Iran’s Evolving Missile and Drone Threat

The impressive surge of U.S. military might into the Middle East has yet to compel Iran to meet President Donald Trump’s demands that it negotiate an agreement that finally ends its nuclear program, ballistic missile arsenals, support for terrorist proxies, and oppression of its own citizens. Ahead of talks between the two countries, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamanei threatened that “more dangerous than the American warship is the weapon that can send it to the bottom of the sea.”

Much of Tehran’s saber rattling comes from its impressive and evolving missile and drone capabilities that complicate Trump’s preference for short, decisive military operations. While Iran clearly demonstrated its medium-range ballistic missiles (MRBM) and drones in three rounds of fighting with Israel in the past two years, in a possible conflict with the United States it will be Iran’s short-range ballistic (SRBM) and cruise missiles that likely will pose the greatest threat.

These weapons raise the specter of a much more destructive conflict than the 12-Day War last June. Iran’s short-range arsenals enable it to hold at risk U.S. bases, forces, and partners around the Gulf, as well as the region’s vulnerably small number of vital energy and other critical infrastructure chokepoints. These weapons have shorter flight times, and they face less robust air and missile defenses, than MRBMs fired at Israel. The proximity of such high-value targets to Iran means these projectiles can arrive in minutes and from multiple directions, complicating interception and increasing the likelihood that at least some weapons penetrate defenses, even when overall interception rates are high. And they were largely undamaged during the 12-Day War, meaning Iran has perhaps several thousand short-range missiles and drones at the ready.

It also has much sharper urgency than ever before to execute large bolt-from-the-blue attacks. This is driven by the regime having been deprived of its nuclear trump card and facing an existential threat from within. With their backs to the wall, and no other leverage with which to demand deescalation, Iranian leaders have greater incentive to dispense with limited and telegraphed strikes and instead impose maximum costs on the United States, Israel, and Arab nations.

For all these reasons, Iran presumably can deal significantly more damage with these short-range capabilities than with a roughly equivalent number of MRBMs against Israel. As its most potent threat, Iran very likely will concentrate on generating high tempo SRBM, cruise missile, and drone fire against close-in Gulf targets, while preserving remaining MRBM launchers for select high-value strikes and to deter or counter Israeli operations. Iran also can be expected to adapt and adjust its strike packages and tactics during any prolonged conflict, to continually maximize their sustainability and effectiveness. In these ways, Iran amasses an overall threat to U.S. forces, assets, and partners that is greater than the sum of its projectile parts.

But Tehran’s arsenals have vulnerabilities, too. The 12-Day War offers the largest sample size here, having exposed in particular how Iran’s ballistic missile launchers form a chokepoint which, if properly targeted, can have outsized effects in degrading the size and rapidity of its salvos. Finding, fixing, and finishing Iran’s aboveground mobile, and underground stationary, launchers—taking out the archers, not the arrows—offers the best prospects for deterring and denying Iran’s most threatening military options.