Not with a bang but with a whimper. The American century ends exactly as Eliot wrote: not with an explosion, but with a whimper. If this is not a joke or another passing whim, then the immediate termination of Operation Epic Fury, announced yesterday by Rubio, is a failure worse than Afghanistan. There, a country remained and continues to remain in the dark ages, on the margins of world civilization, whereas here, key mechanisms of global trade were casually broken, a regional nuclear-armed power was strengthened, and then it was quietly abandoned.
It is no coincidence that yesterday, at a Pentagon press briefing, a Newsmax correspondent (a loyal, pro-Trump network) asked Pete Hegseth: “When did Trump decide to capitulate?”
What do we have in the end: a resilient Iran, despite the loss of its former leadership, now strengthened under a far more radical IRGC elite. A consolidated regime and a protest movement drowned in blood; a population now left with no hope for change or American support. A preserved nuclear potential — Iran is still only six months to a year away from developing full nuclear weapons capability, and is now firmly convinced of the necessity of obtaining them and no longer inclined toward negotiations on the matter.
Oil remains steadily above $100 and does not fall; the Strait of Hormuz is partially closed with unclear prospects, and several dozen dollars of risk premium are now certain to be added per barrel. Missile strikes have destroyed the safe haven of the Persian Gulf — not only its oil hub, but also its trade and high-tech center — undermining investor confidence.
Beyond the $50 billion burned in this senseless war, we are talking about trillions in losses for the global economy, inflation growth in G20 countries from 2.5% to 4%, a general rise in energy prices, a global reduction in air traffic, disruption of logistics chains, and a slowdown in global GDP growth.
Not to mention the hard-to-calculate damage from the loss of the last remaining trust in the United States as a security guarantor and the primary military power of the modern world — the credibility of threat. We are witnessing this power not being defeated, but devalued by distributed network technologies, air and naval drones, and guerrilla warfare tactics. Iran’s regional proxies are gaining a new lease on life.
Not to mention the bonuses for revisionist and terrorist forces around the world, from Moscow to Pyongyang.
Oh yes, and Israel — which, in essence, started this whole mess (recall that it all began with a conversation between Netanyahu and Trump, in which the Israeli prime minister, for the first time in many years, managed to persuade the US president to support strikes on Iran, despite objections from the American military and intelligence community) — Israel, as a result, is left, to put it bluntly, empty-handed: with an enraged, radicalized, and nearly nuclear Iran that has retained part of its missile capabilities, with a destabilized Gulf, and with a withdrawing US ally (including the loss of a pro-Israel majority in America, as all polls indicate). I won’t even mention Israel’s lost Europe, nor the rise of antisemitism worldwide, including as a consequence of this war.
Indeed, Operation Epic Fury should be renamed Epic Fail. I cannot recall such an epic miscalculation in world history in this century, and we have not even seen all the consequences yet. To manage, in one move, to undermine Israel, the Persian Gulf, America, oil prices, and the global economy — that is a special kind of talent.
