In March 2003, the United States launched an invasion of Iraq on false pretenses and without a clear long-term strategy. Twenty years later, it is repeating many of the same mistakes in Ukraine.
This time, however, the stakes are much higher. The United States is no longer the undisputed superpower that it was in the early 2000s. Two decades of failed military interventions abroad, poor economic governance at home, and dysfunctional culture wars have significantly undermined its potential.