Opinion | The Iran war has exposed a major flaw in U.S. military strategy

In one respect, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was a game changer. But in another way it wasn’t. By sinking or damaging the U.S. Navy’s battleships on Dec. 7, 1941, the Japanese forced the United States to rely instead on aircraft carriers. But neither the Pearl Harbor attack nor even the attack nine hours later on Clark Field in the Philippines — which devastated Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s air force on the ground — shook the U.S. military’s reliance on bases within the enemy’s strike range. Indeed, much of the Pacific campaign that followed consisted of landings by U.S. soldiers and Marines to secure island bases to enable air attacks on Japan.