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... The last U.S. troops pulled out of Iraq Wednesday, highlighting a shifting " and shrinking " American military footprint in the Middle East.

That footprint is expected to become even smaller as Pentagon officials, surveying extensive damage to U.S. bases in the Persian Gulf caused by the war in Iran, are reportedly considering shuttering some of those installations.

From Tehran's perspective, these are exciting developments. It's just what its leaders have been hoping for, and demanding, for decades. That doesn't necessarily make the U.S. base closures a bad idea, some analysts say. ...