Mr Trump has publicly dismissed any concern about already-rising US gas prices, he and his aides have scrambled for ways to mitigate the war’s impact on energy supplies as voters tell pollsters that the cost of living is their top concern.

“It's an economic pain point on the US economy that it seems was not fully anticipated," said Mr Josh Lipsky at the Atlantic Council think-tank in Washington.

One former US military official close to the US administration said the widening of the war's economic impact had caught Mr Trump’s team by surprise in part because those with knowledge of oil markets were not consulted ahead of the attack on Iran.

The White House’s Ms Kelly said “the Iranian regime is being absolutely crushed” but did not specifically address concerns about preparations for a war.

Mr Trump made his decision to press ahead with the strikes despite warnings from some senior aides that the escalation could be difficult to contain, according to two White House officials and a Republican close to the administration.

Some traditional US allies were caught off guard. “It’s a decision-making circle of one,” said one Western diplomat.

The war’s duration is a major unknown likely to determine the extent of its repercussions. With the price tag of the Iran campaign mounting by the day, Mr Trump has said that the operation could last four or five weeks or “whatever it takes”, but has offered little explanation of what he envisions will follow.

Retired US Army Lieutenant-General Ben Hodges, who served in Iraq and Afghanistan and formerly commanded the US Army in Europe, commended the US military for its tactics in Iran. But he told Reuters: “From a political, strategic and diplomatic standpoint, it seems not to have been thought all the way through.”

Mr Trump also has a lot riding on helping oil-producing Gulf Arab states weather the Iran crisis, given they have long hosted US bases and have made pledges of massive new US investments to him.

While Gulf allies appear to have fallen in line to support the campaign, especially after Tehran targeted them with missile and drone strikes, not everyone in the region is on board with Mr Trump’s war.

In an open letter to Mr Trump published on March 5, United Arab Emirates billionaire Khalaf Al Habtor, a frequent visitor to Mr Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, asked: “Who gave you the right to turn our region into a battlefield?” REUTERS