The applause in Washington when Israeli and U.S. airstrikes killed Iran’s senior political and military leaders was understandable. It was also unintentionally revealing. The premise behind decapitation strikes is not merely military. It is constitutional. It assumes that the leader is the regime, that authority is biographical and that killing the man can kill the system.

That assumption is false about Iran. But it is becoming increasingly true about the country making it.

The strategic illusion is easy to state. American and Israeli planners acted as if the Islamic Republic’s authority resided in its leaders’ bodies rather than in its institutions — as if killing enough of the right people could kill the system itself. Remove them and the regime should stagger or collapse.

© The Japan Times