America’s military superiority over Iran is undeniable. The more consequential question is whether Washington has defined a political strategy capable of translating battlefield success into a durable strategic outcome—without sacrificing its broader competition with China.

Five months into the conflict with Iran, the United States has demonstrated overwhelming military superiority. American air and naval forces have systematically degraded Tehran’s military infrastructure, destroying missile launchers, command-and-control facilities, drone production sites, air-defense networks, logistics hubs, and key elements of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The campaign has reaffirmed the United States’ unparalleled capacity to project power with speed and precision.

Yet military effectiveness alone does not determine the outcome of wars.

History repeatedly demonstrates that tactical victories can fail to produce strategic success when they are not integrated into a coherent political framework. As the conflict enters a more protracted phase, the central question is no longer whether the United States can continue inflicting military costs on Iran. It is whether those costs are advancing clearly defined political objectives.

This distinction is becoming increasingly important.

The initial phase of the campaign focused on degrading Iran’s military capabilities and constraining its nuclear ambitions. Those objectives remain central. But as military operations continue, the conflict is evolving from a campaign centered on physical destruction into one shaped by political endurance, strategic signaling, and competing perceptions of resolve.

Iran has adapted more effectively than many anticipated. Rather than concentrating forces vulnerable to American precision strikes, it has dispersed military assets, expanded the use of mobile missile launchers, hardened underground facilities, and continued missile and drone operations despite sustained attrition. Such adaptation is characteristic of regimes fighting for survival. Military organizations under existential pressure often become more decentralized and resilient than conventional planning assumes.

The durability of the Islamic Republic also reflects factors extending well beyond its military institutions. Iran’s governing system rests on an........

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