CNN: The broader-than-anticipated impact of the initial assault on Iran’s leadership marked the first of a series of gambles that has turned an operation the White House once envisioned as a focused, weekslong military campaign into an open-ended war that escalated beyond US control, with widening economic and political repercussions — and no clear exit strategy.
Instead of rapid collapse, the Iranian regime has consolidated control, and responded more aggressively than US officials expected, firing on targets across the Middle East, including oil tankers. Iran has effectively halted the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz, sparking a global energy crisis that the administration is now struggling to contain…