On July 17, an Iranian missile strike killed three U.S. servicemembers at the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan, a stark reminder of the cost of President Donald Trump’s war of choice in the Middle East. Their deaths were avoidable, just as the strategy that put them in harm’s way was and remains reversible. Such forward deployments are always a “safe” option until missiles and drones rain down, highlighting the importance of withdrawing American troops from the region and ending this disastrous war.
The Trump administration is reportedly moving assets and troops further from its forward bases lining the Persian Gulf, which have faced the brunt of Iranian attacks. That includes Jordan and Israel. However, as the strike on Muwaffaq Salti highlights, these bases hardly present a more secure option for such deployments.
The United States has at least 32 major military installations and at least 50,000 troops positioned throughout the Middle East, with many more locations not disclosed to the public. Notable sites include Central Command’s regional headquarters at the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, the Navy’s Fifth Fleet headquarters at the Naval Support Activity base in Bahrain, and Al Dhafra Air Base in the United Arab Emirates. Kuwait hosts the Ali Al Salem Air Base and Camp Arifjan, while Saudi Arabia hosts the Prince Sultan Air Base. All have been regularly targeted in the war, with Kuwait and the UAE sites of particular focus for Iran.
These security partnerships, which have largely secured the rule of repressive dictatorships in the Gulf and in countries like Jordan while providing a shield to Israel by pressuring Iran, generally gave Washington a degree of influence over the energy markets that helped drive economic growth.
Yet rather than provide stability across the Middle East, the ever-expanding regional posture has largely served as fuel for America’s so-called “War on Terror,” more properly known as the “forever wars.” Middle Eastern states, including Israel, have long taken advantage of this moral hazard problem, in which petty grievances between regional leaders have fostered wars and aggression under the cover of security guarantees in Washington. By providing security, the United States has been enmeshed in conflicts from the 1980s Iran-Iraq War to its own illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003 and similarly illegal military operations in Syria during its brutal civil war between 2011-2025.
Each of these decisions laid the groundwork for the war on Iran today, one that started without a clear strategy on the arrogant expectation of a quick victory. Yet this war cannot be won through mere airpower alone. In assuming that the Islamic Republic would quickly cave under the pressure of massive force, with Israel and the United States constituting two of the most powerful militaries in the world, the Trump administration sleepwalked into a quagmire of its own making that is getting American troops killed and injured for what is clearly a massive strategic setback.
Understanding its inability to win a direct war with the United States, Iran has opted for calibrated strikes on U.S. bases throughout the region. While the U.S. military has managed to intercept most Iranian strikes, even one direct hit carries disastrous results. Over nearly six months, the Islamic Republic has achieved more than that, increasing its strategic leverage by effectively closing the crucially important Strait of Hormuz to foster a global energy and economic crisis while killing 18 U.S. servicemembers and wounding hundreds more as it has wreaked havoc on American bases and civilian infrastructure across the Middle East.
With dwindling and expensive missile interceptor stocks that reached dangerously low levels in just the first five weeks of the war, the U.S. military is increasingly forced to pick and choose which incoming missiles and substantially cheaper drones to intercept, and with less interceptors per incoming missile. This development has only increased the chance of strikes breaking through defensive lines to hit already exposed forward bases. Instead of deterring strikes, these bases are serving as tempting targets, especially as Iran has improved its accuracy, likely with support that should have always been expected from Russia and China.
Washington recognizes this development, explaining efforts to quietly shift assets and troops to bases further away from Iran. Yet as missile interceptor stocks continue to dwindle, with no clear domestic production capacity to make up for the burn rate, these “safe” bases will only become less safe with time.
Given that the Iranian state rightly views this war as existential to its survival, alongside its ongoing ability to consistently project strength through attacks stretching as far as Egypt despite the months-long air campaign that rained 3,500 strike events on military and civilian targets alike as of July 31, the only path forward is one that ends the war and these fixed permanent deployments. American soldiers cannot be a springboard for indefinite U.S. military operations in the Middle East. There is no justification for American deaths in the name of the unsustainable and impractical goal of total military dominance, let alone unnecessary wars of choice.
Alexander Langlois is a Contributing Fellow at Defense Priorities.