With Operation Midnight Hammer, the USA has efficiently degraded Iran’s nuclear program. Whereas Iranian officers are threatening retaliation, Tehran lacks any significant choices for an efficient counterattack.
Yesterday’s coordinated U.S. assault marked essentially the most important direct American army motion against Iran in fashionable historical past. The operation concerned seven B-2 Spirit stealth bombers flying an 18-hour round-trip mission from Missouri, supported by over 125 complete plane in what Pentagon officers described as the biggest B-2 operational strike ever performed. The targets—Iran’s nuclear services at Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan—have been hit with 14 Large Ordnance Penetrator “bunker-buster” bombs and dozens of Tomahawk cruise missiles.
President Trump introduced that Iran’s “key nuclear enrichment services have been utterly and completely obliterated,” an announcement corroborated by Pentagon assessments reporting “extraordinarily extreme harm and destruction” in any respect three websites. The operation was extremely labeled, with solely a handful of individuals in Washington conscious of its timing or nature. It achieved full tactical shock, no photographs have been fired at U.S. forces.
Notably, the strike got here simply days after President Trump had publicly said that he would take two weeks to determine whether or not or to not launch an assault. Tehran, acquainted with the sample of earlier U.S. administrations, assumed American threats have been hole and that Washington would by no means go so far as conducting a direct army strike.
For a lot of in the USA, nonetheless, this assault was seen as long-overdue retaliation for 1979, when Iran’s Islamic revolutionaries stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, taking 52 People hostage and holding them for 444 days. That disaster marked an amazing humiliation for the U.S., and the 45 years that adopted, absent of any direct retaliation, emboldened Iran to imagine it may assault U.S. pursuits or thwart American coverage with out consequence.
Iran’s response has been predictably dramatic however strategically hole. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) threatened strikes on U.S. forces within the Center East, claiming that “the quantity, dispersion, and dimension of U.S. army bases within the area should not a power, however have doubled their vulnerability.” Iran’s Parliament additionally voted to approve closure of the Strait of Hormuz, although the ultimate choice rests with the Supreme Nationwide Safety Council.
These threats replicate desperation greater than functionality. Whereas Iran possesses short-range missiles that may attain some regional U.S. bases, protection analysts agree that its capability to maintain army motion is proscribed. Its choices are described as minor “potshots,” not critical strategic retaliation. Israeli strikes in recent times have degraded Iran’s ballistic missile infrastructure and decapitated parts of its army command. Iran lacks the capability for large-scale, sustained assaults on U.S. belongings.
U.S. airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear services have raised fears of world power disruptions, significantly by the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint for roughly 20% of world oil and fuel flows. Whereas Iran has the potential to mine the strait, seize vessels, or stage harassment assaults, previous incidents—together with the Eighties Tanker Battle and newer ship seizures—have proven that such disruptions are sometimes transient and met with swift U.S. naval response. The U.S. Fifth Fleet, primarily based in Bahrain, stays a strong deterrent.
Furthermore, there are sensible constraints on Iran’s risk to shut the strait. A lot of the waterway lies in Omani territorial waters, and the strait is just too huge for Iran to shut solely. Even a partial blockade would provoke devastating retaliation and alienate nations that at the moment oppose broader sanctions on Iran. Most critically, such a transfer would lower off Iran’s personal financial lifeline.
That lifeline is already fragile. Roughly 90% of Iran’s oil exports go to China through closely sanctioned “shadow fleet” tankers and small “teapot” refineries. These transactions are performed in yuan, bypassing the Western monetary system. Since this oil commerce already operates exterior formal world markets, threats to disrupt world oil flows lack credibility. Iran can not lower off provides it’s not broadly promoting. New U.S. Treasury sanctions on Chinese language companies concerned on this commerce additionally present Washington’s capability to additional choke Tehran’s restricted income streams.
Lastly, Iran stands alone strategically. Neither Russia nor China has supplied significant army help. Russia’s deputy safety council chair issued verbal condemnation of the strikes, and China has supplied solely generic diplomatic statements. Neither energy seems prepared to escalate on Iran’s behalf. With out worldwide backing, Iran is remoted and strategically boxed in.
The response within the U.S. has been largely supportive. Whereas some anti-interventionist conservatives voiced considerations, mainstream Republican leaders shortly rallied behind the strike. Speaker Mike Johnson praised Trump’s “power, precision, and readability,” Senator Lindsey Graham known as it “the precise name,” and Senate Armed Companies Chairman Roger Wicker stated Trump made a “deliberate—and proper—choice.” Even anti-interventionists like Steve Bannon recommended they may in the end help the transfer. This unity undercuts any Iranian hope that home political divisions would possibly restrain additional U.S. motion.
Strategically, Iran’s choices are restricted and more and more symbolic. Their nuclear program has been crippled, their army command degraded by Israeli strikes, their economic system underneath most sanctions, and their worldwide help nearly nonexistent. Any try at retaliation, whether or not by regional harassment, missile assaults, or proxy strikes, would provoke overwhelming U.S. countermeasures with out advancing Tehran’s aims. Trump’s warning that “many targets stay” if Iran escalates underscores Washington’s higher hand. Iran’s threats could persist, however its capability to comply with by stays constrained by army, financial, and geopolitical realities.
