Iran is defended by this geography, with mountains on three sides, swampland and water on the fourth. The Mongols were the last force to make any progress through the territory in 1219–21 and since then attackers have ground themselves into dust trying to make headway across the mountains. By the time of the Second Gulf War in 2003 even the USA, the greatest fighting force the world has seen, thought better than to take a right turn once it had entered Iraq from the south,
