The Trump administration has reiterated repeatedly that the ongoing war in Iran is nothing like the infamous 2003 invasion of Iraq. “To the media outlets and political left screaming ‘endless wars’, stop,” U.S. defence secretary Pete Hegseth said from the Pentagon podium. “This is not Iraq. This is not endless.”
Others, like vice-president JD Vance, insist the two wars are hardly synonymous because the United States now has a commander-in-chief who knows what he’s doing, unlike those “dumb presidents” in the past who blundered into unwinnable conflicts.
Even so, as the conflict inches toward its one-month anniversary, the 2003 Iraq War metaphor is looking more like an analogy. Sure, 160,000 U.S. troops aren’t occupying Iranian territory, draping an American flag over statues of the late Ali Khamenei or trying to recreate a brand new Iranian political system from the ground up. But the similarities are starting to overshadow the differences.
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