Daniel Byman
The current standoff between the United States and Iran is no longer a clash of capabilities but rather a struggle of political endurance and bargaining leverage. The United States began the conflict with broad, but often unclear, goals that included stopping Iran’s nuclear program, weakening Iran’s missile and conventional military capabilities, and regime change. It is now a contest involving maritime coercion, domestic political constraints, and even great power competition. The result is a war whose trajectory is less defined by battlefield outcomes than by each side’s expectations about the other’s willingness to bear costs.
At the operational level, the conflict has settled into a paradoxical equilibrium: Iran has sought to disrupt global energy flows through a de facto blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, while the United States has responded by “blockading the blockaders,” blocking traffic to and from Iranian ports. Tehran’s tool kit—drones, naval mines, and swarming small boats—imposes risk and uncertainty, even if it is no match for the U.S. Navy.
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