exactly - and this is what good agile attempts to address - implement (importantly) user-facing function in exactly the smallest size possible (also important)

exactly - and this is what good agile attempts to address - implement (importantly) user-facing function in exactly the smallest size possible (also important) with those two things you can build, identify issues / questions / problems in the fastest feedback loop as possible indeed, i would argue 'big iterations' are the ones where all the problems which the author mentions crop up in the first place!