← Force-Planning Documents
Which Path to Persia? (Brookings, 2009): Invasion, 1.4 Million to Occupy, and "Leave It to Bibi"
In June 2009, the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution published "Which Path to Persia? Options for a New American Strategy toward Iran." It laid out every road to confronting Iran: diplomacy, airstrikes, regime change, containment, invasion, and one chapter titled "Leave it to Bibi," about letting Israel strike first. Seventeen years later, readers of the 2026 war recognized the sequence. This page covers what the study said about American ground troops, and about Israel's role.
Evidence rating: CONFIRMED for the quoted text, from the Internet Archive copy of the paper (archive text; Brookings book page).
Who wrote it
The authors named on the paper are Kenneth M. Pollack (also editor), Daniel L. Byman, Martin Indyk, Suzanne Maloney, Michael E. O'Hanlon, and Bruce Riedel. The Saban Center was named for its donor, Israeli-American media investor Haim Saban. Several of these authors were still writing about Iran during the 2026 war: Pollack in Foreign Affairs (a197) and O'Hanlon for Brookings and Foreign Affairs (a196, a198).
The invasion chapter: "Going All the Way"
Chapter 3 sized an American invasion:
- An initial force comparable to Iraq 2003. "Again, this suggests a force roughly comparable to that employed for Operation Iraqi Freedom: four to six divisions amounting to 200,000 to 250,000 troops."
- Two to four Marine regimental combat teams, about 15,000 to 30,000 Marines, to seize a beachhead and a major port.
- Airmobile brigades from the 101st Air Assault Division, the 82nd Airborne Division, and possibly the 173rd Airborne Brigade to get through the mountains.
- At least one and possibly three heavy armored divisions for the drive on Tehran.
- Three or more aircraft carriers if nearby airfields were not available, and a fight to keep the Strait of Hormuz open for the landing.
Then the occupation, using about 20 security personnel per 1,000 people:
"This ratio suggests that an occupation force of 1.4 million troops would be needed for Iran."
The authors wrote that even a force half that size would be essentially the whole active-duty Army and Marine Corps; that a best case would still keep 100,000 to 200,000 US troops in Iran for years; that only a major, rapid expansion of the military could do it without wrecking the National Guard and reserves; and that the option "might require partial conscription for some period and a greater expansion of ground forces than at any time since the Second World War." In worst cases, they wrote, the president might need to ask the American people to accept some form of limited conscription.
The units the study named, Marines to take the coast and the 82nd Airborne, are the same units the Pentagon moved toward Iran in March 2026. See the buildup.
"Leave it to Bibi"
The chapter most quoted in 2026 is chapter 5, "Leave it to Bibi" (Bibi is Benjamin Netanyahu's nickname). One reader quoted it on 26 September 2026: "the United States would encourage—and perhaps even assist—the Israelis in conducting the strikes themselves, in the expectation that both international criticism and Iranian retaliation would be deflected away from the United States and onto Israel" (@Greg_the_Berean on X, 26 Sep 2026). Commentator Brian Berletic had argued since 2024 that events were following this paper (X, 9 Apr 2024).
In June 2025, Israel struck first; the United States joined with the strikes on Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan. In February 2026 the two struck together. A State Department legal opinion dated 21 April 2026 said the United States entered the war "at the request of and in the collective self-defense of its Israeli ally" (Snopes, rated True, 30 Apr 2026). Once the air war could not finish the job, the question became whose soldiers would go in. Israel's Channel 12 reported that Israeli soldiers would not. See Israel keeps its infantry home.
Why it matters
A leading Washington think tank, through a center named for a prominent pro-Israel donor, spelled out in 2009 both halves of the path: Israel opens the fight, and an American ground force of hundreds of thousands, possibly with conscription, is what finishing it would take. The article page for the study: a215.
Related Areas
Status: Kenneth M. Pollack, Daniel L. Byman, Suzanne Maloney, Michael E. O'Hanlon, Bruce Riedel, and Haim Saban are alive. Martin Indyk is deceased (2024).
Last Updated: 2026-09-26