In a sense, it hard not to agree with you. The trajectory was set a good while ago. The destination did not change in any real way. From that perspective, you are right. It has been the case for 20 years and US did not attack Iran.

There is a difference though. For example, with Vietnam, the press was largely careful not ruffle administration's feathers. With Iraq, there was some mild questioning, but few of the established media questioned the narrative pushed by the administration. Now look at the response of the press to even a possibility of another full out war in ME ( at best divided along partisan lines ). That was one of the few times, I actually agreed with Tucker.

The change you are thinking of is that the war of Iran did not happen yet ( and it likely would have based on the publicly available information [1],[2]). If left to Washington alone, I am willing to bet good money, it would have happened already.

[1]https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/concerns-trump-administratio...

[2]https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/20989/pompeos-12-deman...