What Is Iran’s Strategy?

To survive? Or win?

It seems clear to me that the response is the product of a detailed study of both their potential/actual enemies, neighbouring countries, and their powerful friends. The response is not a knee jerk reaction, but a sophisticated and ambitious strategy

This is a short, quickly written piece, to fill an unsurprising void in legacy media reporting in Australia, on what is Iran’s strategy.

Events are of course extremely fluid at this early stage of the war, and obtaining reliable information through the fog of war, induced by both the nature and tempo of events as well as mis and disinformation is not an easy task.

Still, I think there is enough evidence available to form an initial conclusion on what Iran’s strategy is. Rather important given everything that is at stake.

Background

The strikes by Israel, and the United States, which commenced on 28 February 2026, are the continuation of a conflict which has been simmering at varying degrees of intensity for many years. Rather than getting bogged down in determining exactly when this war started, for simplicity we can use the Israeli attacks commencing on 13 June 2025 as a start point. This phase of the conflict ended on 24 June 2025 by a ceasefire arrangement.

This is a useful marker as it denotes a qualitative difference in the nature of the conflict. Despite open hostilities ending, it is clear that both the United States and Israel had not given up on attempts to collapse the Iranian regime (a term I use not in the pejorative sense, but rather to highlight that it is the Islamic Republic that is the target).

The key indicator of this is the economic warfare, or economic ‘statecraft’ in US Treasury Secretary’s words, that was used to create the conditions under which protests would break out.

Actions such as this do not happen in isolation. They are part of a strategy. And that strategy aimed to collapse the Iranian regime via first creating legitimate protests based on economic hardship, and then turning that into violence and rioting which was, it was hoped, result in the collapse of the regime.

Regime Change and Media Coverage - Cameron Leckie

Ultimately that objective failed. The Iranian authorities rapidly brought both the protests and associated violence under control through closing down access to Starlink – the key communications tool used by the rioters.

Yet failure rarely gets in the way of US or Israeli ambitions. Just as the dirty war in Syria took 13 years until the Assad Government was overthrown, attempts to collapse the Iranian Government continue, as the latest attack demonstrates.

Iran - the coiled spring

Rarely do we hear an explicit description of the position that Iran is in. Yet this is critical to understand both its reaction to the initial attack, and its ongoing actions.

By way of analogy, Iran is like a spring that has been compressed, until it can be compressed no more. It has been pressured, predominantly by the West, for years. Onerous sanctions creating enormous economic hardship, diplomatic pressure, military attacks (e.g. the assassination of Qasem Soleimani by Trump, or Israel attacking Iranian diplomatic facilities in Syria), the withdrawal from the JCPOA (by Trump) and perfidy (the conduct of military attacks whilst negotiations were underway – at least twice).

There are striking similarities between Iran’s position now, and Russia’s in 2022.

Iran has been cornered. Placed in a position where it must fight. Or capitulate. It has nowhere left to manoeuvre, knowing that any short-term deal or ceasefire will only be used by its enemies to prepare for the next attack.

Noting that it had nowhere left to retreat to, the leadership of Iran was quite explicit to the world, stating repeatedly that any attack on Iran, no matter how small, would be responded with the full weight of its not inconsiderable force.

“If any aggression is committed against Iran, our response will be stronger than the 12-day war and we will turn the region into hell for the enemy”

Iran will turn region into ‘hell’ if attacked, Guards commander warns | Iran International

True to their word, it would appear that this is exactly what is underway.

Preparation

This war clearly has had a long gestation. Over decades. Both the United States and Israel have long sought to collapse the Iranian regime. This is no secret.

Knowing that this is coming, Iran too has been preparing for this moment for decades.

https://x.com/Megatron_ron/status/2026812401874501774?s=20

This preparation has had physical manifestations, such as the development of an extremely large and evidently powerful suite of drones and missiles, capable of reaching targets across West Asia, including many US military bases and Israel. Other aspects are the large fleet of patrol boats – fast, semi-submersible, heavily armed and ultimately expendable. Iran’s defensive philosophy is clearly to create asymmetric threats for its enemies.

https://www.thedefensenews.com/news-details/Irans-Zolfaghar-Ghost-Boats-Emerge-as-Persistent-Challenge-for-US-Navy-in-Strait-of-Hormuz/

This is known

But what is less known, because until now, it has not really been visible, is what Iran’s strategy in response to an attack would be.

It seems clear to me that the response is the product of a detailed study of both their potential/actual enemies, neighbouring countries, and their powerful friends. The response is not a knee jerk reaction, but a sophisticated and ambitious strategy.

The have identified the Centre of Gravity of their enemies and are ruthlessly targeting their critical vulnerabilities.

To survive? Or to win?

A military maxim is that the best form of defence is offence.

I would argue that the Iranian Government is not seeking to just survive. But to win.

For to merely survive means that its enemies will attack again at some point in the future.

But to win would create long(er) lasting security.

Therefore, based on who and what Iran has targeted, it appears that one of the objectives, perhaps the prime objective of the Iranian’s, is to evict the United States from West Asia.

An ambitious objective to be sure. But an objective that if successful would remove by a long distance, the threat that the dozens of US military bases currently surrounding Iran pose. It would also greatly weaken Israel’s ability to attack Iran.

To achieve this objective requires the attainment of several subordinate objectives

· The first is to outlast its enemies. This is essentially a war of attrition. Iran as an extremely large country, with a large population, is geographically suited to this in comparison to Israel (small population and land area relative to Iran) and US bases throughout the Middle East. Further it appears to have developed a stockpile of missiles and drones which greatly outweighs the capacity of its enemies to intercept. This was demonstrated in the 12-day war of June 2025 when nearly a quarter of the US’ THAAD interceptors were fired yet were unable to stop the penetration by Iranian ballistic and other missiles.

· Second is to degrade and where possible destroy the key mission capabilities required for force projection by the United States in West Asia. We have seen this from day one with the destruction of a radar site, and subsequent attacks on US bases and logistics infrastructure. No doubt these attacks will continue for as long as the conflict does, continuing to degrade capabilities for command and control as well as logistics whilst creating an extraordinarily expensive repair bill.

· Third is to demonstrate to the members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) that the United States cannot protect them. Arguably, this has already been, at least partially achieved. This also has the effect of wedging the governments of the GCC States, whose populations, as demonstrated by the cheering of strikes on US military facilities in Bahrain by the populace as an example, are less happy with the vassal status of their leadership than the political class is.

https://x.com/muntazireimam84/status/2028367475415675380?s=20

· Finally, at least for this analysis, is to make the conflict last long enough, and create enough economic harm that both the key protagonists (the US and Israel) and their supporters (the UK, Europe, Australia and New Zealand) sue for peace. The key to this is shutting down or severely restricting oil exports (with the exception of Russia and China as recently announced by Iran) through the Strait of Hormuz. This already appears to have been achieved not so much through military action but rather under the direction of the insurance companies.

This last component will likely take some weeks, perhaps months, to generate enough pain that Iran’s enemies will come to the negotiating table to achieve terms such as lifting of sanctions. That pain is likely to involve not only oil price spikes, but extreme instability in global financial markets – possibly another of Iran’s objectives, that are likely to have long lasting financial, social and political impacts for many countries around the world.

Will it work?

That question is of course unanswerable.

The strategy which I have proposed appears sound from Iran’s perspective. Iran appears to have the motivation and capacity to achieve it.

But of course, that is no guarantee of success. There are numerous factors which could bring it unstuck.

How much hardship is the population willing and capable of enduring? How big is the missile stockpile? How much damage can the US and Israel cause to the key enablers of the strategy. Can other countries, enemies or neighbours outlast Iran? Will a desperate Trump, or Netanyahu decide to nuke Iran (after which all bets are off…).

Over ensuing weeks, perhaps months, we will find out.

For Australia, listening to the comments of our leaders, it appears they are completely oblivious to the true nature of what is unfolding. Instead of carefully analysing the situation and identifying the entirely foreseeable, and perhaps catastrophic, issues ahead, we are fed with meaningless platitudes such as supporting the ‘brave Iranian people.’

Buckle up folks. I suspect this will be a rough ride.