In a recent commentary for POLITICO Europe, former U.S. ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder highlights a stark and uncomfortable reality: the United States possesses the most powerful military in human history, yet it has not won a war in more than 30 years [1]. From Korea and Vietnam to Afghanistan, Iraq, and now Iran, the U.S. track record is characterized by stalemate, defeat, or strategic catastrophe. Daalder argues that the root cause of this failure is not a lack of firepower, but rather a fundamental flaw in America’s strategic thinking.
The core issue, according to Daalder, is the inversion of Carl von Clausewitz’s famous dictum that war is the continuation of politics by other means [1]. Instead of treating the military as an instrument to achieve clearly defined political objectives, Washington often views war as a substitute for failed policy. This approach results in the deployment of overwhelming force without a clear understanding of what “winning” actually looks like. The recent escalation in Iran, characterized by performative diplomacy followed by a massive bombing campaign, serves as a prime example of this flawed strategy. The belief that sheer destruction will inevitably lead to capitulation ignores the complexities of the political landscape and the resolve of the adversary.
Furthermore, Daalder identifies three structural flaws in the American way of war: the inversion of ends and means, strategic overreach, and the underestimation of asymmetric motivation [1]. The U.S. frequently sets expansive and unrealistic goals — such as regime change or civilizational transformation — which military force is ill-equipped to achieve. The contrast between the limited, successful objectives of the 1991 Gulf War and the disastrous consequences of the subsequent invasion of Iraq illustrates this point vividly. In the Gulf War, President George H.W. Bush defined a narrow, achievable objective — reversing Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait — and resisted pressure to march on Baghdad. That restraint produced a genuine coalition, international legitimacy, and a clear victory. Every major U.S. military engagement since has abandoned that discipline.
Ultimately, tactical superiority cannot compensate for a lack of strategic logic. As the Weinberger/Powell doctrine established in the 1980s — and as the Gulf War demonstrated in practice — force must be applied to limited, defined ends with a clear exit strategy. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth may have invoked Weinberger as a guide for the Iran campaign, but by every measure, those principles were disregarded. The U.S. keeps losing not because its military is weak, but because it keeps choosing its instruments before defining its objectives. As the U.S. navigates its current conflicts, particularly the fraught situation in Iran, it must heed the lessons of the past and return to a framework that prioritizes defined, achievable objectives over the mere application of overwhelming force.
References
[1] Ivo Daalder, “America’s way of war isn’t working,” POLITICO Europe, May 26, 2026. Available at: America’s way of war isn’t working – POLITICO
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