The textbook answer to a military stalemate is a ground offensive. But in Iran, that option faces barriers that the United States never encountered during the Gulf War in 1991 or the invasion of Iraq in 2003 - and the implications extend far beyond the current conflict.
James F. Jeffrey, a former senior diplomat who served in seven U.S. administrations, has outlined the constraints in Foreign Affairs, reports "Hvylya". The most fundamental problem, Jeffrey writes, is geographic: "there is no territory adjacent to Iran on which the United States can amass troops to assault the Iranian mainland."
That alone distinguishes Iran from every major U.S. ground campaign in the Middle East. In 1991, coalition forces assembled in Saudi Arabia. In 2003, troops entered Iraq from Kuwait. Iran's borders offer no such staging ground, and its "territory and population are more than double Iraq's" - making any invasion force requirement vastly larger than what was needed for either previous operation.
Public opposition adds another layer. Jeffrey notes "overwhelming American public opposition" to ground action, a constraint that did not exist at the start of either Gulf War. Meanwhile, any significant Iranian ground movement in the other direction would invite devastating U.S. air attack, creating mutual paralysis on the ground.
Iran's stalemate mirrors Ukraine, where air and missile strikes dominate but prove indecisive. After four years of fighting, neither Russia nor Ukraine can field enough ground forces to launch a war-ending offensive. Jeffrey observes that "air power is seldom decisive, as Russia has learned in Ukraine" - a lesson Washington is now absorbing at its own expense in Iran.
Earlier, "Hvylya" examined how Ukrainian drones have created kill zones where armored vehicles cannot operate.