Alwaght- The war of aggression against Iran has turned US's continued military footprint in the region into a strategic challenge. Over six months of combat, major US bases became easy targets for Tehran’s powerful missiles, according to reports. The Pentagon is now being forced to pull back troops, draw down to its lowest troop levels since 2003, and shell out $5 billion in reconstruction costs. But more troubling for Washington is the collapse of the 45-year-old Carter Doctrine, a seismic warning shot. Trump, who never wanted to be Carter, now finds himself trapped in Carter’s fate.
The Financial Times reports that the US must now overhaul Pentagon military strategy. With large, fixed bases in the Persian Gulf proving highly vulnerable to Iranian missiles and drones during the conflict, the Pentagon has decided to pivot to a leaner, more dispersed model, stationing troops in smaller outposts and rotating fighter jets through temporary airstrips, rather than relying on sprawling, exposed garrisons.
The war has imposed enormous costs on Washington, and now it faces a hefty bill to rebuild those damaged bases. The Enterprise Institute think tank estimates repairs to 11 US facilities across seven West Asia countries at roughly $5 billion. Pentagon had not allocated this cost in the draft budget of war.
Nate Swanson, former senior director for Iran at the US National Security Council, argued: "Rebuilding some of these installations does not make much practical sense. Having to finance repairs for facilities we don't actually need could accelerate the drawdowns already underway."
The war of aggression against Iran has taught the US a bitter lesson. After 22 years, the United States is now seeking a sharp reduction in its military presence across West Asia and in other nations bordering Iran. Any strategic rethinking will also have consequences for troop numbers in the Gulf. The US force posture there, typically around 35,000 troops spread across Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, and Kuwait, is likely to fall to its lowest level since 2003, ahead of the Iraq invasion. The US is also pulling out of Syria and scaling back in Iraq.
Signs of Washington's power decline
At the same time, the Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE) weighed in with a 2026 analysis posing a blunt question: "Is this the end of American hegemony?" Its answer, "it certainly appears so", came with a sharp twist. The primary cause, the institute argued, is not the rise of any foreign power but the US's own self-inflicted wounds.
That assessment signals a notable shift in the US political discourse: the overriding concern is no longer just China's ascent, but the internal erosion of American capacity to project power, from mounting military and economic costs, to fading trust among allies, to a foreign policy increasingly defined by volatility.
Iran war a showcase of the US military power limit
The six-month war has pushed that debate into uncharted territory. The Wall Street Journal, in a recent assessment of American ability to uphold global order, flagged dwindling weapons stockpiles, a shortage of Patriot interceptor missiles, a shrinking US military presence in Asia, and glaring weaknesses in the defense industrial base. The war with Iran, the paper writes, has exposed serious vulnerabilities in that industrial foundation.
The crux of the matter is that the American power is not just a function of how many aircraft, warships, or missiles it has on hand. The capacity to rapidly replace weapons expended in a protracted conflict is itself a core component of military strength. If a great power can mount massive operations but cannot replenish munitions and equipment fast enough to sustain a long war, its deterrent credibility begins to crumble.
The US no longer the power we knew
Nobel laureate and economist Paul Krugman has weighed in with an analysis titled "The Decline and Fall of the American Empire," arguing that the US is no longer the dominant economic and military power it once was. Washington's global role, he contends, now hinges more than ever on allies who still trust American commitments.
That is a crucial point, and it underscores that American power is not just hard power. For decades, Washington has derived much of its influence from a vast network of allies, international institutions, the dollar, the global economy, and soft power. Anything that erodes trust in that network, over the long haul, diminishes American strength.
Decline of soft power
The Council on Foreign Relations, citing Gallup data, reported in July 2026 that China has overtaken the US in global favorability ratings. According to the data, America's net positive rating plunged to negative 15 percent in 2025, while China's hovered near zero. The authors stress that this shift reflects less China's rising appeal than US's declining soft power.
That carries profound strategic weight, because hegemony is not sustained by force alone. When other countries, rather than rallying behind US leadership, begin diversifying their ties with China, Russia, and other powers, the cost to Washington of projecting influence climbs steadily higher.
Decline is even felt inside the US
A national survey conducted by Carnegie Endowment researchers in January 2026 found that a majority of Americans themselves believe the US is declining in global power and influence. Nearly two-thirds of respondents said China's power now equals or even surpasses that of the US.
That is a striking development, because "American decline" is no longer just a foreign narrative. A significant segment of the US public now shares that perception, sensing that their country has lost its once-dominant standing.
Trump: A decline remedy or an accelerating factor?
Some experts now argue that Donald Trump's policies, rather than halting the US decline, may be accelerating it.
The Center for American Progress, in a 2026 report, cataloged 131 specific cases that it says have weakened US security, economic strength, and global influence. From this vantage point, pressing allies, erratic foreign commitments, costly wars, and the heavy-handed use of economic and military tools may project strength in the short term, but over time, they erode trust in Washington.
Joseph Stiglitz, the Nobel-winning American economist, has made a similar case, saying Trump's policies could bring about the end of US hegemony, with Washington losing a significant part of its dominant position in the future global economy.
