There is now a terrific way to keep the US out of the picture - making war on America's infrastructure. The force of the attack can be dialed in for effect. A subroutine is added to the operating system of the switch. All it does is watch a selected set of phones for evidence that the Delta force is being mustered. When the traffic analysis detects the right pattern of phone calls, the bad guys are notified.
LA suffers the equivalent of a myocardial infarct.
Panic ensues, and the US is utterly preoccupied with getting Los Angeles back on its feet. In the meantime, an aggressive gulf state takes control of a critical port near the straits of Hormuz. The US simply doesn't have the bandwidth to deal with it. Several special operations people, several hackers for several months. Unlike conventional 20th century techniques of making war, a state of the art attempt to attenuate the US ability to respond to challenges need not require the politically incorrect destruction of human beings, buildings and weapons.