Two things, technology and diplomacy rub up against each other in this mighty foray to crack the axis of evil. Here we join them together. Kissinger said diplomacy must be backed by force, which is here rigorously satisfied. U.S. technology is being showcased on the world stage. Nevertheless, there is an element of gamble. As Clausewitz remarked, the enemy doesn’t do what you want him to do; he does what he wants to do.

Remarks appear in the press about the ineffective efforts in 1991 to eliminate Saddam Hussein’s mobile SCUD launchers. The current optimism is due to advances in sensor technology. In 1991, digital imaging was present in reconnaissance satellites, but it was primitive. Multiple exposures by low resolution sensors were stitched together by mechanical slewing of the imaging platform. A typical cellphone demonstrates far greater performance; a modern reconnaissance satellite is that much better than a cellphone.

Deployment of satellites to detect missile launches began in 1963 with the Missile Defense Alarm System, but the electromechanical MIDAS sensor could not form an image; it simply pointed in the direction of maximum brightness. This was followed by the Defense Support Program, but most of these satellites used “push-broom” sensors, While modern sensors have the shapes of rectangles, the push-broom sensor was in the shape of a line, with only one dimension. By rotating or pushing the line, a few images per minute could be acquired.

Many readers have heard of FLIR, but few know the origin.  It’s an obsolete acronym for a rectangular sensor, like the one in a cellphone,  that doesn’t need to be physically pushed around to form an image. All modern sensors are “FLIR”; these are used in the current Space-Based Infrared System (SBIRS) satellite constellation. SBIRS was developed partly in response to 1991 Iraq, when SCUD launchers successfully hid in the almost featureless western desert.

For the first time, the high availability and precise real time image forming ability of SBIRS permits use of satellites to counter tactical threats, such as finding launchers. complimented by the Northrop Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawk, the F35’s AN/AAQ-37 Distributed Aperture System (DAS) IR sensors, the U-2, and similar platforms.

But space-based assets are only part of the launcher kill-chain, followed by ground-based processing.  Computational photography renders details invisible to the human eye-brain system, merging into AI classification, with details useful to the running tally.  With only minutes before a launcher vanishes, the next step is to compute the response. What assets, with what strike packages are, available to satisfy the cost functional? Drone, loitering munition, “bomb truck”, F-35?

This is a global optimization problem, related to  the “traveling salesman problem”. In 1985, Hopfield and Tank solved it “near-optimally” with a neural network, reviving AI from its first winter. The answer comes in a few seconds, because the AI knows the status of every available weapon.

Launchers are being eliminated more rapidly than anticipated. There is no precedent for this; hence the results may be unprecedented, coming a little bit closer to boots on the ground. An undefined percentage of Iran’s rocket bases may be under granite rock, beyond the reach of even the MOP. Even with the mixed sedimentary-metamorphic stratigraphy of Fordow, multiple MOPs were applied in multiple hits to “drill down” existing ventilation shafts. Access to these bases is via adits, a.k.a. horizontal tunnels. Tens of yards of these can be collapsed, but the damage is repairable, compared to Fordow, which undermined the mountain itself. And the terrain outside an adit can be altered to impede guidance of a munition to the most vulnerable point of impact.

Hence a purely kinetic solution to Iran’s missile bases may not be possible.  A trade may be envisioned. Destruction of Iran’s industrial base is feasible. At some point, the surviving power structure may be amenable to sacrificing the bases in exchange for remaining infrastructure. This assumes some minimal commonality of values. Sometimes there is, sometimes not. North Vietnam is most pertinent. This ingenious culture valued infrastructure, yet was completely willing to sacrifice it for a political goal. The self-destructive Taliban are another.

Confounding the comparison is the complete split of Iran between pro-West and theocratic elements. If the theocracy capitulates, they may not survive in a new Iran. The fluidity, and the multiple branches of different futures suggest:

• Multiple U.S. strategies are in play. Rather than define the goal at the outset it is legitimate to allow the goal develop over time.
• Destroy industrial base until or unless an opportunity for a trade for the bases manifests. Thorough destruction of these bases requires either Iran’s accession to boots-on-the ground demolition teams, or radical political change.
• Set the stage for revolution, which involves getting guns to the street. As this is written, there is news that the CIA is working with the Kurds. (CNN) CIA working to arm Kurdish forces to spark uprising in Iran, sources say. Another possibility: Sistan and Baluchestan.
• Although the periphery presents opportunities for pressure by destabilization, a core Persian insurgency would greatly favor a good outcome. It is also hardest to achieve.
• Temporary chaos should not be feared. It is an opportunity.

Opinion variously judges Trump’s gamble by international law, human rights advocacy, risk, exit strategy, and domestic politics. None of these frameworks are adequate for the question. Ultimately, it will be judged by results, and later, by history.