In Its Conflict With the United States and Israel, Does Escalation Favor Iran?

In the first hours of the joint U.S.-Israeli military offensive against Iran, U.S. and Israeli strikes killed Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, along with senior commanders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and key intelligence officials, in a decisive blow intended to cripple Tehran’s command structure and destabilize the regime. Yet within hours, any hope that these strikes would limit the scope of the war was dashed. Iran launched hundreds of ballistic missiles and drones at Israel and across the Gulf. The ongoing Iranian response has had enormous ramifications for the Gulf and global economy.  

Are Iran’s strikes acts of scattered retaliation or a bid to transform the stakes of a conflict? What has Iran achieved by widening the conflict’s scope and extending its duration? What options are at the United States’ disposal? And what are the possible risks of further escalation?  

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