When George W. Bush made the decision to launch Operation Iraqi Freedom to topple Saddam Hussein in 2003, his administration failed to answer the simple but crucial question of "what next?" As the Obama administration launches its campaign to protect the nuclear deal with Iran ratified within the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the White House cannot repeat the same fatal error of its predecessor.

Not only must the "what next" be addressed. The administration must have a follow-on strategy and plan for dealing with what will be a tectonic reordering of security in the region and beyond.

Separating emotion and irrationality from this broader issue in the U.S. may prove to be a political bridge too far. The white hot animosities between Republicans and Democrats and legitimate backlash in Congress for the decision to take the JCPOA first to the UN Security Council where it won a unanimous 15-0 approval have taken a certain toll. However, beyond analyzing the technical details of the agreement, three overarching challenges to the JCPOA must be assessed and melded into the "what next" steps and a broader strategy.

First, Iran may choose not to abide fully with the JCPOA. While this is less likely to be outright cheating, more ambiguous actions could arise that while producing no smoking gun in terms of evidence, raise substantial doubts about Iran's intentions.

Second, Iran's support for Shia causes in Iraq, Yemen, Syria, Lebanon and elsewhere could produce serious consequences, intended or otherwise, that could threaten the JCPOA. Further, regional as well as domestic Iranian opponents of the agreement could actively sabotage the JCPOA with actions to taunt or trap Tehran's leadership into responses that could be used to undermine the agreement further.

Third and most importantly, how the JCPOA will affect the immediate and longer-term geostrategic and political dynamics for the region and beyond are, charitably, quite unpredictable. Whether an arms race follows even though the Gulf states outspend Iran about 10-1 on defense; the Shia-Sunni schism widens; or greater stability ultimately emerges are outcomes that strategy must accommodate and consider. Two past examples are relevant.

As the Cold War began to harden after World War II, the West created a strategy based on containment and deterrence of the Soviet Union. When the Soviet Union imploded, in 1991, the policy of a Europe "whole, free and at peace" framed the strategy. The flaw was that the subsequent expansion of NATO deferred the question of how to deal with Russia, possibly contributing to the current difficulties with Vladimir Putin and Moscow's new found aggressiveness in Ukraine and Europe.

What then are the components a strategic framework for the region might include? The first is understanding that a strategic mindset for the 21st century is vital. I have argued for a brains based approach to strategic thinking that recognizes the interconnectivity and interaction between and among the many often competing, contradictory and shared interests of the engaged states and events that are occurring. That Iran views Israel as an enemy does not mitigate the shared interest along with the Sunni Arabs, Turks and the West of defeating the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

Unlike the Cold War with a bilateral rivalry, there is no zero-sum game at play today. Hence, diplomacy and reason based on shared interests must be central in realizing that compromise is essential. And unlike the Cold War, no equivalent security framework exists in the region.

Second, while NATO was the anchor of the West, the Gulf Cooperative Council is neither a military alliance nor an organization remotely approaching NATO's political cohesion. Yet, the GCC could be a building block for engaging Turkey, Egypt and Jordan more closely. Expanding, for example, the combined air operations center in Doha, Qatar where a number of regional states, along with the United States and other Western powers, have been conducting joint operations is a good model for enhancing the role of the GCC.

Third, a regional organization that includes the signatories to the JCPOA (Britain, China, France, Germany, Iran, Russia, the United States) along with representatives from the UN and European Union might be convened as a forum for discussion of the key security issues pertaining to regional stability; defeating IS; Sunni-Shia differences; and containing weapons proliferation.

None of this is easy. In the last year and a half of an administration, political capital is inevitably in short supply. But failure to address the "what next" question that still plagues Iraq today, along with not developing a viable strategy for the region will have profound consequences and not for the better.

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Harlan Ullman is UPI's Arnaud de Borchgrave Distinguished Columnist; Chairman of the Killowen Group that advises leaders of government and business; and Senior Advisor at both Washington D.C.'s Atlantic Council and Business Executives for National Security. His latest book is A Handful of Bullets: How the Murder of Archduke Franz Ferdinand Still Menaces the Peace.