President Donald Trump declared victory on Wednesday, saying, "We've won" - then adding a telling caveat: "we've got to finish the job." Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, writing in Foreign Policy, argues this may be a "win" of the same kind Israel has claimed for decades after wars that pounded adversaries in Gaza and Lebanon - reflecting overwhelming firepower that nonetheless failed to vanquish the enemy.
The harsh Israeli phrase for this recurring cycle is "mowing the grass," as "Hvylya" reports. America, after avoiding an all-out clash with Iran for 47 years, may now be caught in the same trap. Ignatius points to a clear pattern in modern warfare: strategic bombing designed to break popular will usually backfires. People dig in rather than surrender.
Even under a miserable government like the Iranian regime, Ignatius writes, there is national pride, identity, and resistance to control by foreigners. Israeli generals must have wondered as they fired tons of ordnance into Gaza why Hamas did not just give up. Trump's Iran negotiator Steve Witkoff said last month that Trump was "curious ... why they haven't capitulated." An earlier generation asked the same question about the Viet Cong.
If there is one lesson America and Israel should have learned in recent decades, the columnist argues, it is that military success does not usually translate into political victory - in Gaza, Afghanistan, or now Iran. The adversary keeps coming back.
Also read: Ferguson and Haass Agree the Islamic Republic Must Fall - Then Explain Why the War Backfires.