With just over 100 days remaining until the midterm elections, a midterm assessment of the Trump administration’s governance, armed clashes between the United States and Iran are intensifying, drawing attention to President Trump’s intentions. Experts point out that President Trump’s resumption of the war is a “complete losing move.”

“There is virtually no war scenario that would help the Republican Party’s midterm performance.” said Kurt Mills, editor of the American Conservative, a U.S. conservative magazine, speaking to the UK daily the Guardian on the 18th (local time). The magazine is known for taking a favorable view of President Trump’s policies, including ‘America First.’

Mills said of President Trump’s choice to restart the war that it is a “complete losing move and, in effect, evidence that he does not actually care about the midterms,” adding that “he appears to hold a personal grudge against Iranians.”

The Guardian assessed that “by reigniting a war already unpopular with voters, President Trump appears to be inviting a crushing defeat at the polls.”

The midterm elections to be held this November are regarded as a midterm assessment of the Trump administration’s performance. After war between the United States and Iran broke out in February, prices soared along with crude oil prices, chilling public opinion, and President Trump hurried to end the war to secure victory at the polls. However, after the two countries signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to end the war in the middle of last month, they clashed over control of the Strait of Hormuz and have recently exchanged airstrikes, entering into military confrontation. With two U.S. soldiers killed by an Iranian attack the previous day, concerns have even been raised that a full-scale war could resume.

Some interpret the U.S. military operations against Iran as an attempt to regain negotiating leverage over Tehran and to renegotiate the MOU. Nate Swanson, a researcher at the Atlantic Council, a U.S. think tank, warned that “this entails enormous risks, could produce destructive outcomes, and is likely to end in failure.” He also pointed out that the situation has been further snarled by President Trump sidelining Iran experts and instead listening to non-experts such as his son-in-law Jared Kushner.

There are also growing concerns that if this war expands into a full-scale conflict, it could become a years-long war. Alex Vatanka, a researcher at the Middle East Institute in Washington, noted that Iran is signaling a will to retaliate by labeling the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, and even mediator Oman as U.S. ‘partners,’ and he pointed out that “it could lead to a conflict lasting five or even ten years.”

CNN also predicted that while President Trump is likely to expand retaliatory airstrikes in the short term, in the long run he could become trapped in a ‘Trump-style Forever War’ with no exit strategy.