Hopefully, the lesson we learned is to know when to declare victory and walk away, leaving your enemy bloody, vanquished, and terrified of you, rather than long term occupation and nation building. Sure, we now have the best counter insurgency capabilities in the world. But no one wants to be in a war where you have to use that capability.
The fool Bush Junior intended to try nation building from the start.
That was a stated goal of that PNAC outfit, the Project for a New American Century crowd that he brought in to staff his administration.
They had even tried to get Slick Willy to invade Iraq and oust Saddam back in 1998. They seized on 9-11 as the big opportunity to put their plan into action by confusing the public- I think half the country figured Saddam and the hijackers were the same thing.
[Hopefully, the lesson we learned is to know when to declare victory and walk away, leaving your enemy bloody, vanquished, and terrified of you, rather than long term occupation and nation building. ]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Praying_Mantis
I expect we’d have a blocking force in case the Iranians decide to move against the gulf states. But otherwise, it would be airstrikes and missile attacks all the way.
The Iranian economy is on its knees. The destruction of sufficient military equipment and stores will give internal malcontents a fighting chance. Who knows - we might even supply them.