Colin Powell Must Be Rolling Over in His Grave

Trump’s Iran strategy is becoming the kind of open-ended war Powell warned against

Abstract

Colin Powell believed that military force must serve a clear political objective, be coordinated with other instruments of power and stop when that objective has been achieved. Trump’s Iran strategy instead combines sweeping military aims, public promises to protesters, intermittent negotiations and repeated bombing without a convincing definition of victory. Powell might not have opposed force, but he would have demanded a more disciplined strategy—one beginning with intelligence preparation, Iranian partners and covert action rather than public boasting.

Colin Powell was not reluctant to use American power. He helped direct the overwhelming force that expelled Saddam Hussein from Kuwait in 1991. But he believed that force was an instrument of policy, not a substitute for it. Leaders had to define the political objective, determine whether military action could achieve it at an acceptable cost and consider what would happen after the shooting stopped.

Powell’s approach is often summarized in an eight-point checklist, reproduced separately in Comment One. Powell himself cautioned that no fixed formula could govern every crisis. Nevertheless, his 1992 Foreign Affairs essay posed the essential questions: Is the objective important and clear? Have nonviolent alternatives failed? Can force accomplish the objective? At what cost? What happens after force changes the situation?

He also warned against “a little surgical bombing” followed by a little more bombing when the first attack failed. That warning describes the danger of the Iran war with uncomfortable precision.

The administration initially defined success as destroying Iran’s missiles, drones, navy and defense-industrial base; severing support for proxies; and preventing a nuclear weapon. It later declared the military objectives achieved. Yet fighting resumed over the Strait of Hormuz, followed by another pause for negotiations over the strait and a broader nuclear agreement—and then renewed attacks and threats of retaliation. The operation may have been declared complete, but the political conflict plainly was not.

What constitutes victory: destruction of Iran’s military capacity, permanent abandonment of its nuclear program, free navigation through Hormuz, an end to support for terrorist proxies or replacement of the regime? These are different objectives requiring different tools and exit strategies. Declaring all of them simultaneously does not produce clarity.

Trump compounded the problem during Iran’s January uprising. After the regime began killing protesters, he urged Iranians to “KEEP PROTESTING,” “TAKE OVER YOUR INSTITUTIONS” and promised that “HELP IS ON ITS WAY.” Powell would never have advised a president to say that—even if help really were on the way.

Such a declaration creates expectations among people risking their lives, commits the United States without explaining the commitment and alerts the regime that outside assistance may be coming. If the intended help involves the CIA, Mossad, cyberoperations, communications or support for defectors, announcing it is the opposite of covert action. If no meaningful help follows, it encourages vulnerable people to act on a promise America may not keep.

A better strategy would have begun before open war with sustained CIA and Mossad operations: penetrating the regime, disrupting missile and nuclear networks, preserving communications, encouraging defections and, most important, building relationships with credible Iranians capable of organizing an alternative. Military force, if necessary, should have supported that political strategy rather than preceded it.

The opening phase of Afghanistan after September 11 illustrates the principle. CIA officers entered Afghanistan fifteen days after the attacks and moved quickly because the agency had cultivated the Northern Alliance for years. Intelligence officers, Special Forces, local allies and American airpower then combined to overthrow the Taliban rapidly. The later occupation became the indefinite mission Powell feared, but the opening campaign showed how military power can magnify a prepared indigenous movement.

Powell might not have opposed attacking Iran but I suspect he would have deployed a strategy similar to the initial approach to Afghanistan instead of the current bombing. He would have opposed entering a conflict without deciding whether the goal was deterrence, disarmament, negotiated restraint or regime change. Force can destroy targets. Only strategy can convert destruction into a durable political result.

That is the Powell Doctrine’s warning—and why Colin Powell must be rolling over in his grave.