Democrats want to stop President Donald Trump from attacking Cuba without congressional approval, fearing the administration is speeding toward another conflict even while the one in Iran remains unresolved.

Sens. Tim Kaine, Adam Schiff and Ruben Gallego are leading the charge to force a war powers vote in the Senate, where a similar measure failed in April, and Reps. Gregory Meeks and Nydia Velazquez are pushing a resolution in the House.

Fear of a prolonged conflict isn’t confined to congressional Democrats.

“I think a war with Cuba would be one of those wars where it’s easy to get in and hard to get out,” said William LeoGrande, a longtime Cuba scholar at American University, warning that the U.S. could end up trying to run the country “the way it ended up trying to run Iraq.”

Cuba may look vulnerable after months of economic pressure, giving the administration an opening it has not had in years. But experts say that is still not enough to justify another conflict, especially while the U.S. is still managing fragile Iran talks, renewed military action and the fallout from a war that has disrupted shipping, strained stockpiles and grown increasingly unpopular at home.

“There’s nothing particularly urgent about the tensions with Cuba,” Benjamin Gedan, a senior fellow and director of the Stimson Center’s Latin America Program, said in an interview with NOTUS.

The Trump administration has cast the island as a national security threat.

Cuba is “in a lot of trouble,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said at a Cabinet meeting Wednesday. “Having a failed state 90 miles from our shores is a threat to the national security of the United States.”

Gen. Francis L. Donovan, who leads Southern Command, met with Cuban officials on Friday “for a brief exchange on operational security matters,” according to the Pentagon.

The pressure campaign against Cuba has intensified in recent weeks. The USS Nimitz Carrier Strike Group has been operating in the Caribbean since May, while U.S. drones and surveillance aircraft have logged more than 150 hours of flights around Cuba since February. The administration has also tightened sanctions, targeted Cuba’s military-run business network and unsealed an indictment against former Cuban President Raúl Castro over the 1996 Brothers to the Rescue shootdown.

The Pentagon has reportedly positioned troops and weapons that would allow the U.S. to move quickly if Trump gives the final go-ahead. The current naval buildup gives the administration options ranging from precision strikes to an attempt to seize Cuban leadership, though a larger ground invasion would require more forces.

“Other presidents have looked at this for 50, 60 years, doing something,” Trump told reporters earlier this month. “And, it looks like I’ll be the one that does it. So, I would be happy to do it.”

A military strike on Cuba could become harder to defend while the administration is still dealing with Iran. The conflict is not over, even after U.S. and Iranian negotiators reached a tentative framework to extend the ceasefire and begin nuclear talks. The deal still needs final approval, and talks have been difficult in the weeks since the ceasefire began. At home, the war has also grown increasingly unpopular, according to recent polling.

Rep. Don Bacon, a Nebraska Republican and retired Air Force brigadier general, told NOTUS that the timing alone makes him wary of military action against Cuba.

“I would be worried about overextending, and I think it’s not the right time,” Bacon said. “Let’s focus on Iran, finish what we’re doing in Venezuela. I think it sends a bad message.”

Mark Cancian, a retired Marine colonel and defense analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said a Cuba operation would be harder to manage militarily while American forces are tied up in the Middle East.

An attack on Cuba could require mobilizing forces and accepting more risk in other theaters, especially the western Pacific, Cancian said. He also said some munitions used in the Iran conflict are already in short supply, meaning every missile used elsewhere leaves fewer available for a potential crisis with China.

The scale of the operation would also matter, Cancian said. A blockade would be relatively easy, and a bombing campaign would be more difficult but doable. A ground invasion would be different.

“A military operation would be difficult — not impossible by any means, but difficult, given the demands on U.S. forces in the Middle East,” he said.

LeoGrande said that Cuba could look like a quicker win for Trump as Iran becomes more politically difficult. The Cuban military is badly overmatched and still relies on Soviet-era equipment, he said, making the opening phase of a conflict appear deceptively easy.

Then the U.S. would face the harder question of what comes next. LeoGrande said there is no clear opposition force ready to govern, and a U.S. occupation could bring guerrilla resistance, major economic costs and a long effort to rebuild the country.

None of the experts said a strike was imminent and saw the current pressure as a tool to intimidate Havana and force concessions, though LeoGrande said military action remains “absolutely” on the table if Cuba refuses U.S. terms.

Cuba is under severe economic and energy pressure. Blackouts and fuel shortages were already straining basic services, and the cutoff of Venezuelan oil has deepened the crisis. Trump’s threats against countries sending fuel to the island have left Havana with fewer options, while Russia and China have not filled the gap.

If Trump decides to act, LeoGrande said, the administration could point to several possible rationales: the indictment of Raúl Castro, Cuba’s designation as a state sponsor of terrorism, or a humanitarian crisis if economic collapse leads to unrest. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has long pushed for political change in Cuba, has warned about Cuba’s ties to Russia and China, which could also be folded into the case.

Meanwhile, Trump’s January seizure of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro gave the administration a model for using force in the Caribbean at what it saw as low cost. Gedan said Trump appears to believe the U.S. can shape political outcomes in the region more easily than in other parts of the world.

“These kinds of interventions are giving the United States a rogue state profile,” Gedan said.