ASYMMETRIC WARS AND THE HUBRIS OF THE AGGRESSOR

I. The Equation That Does Not Work

The hubris of the aggressor consists in a single assumption: whoever has more firepower wins. Whoever has the better weapons, the more precise bombs, the faster aircraft, the more expensive technology — that side prevails. This is the logic of the stronger. It is intuitive. It is plausible. And it has been empirically refuted for sixty years.

Since Vietnam, no great power has won an asymmetric war. Not one. Not the United States. Not the Soviet Union. Not Russia. Not Israel. Not Saudi Arabia. Not NATO. Not a single time in sixty years has superior conventional firepower led to a lasting victory against an inferior but determined opponent.

And yet, in March 2026, the next attempt begins.

II. The Archive of Failure

Vietnam, 1965–1975. The mightiest army on earth against rice farmers in tunnels. Ten years, 58,000 dead Americans, two to three million dead Vietnamese, 400,000 tonnes of napalm, more bombs than in the entire Second World War — and a defeat. The last helicopter lifted off from the embassy roof in Saigon, and the Viet Cong marched in. The best air force in the world could not defeat an enemy that had no air force.

Afghanistan I, 1979–1989. The Soviet Union against the mujahideen. Ten years, 15,000 dead Soviet soldiers, one million dead Afghans. The most modern army of the Eastern Bloc failed against men with Kalashnikovs and Stinger missiles in the mountains of the Hindu Kush. The Soviet Union withdrew. Two years later, it collapsed.

Afghanistan II, 2001–2021. The United States, NATO, 40 nations, twenty years, over two trillion dollars, the most advanced drones, satellites, special forces — and in the end: the Taliban govern again. The exact same government that had been toppled in 2001 sat in the presidential palace in Kabul again in 2021. Twenty years of war to arrive at the starting point.

Iraq, 2003–2011. Three weeks to Baghdad. "Mission Accomplished," said President Bush on the aircraft carrier. Eight years, 4,500 dead Americans, hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis later: a destroyed state, a civil war, and ISIS as the result. The fastest conventional invasion in history — and the slowest realisation that invasion is not victory.

Lebanon, 2006. Israel against Hezbollah. 34 days. The strongest army in the Middle East against a militia with rockets and tunnels. In the end: Hezbollah still existed. Stronger than before. Israel had destroyed villages but won nothing. The Winograd Commission called it a "serious failure."

Yemen, 2015–present. Saudi Arabia, the wealthiest Arab nation, with the most expensive American equipment, against the Houthis — a group from the poorest areas of the poorest country on the Arabian Peninsula. Eleven years of war. 150,000 dead. Result: the Houthis control the north. They attack ships in the Red Sea. They fire drones at Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia's $100-billion military has been unable to defeat a group whose annual budget is less than the cost of a single Saudi fighter jet.

III. Why the Stronger Loses

The pattern is always the same. And the reasons are always the same.

The attacker must win quickly. The defender need only survive. This is the fundamental asymmetry. The attacker has a home front, a public, election cycles, budget debates. Every month the war lasts costs political capital. The defender has none of these constraints. He is at home. He has nowhere else to be. He need not win — he need only be there when the attacker leaves.

Conventional superiority becomes irrelevant when the opponent does not fight conventionally. A billion dollars for a stealth bomber. Five hundred million for a warship. A hundred million for a squadron of fighter jets. And then: a man with a homemade roadside bomb. A drone costing $20,000. A rocket from a garage. The attacker's technology is built for the wrong war. It can defeat armies. It cannot defeat a population.

Occupation generates resistance. Always. Every bomb that hits a house produces not submission but hatred. Every dead civilian has brothers, sons, cousins. The mathematics of occupation is a negative spiral: the more violence, the more resistance. The more resistance, the more violence. At the end stands a country in ruins — and the resistance is stronger than on the first day.

The attacker can destroy the country but cannot control it. One can blow up every bridge, pulverise every barracks, decapitate every command structure. But one cannot control 88 million people. One cannot stop them from hating. One cannot stop them from waiting. One cannot stop them from coming back in ten years.

IV. The Drone and the Strait

On 28 February 2026, Operation Epic Fury began. The United States and Israel attacked Iran with the largest air offensive since the Iraq War of 2003. Twice the firepower of "Shock and Awe." Khamenei killed. The Iranian air force destroyed. The navy sunk. The command structure decapitated.

Conventionally speaking: a devastating success. In less than a week, Iran's conventional military power was destroyed.

And then Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz.

Not with a fleet. Not with mines. Not with submarines. With a few drones. Cheap, slow, primitive drones — the opposite of Shock and Awe. And they were enough. Not to defeat the American fleet — to convince the insurance industry that the passage was too dangerous.

No insurer means no ships. No ships means no oil. No oil means 20 per cent of global supply. The oil price rose 13 per cent in a single day. European gas prices nearly doubled. The greatest energy crisis since 1973.

A $20,000 drone against a $13-billion aircraft carrier. That is asymmetric warfare in its purest form. The stronger side has destroyed everything it can destroy. And the weaker side, with almost nothing, has inflicted the greater damage.

V. The Proxy Arithmetic

Iran spent four decades building a network designed for precisely this moment. Hezbollah in Lebanon. Shia militias in Iraq. Houthis in Yemen. Cells in Bahrain, Kuwait, the Emirates. Each group capable of autonomous operations. Each group able to continue without central direction from Tehran.

One can destroy the command centre. One can kill the supreme commander. One can disrupt communications. But one cannot simultaneously fight Hezbollah in Lebanon, militias in Iraq, Houthis in Yemen, sleeper cells in the Gulf, and Iranian Revolutionary Guards inside Iran itself. Not with air strikes. Not without ground troops. And nobody wants to send ground troops — 88 million people in a country three times the size of France, mountainous as Afghanistan.

On 4 March 2026 — six days after the war began — Iraq fired missiles at Kuwait. The Houthis resumed attacks in the Red Sea. Hezbollah shelled northern Israel. Iranian drones hit a US embassy in Riyadh. Amazon data centres in Bahrain and the Emirates were struck. An Iranian missile was intercepted over Turkey — a NATO member.

That is the proxy arithmetic: you destroy one country and get a war on five continents.

VI. The Four to Five Weeks

President Trump said the plan envisaged "four to five weeks." Defence Secretary Hegseth said: "This is not Iraq. This is not endless."

In Afghanistan, they said: "A few months." It became twenty years.

In Iraq, they said: "Weeks, not months." It became eight years. And then came ISIS.

In Vietnam, they said: "Christmas." It became ten years.

The hubris is always the same: the confusion of destruction with victory. Yes, Iran's conventional military power can be destroyed in four to five weeks. Perhaps it already has been. But that is not the end of the war. It is the beginning.

For the question is not: can one defeat the Iranian army? The answer is obviously yes. The question is: what comes after?

Who governs Iran when the mullahs are gone? Who controls the Revolutionary Guards as they dissolve into guerrilla units? Who prevents civil war among Persians, Azeris, Kurds, Arabs, Baluch? Who rebuilds the infrastructure? Who pays for it? Who stays long enough to create stability?

Four to five weeks. In four to five weeks, one can destroy a country. One cannot rebuild it in four to five decades.

VII. The Price Others Pay

Hubris has a cost structure. And the costs are never borne by those who decide the war.

In Iran: hundreds of civilians dead. Hospitals destroyed. Schools destroyed. Bread queues. Petrol queues. A population in fear that bears no responsibility for its government funding proxies, just as it bore no responsibility for the CIA overthrowing its prime minister in 1953.

In the Gulf: Amazon data centres offline. Airports damaged. US embassies shelled. Civilians in Dubai, Doha, Kuwait City suddenly living in a war they did not choose.

In the global economy: oil prices explode. Gas prices double. Inflation rises. Supply chains break. Supertanker freight rates reach all-time highs. The insurance industry withdraws. International trade is delayed by weeks.

In Washington: six dead soldiers. "Heroes," says the president. He will receive their coffins. He will find the right words. And then he will sign the next operational order.

The costs of asymmetric war are asymmetrically distributed. The attacker loses money and soldiers. The defender loses everything — but he loses it at home, on his own soil, in his own language. And that is why he keeps fighting, long after the attacker has given up.

VIII. What History Teaches, and What Nobody Learns

The lesson is not complicated. It can be summarised in six words:

One can defeat armies, but not peoples.

Napoleon knew it after Moscow. The British knew it after Afghanistan — the first one, in 1842. The Americans should have known it after Vietnam. The Soviets should have known it after Afghanistan. The Americans should have known it after Afghanistan — this time their own. And after Iraq. And after Libya.

But hubris regenerates. Every generation of generals, politicians, and think-tank strategists believes it is smarter than the last. This time it will be different. This time we have the right weapons. This time we have the right plan. This time it is not an endless war but a "clear, devastating, decisive mission."

That is what Pete Hegseth says. In March 2026. About Iran.

Rumsfeld said it in 2003. About Iraq.

McNamara said it in 1964. About Vietnam.

The same confidence. The same script. The same error.

IX. The Inventor and the General

There is a parallel between asymmetric war and another form of asymmetry that is less bloody but follows the same logic.

An inventor with an idea faces a corporation. The corporation has resources, lawyers, market power, lobbyists. The inventor has none of these. Conventionally speaking, he has no chance. The corporation will win.

But the inventor has something the corporation does not: the idea. And he has time. And he has the willingness to wait decades. The corporation must write quarterly reports. The inventor need only survive.

Large corporations fail against small inventors for the same reason that large armies fail against small guerrillas: because size is not strength. Because firepower is not intelligence. Because money is not right. And because the one who fights for his own country — or for his own idea — always endures longer than the one who fights for a quarterly report.

X. The Strait as Metaphor

The Strait of Hormuz is 33 kilometres wide. The shipping lane is 3 kilometres wide. Through those 3 kilometres flows 20 per cent of the world's oil.

It took no navy to close it. No army. A few drones and the recognition that the weak point of the stronger is not his army but his dependency.

The asymmetric warrior does not attack strength. He attacks dependency. Not the tank, but the fuel line. Not the aircraft carrier, but the insurance policy. Not the army, but the public's willingness to finance the war.

That is the lesson no great power learns: that its greatest weakness is not military but economic. Not in the weapons but in the supply chains. Not on the battlefield but on the stock exchange.

Three drones in the Strait of Hormuz have inflicted more damage on the global economy than the entire Iranian army could ever have done.

This is not a war that can be won in four to five weeks. It is a war that cannot be won at all. For the opponent has understood what the attacker does not: that in asymmetric warfare, the victor is not the one who destroys more, but the one who needs less.

The hubris of the aggressor does not consist in starting the war. It consists in believing he can determine when it ends.