An old warfighter's proverb is "Amateurs study tactics; professionals study logistics." The proverb is commonly attributed to Gen. Omar Bradley, although an earlier version has been attributed to Marine Gen. Robert H. Barrow.
In the last six months, and particularly in the last two, we've seen a lot of amateurs denouncing the strategy in the Iran War. This, along with some "professionals" like the editors of Foreign Policy, who announced, "Trump Is Losing the War in Iran."
Related: Trump Has Already Won in Iran, by Any Definition That Matters
Last March.
Trump is using his superpower: making people think he's a buffoon while he does what he wants. Right now, while people complain he doesn't know what he's doing and can't bring himself to actually win the war, he's focusing on using a classic strategy to bring about the Iran goals he's been stating since before his first term. Since people's memory about Trump is short, sometimes conveniently, let's just recall the main points.
Absolute priority: no Iranian nuclear weapons.
Curtailing their ballistic missile programs.
The IRGC and its surrogates like Hamas and Hezbollah must be disrupted, and Iranian support ended.
Economic and military — when necessary — means should be used to achieve these goals.
Trump and his administration have focused on one of the classic military strategies: the siege.
Siege warfare is the strategy of surrounding a fortified position to isolate it from external support, cut off supplies, and either compel surrender or weaken the opponent to the point where they cannot resist military action or internal revolt.
In Shakespeare's Henry V, he has the governor of Harfleur express the results of a siege:
Governor: Our expectation hath this day an end.
The Dauphin, whom of succors we entreated,
Returns us that his powers are yet not ready
To raise so great a siege. Therefore, great king,
We yield our town and lives to thy soft mercy.
Enter our gates; dispose of us and ours,
For we no longer are defensible. — Henry
V Act 3, Scene 3.
Trump's siege of Iran actually has two tactics that combine to affect the siege: militarily, the government was decapitated, with Israeli intelligence's complete penetration providing targets and often very focused strikes. As well as killing the top tiers of the military, many of the leading Iranian atomic scientists were killed as well. It's worth noting that while military figures have seconds in command, and political leaders always have someone who wants to move up, physicists are much harder to replace, so this in itself was a step toward the first goal.
At the same time, its Navy reduced to speedboats, Army installations largely destroyed, many IRGC sites destroyed. Iran's military is nearly impotent at this point.
The second tactic is economic: Iranian oil exports are down near zero, imports such as they are are reduced to a trickle coming in by expensive overland routes and the Caspian Sea — where their seaports have been struck by Ukraine.
Related: Trump Weighs Massive Escalation in Iran As Houthis Threaten to Close the Red Sea's Critical Strait
Iran has attempted to use the Strait of Hormuz as leverage by trying to close it to shipping, but the U.S. blockade in response increased the impact of the siege.
The result of the siege on Iran economically has been massive. Some examples:
Today and tomorrow will be historic.
— Amjad Taha أمجد طه (@amjadt25) August 23, 2026
The Islamic regime in Iran FEARS the DOLLAR and its own people more than missiles and bombs. Today marks the BEGINNING of the END of this regime. Washington is bringing down the economic hammer with brutal sanctions. This move is about…
Not looking good for IRGC. pic.twitter.com/J6ESVpRXmA
— Zineb Riboua (@zriboua) August 23, 2026
This morning, the U.S. Treasury has increased the economic pressure in what Sec. Bessant has termed an "Economic D-Day."
Nations that, in courting reprieve from Tehran, continue to replenish the very regime from which they seek protection — and now exceed the limits of America’s tolerance.
President Trump is doing what his predecessors refused by ending a threat they resigned themselves to managing. For decades, the political class accepted an endless cycle of provocation instead of advancing American interests. Not another generation should be condemned to the menace of fanatics who devote themselves to “death to America” and fulfilling the regime’s nuclear ambitions. And total financial isolation can obviate the need for American force while enlarging the sphere of freedom for our allies.
Those who sever Iran’s remaining financial and commercial connectivity will reinvigorate their own. They will deepen their access to global capital, reinforce confidence in their markets and attain the standing they seek in the world economy.
The alternative for those who tether themselves to Tehran is the foreclosure of any path to lasting prosperity. Illicit finance will flourish, as it so often does, where confidence has collapsed. And any nation that serves as a financial artery of a withering regime should expect to share in its isolation. To become a sanctuary for terror is to become, in the eyes of the United States, a global pariah.
Iran has already cut itself off from one of its few remaining Gulf friends by shooting missiles at the United Arab Emirates.
Of course, Iran is blustering back.
Iran’s latest National Security Adviser Moshen Rezee threatens all Gulf oil exporters:
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) August 23, 2026
“If the economic war continues, not a single drop of oil will be exported٫ neither through the Strait of Hormuz nor from anywhere in the Persian Gulf. Iran will regard any country’s… pic.twitter.com/9QZajHR9mI
The point is that siege warfare has been an effective strategy for millennia. The current U.S. strategy is a modern siege: military action as needed, and immense economic pressure to make the government less and less tenable.
It's not fast, but as the governor of Harfleur found out, it can be effective.
