The United States has won the military campaign against Iran but risks losing the war strategically - a pattern historian Niall Ferguson compares directly to Britain's 1956 Suez debacle.
In an interview with The Free Press, Ferguson laid out why 38 days of overwhelming air power have not translated into a strategic result, "Hvylya" reports.
"In military terms, this has been a pretty remarkable victory. But it has turned out not to be sufficient," Ferguson said. "You've achieved this great military result. You've degraded Iran's military capabilities. But it actually turns out not to be sufficient, because you've caused a huge economic problem for yourself and for the whole world."
Ferguson pointed to the 1956 Suez Crisis as the closest historical parallel. Britain, France, and Israel attacked Egypt and completely defeated its forces in military terms, yet the operation turned into a strategic catastrophe. Britain could not sustain the economic costs, and Egypt kept control of the Suez Canal. "There's a lot of Suez about what's going on at the moment," Ferguson said.
The central issue, he argued, is that Iran has established control over the Strait of Hormuz and uses it as leverage despite its degraded military. "It turns out you don't need that much firepower to intimidate insurers and ship owners. And the Iranians have that much firepower," he said. Unless Washington can strip Tehran of that lever - through negotiations or ground forces - the military victory risks becoming hollow.
Ferguson characterized the potential outcome as a "non-Pyrrhic defeat" for the US: the economic costs will not be catastrophic, perhaps 100 basis points on inflation, but the result would still amount to defeat. Iran, by contrast, would claim a Pyrrhic victory - its regime intact and its adversary humiliated, but its economy and military in ruins.