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At a broad level, it’s important to acknowledge a hard truth: this war is a textbook case of the old saying - "Strategy must precede action"
The underlying assumption in the US and Israel was that weakening Iran kineticly would eventually lead to the collapse of the regime and that a sustained U.S.-Israeli campaign, targeting Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, could trigger systemic change thay will change the Middle East.
But this war overlooked a critical variable: the Islamic Republic of Iran is a different kind of actor. Traditional cost-benefit calculations don’t apply in the conventional sense.
Moreover, the war has generated second-order effects that have made the strategic landscape more complex — not less. From Iran’s growing assertiveness around the Strait of Hormuz, to the hardening of its internal decision-making processes, to the rising influence of Mojtaba Khamenei and the expanding dominance of the IRGC, the Iranian system has, in many ways, become more rigid and more ideological.
These dynamics are pushing the administration into a narrowing set of options, none of them good. The choice increasingly looks like this: accept a deal that is, in essence, a strengthened version of the previous nuclear agreement, or return to military escalation that carries significant regional risks without guaranteeing meaningful change in Iran’s behavior.
In effect, this war has helped shape what could be called “Islamic Republic 3.0” — a system forged not only through pressure, but also through strategic miscalculation. While the regime may have been weakened militarily and economically, it has, paradoxically, been strengthened internally, particularly among its core base.
This may well be the campaign’s most significant strategic miscalculation.
The protests inside Iran had left the regime increasingly exposed, struggling to respond to public demands, led by an aging and ailing supreme leader. There was a moment of internal vulnerability.
Yet the campaign, despite its tactical achievements, has given the regime a renewed sense of purpose at a time when it was fighting for its political future. Instead of weakening it from within, it has helped consolidate its base and rally its supporters.
It remains unclear how this will end. But at this stage, one conclusion is difficult to avoid: alongside tactical gains, the war has produced a more challenging strategic environment for Iran’s neighbors, for Israel, and for the United States.
And most importantly, Iran’s leadership has no intention of capitulating. Neither pressure nor escalation is likely to force a deeply ideological regime to abandon its foundational principles.
There is no decisive blow. No silver bullet.
Only two realistic paths remain:
a deal that looks remarkably similar to what Iran was willing to consider before the war — or an expanded conflict with no clear endgame.
This is the reality.
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With negotiations between U.S. and Iranian officials set to take place in Pakistan, former senior Biden administration advisor Amos Hochstein says misunderstandings among negotiators put the U.S. “in a worse position.” “My concern is no matter how the war ends – the Iranians now have a card they never had before in practice,” he adds. “In theory, we knew they can close the straits, but they never did, and now, for the foreseeable future, they have this card against us and against their neighbors.”
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