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Smart Bombs: Military, Defense and National Security
A War Against Iran Could Open Up a Pandora’s Box That Won’t Be Easy To Close
By Andrew Latham
Published1 day ago ( February 17, 2026)
Google News
B-2B-2. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
War on Iran Would Solve the Wrong Problem: Summary and Key Points
-A major U.S. strike campaign could severely damage Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, missile networks, and IRGC command nodes.
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A U.S. Air Force pilots assigned to the 393rd Bomb Squadron prepare a B-2 Spirit aircraft for hot-pit refueling at Pease Air National Guard Base, New Hampshire, Sept. 20, 2025. The aircraft is the first operated by the 509th Bomb Wing to land at Pease ANGB, formerly Pease Air Force Base, since the 509 BW, formerly 509th Bombardment Wing, was stationed at Pease AFB and the active-duty base closed nearly 35 years ago. The lineage of the 509th BW traces back to the World War II Era when the 509th Composite Group dropped the atomic bombs on Japan. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Joshua Hastings)
A U.S. Air Force pilots assigned to the 393rd Bomb Squadron prepare a B-2 Spirit aircraft for hot-pit refueling at Pease Air National Guard Base, New Hampshire, Sept. 20, 2025. The aircraft is the first operated by the 509th Bomb Wing to land at Pease ANGB, formerly Pease Air Force Base, since the 509 BW, formerly 509th Bombardment Wing, was stationed at Pease AFB and the active-duty base closed nearly 35 years ago. The lineage of the 509th BW traces back to the World War II Era when the 509th Composite Group dropped the atomic bombs on Japan. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Joshua Hastings)
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-The deeper issue is what comes after. Physical destruction would likely buy time, not resolution, while strengthening Tehran’s incentive to sprint toward an overt nuclear deterrent.
-Retaliation would surge through Iran’s proxy ecosystem, widening the battlespace and forcing sustained U.S. presence across air defense, maritime security, and regional reassurance.
-Energy shocks from Hormuz risks would ripple globally. The net effect: a militarily feasible operation that drains strategic bandwidth and tightens force-allocation pressure in higher-priority theaters.
A War on Iran Would Solve the Wrong Problem for America
The dispatch of the USS Gerald R. Ford carrier strike group to the Middle East is an unmistakable sign that U.S. carrier-based signalling to Tehran is giving way to real carrier-based strike preparation. Debate over a potential U.S. or Israeli bombing campaign has intensified in parallel as Tehran’s nuclear breakout potential remains acute and regional proxy activity continues to widen.
Much of that debate centers on feasibility — whether American airpower could significantly degrade Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, disrupt missile production and storage networks, and fracture IRGC command coordination long enough to alter regional deterrence dynamics. On those questions, the answer is almost certainly yes. The United States retains the capacity to impose severe physical damage on Iranian military and nuclear assets within a compressed operational window.
But military feasibility and strategic alignment are not the same thing. Even a highly successful bombing campaign, one that addressed the most visible manifestations of the Iran problem, would ultimately deepen the structural pressures already weighing on U.S. grand strategy.
Tactical Success Is Not in Doubt
A large-scale strike campaign would not resemble the episodic shadow-war exchanges that defined much of the U.S.–Iran confrontation over the past decade. Nor would it mirror the scale or duration of the 2025 12-Day War.
It would move immediately toward sustained degradation — nuclear infrastructure, missile forces, regime security networks — executed through repeated strike cycles rather than mere symbolic demonstration attacks.
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A modified B-52H Stratofortress departs Edwards Air Force Base for an evening training mission on June 25, 2025. The aircraft is assigned to the 419th Flight Test Squadron, Global Power Bombers Combined Test Force, tasked with supporting developmental testing across the B-52, B-1, and B-2 bomber portfolio. Along with most 412th Test Wing aircraft, B-52H bombers at Edwards include special instrumentation to conduct a variety of testing activities. (Air Force photo by Chase Kohler)
A modified B-52H Stratofortress departs Edwards Air Force Base for an evening training mission on June 25, 2025. The aircraft is assigned to the 419th Flight Test Squadron, Global Power Bombers Combined Test Force, tasked with supporting developmental testing across the B-52, B-1, and B-2 bomber portfolio. Along with most 412th Test Wing aircraft, B-52H bombers at Edwards include special instrumentation to conduct a variety of testing activities. (Air Force photo by Chase Kohler)
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The operational effects would be significant. Enrichment capacity could be pushed backward on the timeline. Missile regeneration would require time and industrial recovery. Personnel losses inside the IRGC would disrupt planning tempo and weaken coordination across partner organizations. In narrow military terms, the United States could inflict significant setbacks on Iran’s coercive reach.
Those gains, however, would be fleeting. Industrial recovery begins quickly in systems built with redundancy in mind. Nuclear knowledge survives bunker penetration. Facilities can be reconstituted deeper underground, dispersed across new sites, or hardened further. A strike campaign purchases time. It does not resolve the underlying challenge.
The Nuclear Acceleration Risk
The more consequential question is how Tehran would internalize such an attack. Modern regime survival lessons are not lost on Iranian planners. Iraq disarmed and fell. Libya abandoned its nuclear program and collapsed under external intervention.
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B-2 Spirit
A B-2 Spirit prepares to take-off from Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. during Bamboo Eagle, Jan. 29, 2024. Bamboo Eagle provides Airmen, allies, and partners with a multidimensional, combat-representative battle-space to conduct advanced training in support of U.S. national interests. (U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Bryson Britt)
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A bombing campaign might therefore delay Iran’s technical progress while intensifying its political resolve. What had been calibrated nuclear latency could shift toward open weaponization. Survival logic would harden under direct assault. The pursuit of a deliverable deterrent would gain urgency rather than diminish.
In that sense, physical destruction and strategic radicalization could unfold simultaneously. Delay in infrastructure might coexist with acceleration in intent.
Proxy Retaliation and Regional Expansion
Strikes on Iranian territory would not remain geographically bounded. Tehran’s deterrent architecture is deliberately externalized across aligned militias and partner organizations. Retaliatory pressure would emerge quickly through those channels, not sequentially.
U.S. facilities throughout the region would be at risk of renewed attack. Hezbollah would activate whatever assets it had left and escalate along Israel’s northern border. The Houthis might resume their disruptions at sea if the war expands. The battlespace would extend well beyond Iranian territory rather than remain confined to it.
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F-22
U.S. Air Force Maj. Paul ‘Loco’ Lopez, F-22 Demo Team commander/pilot, performs an aerial demonstration during the MCAS Beaufort air show, April 27, 2019. Maj. Lopez has over 1,500 hours flying both the F-15 and the F-22 and is in his second year as the commander of the F-22 Raptor Demonstration Team. (U.S. Air Force photo by 2nd Lt. Samuel Eckholm)
A U.S. Air Force F-22 Raptor pilot from the 95th Fighter Squadron, Tyndall Air Force Base, Fla., flies over the Baltic Sea Sept. 4, 2015. The U.S. Air Force has deployed four F-22 Raptors, one C-17 Globemaster III, approximately 60 Airmen and associated equipment to Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany. While these aircraft and Airmen are in Europe, they will conduct air training with other Europe-based aircraft. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Jason Robertson/Released)
A U.S. Air Force F-22 Raptor pilot from the 95th Fighter Squadron, Tyndall Air Force Base, Fla., flies over the Baltic Sea Sept. 4, 2015. The U.S. Air Force has deployed four F-22 Raptors, one C-17 Globemaster III, approximately 60 Airmen and associated equipment to Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany. While these aircraft and Airmen are in Europe, they will conduct air training with other Europe-based aircraft. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Jason Robertson/Released)
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Managing that escalation would require a sustained American presence. Naval patrol zones would expand. Air defense assets would require reinforcement. Intelligence coverage would thicken across multiple theaters. A strike campaign would evolve into an enduring regional security management burden.
Energy Market Shockwaves
Iran’s geography ensures that conflict reverberates beyond military channels. Even limited disruption to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz would likely produce price volatility. More serious interference would transmit economic shock outward at speed.
Energy dislocation does not remain regional. It moves through inflation, allied fiscal strain, and the redistribution of revenue flows. Russia would benefit from sustained price elevation. Other hydrocarbon producers would capture windfall gains.
The economic externalities of war would shift balance sheets in ways misaligned with U.S. competitive positioning.
Military action would carry geoeconomic consequences independent of battlefield outcomes.
Strategic Bandwidth and Force Allocation
The most enduring effects would appear at the level of global posture. A major conflict with Iran would require sustained allocation of high-end U.S. assets. Carrier groups, bombers, ISR platforms, and missile defense architecture would be drawn into the theater over time.
Those deployments are not costless. Assets concentrated in the Gulf are unavailable elsewhere. Indo-Pacific balancing requirements would feel compression. European reassurance rotations could tighten. Readiness cycles would absorb operational strain.
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Iran Navy Kilo-Class
Iran’s Navy Has Kilo-Class Submarines. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
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Strategic competition does not pause for regional wars. China’s military trajectory would continue uninterrupted. Russian opportunism would remain opportunistic. A war with Iran would consume bandwidth for force allocation needed in higher-priority theaters.
The Overstretch Mechanism
This is the structural paradox at the heart of the bombing debate. A strike campaign might weaken Iran’s immediate capacity to threaten regional partners. Yet the act of waging that campaign would expand the perimeter that the United States must defend.
Retaliation risks would require a prolonged presence. Maritime security commitments would deepen. Partner reassurance demands would grow heavier. Each layer would add weight to an already extended strategic architecture.
Overstretch emerges when commitments accumulate faster than force structure can absorb. A new major theater of conflict would intensify that imbalance rather than relieve it.
Tactical Victory, Strategic Ambiguity
None of this negates battlefield effectiveness. On operational metrics, the campaign could register as a clear success.
But success measured in terms of physical damage obscures broader strategic effects. Iran would remain adversarial. Nuclear incentives might intensify. Proxy warfare would broaden. U.S. posture requirements would thicken rather than contract.
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Iran
Iranian Ballistic Missile. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
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The United States would exit the conflict not into strategic relief, but into a more combustible regional system layered atop an already demanding global competition environment.
Solving the Immediate, Compounding the Enduring
The central question is not whether the United States can execute an effective bombing campaign. It can. The question is whether doing so resolves the dominant strategic pressures shaping American power in this period.
Here, the alignment frays. A war with Iran would address urgent operational concerns tied to nuclear latency and proxy coercion. At the same time, it would deepen the strain on force allocation, widen the demands on escalation management, and divert attention from pacing threats in other theaters.
In strategic terms, it would solve the most immediate problem while aggravating the most consequential one.
About the Author: Dr. Andrew Latham
Andrew Latham is a non-resident fellow at Defense Priorities and a professor of international relations and political theory at Macalester College in Saint Paul, MN. You can follow him on X: @aakatham.
In this article:B-2, B-2 Bomber, Bombers, Defense, Energy, featured, Iran, Middle East, Military, Oil, Stealth
Written By
Andrew Latham
A 19FortyFive daily columnist, Andrew Latham is a professor of International Relations at Macalester College specializing in the politics of international conflict and security. He teaches courses on international security, Chinese foreign policy, war and peace in the Middle East, Regional Security in the Indo-Pacific Region, and the World Wars.
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