Amid reports that the US was preparing to launch an extended military assault on Iran, analysts warn there is a risk of US combat fatalities and that the war won’t end quickly or cleanly despite the US having an upper hand over Iran.
While experts, including Admiral Bob Harvard, former deputy commander of the US Central Command (CENTCOM), say America’s current combat capabilities are “far more advanced” than in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and can conduct hundreds of strikes a day, whereas it was previously 40 or 50 strikes a day. “If you were to target the IRGC and hit all its bases and facilities, you could probably do it in a matter of hours. That’s unprecedented,” Harvard added.
Daniel B. Shapiro, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel and senior Pentagon official during the Biden administration, also agrees that the United States, backed by ally Israel, would have an “overwhelming advantage” militarily over Iran. “They’ll definitely take terrible damage from combined U.S.-Israeli strikes,” Shapiro, a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council, told The New York Times. “But that doesn’t mean it ends quickly, or clean — and they do have some ability to impose some costs in the other direction.”
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Benny Sabati, an INSS analyst and Tehran-born former intelligence officer, thinks that Iran is preparing for a doomsday war. "Iran is also preparing for war this weekend, that's true. The Iranians are preparing for a kind of doomsday war. The Iranian regime has had its back against the wall for many years, and it thinks that people are coming to destroy it every day, so it is preparing accordingly. A lot of propaganda and talk of destroying the other side, of course,” Sabati told Israeli media Maariv.
But, they still don’t have the upperhand. “The Iranians cannot stand up to the qualities, the precision and the actions of Americans. We saw that in the 12-Day War. They are not strong, so they resort to propaganda and try to deter the side from attacking them, because they know the outcome,” he added.
