Did the US achieve its aims in Iran? — The Security Brief

[0:00] Donald Trump has announced a conditional two-week ceasefire in the US and Israeli war with Iran. [0:06] But are the president's claims of total victory supported by the fights? [0:11] While the war has demonstrated again the power of the American arsenal, [0:15] it's also demonstrated the limits of that power and the tactical resilience of the Iranian regime. [0:21] And what about the cost to US stockpiles? [0:23] We're going to give you a full assessment of what has been achieved [0:26] and the enormous challenges ahead in turning a ceasefire into a durable peace. [0:32] Stay with us. This is the Security Brief. [0:35] So, Mikey, this is really a stock take of what has been achieved, delivered since February the 28th [0:52] and the enormous challenges that remain. [0:55] Let's remind ourselves at the outset what the objectives for the US administration were. [1:01] Yeah, and I think there were four that we heard about on quite a consistent basis [1:06] before February the 28th. The first one was preventing Iran from enriching uranium, [1:11] despite the fact that the Trump admin had declared that Iran's enrichment program had been quote unquote [1:17] obliterated during Operation Midnight Hammer going back to June 2025 last year. [1:23] The second taking out Iran's proxies. Two main proxies that we're really talking about there [1:27] are the Popular Mobilization Forces in Iraq and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Then there was the third, [1:32] which was Iran's ballistic missile program destroying that, and then regime change. [1:39] The pace of the attacks was really unprecedented. How many airstrikes are we talking? [1:44] We're talking a lot. Let's take a look at the rough airstrike picture today. I think we've got a graphic [1:50] up here. US IDF strikes in blue on the right and Iran retaliatory strikes in red on the left. [1:58] CENTCOM is saying it's conducted 10,000 combat flights and struck more than 13,000 targets [2:05] inside Iran since February the 28th. I mean, I'm just looking at that map. It doesn't really give us [2:12] a full picture of just how many targets were hit. It doesn't. But the fact that this amount of targets [2:21] in that amount of time has been stated is significant. We looked at, in our last security brief, [2:27] how artificial intelligence has been used to facilitate generating that target set. [2:34] It's called the kill chain in military parlance, but effectively the precision guided [2:38] munitions process. And to give an example of how that has evolved over the last couple of years, [2:44] the IDF used a similar AI system in 2023 on Gaza, and that took them from developing around 50 targets [2:52] a year to 100 a day. So you can see how AI has rapidly improved that. Unless we forget, [2:58] the war started on February the 28th with the elimination of the Ayatollah. Yeah. So this is [3:03] evidence that the US started with the objective of regime change that was cited back in the original [3:08] objectives. In the military, we call this strike what's called a TST, time-sensitive target. And they're [3:16] calling it a decapitation strike for obvious reasons. Let's take a look at the bomb damage assessment [3:20] footage that was released by the IDF on those Ayatollah strikes. So basically, a TST, time-sensitive [3:27] target, it's a window of opportunity, if you like. And that was based on the location window [3:32] of the Ayatollah opening up, actually, along with many other high-value Islamic revolutionary [3:37] guard corps leadership targets in the same location that the Ayatollah was based in, in the bunker in [3:42] Tehran. Yeah. And likely that Mushtaba Khemini was in that same compound. I think his wife and [3:47] members of his family were killed. We haven't seen him since. There were other high-profile targets [3:53] that were taken out as well. Yeah. About 40 high-value targets removed. Can that be defined [4:00] as regime change? Well, look, killing high-value targets does not correlate to regime change. [4:05] Regime change, sort of the stricter definition of it, is much broader. And it's way more complex [4:11] than taking out just political leadership. It's about the governing system. So Iran's theocracy, [4:16] that still stands, for example. And it's about the institutions that keep the political leadership [4:21] in power. So you've got the military, you've got the police, and the court system, the judicial system, [4:25] that's all still there. And if you were to look for a precedent of that, you'd really only need to [4:30] look back at Iraq in 2003, and the way in which the US and the Allies removed Saddam Hussein. [4:37] Yeah. I mean, you were right in the middle of that. You were reporting from there, and I was [4:41] operating inside there on three tours. So for sure, regime change through what we call hard power, [4:47] so military conflict, has never worked in contemporary military conflict or history, [4:53] as we witness, as you say, in that catastrophe in Iraq. Can we look at the other pre-conflict [4:57] objectives, specifically the ballistic program? Because it stands to reason, it's quite obvious to people, [5:03] that that program exists in some shape, because they continue to fire. [5:08] Right. Iran had, and still likely has, if I'm honest, the most diverse and sizable ballistic [5:14] missile inventory in the Middle East. And that includes hypersonic missiles, like the FATA-2. [5:19] That's a Mach 5 Plus missile, that Mach 5 Plus is five times greater than the speed of sound, [5:26] although we know they can go much more than that, some estimates up to Mach 13. But it's also got this [5:31] hypersonic glide body. We've spoken about this on the security brief, which allows the warhead to [5:36] change directory in the middle of flight. And that makes them way harder to hit. And a significant [5:42] amount of those missiles, as we can see here, are stored underground. Well, and that's impossible. [5:47] I mean, look at the length of these tunnels. It's impossible to take all that out in airstrikes. [5:52] You'd need consecutive airstrikes, and you'd need eyes on the ground to know that it'd been [5:56] fully demolished. Right. You'd need human intelligence to be able to indicate where they were. [6:00] You know, after two weeks, the US stated that Iran's missile launch volume was down by 90%. [6:07] And I think that's probably fairly accurate. Analysis by the Institute for the Study of War [6:11] says medium range ballistic missile launches are, quote, severely regraded. Note the medium range [6:17] ballistic missile capability here from what the ISW is saying versus what the Trump administration, [6:23] which was saying just ballistic missiles. And I know there was intelligence that the tunnels [6:26] have been destroyed. But in fact, they were digging out the missiles, which were still intact, [6:31] which speaks to the difficulty and the resilience and resilience of it. And still, as I mentioned, [6:38] still able to reach Israel and, of course, Gulf neighbors. Yeah, let's take a look at the graphic [6:44] again of Iran's retaliatory strikes. This graphic shows you just how broad Iran's ballistic missile [6:51] capability was or is. I mean, if you look at Israel over in the far left of that shot and the cluster [6:58] of red dots, it's received a huge amount of incoming. But Israel's Iron Dome air defense network has [7:04] absorbed a significant amount of those attacks. So the Tamir missile system out to 70 kilometers, [7:09] that's shorter range. David Sling out to 300 kilometers and the Arrow 2 and 3 out to beyond 1500 [7:15] kilometers. But it's important to say that Iron Dome is kind of that generic word that's used for all of it. [7:19] But I'm looking at that map on the left there and that veil of security that the Gulf states had [7:25] established, which was crucially important to their domestic economies. There was this [7:31] accommodation with Iran. That has all been shredded. Yeah. I mean, if you just look at the map on the [7:36] left and look at the Gulf states that have been targeted from top to bottom, you know, strikes in [7:42] Iraq, look at Kuwait, a huge amount there. Saudi, Qatar, UAE, Oman. And the theme there [7:51] certainly in the initial stages of the conflict was all about targeting US bases that were across [7:57] the region. And on the right, you'll see some of the blue spots around Carg Island. That was hit [8:02] heavily in the final assault and also two of the very big petrochemical plants. Is that important? [8:09] Yeah, I think it is. And this sort of like tit for tat strikes on energy infrastructure, [8:15] all sort of seem to center around March the 18th. On March the 18th, we saw the IDF strike Iran's [8:21] South Par's natural gas and petrochemical complex. And then we also saw Iran strike Qatar's Ras La [8:29] Fan natural gas facility. So March the 18th was kind of when it all escalated on the energy [8:35] infrastructure piece. But the petrochemical plants, I just want to come back to that, [8:40] are they important to the ballistic missile program? [8:42] I think highly likely, yes. The reason for that being is that sodium percolate is a chemical that [8:48] has been shipped in through China. China provides that. And these petrochemical plants, [8:55] especially the South Par's, they're likely involved in that process of converting sodium percolate, [9:00] which then goes into ammonium percolate. And then it's used in the solid fuel propellant for ballistic [9:05] missiles. Those petrochemical plants are likely somewhere in the process of converting that sodium [9:10] percolate into that fuel. Right. So it's about targeting the steel manufacturing, the fuel for the [9:16] missiles, essentially trying to stop the reproduction of what they have destroyed over the last six weeks [9:21] or so. Yeah, it's a holistic approach to actually taking out that ability to produce. Let's talk [9:26] about the interceptors, because a lot of those have been fired through the conflict and a lot of [9:32] them supplied to the Gulf states. Right. And the rapid depletion of those interceptors, I think, [9:39] is one of the big stories of this conflict. A critical vulnerability, we call it in military parlance. [9:45] And one of cost benefit ratios, we've spoken about that before. Let's take a look at [9:49] the graphic of how the Patriot missile has been used. So an estimated 2,400 interceptors fired mostly [9:58] from Patriot missile batteries that you can see here. And we're talking about the PAC-3 Patriot missile. [10:03] That's the latest one, if you like. That comes in at a cost around 4 million a missile. That's not [10:08] including the batteries. And the US produces around 650 of these PAC-3 interceptors per year, [10:14] which under the current production capability would take around three and a half years to replace. [10:19] This is set, however, Christian, to increase to 2,000 per year, but that's by 2030. [10:24] But we're not just talking about Patriots, are we? [10:26] No, we're talking about what's called THAAD, Turbinal High Altitude Air Defence. [10:30] Let's take a look at another graphic, just to look at what the statistics are on that. [10:35] The cost of the THAAD missile is a staggering 13 million per missile. Again, [10:39] not including the battery. And just to contrast that, during the 12-day war in 2025, approximately 150 [10:45] THAADs were used during that period, which is reportedly around 25% of the current US stockpiles. [10:52] The US produces around 90 THAAD interceptors per year, which would take around four years to replace [10:57] under production capability. But again, that is set to increase to 400 per year, but no time soon. [11:03] And the other big takeaway, and a lot of people will remember this conflict for it, [11:07] is the threat that came from the Shahed drones. [11:09] Yeah, the Shahed 136. And we've spoken about this a lot. And the reason we've spoken about this a lot is [11:13] because it's just so significant in terms of a high-tech, low-tech conflict, which is what we've [11:18] seen. So let's just take a look at the Shahed here on the graphic. A simple, low-cost, mass-produced [11:25] one-way attack drone that we have seen cause havoc across the Gulf states since February the 28th. [11:30] It's around $35,000 per unit, travels around 120 miles an hour, and it carries around a 20 to 60 [11:36] kilogram warhead. And Iran is estimated to have over 50,000 of these. So it's not a difficult target. [11:42] But when costly interceptors like Patriot and THAAD are being used, sometimes two or more launches for [11:49] a single drone, it's an effective method that the Iranians have been using to deplete stockpiles. [11:54] Just as an aside, you've talked there about the depletion of the interceptors. A lot of these [12:00] interceptors before the war were going to Ukraine. [12:02] Right. The reliance on Ukraine of the Patriot missile was significant. And if you remember, [12:10] when we've spoken about what's called the Pearl Agreement, which is the Prioritize Ukrainian [12:15] Requirements List, the way that works effectively is that the Europeans put a lot of cash into that [12:21] Pearl. And then that cash is used to pay for those Patriots that the US is using. And there were [12:29] significant orders in for Ukraine. So there are huge questions now about the supply of those Patriots [12:36] to Ukraine and whether that supply has now been derailed by this conflict in Iran and a preference [12:42] to send their weapons to the Middle East. So I think we really do now need to watch this space on [12:48] any potential rows that might now exist or ensue based on where those Patriot missiles are going from [12:56] Pearl that were originally destined to Ukraine. Yeah, that is that's certainly an open question. [13:01] Let's just talk about the capability that is still in the region, because [13:05] up until last week, we were talking about the amphibious landers that were coming up to 10,000 [13:09] troops. Presumably, they're still in theater. Yes. And I think this is the other big story. So [13:14] cost benefit ratios is one. I think a realization by the US of the complexity of achieving those initial [13:22] objectives that we spoke about and countering Iran's moves as the conflict has played out over [13:28] the last four or five weeks. So let's just take a look at what additional capability has been sent [13:34] into theater or is being sent into theater since February the 28th. What you can see here is the [13:40] so let's start on the right, we had the USS Abraham Lincoln, that was one of the first to arrive in the [13:45] region. And then if you remember the USS Gerald Ford, the largest aircraft carrier in the world that also [13:50] came in. But that's had to limp back to the Mediterranean and is likely to be out of the [13:54] picture for two years. Additional capabilities. Two years? Two years. Yeah. I mean, it was originally [14:00] the the chatter on open source intelligence was originally due to the toilets, believe it or not. [14:06] But then there was chatter about it taking some incoming as well. So unverified, of course, but [14:11] chatter on open source intelligence. But on the left here, we have two amphibious ready groups that have [14:15] been sent to the region. The USS Tripoli from Japan, Okinawa, that's a lightning [14:20] carrier. So it carries the F-35B. But also with that USS Tripoli, two amphibious assault ships. [14:29] And then you've got a marine expedition unit on board, which consists of about 2,000 marines. [14:34] Similarly, you've got the USS Boxer amphibious ready group that's coming from the west coast [14:39] of the States. The USS Boxer is slightly different to the Tripoli in terms that it's got a well deck, [14:43] which means you can literally ship marines from that ship to shore. It's also got two amphibious [14:48] assault ships with it and a marine expedition unit of about 2,000 marines. [14:52] Hey, I mean, we talked though that the objective was to take perhaps [14:58] Karg Island or perhaps to take the uranium. Are those objectives still on the table? And how long [15:04] can you keep that sort of force in place? Well, I think, I mean, that's the point. Karg wasn't on [15:08] the table when we look at the original objectives. Denying Iran the ability to enrich uranium was. [15:15] So I think as the conflict is involved, the Hormuz Strait became the centerpiece of Iran's strategy. [15:21] No one even mentioned the Hormuz Strait before February the 28th. And the Hormuz Strait is [15:25] basically a chokehold on global oil and liquefied natural gas. There's some extraordinary [15:30] reporting in the New York Times that back in February, Netanyahu told Donald Trump at the [15:35] White House that they could quickly eliminate any threat to the Strait of Hormuz. They were wrong. [15:42] Did they miscalculate? I mean, they say they didn't, which they're obviously going to say. [15:47] But it's obvious to me that, you know, having done all the research and analysis that we've done, [15:52] that relinquishing Iran's superiority over that strait would be a huge, huge operation. [15:59] It would be hugely risk-on in terms of fatalities. There would be risk to strategic assets like the [16:04] amphibious ready groups that we've just seen or the carrier. And it would involve US boots on the ground [16:10] and an enduring commitment, which I don't think the Trump administration has any appetite for. [16:14] You've got to remember that everything that we've seen in the first two to three weeks of this [16:19] conflict has been purely air power without the idea of putting boots on the ground. It's only [16:23] subsequently that that's become an issue. And when you consider this in the context of the objectives [16:28] you set out at the top, actually it became then about the strait and about reopening the strait. [16:34] It became about the global economy and the threat to oil supplies. [16:38] Right. And threat to oil supplies for Europe, for Asia, for China, but not the US. So it wasn't and [16:45] isn't and wasn't ever a US problem. [16:47] So who then to sum up are the real winners in all this? [16:52] So Russia, number one, without a doubt. Oil sanctions lifted, price of oil increase [16:59] and global attention diverted, especially the media diverted from Russian strikes on Ukraine. [17:05] So there's no doubt that Russia is a benefactor. Obviously China, US capability is massively [17:11] diverted from the Indo-Pacific, including the Tripoli that we saw, that sail from Okinawa. [17:16] You've got terminal high altitude air defence, air defence batteries being redeployed [17:21] to the Middle East and South Korea. Analysis by the Atlantic Council in the case of 60% [17:27] of US B-1B Lancer strategic bomber capability that are flying out of RAF Fairfoot. That's now [17:32] involved in the conflict. And just to interject there, not to mention the fact they've had eyes on [17:36] the capability of what America has and they've been heavily involved in diplomacy in the region. [17:42] And there will be countries in that region now looking perhaps more to China than to America. [17:47] Right. Exactly. Especially when you look at, you know, the way that Donald Trump has criticized, [17:53] gone after allies, gone after NATO. Again, you know, that's a really good and important point in [17:59] terms of the way that, you know, maybe India, for example, will become more China facing because of [18:04] what we've seen here. But if we go back to the Pentagon's national security strategy that was [18:09] published in 2025, what was the priority on that? Indo-Pacific. Right. And here we are having [18:14] a lot of assets diverted and stripped away from that based on this conflict in Iran. [18:19] Mikey, it's a really good summing up of where we currently are. Of course, a negotiation over the [18:25] next two weeks that will take us in a whole range of different directions, but we'll continue to [18:31] follow that for you. Mikey Kay, for the moment, thank you very much. This was the Security Brief. We'll see you next time.