The United States has demonstrated that it can strike targets deep inside Iran. Whether those strikes have brought the nuclear dispute closer to resolution is far less clear.
Now, according to recent reporting, Washington has warned regional allies to prepare for possible renewed military operations after the Nov. 3 midterm elections. President Donald Trump has not made a final decision.
Before another campaign begins, one question deserves a convincing answer: What would additional strikes accomplish that the earlier attacks did not?
The nuclear facilities have suffered substantial damage. Yet international inspectors still cannot verify the status of Iran’s previously declared stockpile of highly enriched uranium. The underlying security dispute remains unresolved, and another round of military operations could bring further retaliation.
The question is whether more destruction would produce a different result.
During the first wave of war, I wrote “Both Your Houses: Iran, America, and the Wages of Unchecked Power,” published in April. Among the possible outcomes I examined was a prolonged conflict in which military operations continued because the political objectives remained beyond reach.
The prospect of renewed strikes makes that possibility worth examining again.
For nearly five decades, my work has focused on complex systems, particularly the security and resilience of electric power networks. After Sept. 11, 2001, I directed infrastructure security research for North American utilities at the Electric Power Research Institute.
A lesson from that work is relevant here: The immediate effects of an attack can be measured with considerable precision. Its wider consequences are often much harder to predict.
In March, Trump threatened to obliterate Iran’s power plants, beginning with the largest.
A power station can be disabled quickly. Restoring it may take months or years. In the meantime, disruptions can spread through water treatment, hospitals, communications and other services that depend on reliable electricity.
The military significance of a target does not eliminate these consequences. Nor does the accuracy of a weapon determine the full extent of the harm it may cause.
International humanitarian law requires military planners to distinguish military objectives from civilian objects, assess expected civilian harm and take feasible precautions. Where infrastructure serves both civilian and military purposes, its status and the foreseeable consequences of an attack require careful assessment.
The same concern applies to attacks against essential infrastructure anywhere in the region.
The nuclear question presents a different, equally difficult problem.
On Oct. 27, International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Grossi told the United Nations Security Council that the agency still needed information and access to verify the status of approximately 440 kilograms of Iran’s previously declared highly enriched uranium.
He also reported that the agency had identified no activity to repair or reconstruct facilities damaged in the military attacks of 2025 and 2026. Taken together, these findings reveal both the effects and the limits of the earlier strikes.
Physical damage to nuclear facilities is significant. But it does not establish the location or condition of nuclear material, nor does it provide continuing assurance about future activities. Additional attacks might further reduce operational capacity. They could also complicate the inspections needed to establish what remains.
The distinction between damaging a nuclear program and verifying its status is fundamental.
In engineering, the condition of a complex system cannot be established through assumptions about its visible components. Reliable conclusions require measurements, access and independent verification.
Nuclear safeguards operate on the same principle.
The IAEA needs the information and access required to account for nuclear material and assess compliance with safeguards obligations. Any durable arrangement would also need credible monitoring and procedures for addressing violations.
These requirements are demanding. They are nevertheless essential to determining whether a nuclear agreement is working.
Military operations may change the conditions under which negotiations take place. They cannot perform the work of verification.
There is also a broader strategic question.
An operation can meet its immediate military objectives without producing the political outcome for which it was undertaken. The destruction of facilities may reduce capabilities while leaving the underlying disputes unresolved.
That distinction becomes particularly important when a campaign is repeated.
If the next round of strikes leaves the nuclear material unverified and the principal security concerns unresolved, what would justify the operation after that?
The risk is a sequence of increasingly costly actions in which each incomplete result becomes the reason for another attempt.
This is not inevitable. Military pressure can influence negotiations, and credible security threats cannot simply be disregarded. The relevant question is whether a proposed operation has a realistic path from its immediate military effects to an achievable and lasting outcome.
That path needs to be explained before the operation begins.
Recent diplomatic efforts offer another consideration. Iran has indicated through mediators that it remains open to discussions, although substantial differences persist. Negotiations may fail, and any agreement would require independent verification rather than assurances from either side.
But an unresolved negotiation and an unsuccessful military campaign should be judged by the same standard: whether they improve the prospects for a durable settlement.
The most useful comparison is therefore between achievable outcomes, including their risks and uncertainties.
What additional nuclear capabilities would the proposed strikes remove? How would the remaining material be accounted for? What inspections would follow? How would renewed military operations affect the possibility of reaching and maintaining an agreement?
These are practical questions. Their answers should shape the decision.
Congress has a responsibility to examine the administration’s objectives, legal authority and evidence before further escalation. The administration, in turn, should explain what has changed since the earlier operations and how it would determine whether another campaign had succeeded.
My concern is informed by years of studying failures in interconnected infrastructure. Damage to one component can be repaired while the wider system continues to suffer. Recovery depends on understanding the relationships that made the system function in the first place.
Military strategy requires similar attention to what happens after an operation is completed.
The United States has the capacity to strike Iran again. The consequences of doing so deserve rigorous examination, especially when the earlier attacks have not resolved the central nuclear verification problem.
Before another campaign begins, the administration should establish how it would bring that problem closer to a lasting solution.
The ability to destroy another target is not, by itself, an answer.
Massoud Amin is professor emeritus at the University of Minnesota, an IEEE and ASME Fellow, and a pioneer of the self-healing smart grid. He previously directed infrastructure security research for North American utilities at the Electric Power Research Institute. He is the author of “Both Your Houses: Iran, America, and the Wages of Unchecked Power” (2026).
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