Iran didn’t adapt to America's playbook. Russia and China already have

Trump launches Operation Epic Fury against Iran using airpower strikes, marking unexpected regime-change operation that could define his entire second presidential term.

Joshua S. Treviño is the chief transformation officer at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, and the senior fellow for the Western Hemisphere Initiative at the America First Policy Institute.

There are significant differences between this regime-change project and the ones preceding it in Iraq and Afghanistan. First and foremost, there is no American occupation force in the offing. American aircraft will range across Iran at will; American soldiers will not.

The president made it explicit in his address that he expects the people of Iran to overthrow their own regime, and there is reason to believe they will. (Alleged footage of Iranians cheering the death of the ayatollah lends credence to this belief.) The good news, if one wishes, is that those other models are not being followed. The bad news is that the most applicable precedent for regime change by airpower alone is Libya.