The dominant narrative in relation to the Iran War is that the United States and Israel are mercilessly mauling the Iranians, and are on the verge of administering the coup de grâce, after which Iran will obeisantly submit to unconditional surrender, and bathe Emperor Trump’s feet with their penitent tears.
At least that’s the Hollywood version of the tale.
Here in the real world, American stockpiles of long-range stand-off strike munitions (Tomahawk: ~900 nautical miles; JASSM: ~600 nautical miles) have reached a critical stage.
In the case of the US, it is almost certain that usable Tomahawk inventory is now no more than ~2500, perhaps as few as ~2000 when you consider how many “duds” there have been in recent years.
They may have ~3000 JASSM left.
So, about ~5000 subsonic cruise missiles to finish off the job of subduing Iran, and still have enough to fight elsewhere if the need arises.
But it’s already not even remotely enough to go up against Russia or China. They would be gone in a matter of days.
It’s a pitiful state of affairs for the erstwhile “Greatest Military in Human History”.
In any case, given the severely depleted stockpiles of American long-range cruise missiles, we have arrived at a very important juncture in this war.
In order to defeat Iran without compromising its already tenuous ability to face Russia and/or China, the US will have to start using glide bombs instead of its precious stand-off missiles.
The problem with that, of course, is that dropping JDAM glide bombs requires the launching aircraft to get within ~40 nmi.
That is well within the “Danger Zone” of Iranian air defenses.
Of course, most people believe Iranian air defenses have been completely eradicated; that US and Israeli aircraft are now flying over Iran unopposed.
Total air supremacy.
I am not nearly so sanguine when it comes to this question.
Sure, when this war started back up in earnest almost a week ago, Iran didn’t have sufficient breadth and depth of integrated air defenses to defend comprehensively against Tomahawk, JASSM, or the relative handful of Sparrow ALBMs Israel has.
So they decided to defend a few very important sites as best they could, but otherwise accept the reality that other targets were going to get hit — at least until the inherent limitations of the strained US stockpiles began to assert their inexorable logic.
What I believe the Iranians have done is to judiciously husband their air defense systems in anticipation of the day when the US and Israel would be compelled to venture into range in order to drop glide bombs.
That day is either already here, or is very soon approaching.
Missiles and bombs are a challenge to shoot down, but aircraft are not. They are all exceedingly vulnerable, including the B-2, F-22, and F-35.
If the US flies “stealth” aircraft into Iran to drop short-range munitions, I fully expect some will get shot down, including the devoutly venerated B-2.
And if the US flies “non-stealth” aircraft into Iran to drop short-range munitions, I fully expect several to get shot down.
Then we’ll have a serious crisis on our hands.