For now we seem to have averted an all-out shooting war between the United States and Iran.
Yet it’s not over. The world is more dangerous than it was a week ago, and President Donald Trump’s exuberance suggests that he may have learned precisely the wrong lesson from his clash with Iran.
Trump and some of his supporters are crowing at the lack of American casualties — Iran may have carefully aimed so as to miss people — in ways that remind me of the hubris preceding the 2003 invasion of Iraq. As there were then, there are today concerns about whether intelligence has been overstated, leaders are thumping their chests and there’s too much confidence in the ability of the military toolbox to solve complex problems.