The United States is expanding its attacks on Iran after three U.S. soldiers were killed over the weekend, the first U.S. fatalities in the conflict since March. Two U.S. service members were killed in an Iranian attack on a base in Jordan, and a third soldier was killed in northern Iraq during a "controlled detonation" of a downed Iranian drone. The United States has now bombed Iran for nine consecutive nights, and Iran has retaliated by striking U.S. allies across the Persian Gulf. The war, which has led to the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, has squeezed global supplies of oil and gas.
"The United States has considerable violence at its disposal, but it has limited political capacity to dictate terms," says Toby Jones, associate professor of Middle East history at Rutgers University. Jones says that while the United States has tried to "inflict pain" on Iranian civilians in order to weaken the government, "it's hard to say that it's working."
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