How to Deal With Iran

Palladium Magazine | Marko Jukic

The United States signed the 14-point Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding with Iran in June 2026 to secure a 60-day ceasefire and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, but Iranian forces resumed striking civilian ships days later. Continued closure of the strait, through which roughly 20 percent of global oil and gas supply passes, risks triggering a severe global economic depression.

This maritime standoff reflects a fundamental shift in technological parity, as Iran's mass-produced Shahed-131 and Shahed-136 drones have commoditized long-range precision strikes across the Persian Gulf region. Because mobile launchers operate deep inland and facilities lie underground, air strikes cannot eliminate Iran’s defense industrial base or reopen the waterway by force. Iranian military authorities cited Israeli violations in southern Lebanon to justify closing the strait, seeking to preserve Hezbollah. Consequently, avoiding prolonged economic fallout will require diplomatic concessions, as neither regional military coercion nor alternative pipelines can bypass Iranian anti-access capabilities.

Comment

The rapid diffusion of dual-use manufacturing technologies has decoupled long-range precision strike capacity from Western aerospace defence supply chains. Mass-produced platform designs like the Shahed-136 leverage commercial off-the-shelf internal combustion engines and standardised microelectronics, bypassing high-barrier metallurgical and industrial processes previously required for cruise missile production. This decentralised manufacturing architecture allows dispersed subterranean assembly facilities to maintain high-rate output despite persistent air surveillance and international sanction regimes.

This structural cost asymmetry degrades standard Western air defence economics, where multi-million-dollar interceptors are expended against low-cost uncrewed aerial vehicles. Consequently, maintaining a continuous defensive screen around the Strait of Hormuz depletes US Navy SM-2 and SM-6 missile stocks faster than frontline industrial facilities can replenish them.

Strategic Question for Discussion

If low-cost platforms like the Shahed-136 continue to invert the cost-per-engagement ratio against advanced interceptors like the SM-6, which industrial adaptation—accelerated directed-energy deployment or mass production of low-cost attrition interceptors—offers a more viable path for maintaining maritime security in restricted chokepoints?

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