Situation Overview
On Day Five (March 4), the conflict’s operational logic continues the exploitation phase: The combined U.S.-Israel force sustained the strike tempo, preserved air-access advantages through continued air-defense degradation, and expanded pressure across Iran’s sustainment functions. The First Five Days’ defining shift is selective strategic node expansion, including the first reported strike on nuclear facilities, paired with continued targeting of internal security infrastructure and maritime assets to shape escalation control and maintain regime change pressure.
The operational and political picture for the First Five Days indicates the following
- Air-Access consolidation: Continued strikes on Iranian air defenses appear designed to maintain operational strike freedom over key air corridors, enabling follow-on waves with reduced risk and supporting deeper kill-chain work against secondary infrastructure and coercive institutions.
- Strategic threshold movement: the reported strike on Natanz marks a step change in target logic, shifting from general capability degradation to selective strategic signaling and denial, increasing pressure on Iran’s long-term leverage and bargaining positions.
- Iranian retaliation adaptation: Iran’s ballistic missile barrages against Israel continued at a lower rate compared to Day 1, consistent with launcher attrition and C2 disruptions. Simultaneously, Tehran sustained pressure on Gulf countries with drones and missile to stretch Integrated Air and Missile Defense networks and raise the cost of hosting U.S. assets.
- Economic Coercion: Energy infrastructure disruptions and continued gray-zone maritime activity around Hormuz reinforce Iran’s efforts to international costs and push Gulf capital toward pressuring Washington to de-escalate.
- Horizontal Escalation Threat: Hezbollah linked activity and Shia militia threats add escalation branches that can widen the conflict even if the main strike and retaliation exchange remains Iran centric.
Military Assessment
First Five Days reflect a transition from initial shock and rapid decapitation effects toward sustained exploitation under consolidated air access. The combined U.S.-Israeli force continued degrading Iranian air defenses and residual strike infrastructure to preserve operational freedom over western and central Iran, while selectively explain target baskets to include strategic nodes and internal security institutions. In parallel, Iran’s retaliation persists but at a reduced ballistic tempo compared to prior days, suggesting launcher attrition and command frictions, even as drone activity and Gulf directed strikes maintain regional pressure. The conflict is increasingly defined not by single high-volume salvos, but by attritional exchanges across air defense suppression, missile inventories, and maritime shaping operations.
Iran’s Offensive
By March 2, the third day of the war, Iran’s offensive posture shifted from high-volume saturation to a constrained but persistent retaliation model. The reduction in volume likely reflects cumulative launcher attrition and degradation of command-and-control networks following sustained U.S. and Israeli strikes. Israeli assessments indicate that roughly half of Iran’s missile launchers had been destroyed by March 1, limiting Tehran’s ability to coordinate massed salvos. While Iran appears to be attempting larger, more synchronized attacks, the practical output suggests that its retaliatory capacity is operating under growing operation frictions. The intensity and operational tempo of Iranian missile strikes have continued to decline over the following days. According to General Dan Caine, Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, the volume of fire as of March 4 has plummeted by 86% compared to the opening day of the conflict. This decline in strike volume may be attributed to the kinetic neutralization of Iranian missile launchers or the depletion of immediate stockpiles. Alternatively, it may reflect a deliberate shift toward strategic preservation; anticipating a protracted war of attrition, Tehran may be rationing its missile inventory to ensure long-term operational sustainability.
In parallel, Iran sustained a diversified strike campaign against the Gulf states. The UAE Ministry of Defense reported that since February 28, Iran had launched 174 ballistic missiles and 689 drones at Emirati territory, with a limited number penetrating air defenses. On the third day specifically, Iran targeted the Prince Sultan Airbase in Saudi Arabia, Ali al Salem Airbase, the U.S. Embassy, and Camp Arifjan in Kuwait where six U.S. soldiers were killed, and other U.S. associated facilities in the UAE and Bahrain, with some claims that even the prior hotel strikes were targeting U.S. personal. The pattern indicates a deliberate strategy to stretch the Integrated Air and Missile Defense architecture across multiple states simultaneously, forcing regional partners to expend interceptor inventories while maintaining defensive alert status over critical infrastructure and U.S. bases. Iranian Shahed drones are a particularly persistent threat especially in the Gulf theatre, where air defense density is lower compared to Israel.
Energy infrastructure disruption intensified on March 2. Qatar halted liquified natural gas (LNG) production following drone strikes on facilities in Ras Laffan and Mesaieed, temporarily affecting roughly 20% of global LNG supply. Saudi Aramco also shut down parts of the Ras Tanura refinery as a precaution but without major impact on supplies. Energy markets reacted quickly and sharply: oil prices rose to $82 per barrel, marking the highest level since early 2025, whereas natural gas in Europe surged by 46%. These actions indicate that Tehran’s strategy is not limited to the battlefield retaliation but seeks to impose systemic economic costs on Gulf States and international markets, thereby increasing diplomatic pressure for de-escalation.
Maritime escalation in and around the Strait of Hormuz continued. Iranian officials publicly stated that the strait was closed and warned that no vessel would transit the strait safely. On March 2, Iranian forces reportedly targeted a commercial oil tanker with drones, causing a fire, while separate projectile attacks were reported against a tanker in Bahrain. The cumulative effect is the creation of a gray-zone maritime battlespace that increases insurance costs, disrupts global shipping, and amplifies economic uncertainty without a formally declared blockade.
While not unexpected, but Resistance Axis aligned actors demonstrated calibrated engagement as well. Hezbollah may have conducted a drone strike against the United Kingdom’s RAF Akrotiri base in Cyprus. Lebanese Hezbollah activity against Israel itself remained limited and was mostly symbolic. The Houthis did not conduct confirmed retaliatory attacks since the beginning of the war, but their posture remains strategically significant. Statements by Houthi officials to resume attacks on Israel and shipping routes have yet to be followed by actions.
As with the U.S. and Israel, Iran as well is preparing for prolonged war that may last multiple weeks. First Five Days thus depict a transition from shock saturation of the first day to endurance warfare. Iran’s ballistic missile output appears constrained but ongoing; drone operations remain active; energy and maritime coercion are intensifying; and proxy networks are limited but selectively activated. The conflict is entering an attritional phase for Iran in which launcher survivability, interceptor stockpiles, and coalition escalation management will increasingly shape the operational trajectory over the next few days.
Israel’s Offensive
First Five Days appear best read as a continuation of the Day Two exploitation phase. The U.S. and Israel maintained strike tempo, widened the target set, and converted degraded air-defense conditions into sustained operational freedom. U.S. political messaging, including statements attributed to President Trump, frame the first phase as having eliminated Iran’s military command. In line with prior day operations, public claims likely outpace verifiable battle damage assessment, but the key analytical point that operations after Day 2 continue the transition from initial shock and suppression toward consolidation and systemic pressure rather than a discrete endpoint remains.
Operationally, Iranian air space appears less contested than on Day One, but not entirely uncontested. Reporting indicates residual Iranian Air Force and Air Defense activity and continued sorties by legacy platforms around Tehran, with some activity around the gulf. This suggests degraded uneven defensive capacity rather than a total collapse of air control. The more reliable indicator is behavioral: though it does not by itself confirm full air superiority, Israeli messaging giving advanced notice of strike intent in central Tehran is consistent with a drastically reduced perceived risk from Iranian IADFs in key corridors.
Operational Continuity
First Five Days of reporting remains consistent with the Day Two target logic: the campaign continues to work down the kill-chain, emphasizing secondary military infrastructure, internal security and regime protection institutions, and command nodes outside the immediate core. In practice, this is the continuation of the systemic pressure phase, degrading the regime’s capacity to coordinate, police, and govern under sustained attacks.
The joint concept of operations also appears to preserve a functional division of labor. The United States is reported to be prioritizing higher-order strategic effects, including strikes tied to Iran’s nuclear and maritime military infrastructure, while Israel’s target set remains oriented toward tactical and regime-control pressure (bases, internal security facilities, and coercive institutions). This is not a strict separation, but the pattern is consistent with the comparative advantage described in Day One: the U.S. scaling sustained strategic degradation, Israel sustaining high-tempo pressure on the regime’s operational and internal control ecosystem.
Maritime and Coastal Axis
First Five Days adds a clear emphasis on the maritime domain. Reporting that U.S. strikes targeted and destroyed the Iranian Navy in the Gulf of Oman, as well as targeting the Iranian naval infrastructure (Bandar Abbas, Konarak, Jask, Bandar-e Mahshahr) and statements attributed to Secretary of State Rubio referencing the threat of Iran to global shipping together support the assessment that the U.S. is now investing more strike capacity into maritime access and choke-point shaping, along with the Strait of Hormuz as the strategic center of gravity.
On the fifth day of the conflict, the United States expanded the regional scope of hostilities by torpedoing and sinking an Iranian vessel off the coast of Sri Lanka, resulting in 87 fatalities. Through this action, the U.S. established a precedent for a complex maritime warfare pattern, signaling its intent to engage and neutralize high-value targets well beyond the primary theater of operations.
Battle damage claims regarding naval destruction are hard to verify in real time, but the destruction of the 11 vessels assessed as true. But the more durable analytical inspection is that if naval and coastal defenses are being degraded, U.S. forces may expand sea-based strike tempo from the south, opening additional launch baskets and shortening strike cycle. Simultaneously, pressure on Asian countries, which depend on oil and gas exports from Gulf countries may decrease. Even under that scenario however, maritime risks do not disappear: residual threats from coastal missile launchers, drones/USVs, mines, and dispersed IRGC-N capabilities would remain plausible and likely and may rise in relative importance to Iranian decisionmakers as conventional naval assets are attritted.
Escalation management
A notable Day Three development is the reported opening of a Lebanon front with Hezbollah activity. This would not be an operational surprise; it is more plausibly an expected escalation branch with pre-dedicated Israeli capacity. The practical effect is to introduce force-allocation tradeoffs and increase the likelihood of horizontal escalation dynamics, even if Israel maintains the ability to continue striking Iran at the current tempo.
Finally, the growing density of missiles, drones, and regional air-defense activity increases the probability of operational friction, including the misidentification and friendly fire risk. Reports of three U.S. F-15Es lost to Kuwaiti air defenses prove this point. As multi-axis salvos intensify and multiple air-defense networks operate simultaneously, deconflicting becomes a strategic variable, and it can impose real costs independent of the Iranian threat.
Targets of Operations
Strategic Facilities (2 Facilities)
Natanz Nuclear Facility, Arak Nuclear Facility
Military Facilities (16 Facilities)
Naval: All of Iran’s Naval vessels, IRGC Navy Facility (Bandar Abbas), Naval Facility (Konarak), Naval Facility (Bandar-e Jask), Naval Facility (Bandar-e Mahshahr)
Other: IRGC Military Base (Chabahar), Military Base (Marivan), Missile Facility (Chamran), Missile Facility (Isfahan), Missile Facility (Kermanshah), Drone Facility (Kermanshah), Missile Facility (Khorramabad), IRGC Military Base (Khorramabad), Missile Facility (Urmia), Military Facility (Tabriz), Military Facility (Ilam), Kerman Airport.
Internal Security Facilities (8 Facilities)
Police Station (Ilam), Police Special forces Station (Ilam), Intelligence Agency (Ilam), Law Enforcement Command (Ilam), Border Guards, (Ilam), Border Guards (Tehran), Basic Facility (Tehran), Police Station (Tehran).
Strategic Assessment
Going forward, the campaign’s trajectory will be shaped less by individual strike events and more by endurance indicators. The most binding variable is missile inventories on both sides. Iran’s usable ballistic missile stockpile (plus launcher survivability and launch tempo) versus the joint force’s interceptor depth and reload capacity across Patriot/THAAD/ship-based layers. The side that runs down first faces a structural disadvantage: Iran would lose scalable cost-imposition and regional coercion; the join forces would face rising bypasses of Iranian munitions through air defenses, forcing either wider strike at source escalation against launch ecosystems or acceptance of higher exposure across regional nodes.
A second indicator set is the cohesion inside Iran’s coercive architecture, especially the status of Artesh, relative to the IRGC. Artesh is institutionally distinct, and its behavior matters in two ways: operationally, whether it continues to function as a coherent combat force under sustained pressure, and politically, whether any drift, fragmentation, or non-compliance emerges between the Artesh and the regime and IRGC command structures. Early signs to monitor include local command refusals, public or semi-public dissent by senior officers, or visible frictions in internal security tasking. In parallel, indicators of civil unrest and internal security stress, localized protests, breakdowns in police coverage, strikes, or heavy-handed repression despite the ongoing conflict situation, will matter because the campaign is increasing targeting regime sustainment functions, which can amplify governance strain.
Lastly, the permission by the United Kingdom to use RAF Fairford and Diego Garcia for so-called defensive operation against Iranian missile facilities may decrease runs between B2 bombing runs, which so far had to deploy from mainland United States to attack Iran, allowing the U.S. to use them more frequently.
Domestic Politics of Iran
Iran’s domestic politics continue to be shaped at two distinct levels to maintain elite-level cohesion and ensure state-society solidarity. The emphasis on "continuity" and state capacity within the constitutional framework is clearly designed to prevent any perception of a governance deficit or power vacuum, both domestically and internationally.
On the other hand, the crowds gathering in major Iranian urban centers present a "rally around the flag" effect in response to ongoing U.S. and Israeli strikes. Iran’s previous harsh crackdowns on protests already indicated that the regime was anticipating and preparing for internal unrest. Consequently, the combination of nationalist sentiment and the "extra-sensitive" posture of the internal security apparatus has become the dual cornerstone for maintaining domestic unity.
While the elite level adheres to constitutional processes, it is well-recognized that the decentralized security architecture and mosaic defense doctrine have created a degree of divergence between political and military elites. This distance is currently tolerated as a strategic and national security necessity to grant military commanders a level of autonomy under wartime conditions. However, should this gap become permanent or widen further, the likelihood of Iran shifting toward a military-style administration increases. To prevent this, the preservation of unity between military and civilian (including the Clerical) elites is essential.
A critical conclusion to be drawn here is that the next Supreme Leader will likely be a figure with close ties to the security bureaucracy, particularly the IRGC. Such a selection would serve two purposes: it would prevent the rift between political and military elites from deepening, and it would ensure that Iran’s overarching grand strategy remains consistent.
Obstacles to the Succession of the Supreme Leader
As Iran pivots toward selecting a successor following the death of Khamenei, two primary challenges are protracted the process. Notably, the lack of a strict constitutional time limit for this selection suggests that delays do not necessarily constitute a departure from the legal framework.
1. The Security Imperative
The first obstacle is operational security. Convening 88 elderly members of the Assembly of Experts at a single physical venue is currently deemed unfeasible, as such a gathering would be a high-priority target for kinetic air strikes. While alternative methods -such as decentralized virtual meetings- are being explored to mitigate these security risks, they inherently slow the pace of deliberation and formal voting.
2. The Consensus Deficit
The second challenge is the lack of a unified consensus on who should occupy the system’s most pivotal position. Despite years of contingency planning for the post-Khamenei era, the actual transition has proven fractious. Two figures have emerged at the forefront:
Mojtaba Khamenei: Highly influential with deep-rooted ties to the IRGC, he is frequently cited as a leading candidate. While his selection would signal institutional and managerial continuity, it carries the risk of being perceived as dynastic succession. This "monarchist" undertone could have complex, unpredictable long-term repercussions for Iran’s revolutionary political culture.
Ali Reza Arafi: His prominence has grown following his appointment to the Temporary Leadership Council, marking him as a significant contender within the clerical establishment.
However, one particular figure may be considered a "wildcard" or surprise contender. Former President Hassan Rouhani has long been identified as a potential candidate for the Supreme Leadership. As a quintessential establishment insider, Rouhani held critical military roles during the Iran-Iraq War, making him uniquely qualified for executive leadership under wartime conditions.
Associated with the political circle of the late Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Rouhani is known for his moderate pragmatic stance. His selection would be significant in preserving the “Revolutionary Generation’s” grip on power while potentially revitalizing the founding values of the Islamic Revolution-specifically the notions of constitutionalism and the rule of law- as a counterweight to the current IRGC-led and hardliner-dominated structure.
Despite his reputation for diplomatic pragmatism and a preference for improving relations with the West, Rouhani would likely maintain a firm stance in the current conflict. His leadership should not be interpreted as an immediate move toward de-escalation; rather, he would seek to manage the war through a more institutionalized, state-centric framework.
Strategic Assessment
The tension between the need for immediate stability and the long-term legitimacy of the office remains the central dilemma. If the transition leans toward a security-centric candidate like Mojtaba Khamenei, the fusion of the clerical leadership and the military bureaucracy will be absolute, potentially altering the foundational character of the Islamic Republic.
Ethnic/Sectarian Fragmenting and the Proxy Threat to Iranian Territorial Integrity
While the “rally around the flag” phenomenon remains a dominant visual in Iran’s major urban centers, the country’s ethnic and sectarian minorities continue to represent significant structural vulnerabilities. Reports indicate that armed groups, particularly in Kurdish-populated regions, are coordinating with Iraq-based affiliates to launch an insurrection -allegedly in alignment with clandestine U.S. and Israeli operational planning. This has brought scenarios of Iranian balkanization and territorial partition to the forefront of regional security discourse.
Degradation of Response Capacity
Our assessment posits that while the Iranian security apparatus is likely to suppress such an uprising through overwhelming force, the process will inevitably lead to a degradation of Iran’s external projection. By being forced to pivot resources inward to maintain domestic order, Tehran’s capacity to sustain high-intensity responses against U.S. and Israeli assets -specifically its missile and drone strike frequency- could be significantly diminished.
Regional Implications: The Iraq-Turkey Nexus
Iran’s recent kinetic strikes on Iraqi territory are a preemptive effort to disrupt this specific escalation. This situation directly intersects with Türkiye’s “Terror-Free Türkiye” (Terörsüz Türkiye) initiative. Ankara is closely monitoring these developments, as any shift in the Kurdish militant landscape across the Iran-Iraq border has immediate implications for Turkish border security and its long-term strategy to neutralize the PKK and its regional branches.
Main Takeaways from the First Five Days
The First Five Days confirm the transition from “opening shock” to system pressure under sustained air access. The combined force is consolidating operational advantage and expanding target baskets that degrade governance and coercive capacity, not just military capabilities. Natan is the clearest marker that the campaign is now willing to touch higher-order strategic nodes.
The war is entering an endurance contest defined by inventories and reload capacity. The binding variable to watch is missile inventories on both sides: Iran’s usable ballistic missile stock plus launcher survivability and launch tempo versus the combined force’s interceptor depth and reload capacity across Patriot/THAAD/ship-based layers.
The Gulf is the strategic hinge: sustained fire can drive alignment or accommodation. Iran’s Gulf-centric coercion seeks to fracture the basing ecosystem politically by forcing capital to choose between deeper operation alignment against Iran’s launch ecosystem or cost-minimizing deconflicting. Energy infrastructure disruptions and maritime risk are designed to accelerate this decision point.
Domestic cohesion and coercive control remain a forward indicator. Strain indicators within Iran’s internal security apparatus (Basij capacity, policing coverage, repression intensity, localized unrest signals) will matter as strikes increasingly target regime sustainment functions. Parallel monitoring of Artesh-IRGC cohesion is necessary for both operational effectiveness and regime stability assessments.
[Contributors: Mehmet Salah Devrim, İsmet Horasanlı]
