Forecasts and Uncertainties: How Far Will Iran's War Lead?

In this fifth week of the Iran war, President Trump's statements are equivocal. So are those of Iranian leaders. Only the Israeli position is clear: priority to military and security imperatives.

Information from the theater of operations, and sociopolitical analyses in the three belligerent states, come mainly from the press. The sources cited are often biased, and highlight only a part of the facts that serve the theses of their authors.

It must be noted that the majority of the Western print media and audiovisual media insist more on the costs of the war than on its strategic outcome, which cannot be purely political or purely military, but must constitute a unique strategic synthesis. The military implements its own strategy to serve national objectives. Decision-makers do the same at the political level. An assessment of this campaign should take all of this into account.

Some analysts neglect that the course of the war depends closely on the military and economic resources of each belligerent. These constitute the major determinant of success or failure. Ideology, willingness to fight, motivation and internal solidarity of each side come next.

The American citizen believes that the ongoing military conflict weighs on his wallet. Some American companies complain about losses. Others, on the contrary, are making or will make profits. It is certain that after the war, the American economy, which is increasingly focused on the American continent and on a resumption of trade with China, will recover easily, as Trump bets.

It should be noted, in this context, that the upcoming meeting between Trump and Xi Jinping, postponed for a few months, would be followed by the signing of huge contracts. Beijing could notably buy 600 Boeing planes from Washington for an amount of 140 billion dollars, soybeans for 20 billion, not to mention American oil and gas, and the lifting of restrictions on Beijing's purchase of electronic chips from the American company Nvidia. In return, the United States could import 'Rare Earths' from China, essential for the manufacture of computer hardware and AI, on which Xi Jinping has imposed severe restrictions, not forgetting low-cost Chinese products intended for American consumers.

Militarily, Washington carefully avoids and will avoid any entanglement or war of attrition, mentioned notably by Trump's opponents, like the wars in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan, where the United States had tried, without success, to change regimes.

American human and military equipment losses are so far relatively minimal, and military and economic resources are far from exhausted. The Pentagon had also set itself four to six weeks to achieve its objectives, and this deadline is still within the initially announced limits.

Iran, for its part, is in a disastrous socioeconomic situation. This worsened in 2025 when Washington increased the sanctions imposed on the Islamic Republic, which further strangles the Iranian economy and considerably reduced the flow of dollars from Iraqi banks. This situation risks deteriorating further after the conflict.

Furthermore, the evident hegemony of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) over the mullahs and key figures of the regime exacerbates the discontent of the Artesh (the Iranian regular army), so far spared from Israeli-American bombings, of reformers like President Masoud Pezeshkian, and of Kurdish, Baluch, Arab and Azeri minorities, who are only asking to act militarily.

These dissensions would lead to a radicalization of the IRGC inside the country. Iran would need at least two decades to recover.

In short, the failure of the IRGC's regional strategy over the last two decades is evident: it has cost hundreds of billions of dollars for nothing. Iran is in ruins.

Before the outbreak of the conflict, the Islamic Republic possessed the largest and most diversified missile and drone arsenal in the Middle East, characterized by a shift towards solid-fuel ballistic missiles, therefore rapidly deployable and highly accurate, and massive stocks of long-range loitering munitions.

According to estimates, Iran had a stock of approximately 2000 to 3000 long-range (2000 km) and short-range (300 km) ballistic missiles, including hypersonic Fattah, capable of reaching speeds exceeding Mach 10, and long-range Khorramshahr with a payload of over one ton, capable of multiple warheads and which have demonstrated their effectiveness. It also had approximately 480 mobile missile launchers. Iran has also mass-produced tens of thousands of suicide drones, especially the famous Shahed-136, with an operational range of 1500 to 2500 kilometers.

It had equipped this arsenal with Chinese precision capabilities, allowing it to strike American radar antennas, which enabled the destruction of about seven sophisticated American radars and opened a breach in anti-missile defenses. Finally, Iran has massively invested in underground production and storage facilities to secure its arsenal, making its total destruction from the air more difficult. The IRGC's strategy aimed at a target saturation capability, in order to overwhelm defense systems, which was very partially successful given that the success rate on target demonstrated a success of 5 to 10%. These capabilities have been reduced by two-thirds after a month of conflict, according to Americans and Israelis. They continue to decrease.

The Pentagon is preparing in the coming days for a prolonged ground campaign, with the deployment of thousands of additional American soldiers, as reported by the Washington Post and CBS. American elite units are preparing, including Navy SEALs, Rangers, Marines, and the 83rd Airborne Division, and are providing Washington with flexible options for eventual operations inside Iran, aimed at annihilating what remains of Iranian missiles and drones, and also the nuclear program.

The Tehran Times warned that the American plan would begin with targeted assassinations of high-ranking officials, as at the start of the military conflict, followed by strikes against strategic infrastructure.

The ground phase would subsequently involve thousands of local fighters, Iranian and non-Iranian, coming from the northwest, probably Kurds, supported by 5000 American soldiers distributed between Bahrain and the maritime axes, with the deployment of the 3rd aircraft carrier. Still according to the same source, marines and paratroopers would storm airports in the port city of Bandar Abbas and other cities, to facilitate airlifts, while airborne teams will strike sites related to missiles and the nuclear program. These assertions by the Tehran Times mean that Iran is preparing to oppose this plan.

Meanwhile, American and Israeli strikes continue thanks to air superiority, and continue to degrade the Iranian arsenal.

In view of all this, the observation is as follows: the Iranians, despite their military setbacks and considerable losses, demonstrate no flexibility or willingness for strategic concessions. American victory would therefore be limited to the military plane, while neutralizing, in the long term, Iran's capacity for harm.

In return, and despite Trump's assertions, the IRGC continues to hold out, which makes a breakthrough in negotiations highly unlikely. Conclusions therefore remain premature pending the implementation or non-implementation of the American ground option.