The U.S.-Israel war against Iran is barely more than a week old. Militarily, it couldn’t be going better — its success is a credit to our superb U.S. Armed Forces, with outstanding leadership, thorough planning, and precise execution.

As Americans, we can be rightly proud of our troops’ achievements. As with the U.S. hockey team’s Olympic gold medal victory just weeks ago, there’s a part of us that wants to cheer “USA! USA! USA!” — but on balance, there’s nothing very cheerful about warfighting.

War is hellish and unforgiving for those on the losing side, and painful for all involved. Every image of a destroyed Iranian building or sunken ship translates to further reduction of the threat facing our nation — a reason for relief, but not joy.

Political polling shows significant disagreement and general uneasiness with our country’s leadership in this new war. Critics express concern that something could go wrong (always the case) and uncertainty as to whether it will end quickly (impossible to predict); and from those on the Left, there is the standard unbridled fury about anything and everything related to President Donald Trump. Pollsters tell us that the public would prefer that the president devote his full attention to making life better (e.g., more affordable) for everyday Americans. (OK, got it — but how about preventing nuclear cataclysm? Isn’t that better for everyone?)

But I believe that a major factor in our collective uneasiness about the war is that we’re not used to being the aggressor. Americans have long viewed the primary role of our vast armed services as preventing an outbreak of war, not leading the charge against others. And the disproportionate outcome of the war so far seems to validate the assertion by critics that the Iran threat was not “imminent,” and that, therefore, the war is unjustified.

Much of the media coverage of the war to date has come across like an ESPN day-to-day update on Major League Baseball’s season — heavy on statistics, nice to see our home team ahead of the pack, a few TV clips of big plays, and not much of the gory detail. It’s easy to lose sight of the fact that behind every stat is real-life brutality, destruction, and death.

For me, the reality check came last Wednesday with the news that a U.S. fast attack nuclear submarine (as yet, not identified) had torpedoed the Iranian warship IRIS Dena, catching it by surprise at dawn in mid-ocean transit far from Iran, sending it to the bottom in minutes. Although the Iranian ship was a legitimate wartime target, this wasn’t a battle; it was more like a blue water execution, sinking it and killing all but 32 of its approximately 130 crew members.

In ESPN-like fashion, the media characterized that episode as not just another win for the good guys, but a particularly interesting factoid — the first sinking of an enemy ship by a U.S. submarine since World War II.

My own reaction was more personal. Decades ago, during our Cold War with the former Soviet Union, I served on a nuclear fast attack submarine. Dozens of times, in training and at sea exercises, we practiced and refined the techniques needed to attack another vessel, maneuvering stealthily to get into position for a successful shot, then simulating the torpedo launch — ready for the real thing if ever called upon, but not expecting that to happen.

And in our Cold War surveillance role, we sometimes operated in close proximity to Soviet surface ships and submarines, always at the risk of detection and inadvertent confrontation. But — naively, perhaps — we never expected our ship to be firing live torpedoes at other vessels. We prepared for that eventuality, but our Cold War job was to prevent it from ever happening.

Seamen respect other seamen, regardless of nationality. We share similar lives, similar discomforts, similar risks. Fortunately for me, at no point in my service did I have to confront the reality that a torpedo we fired had sent a crew not unlike our own to violent deaths. And so, I can only imagine the emotional burden now carried by those involved in last week’s sinking of the Dena.

That emotional burden is no different than that now being internalized by thousands of other armed forces personnel involved in planning and executing missile, drone, and bombing operations against Iran. Some, like aviators at the tip of the spear, are seeing firsthand the devastation that their professional expertise produces.

The warrior ethic we expect of our service members demands total commitment to the job at hand, but American citizens should be keenly aware of the toll, physical and mental, that it takes on those who serve on our behalf.

To put that in context, and setting aside all of the political implications, I believe that our nation’s role in initiating and leading this current phase of war with Iran carries with it some heavy responsibilities:

1.) We must be certain that war is justified. That’s clearly the case. There is no question about Iran’s hostile actions for decades, taking thousands of American, Israeli, and other lives, its sponsorship of worldwide terrorism; its relentless quest to acquire nuclear weapons (and obvious willingness to deploy them); and its rejection of all efforts for negotiated settlement. Rendering Iran incapable of pursuing its “death to America” commitment is a justifiable and inherently defensive action.

2.) We must set clear objectives and commit to ceasing hostilities when those objectives have been met. They are the elimination of Iran’s capability to manufacture nuclear weapons, elimination of their ballistic missile and major military capability, and to undermine or terminate the existing (at the war’s beginning) fanatic regime.

3.) We must prosecute the war by focusing our attacks on targets necessary to achieve the above objectives, with best efforts to avoid collateral civilian damage.

And for all who remain convinced that our president is concerned only with his own personal gain, you might take into account the enormous personal and reputational risk he took on in launching this unpopular war, and his simultaneously politically risky initiatives in our own hemisphere. If he were a conventional politician seeking a happy legacy, he would be staying home and kicking those cans down the road like his predecessors, while zeroing in on “affordability” and better poll numbers.

Success on both fronts would benefit our nation and the world for decades to come. Let’s root for that success.