Justifications for the US military presence in the Middle East have become exercises in circular logic.
Since the US and Israel launched the Iran War on February 28, Iran’s attacks on US bases have killed multiple US service members, injured many others, and damaged billions of dollars’ worth of US military equipment, while providing limited utility in the conflict.
These bases are the physical manifestation of the United States’ needless entanglement in the region. Even as the United States chooses yet another Middle East war, there are very few direct threats to US national security emanating from the region. The only reason that Iran, or any of its allies, poses a threat to the United States is because of the presence of these bases and the tens of thousands of troops deployed to the region.
The United States should redress its overextension and close most of the bases as part of a broader retrenchment from the Middle East. Given that such a maneuver would be politically impractical amid war, the United States should use the eventual termination of this conflict as an opportunity to pull back and significantly reduce its presence in the region.
There’s no doubt that the United States recognizes how exposed these bases are. In a roughly 13-month period following Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel, US bases and personnel in the region faced 170 attacks from Iranian-allied groups. One of those attacks killed three American service members stationed in a poorly defended outpost in northeast Jordan in January 2024.
As the US conducted a massive military buildup in the weeks leading up to the February 28 launch of this war, the Pentagon advised some personnel at CENTCOM’s forward headquarters at the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar to evacuate. The US Navy’s Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain reduced staffing to “mission-critical” levels ahead of the attack. Similarly, ahead of its strikes on Iranian nuclear sites in June 2025, the United States moved military assets and personnel from bases in the Middle East. If these bases are so vital, why would the US military reduce its personnel in advance of a war?
In the first week of the war alone, Iranian missile and drone strikes have done extensive damage to US bases in the region, including hitting the Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain. Iran has destroyed or severely degraded expensive US radar systems in Jordan, Qatar, and the UAE that are used for missile defense. As of March 10, at least 17 US sites have been damaged in the war. The presence of these bases is also incentivizing Iran to attack host countries in the region, leading to a wider, increasingly uncontrollable war.
Among the administration’s numerous justifications for launching the war on Iran, according to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, is that they expected Israel to strike Iran first, and Tehran to subsequently retaliate by attacking US personnel in the region. By that logic, if the United States didn’t have such a large presence in the region, there would have been no need to join Israel’s war because Iran would not have had numerous US targets in range.
Eliminating, or at least greatly reducing, the US presence in the region would have numerous strategic upsides for the United States. Chiefly, it reduces US troops’ vulnerability to attack and lessens the potential for escalation and deeper entrenchment in the region. A withdrawal of US personnel would also mean Washington could remove other assets, including missile defense systems and carrier strike groups.
This would encourage Middle Eastern states to end their free-riding, take their own defense more seriously, and reduce reliance on the United States. The Trump administration has rightly called on Europe to share a greater burden in its own defense—it should do the same with its Middle East partners. The US presence has also fostered a moral hazard in the US-Israeli relationship, whereby Israel undertakes aggressive actions because it is confident of US backing. Rubio’s justification for the war is a prime example of this problem.
US interests in the region are limited and certainly do not justify such a substantial presence. Middle Eastern states should be just as, if not more, responsible for keeping sea lanes open and ensuring the flow of oil—indeed, they have a strong incentive to do so. The same goes for the threat posed by groups like ISIS, which are a much greater threat to regional states than the United States. More broadly, most of the challenges the Middle East faces are political and can’t be resolved by an overly militarized US presence in the region.
Just days before the war with Iran began, the United States announced that it would totally withdraw American troops from Syria. This is a good start. Unfortunately, US attention and resources will now be focused on fighting yet another reckless Middle East war, instead of rightsizing America’s overextension in the region.
About the Author: Adam Gallagher
Adam Gallagher is a contributing fellow at Defense Priorities. He is a foreign policy editor, writer, and analyst, focusing on US foreign policy in the Middle East and Asia, and US grand strategy in the multipolar world. Most recently, he was the editor-in-chief at the US Institute of Peace and has also been an editor at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the International Foundation for Electoral Systems. For more of his work, follow him on X @AEGallagher10.
