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Analysts Warn of Pattern Where Small Conflicts Spiral Beyond Control, Trapping Democracies in Protracted Engagements
The Trump administration's military campaign in Iran faces a dangerous trajectory that could transform the conflict into what Foreign Affairs analyst Robert D. Kaplan calls a "middle-sized war"—a category of engagement that has historically proven catastrophic for American foreign policy and democratic institutions.
Writing for Foreign Affairs, Kaplan argues that middle-sized wars present a unique paradox for democracies. These conflicts are "big enough to cause immense destruction and bloodshed but small enough that they do not engage the full home front," Kaplan explains, citing military historian James Stokesbury's observation that democracies excel at small, professional operations or total war mobilization—but struggle decisively in the ambiguous middle ground.
The pattern is disquietingly familiar. Vietnam, Korea, Afghanistan, and Iraq all began as limited interventions before evolving into protracted conflicts that ruined presidential administrations and eroded public trust in government. Now, Kaplan warns, President Donald Trump's Operation Epic Fury against Iran carries similar risks. The administration's demand for regime surrender, combined with sustained bombing that could trigger Iranian anarchy and Persian Gulf destabilization, sets the stage for precisely the kind of open-ended commitment that has bedeviled Washington before.
"Middle-sized wars often stem from misunderstandings about the place intervention is meant to help," Kaplan notes in Foreign Affairs, drawing on historian Barbara Tuchman's analysis of Vietnam. The danger signs are already visible: an "obsession with geopolitics" while ignoring "local cultural and political conditions" that area specialists understand better than grand strategists. The Iraq invasion of 2003 demonstrated the consequences of rushed intelligence and inadequate "day-after" planning, leading to a conflict that cost trillions and reshaped the Middle East—for the worse.
Kaplan's analysis, published in Foreign Affairs, identifies the fundamental miscalculation inherent in such decisions. Leaders face binary choices under profound uncertainty, making judgments that will later be second-guessed by "people with the advantage of historical hindsight." The Iranian regime's nuclear capabilities may present a genuine threat, but the risk of triggering a middle-sized war—between destruction limited enough to avoid total commitment but severe enough to demand one—may outweigh the danger of inaction.
The warning extends beyond Iran. Kaplan identifies parallel risks in potential conflicts with Mexican drug cartels and in Venezuela, where removing Nicolás Maduro without robust post-intervention planning could replicate Iraq's chaos. The Powell Doctrine—embracing overwhelming force, clear exit strategies, vital national interests, and broad public support—has been sidelined, despite its proven correlation with avoiding middle-sized wars.
The stakes transcend immediate casualties. "Middle-sized wars will weaken the United States and contribute to its ultimate demise," Kaplan warns in Foreign Affairs. The Byzantine Empire survived over a millennium by avoiding open warfare; America's 250-year republic faces accumulating conflicts that threaten a "fatal split between the public and its governing elite."
For Trump, who promised to end "forever wars," the irony is acute. Through what Kaplan describes as "loose rhetoric, poor planning, a lack of policy discipline, and the normal collection of mistakes," the administration risks blundering into precisely the quagmire it pledged to escape. The "slippery slope of incrementalism" means that today's air and naval operations could tomorrow require special forces advisors, and eventually ground troops—escalation dynamics that Vietnam followed over years.
The lesson, Foreign Affairs analyst Kaplan suggests, is not isolationism but discipline: "Avoiding small and even middle-sized wars starts with this kind of restraint." For an empire necessarily involved in global affairs, the question is not whether to engage—but how to disengage before engagement becomes entrapment.