Greg Priddy
By some measures, the 12 days of airstrikes by Israel and the US against Iran were a remarkable success. The campaign culminated on June 21 with B-2 strikes by the US using our largest bunker buster munitions, a capability Israel lacked, as well as cruise missiles, doing significant damage to Iran’s nuclear sites at Natanz, Fordo, and Esfahan.
Israel had very effectively established air superiority over Iran, destroying much of its air defense network and the paltry Iranian Air Force. Iran also painfully refrained from retaliating against the US entry to the conflict, staging only a token missile launch at the main US base in Qatar, which did no damage. Some of Iran’s missiles succeeded in evading Israel’s defenses, but only 28 Israelis were killed. After that, President Trump was able to pull both Israel and Iran into a ceasefire rapidly. Even the “risk premium” in oil prices quickly evaporated after the token Iranian retaliation against the US.
Was the American Bombing of Iran a Success?
Despite all of this, the apparent success of the military campaign has not yielded a stable equilibrium, a point Trump appears alternately to either be in denial about or trying to obscure, even while acknowledging that renewed negotiations with Tehran will be necessary. In remarks in The Hague on June 25 at the NATO Summit, Trump said, “The last thing they want to do is enrich anything right now. They want to recover.”
Trump also said, “We’re going to talk to them next week, with Iran. We may sign an agreement. I don’t know. To me, I don’t think it’s that necessary.” When he was asked if the US intended to strike Iran if it reconstituted its enrichment program, Trump said, “Sure.”
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