Poor strategy doomed US in the war with Iran

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Daniel L. Davis, a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel and combat veteran, is a Senior Fellow at Defense Priorities and host of the “Daniel Davis Deep Dive” on YouTube.

On paper, the balance of power between the United States and Iran was never a contest. When President Donald Trump chose to initiate a full-scale war, Washington possessed unmatched airpower, precision-guided munitions, and an economic apparatus capable of squeezing opponents to the brink.

But war is not fought on paper. It is fought in physical space, defined by geography, industrial capacity, and the stark laws of military attrition.

Five months into this conflict, a sober analysis reveals a truth that Washington’s foreign policy establishment refuses to stomach: America’s war against Iran has already been lost at the strategic level.

Nothing we do from this point forward can reverse that outcome. All we can do now is limit the damage — or refuse to acknowledge reality and make the cost of failure worse.

The roots of our strategic failure lie in a fundamental miscalculation of Iranian leverage. For decades, Western analysts worried that Tehran might close the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow chokepoint through which a fifth of the world’s petroleum flows. Yet Iran exercised self-restraint because its leadership calculated that initiating such a crisis would impose unacceptable diplomatic and economic costs on Iran.

By choosing war, Washington shattered that self-restraint. Facing a combined U.S.-Israeli military apparatus with vast military superiority, Iran reached for its primary asymmetric lever. It seized control of the strait, willing to endure the fallout because it was now in a fight for its literal survival.

Tehran did not make this move unprepared. For over two decades, anticipating an eventual clash with the United States, Iran quietly built massive underground networks — dubbed “missile cities” — hewn deep into granite mountains. These facilities were engineered to house, launch and continuously manufacture long-range drones and ballistic missiles safe from even the most formidable American ordnance.

I have stood inside a similar hardened facility deep under a mountain right here in America, built to withstand a direct nuclear strike. I can assure you from firsthand military experience: no conventional bombing campaign — no matter how intense or prolonged — will ever destroy all of Iran’s subterranean missile complexes.

We have now spent months proving Iran’s defense planners right. First, we conducted nearly 40 days of high-intensity bombardment, failing to force Tehran’s submission while barely scratching its granite-shielded missile infrastructure. Next, we tried a two-month naval blockade to starve out the regime, which yielded no capitulation. We then signed a Memorandum of Understanding, which quickly dissolved amid mutual recriminations. Most recently, we launched 13 consecutive days of targeted strikes. Tehran did not budge under any of it.

A familiar chorus of retired generals and admirals is now demanding another escalation to “finish the job.” Their recommendations amount to trying the exact same playbook — attacking the same hardened targets with the same munitions — only bigger and harder. It is the definition of strategic insanity: expecting a different result from the same failed tactics.

Continuing down this path will not produce a military victory. What it will do is consume our finite military strength. Every day this war continues, our naval vessels are pushed to operational limits, our aircrews burn out under relentless tasking, and our inventories of critical offensive missiles and defensive interceptors drain away.

By refusing to acknowledge painful military and geographical realities, we risk catastrophically weakening our global force structure. Taken far enough, the erosion of our missile stockpiles and naval readiness will leave us unable to meet security commitments elsewhere, forcing an involuntary retreat from theaters beyond the Middle East.

There is no military solution to this crisis. If the Iranian leadership remains steadfast, continuing to pursue the unattainable goal of forcing Iran to submit and reopen the strait will deepen our self-inflicted losses.

A prudent path forward is to end this war now on the best terms available. Better yet, Washington should declare an immediate withdrawal of forces from the region, lift the naval blockade, and establish a firm offshore or long-range deterrence posture, serving as a clear warning that the U.S. will continue to monitor Iran’s nuclear program while our troops and assets are safely beyond Iran’s limited reach.

This is an unhappy compromise that many in Washington will revile. But the harshest truth of all is that our loss was baked in the day we launched this war and pushed Iran into taking the strait. All the rhetoric in the world cannot alter the physical fundamentals of conflict. We can either acknowledge reality now or suffer a far more devastating military loss later.