‘We Will Have to Wait and See if Iran Is Done’
Former Centcom commander says the United States would be mistaken to take Iran’s word that it does not seek escalation.
As a young general officer, one of retired Gen. Joseph Votel’s first jobs in the U.S. Defense Department was as the director of a task force established to defeat a lethal new threat that killed and maimed thousands of American and coalition troops in the early 2000s—improvised explosive devices.
Lara Seligman is a staff writer at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @laraseligman
More from Foreign Policy

No, the World Is Not Multipolar
The idea of emerging power centers is popular but wrong—and could lead to serious policy mistakes.

America Prepares for a Pacific War With China It Doesn’t Want
Embedded with U.S. forces in the Pacific, I saw the dilemmas of deterrence firsthand.

America Can’t Stop China’s Rise
And it should stop trying.

The Morality of Ukraine’s War Is Very Murky
The ethical calculations are less clear than you might think.