The U.S. government invaded Iraq after a painful public debate over the possibility that Saddam Hussein was developing chemical and biological weapons. The claim turned out to be false, and the war led to the deaths of thousands of American service members and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. Two decades later, the episode is widely remembered as a signal failure not just of the post–Cold War foreign policy establishment but of the media that were supposed to hold the government to account and keep the public better informed.
Yet as bad as the Iraq War was, America's current war against Iran is making it look like a master class. In late February, the U.S. launched a war against Iran that, unlike the very public run-up to the Iraq invasion, began with almost no public debate about the conflict's costs, tradeoffs, risks, morality, or even goals. In mid-March it became clear that the Trump administration had not even prepared for the possibility that Iran would retaliate by blocking the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz—a maritime choke point that hosts roughly 20 percent of global energy flows, and whose shutdown has already sent oil prices skyrocketing while threatening a global recession or worse.
