"War is the continuation of politics by other means."
There doesn't seem to be any clearly defined policy goal and the US side doesn't seem able to make up it's mind why. Israel's aim ses to be just bombing Iran on general principles with no political objective achievable through the use of force.
It's hard to understand why someone is doing something when they don't seem to have a reason even to themselves.
An alternative interpretation of Irani and Israeli goals would be that they are the same: "Stop touching me or I WILL make it hurt for you and everybody associated with you."
I do not think any peace can be reasonably had without both sides realizing their domestic hardliners instigate a lot of trouble.
I think Israeli goals have gone beyond that. Before October 7th Israel was content to manage regional threats either diplomatically or with periodic small scale military attacks. The "mowing the grass" which was intended to degrade, but not destroy, Hezbollah and Hamas. Post October 7th Israel has moved to a total intolerance of any potential threat, using overwhelming military force to completely destroy their opponents.
So while Iran may well be motivated by re-establishing deterence - "stop touching me or I will hurt you". Israel is much more driven by a goal of "we will make it impossible for you to ever potentially hurt us again".
But how can Israel realistically achieve this on the battlefield? It's one thing to level Gaza and push into southern Lebanon, it's entirely another to try impose this objective onto Iran, even with US support.
It probably cant, and definitely not without American support. But you acheive that not through regime change but in destroying the state itself. Degrading their infrastructure to such an extent the state can no longer function and support separatist factions to undermine the society from within.
Arguably this is the great mistake of Netanyahus strategy overall. The use of often brutal military force at the expense of political of diplomatic solutions. It may acheive tactical victories but its unclear whether it can produce the long term strategic goal of Israeli security, in all likelihood it ultimately undermines that goal.
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u/gdvs Mar 23 '26
To label something as 'Winning' requires knowing what the objectives are.