Starting a war is far easier than ending one with clear victory
In the early days of March, two leaders launched a war they believed would end before it truly began — certain that a weakened Iran would crumble under the weight of coordinated military force and finally deliver a reordered Middle East. Four months on, the Islamic Republic endures, the Strait of Hormuz remains closed, and the confident architects of swift regime change find themselves navigating consequences neither anticipated nor controls. History, as it often does, has declined to follow the script.
- Trump and Netanyahu launched their war expecting collapse within weeks, but Iran's leadership — hardened by decades of preparation and ideological conviction — replaced its dead and kept fighting.
- Iran struck back with precision: closing the Strait of Hormuz, downing American aircraft, and weaving its regional conflicts into a single negotiating knot that neither Washington nor Tel Aviv can easily untangle.
- Trump, facing an American public that never asked for this war, has begun constraining his Israeli ally — telling Netanyahu to stand down a planned Beirut strike — a signal that the alliance is bending under the pressure of diverging interests.
- Netanyahu calls Iran's linkage strategy 'intolerable,' but the objection rings hollow as Trump's appetite for an exit deal quietly overrides Israel's maximalist ambitions.
- The region is not being remade into the stable, American-aligned order that Gulf states wagered on — it is hardening into a permacrisis of attritional conflict, economic disruption, and strategic stalemate with no visible horizon.
When Trump and Netanyahu ordered strikes on Iran at the end of February, they spoke less like men beginning a war than like men announcing its conclusion. Trump, recording his address in the early hours at Mar-a-Lago, told the Iranian people their liberation was at hand. Netanyahu stood on the roof of Israel's defense ministry and described the fulfillment of a forty-year ambition. Both seemed certain the regime — already battered by sanctions, internal decay, and the loss of its regional proxies — would not survive the blow.
Four months later, that certainty has dissolved. The Islamic Republic did not collapse when its supreme leader was killed. Younger, more ideological men stepped forward, willing to escalate in ways their predecessors were not. Iran shot down an American Apache helicopter, closed the Strait of Hormuz in March, and linked its conflicts in Lebanon and the Gulf into a single strategic front — ensuring that no separate peace could be negotiated without addressing the whole.
What Trump and Netanyahu underestimated was not Iran's military hardware but its capacity to endure. Nearly fifty years of preparation had built redundancy into the regime's command structure and grounded its survival in religious conviction that outlasts any economic calculation. The leaders who assumed they were striking a dying state found themselves fighting one that had spent generations rehearsing for exactly this moment.
The fractures between Washington and Tel Aviv are now visible. When Trump told Netanyahu to cancel a planned attack on Beirut — citing a diplomatic opening that may or may not be real — he was implicitly accepting Iran's terms of linkage. Netanyahu called it intolerable. But Trump's need for an exit he can present as victory to an American public that never wanted this war has begun to outweigh his commitment to Israel's maximalist goals.
What neither leader promised — and what the region is now inheriting — is a permacrisis: a prolonged state of attritional conflict, closed waterways, and stalled diplomacy in which no one wins decisively and no one finds a clean way to stop. The Gulf states that aligned with American power watch their vision of prosperity recede. The lesson, as old as war itself, reasserts itself: beginning a conflict is far simpler than ending one on the terms you announced.
When Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu ordered their militaries to war against Iran on the last day of February, they spoke like men certain of what came next. Trump, recording his message in the small hours at Mar-a-Lago, promised the Iranian people that their moment of liberation had arrived. "The hour of your freedom is at hand," he told them, instructing them to stay indoors while bombs fell, then to rise up and claim their government once the dust settled. Netanyahu stood on the roof of Israel's defense ministry in Tel Aviv the next morning, backlit by sunlight, and spoke of finally fulfilling a 40-year ambition to strike down what he called the terror regime. Both men seemed to be announcing not the beginning of a war but the end of one—the swift, decisive toppling of a government they believed was already weakened beyond recovery.
Neither calculation has survived contact with reality. Four months into the conflict, the Iranian regime remains intact, defiant, and increasingly capable of imposing costs that neither leader anticipated. The Apache helicopter that Iran shot down in recent days was merely the latest reminder that the Islamic Republic, far from collapsing under military pressure, has learned to fight back in ways that complicate any simple exit strategy. The crew survived, but the message was unmistakable: Iran's rulers will not be pushed around, and they possess the means to make any American or Israeli advance painful.
What Trump and Netanyahu fundamentally miscalculated was the resilience of an adversary they had assumed was already broken. They saw a regime battered by economic sanctions, internal corruption, and the loss of key allies—Hamas decimated in Gaza, Hezbollah hammered in Lebanon, Syria's Bashar al-Assad deposed and fled to Moscow. They saw a government that had just crushed massive domestic protests by killing thousands of its own citizens. All of this suggested a state in terminal decline, vulnerable to the kind of swift military intervention that had worked, in Trump's view, when the United States abducted Venezuela's president and installed a compliant successor. Iran would be next. It seemed obvious.
What they underestimated was the regime's capacity to endure. The Iranian leadership has spent nearly fifty years preparing for exactly this kind of assault. They have built redundancy into their command structure, distributed their decision-making, and grounded their survival strategy in religious and ideological conviction that runs deeper than any economic calculation. When Israel and America killed Iran's supreme leader and his closest associates, the regime did not collapse. New men stepped forward—younger, more ideological, and more willing to take risks in what they view as an existential struggle. They have proven just as ruthless as their predecessors and considerably more willing to escalate.
Iran's strategy has been to make the cost of continued conflict unbearable while simultaneously preventing any separate peace. They closed the Strait of Hormuz in March, one of the world's most critical waterways, choking off the flow of oil and threatening the economic foundations of the Gulf states that had aligned with America and Israel. They have linked the war in Lebanon to the war in the Gulf, making clear to Trump that any deal must account for what happens to Hezbollah and southern Lebanon. When Trump recently told Netanyahu to cancel a planned attack on Beirut—citing progress toward a negotiated settlement that may or may not exist—he was implicitly accepting Iran's terms. Netanyahu objected, calling the linkage "intolerable and completely unacceptable." But Trump's interest in ending the war, in finding a way out that he can present as victory to an American public that never wanted it in the first place, now outweighs his commitment to his Israeli ally's maximalist demands.
The region is being reshaped, just not in the way either leader imagined. Instead of a swift regime change followed by a new regional order, the Middle East is settling into what might be called a permacrisis—a state of perpetual tension that lurches between outright conflict and exhausted standoff, with no clear path to resolution. The Strait of Hormuz remains closed. The diplomatic process, such as it is, moves sluggishly and without visible progress. Trump wants a deal that reopens the waterway and sets terms for longer negotiations over Iran's nuclear program. Iran wants acknowledgment of its regional power and a guarantee that further attacks will bring consequences it is willing and able to inflict. Neither side has found language that bridges that gap.
Meanwhile, the Gulf oil states that bet on American military dominance now watch their vision of a stable, prosperous future recede into uncertainty. Investors and tourists see a region at war, not an oasis of opportunity. The economic damage compounds daily. Trump and Netanyahu are learning what every leader eventually discovers: that starting a war is far easier than ending one with the clear victory you promised. The question now is not whether Iran will be defeated, but whether anyone can find a way to stop fighting that does not look like surrender.
Notable Quotes
The hour of your freedom is at hand. Stay sheltered. Don't leave your home. It's very dangerous outside. Bombs will be dropping everywhere.— Trump, in video message to Iranian people on February 28, 2026
This coalition of forces allows us to do what I have yearned to do for 40 years: smite the terror regime hip and thigh.— Netanyahu, in statement from Tel Aviv on February 28, 2026
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
Why did Trump and Netanyahu believe the Iranian regime would collapse so quickly?
They looked at the surface conditions—economic crisis, internal dissent, the loss of key allies—and assumed those pressures would shatter the state from within. They underestimated how thoroughly the regime had engineered itself to survive exactly this kind of assault.
What changed their calculation about the war's duration?
Reality. The regime didn't collapse. Iran demonstrated it could close a critical global waterway, shoot down American aircraft, and impose costs that made a quick victory impossible. Trump and Netanyahu lost control of the consequences almost immediately.
Why is Trump now constraining Netanyahu's operations in Lebanon?
Because Trump wants out. He needs a deal he can call a victory. Netanyahu wants to continue until Iran is crippled. Those are incompatible goals, and Trump has the leverage to force Netanyahu's hand.
What is Iran actually demanding?
Acknowledgment of its regional power and a guarantee that further attacks will bring painful consequences. They've linked everything together—Lebanon, the Gulf, the nuclear question—so Trump can't negotiate a partial peace.
Is there a path to resolution?
Not an obvious one. The Strait of Hormuz is still closed. The new Iranian leadership is just as ideological as the old guard but more willing to take risks. Without a remarkable diplomatic breakthrough, this becomes a long, grinding stalemate.
What do the Gulf states think about all this?
They're watching their futures evaporate. They bet on American military dominance creating stability. Instead they got a war that's destroying the investment climate they spent years building.