Iran's Asymmetric Arsenal The war that began on February 28, 2026, after the joint U.S.-Israeli strike on Iran was never a contest between equals. U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Washington’s objectives were to destroy Iran’s missile launchers, defense industrial base, and navy, and to ensure Iran never gets a nuclear weapon. U.S. commanders also said Iran’s air defenses had been severely degraded and hundreds of missiles, launchers, and drones had been destroyed. Yet even after those blows, Reuters reported that Iran retained missile capability, continued firing, and kept forcing the U.S., Israel, and Gulf states into a grinding defensive campaign. In other words, Iran did not need parity to stay dangerous. It needed survivable weapons, dispersed launch capacity, and the ability to keep the defender spending. https://www.boloji.com/articles/55338/irans-asymmetric-arsenal