WASHINGTON—Experienced foreign-policy observers in the US capital have long learned never to make public predictions. The world is far too uncertain and the downside risks to your reputation are far too high if you end up well off the mark. It’s clearly advisable to wait until events have already transpired and then claim afterward that you saw them coming all along. This is especially the case when it comes to decisions to go to war.
Yet those who carry the burden of policymaking are forced to make predictions to inform their policies. So even as negotiations continue between the United States and Iran, US President Donald Trump and his advisers are undoubtedly trying to assess what Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will do in the face of the “massive armada” that is in the final stages of being assembled in the Middle East, and Iranian leaders are doing the same.
In rare instances, policymakers are fortunate to possess hard intelligence that provides reliable answers. More often, however, they are making their own educated but fundamentally subjective judgments—and those judgments can be usefully informed by credible perspectives from outside of government. Therefore, experienced foreign-policy observers do a disservice to policymakers when they withhold their own predictions. So, as US strikes on Iran appear ever more likely, here are ten predictions of mine. And since not all predictions are created equal, I’ve also offered a rough assessment of my level of confidence for each.
1. Khamenei will not offer a last-minute strong deal.
HIGH CONFIDENCE
The Iranian regime’s power has sharply declined over the past year and a half, during which Israel successfully conducted military operations in Lebanon and against Iranian strategic air defenses; the Bashar al-Assad regime fell in Syria and the twelve-day war concluded with US strikes on Iranian nuclear sites; the Iranian economy continued collapsing, and nationwide anti-regime protests were only put down through brutal force.
Given this fundamentally changed strategic environment, the minimum-acceptable requirement a deal today must include is an ironclad commitment to zero uranium enrichment in Iran. However, I do not see any evidence that the regime is capable of offering this concession, much less offering any compromises on its arsenal of long-range precision weapons or its network of terrorist nonstate proxies, even if Trump would be willing to offer complete sanctions relief in return.
In the immediate aftermath of the crackdown, Iranian diplomats successfully shifted the focus from the butchery of their own people to a more familiar and comfortable subject: Iran’s nuclear program. These same diplomats then busied themselves in drawing out the discussions through delaying tactics.
2. Trump will not accept a last-minute weak deal.
MODERATE CONFIDENCE
Trump has consistently emphasized that he wants a deal with Iran and, in the past, has signaled his flexibility on the details. The likelihood of Trump accepting a weak deal in his first term, for instance, was quite high. If Khamenei had better understood Trump during his first term, then the Iranian leader would have proposed ripping up the deal he struck with US President Barack Obama and allowed Trump to sign a “better” deal, akin to Mexico’s more astute approach to Trump regarding the North American Free Trade Agreement. Trump likely would have accepted this proposal, overruling his much more hawkish advisers.
As Trump’s second term began, the likelihood of him accepting a deal remained high, given that he excluded and publicly denounced many of those first-term Iran hawks, going so far as to cancel security protection for those Iran was trying to kill. This past April, the administration even signaled that Trump would be willing to accept a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action–lite deal. Yet Tehran has still slow-rolled the negotiations. While Trump is eager to find an acceptable off-ramp to war, and he would likely accept provisions that I would find unacceptable, even that may not be on offer.
Now, given the negative experience of Iranian delay and Iran’s fundamentally changed strategic environment, Trump is likely no longer willing to accept an obviously weak deal. But given his repeated previous inclinations and leaks that continue to hint at shifting US goalposts that would allow some Iranian domestic enrichment, my confidence in this conclusion can only be moderate.
3. If Trump appears willing to accept a weak deal, then Netanyahu will preempt by striking Iran.
HIGH CONFIDENCE
Last June, when many perceived that the United States and Iran were on a path to a new nuclear deal, one that might have even been weaker than Obama’s deal, Israel preempted it by striking Iran. Trump did not give Israel the “red light,” and despite his initial attempt to distance the United States from the Israeli strike, Trump eventually decided to order US strikes on the key Iranian nuclear sites—a decision I encouraged in advance and then applauded afterward.
Given Israel’s tactical successes against Iran and its strategic success that resulted in a complete reversal by Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would likely seek to replicate this approach should my second prediction above prove to be incorrect—especially since this is an election year in Israel. Of course, Trump and his advisers likely recognize that, which adds to the confidence of my previous assessment that in the end Trump will not accept a weak deal.
Alternatively, the United States could give Netanyahu a clear “red light” against any such action. But based on Trump’s previous inclination to hedge, I cannot be confident that he would do so. And even if he did, in the face of a coming election Netanyahu is likely to prioritize his domestic political standing over his relationship with Trump.
4. Trump will be presented with three strategic options: “Enforce,” “Degrade,” or “Remove.”
HIGH CONFIDENCE
I’m not privy to the papers going up to the president these days, but if I were again on the National Security Council staff or in the Pentagon, then I would organize three basic option packages for presidential consideration.
The first, “Enforce,” would consist of a nation-wide campaign of strikes against buildings and other infrastructure of the Iranian state security forces most directly responsible for the violent crackdown against protesters. It would specifically target the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its Basij militia. This campaign would likely last only one or two nights, with only modest fatalities expected in comparison to the thousands killed by these forces.
The second, “Degrade,” would involve expanding the target set to include regime assets that most directly threaten the region and US national security interests, notably Iran’s remaining nuclear infrastructure and its missile, rocket, and drone deployments, inventories, and supporting industrial backbones. This campaign would be significantly longer, and it would likely need to be accompanied with a credible threat to repeat it every six to nine months as Iran rebuilt its missile inventories.
The third, “Remove,” would further expand the campaign to seek to decapitate the regime’s political and military leadership, disrupt the regime’s ability to effectively command and control its forces in the short term, and strike symbolic targets associated with the regime’s repression of the Iranian people and its perceived legitimacy to rule. “Remove” would likely acknowledge that there is scant historical evidence in Iran or elsewhere that regime change can be accomplished through air strikes alone, but nevertheless I can’t imagine that any option will be presented to the president that would include US conventional ground forces. Those who advocate for this option would argue, however, that even if the regime doesn’t fall it would be so badly damaged that it could not pose an immediate threat and might open the door to other opportunities, akin to what Israel accomplished against Hezbollah.
While these three options would be presented separately, Trump, like many of his predecessors, would also have the ability to take an à la carte approach to the individual target packages within the three options, mixing and matching as he sees fit.
5. Trump will choose the first option, “Enforce.”
LOW CONFIDENCE
Trump is caught in a trap of his own making, unfortunately. In contrast to the incident back in 2019, when he (correctly) rejected the Pentagon’s strike options designed to retaliate against Iranian forces shooting down a US drone, this time Trump drew a “red line” that the Iranian regime then clearly crossed. Trump openly encouraged the uprising, even promising that US “help is on its way,” and then stood back while protesters were butchered. This is akin to what the United States did to Hungarians in 1956 and to Iraqis in 1991, the low points of the Dwight Eisenhower and George H.W. Bush administrations, respectively. Trump previously mocked Obama’s refusal to enforce his own red line on Syria in 2013, the low point of that administration, and then proudly enforced Obama’s red line himself in 2017 and 2018.
Moreover, the US military assets Trump has amassed can’t stay in place forever. If he orders them to leave without any strikes or deal, then it will be perceived by many, including Tehran, as an embarrassing US retreat. Trump is determined to avoid being perceived as “weaker than Obama.” Therefore, I predict that he will choose to strike.
And yet, everyone I have spoken with who has spent time with Trump over the years discussing the potential for conflict with Iran has come away with the same conclusion: Trump does not want this war. He is, with good reason, extremely concerned with where it could lead. For that reason, if Khamenei is unwilling to offer a deal strong enough to prevent US strikes, and if Trump is now unwilling to accept a weaker deal, then I think he will pick the option least likely to cascade into a full war. Among the three options, that would be “Enforce.” From his perspective, this would likely have the added benefit of shifting the subject of public discussion back to the protests and away from his unsuccessful negotiations on nuclear issues.
In choosing “Enforce,” Trump would almost certainly be disregarding US Central Command’s recommended option, which I assume would be “Degrade.” I am sympathetic to the argument that it would be a missed opportunity not to set the precedent that the United States reserves the right to target Iran’s missiles when it feels threatened, but I don’t think Trump would share this sympathy. I would similarly be surprised if, under “Enforce,” Trump would allow Israel to be an overt part of the operation.
My degree of confidence is merely low for this prediction, however. While Trump is quite consistent and thus predictable over the long term, he has proved to act impulsively and thus unpredictably when presented with immediate decisions. That was the case in early 2020, for instance, when Trump surprised some of his top advisors by quickly choosing the most aggressive of the military options put in front of him by ordering the killing of Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani. And while many commentators initially predicted worst-case scenarios as a result of this action, in the end this decision turned out to be one of the most strategically beneficial of his first term.
After this, the direction of the conflict will depend on decisions made in Iran—by the supreme leader and by the people.
6. Khamenei will order a fundamentally symbolic response.
MODERATE CONFIDENCE
Assuming my fifth prediction above holds, the Iranian regime will have to decide how to respond. It would be unprecedented for Tehran not to respond at all; the regime typically responds in a manner that appears symmetrical according to its own analysis. Therefore, if Khamenei recognizes that Trump limited his strikes to only enforce his red line, and if he is convinced that Trump wants to end the exchange of fire after one round, then his response is likely to be largely symbolic.
An example of this approach is the performative “attack” his forces made on Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar last year in response to the US strikes on Iran’s nuclear program. At that time, the response was designed to de-escalate the immediate conflict while allowing Iran to claim that its number of missiles fired matched the count of bombs used by the United States. This time around, the regime planners won’t repeat the exact same response as before, of course. Therefore, US defense planners should anticipate symbolic attacks on different targets, such as a US aircraft carrier or the fifth fleet headquarters in Bahrain.
Given the scale of US military forces in the area, it would be stupid or suicidal for Iran to choose any other approach than a symbolic attack. So this prediction may appear to be straightforward. However, my confidence in this prediction is not high because Iran’s leaders have made especially poor decisions in the recent past, most notably their foolish choice to strike Israel directly with hundreds of projectiles—twice!—which then led to Iran’s current weakened position. It is therefore possible that Iranian leaders will fail to grasp the dangers they face now, leading to another disastrous miscalculation from their perspective.
Some observers of Iran go further and argue that the eighty-six-year-old Khamenei would prefer to be remembered as a martyr rather than a failure. I have never been convinced by the argument that Iran’s theocratic system structurally produces irrational choices, but my concerns about the quality of its decision making have gone up markedly in recent years.
7. If Khamenei miscalculates, then Trump will escalate to “Degrade”—but he will be willing to cut the operation short.
HIGH CONFIDENCE
Instead of acting to deescalate the conflict after a US strike, Iran might escalate with an attack that goes beyond mere symbolism. This attack might, for example, result in US casualties. If this happens, then Trump will be forced to escalate in turn. The easiest way for Trump to do so would be by ordering the “Degrade” campaign to commence. Israel might also be allowed to join the campaign in this scenario.
That said, I think Trump would then behave just as he did last June. He would prove eager to end the US campaign far short of its designed duration and as soon as he assessed that Iran had been deterred from its escalatory path. Unlike the mistake he made last time, however, I would hope that Trump would demand, as a price to halt the campaign, a commitment from Iran to immediately meet for direct negotiations.
8. The Iranian people will rise up again after the US strikes.
MODERATE CONFIDENCE
It would be completely understandable if the Iranian people were sufficiently cowed by the incredible cruelty of the regime. One should never fall into the trap of criticizing a subjugated people who decide to prioritize self-preservation. Indeed, this typical reaction is why despots throughout history have resorted to brutality; for instance, Syrian President Hafez al-Assad’s violent repression in the 1982 Hama massacre successfully deterred further uprisings in Syria for three decades.
Nevertheless, I think foreign-policy analysts have an unfortunate track record of underestimating both the willingness of the repressed to rise up against their overlords and the courage of those who are eager to risk death to support revolution. This is especially true in the Middle East, where analysts in the United States have been surprised again and again—by the Iranian revolution forty-seven years ago and the Arab Spring fifteen years ago, and by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak’s fall in 2011 and Assad’s in 2024. I fear that some analysts in the United States are making the same mistake again now by underestimating the Iranian people’s resolve, notwithstanding how immediate the threat is to those who oppose Khamenei.
In recent years, the Iranian people have repeatedly shown that they will take almost any opportunity available to them to express their widespread opposition. The Women, Life, Freedom protests in 2022 posed a direct threat to the ideological legitimacy of the regime, and the most recent protests further escalated the threat by putting the regime’s survival itself in jeopardy.
In early January, the Iranian people did respond to Trump’s call to the streets, but his pledge of support proved empty. But the next time they will be reacting to Trump’s actions, not his words, and further inspired by their recognition that the United States actually has the forces in place to protect them. If they do, it is likely to become the turning point for the entire confrontation, and I wouldn’t discount the possibility of the people seeing it in those terms and then taking advantage of the best chance they’ve had in forty-six years to rid themselves of this regime.
9. If widespread protests emerge, the regime will murder en masse, again.
HIGH CONFIDENCE
Of course, if Iranians do rise up again in significant numbers, then the regime will assess those protests to be an existential threat. That assessment will be accurate. Iranian security forces should therefore be expected to respond to that threat in the exact same manner that they have done before. Thousands more Iranians will likely be killed, possibly tens of thousands, depending on the scale of the protests themselves and how quickly the regime acts.
10. If Iranian protesters are again massacred, Trump will quickly escalate to “Degrade” and “Remove.”
HIGH CONFIDENCE
In this scenario drawn by these successive predictions, Trump will be confronted with a challenge that will define the legacy of his second term. He will have publicly committed the United States to a “red line” to prevent an enemy’s behavior and then punished that enemy for ignoring his warning and crossing that line—only to then have that same enemy cross the same line again. Few scenarios could be more destructive to US credibility. The president would then have to escalate further.
At this point, the United States and Iran would be in a war that both correctly assess as existential: For Tehran, to the regime itself. For Washington, to its credibility as the world’s remaining superpower. It is impossible to predict the military outcome, since so much depends on the operational and tactical prowess of each side in the first days of a sharp escalation.
If US forces quickly destroy much of Iran’s ability to project force beyond its borders, and if they decapitate the regime’s leadership (likely with Israel’s help), then that will open a window of opportunity for the Iranian people to try to change their regime. Alternatively, if the regime is able to deploy most of the forces available to it, then it would likely direct them against any target that could pressure the United States into stopping its campaign, including targeting US forces, maritime shipping, and civilian population centers in Israel and elsewhere, looking to exhaust the US-Israeli combined stockpile of interceptors. Israel already appears to be preemptively acting to diminish this threat by killing those it believes would be involved in directing Hezbollah’s response.
Even individual tactical successes by Iran could have large strategic implications. For instance, one rocket hitting one high rise in downtown Dubai could damage the United Arab Emirates’ economic model for years to come. Foreign executives proved their willingness to flee that country during the financial crisis in 2008, and they would likely do the same in larger numbers if they believed their lives instead of just their wallets were at risk. Similarly, when Iran was deemed responsible for the attacks on the oil processing facilities at Abqaiq and Khurais in 2019, it appeared to intentionally target elements that were readily replaceable, thus limiting the economic consequences to global markets. If Iran were to instead target elements that it knows could take far longer to replace, then the results could be much more damaging. And given the unique role Saudi Arabia plays in the global price of oil, the impact would immediately be felt in the United States.
It is even more difficult to predict the political outcome of such a confrontation. Most experts in my circles believe that the most likely result of regime change in Iran is the establishment of a non-theocratic but firmly anti-US “IRGC-istan” government, which rules over the Iranian people with an even more brutal iron fist. But there are other potential outcomes as well. Some experts predict that the collapse of Iran’s central government would set off a civil war, in which numerous outside actors support different internal elements, some divided along ethnic lines. Some Iran watchers expect the current regime to survive in some form, while still others foresee the restoration of monarchy and the return of Reza Pahlavi. Still others hope for the rise of the Mojahedin-e-Khalq, now known as the National Council of Resistance of Iran. Very few experts, however, are optimistic enough to predict a clear path toward Iranian democracy.
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