Don’t let the battlefield optics fool you: America’s overall national security has been harmed

Vice Admiral Joe Sestak, USN (Ret)

The Philadelphia Inquirer

March 10, 2026

In a single year, the United States has attacked seven countries — Somalia, Iraq, Yemen, Iran, Syria, Nigeria, and Venezuela. Assembling a third of U.S. overseas warships and about 375 military aircraft, the United States struck, for a second time in eight months, a weakened Iran, initially to force another nuclear “deal,” then “freedom” for the Iranian people, and now rationales that seem to change from moment to moment.

The first Trump administration broke America’s word in 2018, tearing up the nuclear accord signed with Iran three years earlier — despite having surprise inspections of its nuclear facilities with 24-7 camera “eyes” and acoustic/vibration/heat “ears” inside so Iran couldn’t cheat. Crippled by new Trump 45 sanctions, Iran returned to enriching uranium a year later.

This administration’s new “deal” replicated the discarded accord, with additional demands for dismantling the buildings, limiting ballistic missiles, and no funding of regional proxies.

Before we struck Iran again, U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff said President Donald Trump was “curious” why Iran hadn’t “capitulated,”given the threat of military strikes.

But as Ukraine demonstrated when denying the administration’s demand to trade its territory for a “deal” with Russia — which also broke its word about not attacking Ukraine after it surrendered its nuclear weapons — nations are realists, and unlike Charlie Brown, don’t trust Lucy’s promise not to pull the football away again.

In addition to our having spurned American alliances, eight regional nations — from the United Kingdom (allowing its base on Diego Garcia to be used only for defensive purposes) to Saudi Arabia — barred America from using airspace above, and our bases on, their territories for the Iranian strikes. Now the shoe is on the other foot: With swarms of low-tech, slow speed, low-to-the-ground Iranian drones breaching U.S. air defenses — killing U.S. soldiers, damaging operations centers and embassies — an unprepared America has asked Ukraine for its interceptor drones, advisers, and detection technology that it has developed against Russia’s similar drones.

More, Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, reportedlyexpressed some concern about how a sustained operation would impact the military’s depleted state of critical munitions — raising a fundamental question: How is our nation’s overall security?

The answer? It is not good.

Joe Sestak is a former Navy vice admiral, a former U.S. representative for Pennsylvania’s 7th Congressional District, who served on the House Armed Services Committee, and onetime director for defense policy of the National Security Council staff.