By Leonard Weinberg

On January 28, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an Iranian-backed group, launched a successful and lethal drone attack on Tower 22, an American military outpost in northeast Jordan. Three US service members were killed and 47 more wounded. While Iran-backed groups have been attacking US positions across the Middle East since the outbreak of the Israel–Hamas war last October, this was the first strike to kill US soldiers.

The attack has prompted strong demands in Washington and elsewhere for a powerful US response. Instead of targeting the various groups in Iraq sponsored to one degree or another by the regime in Tehran, advocates call for striking at Iran directly. Such a response might involve disrupting Iran’s petroleum industry by bombarding the relevant facilities.

The demands for a strong kinetic response are countered by warnings about the US being drawn into a wider regional war in the Middle East. The unsuccessful American military effort to stop the Taliban’s control of Afghanistan and a less ambitious but equally unsuccessful intervention in the Lebanese civil war in........

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