And yet, what have they achieved?

Iran's power structure is unchanged. Oil is more expensive than in a long time. American alliances are fraying. Iran now exerts control over the Strait of Hormuz.

All this has done is to expose the limits of hard power, America's biggest asset.

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WarmWash 2 days ago | parent [-]

No one really knows what Irans power structure looks like right now. The supreme leader is in hiding and apparently is only communicating in person, but other leaders are doing the same, and all are scared of getting together.

So it seems more like there is a splintered regime of autonomous cells all kinda doing what they think they should be doing. Whatever general controls the revolutionary guard around the strait could defect tomorrow and sell out to the US, becoming president of his own little carved out country without anyone to really stop him. We known Trump would be falling over himself to make that deal right now.

	▲	vrganj 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		The very best result the US could get now would be the equivalent of the JCPOA, which it already had and tore up. JCPOA was negotiated under the leadership of the EU, all Trump has done is shown that the EU's soft power is more effective than American hard power.