There Are Times When

[Anomalocaris]

Not really, we can't stop it very easily because 1.  we can neither admit it was our fault, nor 2. stand aside and let it burn itself out without it turning into a tail wagging dog domestic political circus, nor 3. Commit the necessary forces and absorb the necessary costs and casualties, both military and domestic civilian, to really stamp it out.

Our allies are doing a pretty shit job now they want to regain the land they lost but more or less things seem bad now maybe just maybe it will burn itself out no matter how much land they loose or gain they are bound to fuck up. 

We are too disfunctional to let it burn out.  We will make a domestic political circus out of it, creating an politically charged atmosphere where it would both politically impossible to be fully disengaged, as well as impossible to commit enough resources in time to make a positive difference.   It would then become like a Vietnam, as we are compelled to submit ourselves to creeping involvement, with drone strikes escalating to special force operations, and special force operations escalate into special force operations where things go wrong and special operatives are killed or capture.   This would then escalate into sustained US air strikes and sustained boots on the ground, all the while committing Not enough force (enough would be about the size of the entire army ground forces) to actually control the situation, but having to navigate, and as always be thorough outmaneuvered in, local political landscape.

In the end, we would be so stuck we would be thankful for any ally that can let us extricate.  That ally would Very likely be Iran.  

I think it is likely that the Sunni Islamic state would be short lived and eventually implode under the pressure of an alliance against it, and Out of the resulting chaos and redrawing of the map in the middleeast Iran would emerge as the regional superpower with post ISIS Iraq effectively its satellite state.     If such an Iran then chose to openly go nuclear there would be nothing we or anyone can do about it at all.   The middleeast would then quickly degenerate into a local nuclear standoff between Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Israel.