How Israel’s 12-Day War on Iran Achieved Remarkable Military Success – Analysis

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Wald said that “in the report, beyond presenting an operational and tactical account of Israel’s remarkable military success that I would go so far as to say is probably the most impressive military operation I’ve ever seen or been part of against Iran, we highlight some of the differences that the United States and Israel have from a strategic standpoint.”

“And there are a lot of lessons learned that we can take away from that that I think are still being sorted out,” he continued.

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The war was also the culmination of 30 years of confrontation with Iran, Ashley noted.

“As you get to the proximity of the actual strike, there were several activities that the [Israel] Air Force took that really kind of desensitized the Iranians. So was their number of nightly maneuvers, which conditioned the Iranian forces to expect false alarms, not knowing what was actually going to come,” he added.

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One Iranian official thought the strike on his own home was an earthquake. He could not conceive that Tehran had been outplayed.

The primary objective of Israel was to go after Iran’s nuclear program. However, over time, it became clear Israel would also need to gain air superiority and target the ballistic missile threat.

This cannot be overstated enough. Iran carried out two massive attacks on Israel using hundreds of missiles and drones in 2024. It also operationalized its proxies. The Iranian missiles were very deadly. This was far worse than Iraq’s Saddam Hussein’s Scud missile threat in 1991.

However, unlike 1991, Israel had air defenses in the form of Arrow 2 and Arrow 3 interceptors, as well as other systems, such as an improved Iron Dome, aircraft, David’s Sling, and other weapons.

Israel also had more of an opportunity to finally take out Iran. With Hezbollah weakened due to blows from Israel in September and October 2024, the group could not retaliate for Iran. In addition, the Syrian Assad regime fell. This meant Iran could not transfer missiles via militias in Iraq to Syria.

In essence, everything fell into place in June 2025. There was a window of opportunity to strike. Once in a generation, this comes along, and Israel chose to go forward. Israel has trained for this for years.

Wald said, “I think the most impressive thing – there are so many impressive things the Israelis did in this, and the US contribution as well, but the Israelis particularly – was the decision from going to a single target to a campaign.”

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“That was a significant thing that doesn’t happen overnight. And they did it, pivoting and changing the whole plan in a very short period of time,” he added. “We met with the individual who was in charge – that awe-inspiring person. These guys are really sharp.”

Wald also noted that “the fact that they [Israel] pivoted, and, you know, kind of put their country at risk if it didn’t work, [that they] dared to do that and came up with a plan – that is going to go down in history. Like I said, I think it is one of the great campaigns of all time. That was very impressive to me.”

Another important point was how Israel’s friends helped the state during the war. Fox noted that “a consortium of like-minded nations came together and defended Israel a couple of times; once, the earlier piece: France, UK, Jordan.”

“There’s an indication that there was cooperation with some other nations in the region, and, of course, the United States. That would have been, I think, impossible without the touches within the region of Israel’s Defense Force staffers working with the US Central Command, but also becoming more integrated in the region,” he said.

“It’s just impossible, I think, to describe how remarkable that is. For those of us who spent time in the region, that might not have come out the way that it did,” Fox continued.

This means Israel’s integration into the US Central Command and joint training has been vital. Israeli F-35s, F-15s, and F-16s fighter jets, along with other platforms, were also key to the war.

One issue for Israel is that its refueler fleet is aging. “It’s been a long-standing recommendation of JINSA that the KC-46, the new tanker, be expedited to Israel. They’re on the books to get those tankers. They need them now. The ones they were using, the 707 (the RAM), are old and in need of repair and just not up to the mission,” Wald said.

Ashley agreed, “One of the challenges they did have is really an older fleet of air refuel capability. So that is a challenge that we hit in recommendations. In the way ahead, that’s something that they’re going to need to bolster as they’re going forward.”

He noted, however, that a large portion of Iran’s ballistic missiles were destroyed. “Probably more than half of the launchers were eliminated.”