One of the more useful frameworks for analyzing geopolitical conflicts comes from Sarah C. M. Paine. Particularly her distinction between limited and unlimited goals, alongside the broader principle that states do not have permanent allies, only permanent interests. The current Iran-Israel-USA conflict becomes significantly easier to understand through this lens.

First, identify the primary actors involved: • Iran • United States • Israel • The Gulf Arab states: ○ Saudi Arabia ○ UAE ○ Qatar ○ Bahrain ○ Kuwait ○ Oman

For the purposes of this analysis, the “state” here primarily refers exclusively to the government, not including the population itself. Populations matter politically, economically, and socially, but large-scale geopolitical decisions, especially in this context, are usually made by the state itself.

|| Permanent Interests ||

| Iran | Iran’s primary permanent interest is regime survival and autonomy (unlike the erstwhile Pahlavi regime). Everything else flows downstream from this. Economic hardship, sanctions, isolation, proxy warfare, suppression of dissent, and military escalation seem to be historically acceptable costs to the clerical/IRGC regime. It appears willing to absorb very high civilian and economic costs in pursuit of institutional survival and sovereignty. Please note that this analysis does not support nor condone these actions, applicable to all parties in the situation.

The Iranian regime saw: • Iraq invaded • Libya dismantled after surrendering its WMD ambitions • Assad's Syria collapse • Western-backed regime change operations across multiple regions of the world

The lesson learned was that states unable to deter external coercion become vulnerable to it. From Tehran’s perspective, deterrence is directly tied to survival.

| United States | The United States seeks to preserve global conditions favourable to American power projection, financial dominance, maritime supremacy, and sustained economic leadership. This analysis deliberately does not explicitly address the “petrodollar” concept as a standalone factor.

This is not uniquely American behavior. Great powers historically attempt to preserve the international structures from which they benefit. The most recent example before the USA was the British Empire whose “template” largely inspired that of the USA though the latter does not employ overt imperialist conquest.

The United States benefits enormously from: • the dollar being the global reserve currency, • secure global shipping lanes, • stable energy flows, • allied dependency on American security guarantees, • and the absence of regional hegemons (hostile or otherwise).

From this perspective, an independent and regionally influential Iran that openly opposes the American-led order becomes problematic.

| Israel | Israel’s permanent interest is national survival. Unlike larger powers with strategic depth, Israel operates under a security doctrine shaped heavily by geography, and historical experience. A small land area, reserve-force military structure, and history of existential wars create an institutional mindset where deterrence (a common theme here) becomes critical. This is important because many outside observers incorrectly identify “regional dominance” as Israel’s primary interest. Regional dominance is better understood as a mechanism used to prevent existential threats from emerging nearby.

Israeli strategic culture strongly favours: • Pre-emption, • Military intelligence & technological superiority, • and disproportionate retaliatory capability.

From the Israeli perspective, deterrence failure carries potentially catastrophic consequences.

| The Gulf States | The Gulf Arab states largely seek preservation of regional stability and economic continuity.

Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Oman all benefit heavily from: • uninterrupted hydrocarbon exports, • trade, • investment inflows, • tourism, • logistics infrastructure, • and economic diversification initiatives.

These states are increasingly pursuing strategic hedging rather than rigid alignment. They maintain security relationships with the United States while simultaneously attempting to avoid direct confrontation with Iran. Their economies are deeply integrated into global systems dependent on stable maritime trade and investor confidence. For the Gulf states, prolonged regional war is economically disastrous.

This becomes important later.

|| Goals and Mechanisms || Once permanent interests are established, the next step is identifying the actual goals being pursued within the conflict.

This is where the distinction between limited and unlimited goals becomes critical.

| United States | Point to note: no clearly stated unified goal broadcasted.

Goal 1: Prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons At first glance, this appears to be a limited goal. In reality, it sits awkwardly between limited and unlimited categories.

A truly limited goal would look something like: > disrupt enrichment capability at Facility X for N years. This is operationally achievable.

An unlimited version of the same goal becomes: > permanently remove Iran’s ability and intent to pursue nuclear technology.

This is where the problem emerges.

Intent & scientific knowledge cannot be permanently erased from a nation-state with a large technical and industrial base. Infrastructure can be destroyed, personnel can be assassinated, programs can be delayed, but intent survives. In fact, coercive attacks often strengthen deterrence incentives.

If a state concludes that surrendering strategic deterrence capability increases vulnerability to regime collapse, invasion, or coercion, then pursuit of such capability becomes more attractive, not less. This logic appeared in North Korea, Pakistan, and arguably post-Libya & post-Iraq thinking across multiple states. This has reflected in Israel's state policy ever since its inception as well.

Ironically, direct attacks on Iran strengthen long-term domestic support for nuclear weaponization within Iran.

Goal 2: Regime change This is clearly an unlimited goal. Once regime survival becomes threatened, negotiations become structurally difficult because compromise begins resembling surrender. The United States has repeatedly engaged in regime change operations or regime destabilization efforts across multiple regions and eras:

• Iran in 1953 • Iraq in 2003 • Afghanistan across the late 1900s & early 2000s. • multiple Latin American states during the Cold War

The long-term stabilization record of externally imposed regime restructuring is mixed at best, especially in states with strong ideological institutions or fragmented political environments. Iran presents additional complications:

• IRGC internal control structures • ideological cohesion • domestic surveillance capability • and comparatively strong state institutions relative to many collapsed regional states

Public uprising alone is unlikely to remove the regime under current conditions unless significant internal fractures emerge within the state apparatus itself.

| Israel | Israeli goals broadly align with American goals, though Israeli rhetoric is often more explicit and less strategically ambiguous. Israel seeks:

• removal or degradation of Iranian nuclear capability, • degradation of Iranian proxy networks, • and reduction of long-term existential threats.

Again, regional dominance itself is not necessarily the terminal objective. The end objective is preventing the emergence of hostile military conditions capable of threatening Israeli national survival. Historically, multiple neighbouring states openly called for Israel’s destruction. Although many surrounding states today lack either the political will or military capability for such ambitions, Israeli security doctrine remains deeply shaped by those earlier periods.

This produces a security posture heavily leaning toward pre-emption and escalation control.

| Iran | Goal 1: Regime and state survival Iran’s primary operational goal is survival. More specifically:

• maintain sufficient military capability, • preserve critical infrastructure, • maintain internal control, • preserve energy and economic functionality, • and avoid collapse into state paralysis.

This is actually a relatively limited and clearly definable objective. Iran does not need total victory to claim strategic survival. It merely needs to remain functional enough to preserve continuity of the state and regime.

Goal 2: Raise costs for Gulf cooperation with the United States Iran seeks to pressure Gulf states away from deeper military cooperation with the US and Israel by threatening:

• oil infrastructure, • desalination infrastructure, • energy facilities, • shipping, • and American regional bases.

This is where Iran’s goals become more structurally unlimited. Iran is attempting to coerce multiple sovereign states into distancing themselves from the world’s dominant military and financial power despite those states being deeply economically integrated into the American-led global system. The Gulf states prioritize stability and economic continuity. Threatening the very infrastructure underpinning their prosperity is more likely to increase hostility toward Iran than produce strategic alignment with it.

Goal 3: Use economic disruption as coercive leverage The Strait of Hormuz becomes important here. Iran does not necessarily need to fully close Hormuz permanently. Even partial disruption or credible threat escalation can significantly affect:

• shipping insurance, • energy prices, • investor confidence, • and global markets.

The objective is straightforward: raise global economic costs sufficiently that external actors pressure the United States and Israel toward de-escalation. This is coercive leverage through economic vulnerability.

| Why This Conflict Is Structurally Dangerous |

The problem with this conflict is that several actors are pursuing operationally limited actions in service of fundamentally unlimited political objectives, which creates escalation traps.

1. If Iran submits fully to American-Israeli coercion, it validates the idea that sufficiently powerful states can use military and economic force to dictate the sovereign behavior of weaker states. That precedent has consequences far beyond Iran.

2. If Iran successfully uses proxy warfare, regional strikes, and maritime coercion to force concessions while continuing regional destabilization activities, that also creates a dangerous precedent.

Neither side wants to concede reputational defeat. This is why the conflict lacks a clean victory condition. States pursue nuclear deterrence because they believe survival without it is uncertain. Every direct military confrontation with Iran risks strengthening exactly that belief.

| The Real Strategic Failure |

The easiest war to exit is the one never started. The Obama-era nuclear negotiations represented an attempt to contain Iranian capability through incentives, monitoring, and economic integration rather than direct escalation. Sanctions represented a more coercive middle ground. Periodic limited strikes against specific military capabilities would also fall into the category of limited operational objectives. Whether any of these approaches were sustainable long-term is debatable.

What is far less debatable is that once conflicts become tied to regime survival, national survival, deterrence credibility, and ideological legitimacy, clean exits become extremely difficult. At that point, every actor begins fearing that compromise itself may invite future vulnerability. That is when conflicts stop being about achievable objectives and start becoming contests of endurance.