I. The Problem With State Signalling
Whenever states need to wage warfare they often employ a simple yet effective methodology which seems to work again and again. They will send multiple signals through various agencies and institutions which will give hope that they will not be waging warfare while preparing a serious military force behind the scenes which aims to catch the enemy off guard.
Consider February 24, 2022, Russia attacked Ukraine.
To understand what followed, it is worth revisiting what the expert community was saying in the months before that date. Nearly every major outlet was publishing analysis after analysis, with security experts and political scientists converging on the same conclusion: Russia would not invade Ukraine. Their reasoning varied. The confidence did not.
One piece argued that a full-scale war in Ukraine “does not really fit into how the Kremlin has used hard power in its geopolitical games. The examples of Georgia, Syria, Libya, and (so far) Ukraine, show that it pursues a cost-efficient policy” (Al Jazeera, 2022). Another offered that Putin was “not about to give the green light for the Russian army to invade Ukraine” and that “suggestions to the contrary from Western officials are unhelpful” (Modern Diplomacy, 2021). A third compiled a list of reasons why a full-scale Russian invasion might not happen (BBC News, 2022).
These were not fringe blogs. These were institutions with dedicated foreign policy desks, sourced analysts, and years of regional expertise. It is worth noting that some analysts and intelligence agencies, including elements of US and UK intelligence, did assess escalation as a serious possibility in the weeks before the invasion. The failure examined here was one of dominant public consensus, not universal blindness. But that consensus was wrong, and understanding why requires examining which framework produced it and what a different one would have seen.
This article applies a framework that prioritises structural constraints, documented red lines, and observable force posture over stated intent. It does not treat what states say as worthless. It treats it as the least reliable input available, and argues that the analytical community has, in both cases examined here, inverted that priority.
II. Why the Analysts Were Wrong About Russia
War is not a policy instrument in isolation. It is an expression of ideology, identity, institutional memory, and structural interest. Understanding how a state goes to war requires reading its doctrine, its history, and its perception of threat. Not its press releases.
The accumulated weight of structural conditions made significant Russian military escalation against Ukraine highly likely well before February 2022. The conditions had been being built for years, and none of them were obscure. They required no classified intelligence to observe.
The foundational issue was NATO expansion. Russia had communicated, repeatedly and explicitly, that it viewed NATO’s eastward growth as a direct security threat. The prospect of Ukraine joining the alliance, which would place NATO military infrastructure directly on Russia’s borders, was not a negotiating concern. It was a structural impossibility within Russian strategic doctrine. That position had been consistent for over a decade before the invasion.
Russia also had concrete territorial interests in Crimea and the Donbas, rooted in a combination of ethnic, historical, and logistical factors that its leadership had never been subtle about. The notion that Russia would absorb those pressures indefinitely while Ukraine moved closer to Western integration was, in retrospect, an optimistic assumption dressed up as analysis.
The consensus error was assigning disproportionate weight to Russian statements and insufficient weight to Russian posture and structural interest. Major powers routinely use obfuscation, strategic ambiguity, and carefully managed public language to conceal operational intent. Russia did not technically lie when it said it would not invade Ukraine. It has maintained since February 2022 that it conducted a “special military operation,” not a war. That distinction is legally and rhetorically deliberate. Treating it as evidence of genuine restraint was the analyst’s error, not Russia’s deception.
The clearest signal came when Russia announced joint military exercises with Belarus. The announcement was treated largely as routine. However, amassing such a volume of forces on a border under the cover of a training exercise and then redeploying them into combat is not a novel tactic. The scale and positioning of those forces was inconsistent with a temporary drill. That signal, read against Russia’s documented strategic interests and established doctrine, pointed strongly toward imminent military action.
The sustained tempo of US and allied ISR (Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance) platforms operating in the region was another publicly visible indicator pointing in the same direction. This indicator received comparatively little attention in public analysis.
III. The Iran Playbook: Structural Failure and Military Preparation
The trajectory toward military action against Iran followed a structurally similar pattern to Russia in 2022, with one variation in execution. Where Russia used military exercises as positional cover, the United States and Israel conducted military preparation concurrently with a diplomatic process that, given the publicly stated positions of both sides, was structurally unlikely to produce an agreement. Whether the process was designed with that outcome in mind is a matter of intent the available evidence does not settle. What the evidence does establish is the structural incompatibility and the parallel operational timeline.
The Structural Impossibility
The core fault line was not ambiguous. The United States, under sustained Israeli pressure, insisted that Iran’s ballistic missile programme be included in any final agreement. Iran’s position on this had been stated consistently for years. Ballistic missiles constitute Iran’s primary conventional deterrence layer. In a threat environment that includes Israeli air superiority, a large American naval presence in the Gulf, and the absence of reliable conventional military parity, surrendering that capability alongside its enrichment programme was not a concession Iran could make without rendering itself strategically indefensible.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi stated clearly that the missile programme “has never been, and never will be, part of the agenda in the nuclear talks” (Manara Magazine, 2026). Former security council secretary Admiral Ali Shamkhani reinforced this, stating that ballistic missile capabilities are “a red line that will never be placed on the negotiating table” (Fox News, 2026a). These were structural constraints, and they were entirely public.
Israel understood this. The United States understood this. Including the missile demand in the negotiating framework meant the talks were operating around an irresolvable incompatibility. Independent analysts confirmed as much: “publicly stated red lines by both sides were incompatible with each other, meaning negotiations were always likely to fail” (USC Dornsife, 2026).
The Diplomatic Timeline
In March 2025, the Trump administration sent a letter to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei setting a 60-day window for diplomatic resolution. Publicly framed as an overture, it functioned in practice more like an ultimatum given the imposed timeline. Five rounds of indirect, Oman-brokered talks followed between April and May 2025. Progress on the nuclear enrichment track was partial. On the missile question, there was no movement at all. The chief US negotiator Steve Witkoff left the fifth round of Rome talks early, citing his flight schedule (Al Jazeera, 2025). The Omani mediator noted “some but not conclusive progress” (Euronews, 2025).
On June 13, 2025, two days before a sixth round was scheduled, Israel launched pre-emptive strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, senior commanders, and key personnel. This initiated what became known as the Twelve-Day War. On June 21 and 22, the United States struck Iranian nuclear facilities at Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan. Iran struck a US air base in Qatar on June 23, and a ceasefire followed the same day.
A second round of indirect negotiations resumed in Oman and Geneva through early 2026. By February 17, Trump was telling reporters he thought Iran wanted to make a deal (USC Dornsife, 2026). By February 26, the optimism had visibly collapsed.
On February 27, 2026, Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr Al-Busaidi announced a breakthrough: Iran had agreed to never stockpile enriched uranium and to full IAEA verification. The announcement was widely reported.
At 1:15 AM on February 28, 2026, Operations Epic Fury and Roaring Lion began. The United States and Israel launched coordinated strikes across at least nine Iranian cities, targeting leadership, military installations, missile production sites, and nuclear infrastructure (CENTCOM, 2026). Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was killed in the opening salvo (BBC News, 2026). Trump announced the strikes in a social media post at 2:00 AM EST, with no address to Congress beyond a notification to the Gang of Eight (CSIS, 2026a).
The Oman breakthrough announcement had been made less than 24 hours before the strikes began and was rendered entirely irrelevant by events. The missile demand had remained the unresolved condition throughout. Whether the diplomatic process functioned to produce the conclusion that all options had been exhausted, or whether that conclusion was an incidental byproduct of a decision already made, the administration’s public justification reflected that framing precisely. A genuine concession on enrichment was announced, then set aside within a single news cycle. That detail has received less analytical attention than it warrants.
The Military Buildup: What Open-Source Reporting Indicated
The military buildup preceding the strikes was not concealed. It was simply not read correctly and was mostly regarded as a way to put pressure on Iran to accept the negotiations.
By mid-February 2026, open-source tracking teams reported more than 85 fuel tankers and over 170 cargo planes repositioning into the region (PBS NewsHour, 2026). At least 20 KC-135 Stratotankers had arrived at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, a significant increase above baseline levels (Middle East Forum, 2026). Two carrier strike groups, led by the USS Abraham Lincoln and the USS Gerald R. Ford, were positioned in the region, representing the largest reported US naval concentration in the Middle East since 2003 (CSIS, 2026b). On February 24, eleven F-22 fighters departed RAF Lakenheath in England for Ovda Airbase in southern Israel, confirmed by open-source flight tracking data and aircraft spotters, marking the first operational deployment of US combat aircraft to an Israeli base (The War Zone, 2026; Fox News, 2026b; Air and Space Forces Magazine, 2026). On February 26, satellite imagery confirmed that all US naval vessels had left their berths at the Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain, a step previously taken in June 2025 ahead of Operation Midnight Hammer. The US Navy also reduced 5th Fleet headquarters staffing to fewer than 100 mission-critical personnel (Middle East Monitor, 2026; Fox News, 2026c). The number of US Air Force refueling tankers at Ben Gurion Airport rose to fourteen, providing the carrier air wings sufficient range to reach Iranian targets (The War Zone, 2026). Flight-tracking data confirmed the movement of over 150 aircraft toward Europe and the Middle East after nuclear talks stalled (Washington Post, 2026).
Aerial refueling aircraft are not a show of force. They are an operational necessity for sustained strike campaigns conducted at range. This volume of tankers and combat aircraft, combined with the two carrier groups, three strategic bomber variants, and the drawdown of non-essential personnel from Gulf bases, was consistent with an offensive operational posture rather than a diplomatic one.
IDF spokesperson Brigadier General Effie Defrin subsequently confirmed in a Fox News interview that the operation had been preceded by months of strategic deception. “It was a strategic and operational deception,” he said. “For many long months there was deception, so they were surprised.” Senior officials deliberately maintained routine appearances the night before the strike, ensuring that satellite imagery would not indicate heightened readiness at key facilities (Fox News, 2026d). This account is drawn from post-strike official statements and should be read with that framing in mind, but it is consistent with the operational pattern and the concurrent open-source evidence.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s announced visit to Israel deserves its own note. Publicised on February 27, 2026, the same day as the Oman breakthrough, it was reported as potentially indicating “a longer timeline for any potential strike” (PBS NewsHour, 2026). The visit never took place. The strikes began the following morning.
The parallel between this and Russia’s 2022 exercise announcement is structural. In both cases, a publicly visible event was treated by analysts as evidence of a longer timeline. In both cases, it coincided with the final preparatory phase of military action. The lesson is not that diplomatic announcements are always covered. It is that they cannot be read as evidence against military preparation when the force posture indicators point the other way.
IV. What This Tells Us About How States Behave
The lesson from both cases is not that war is inevitable or that diplomacy is always theatre. The lesson is more precise and more uncomfortable: stated intentions are the least reliable signal available to a geopolitical forecaster. Instead, the signals actually seemed to be monitored are:
Structural interests show what a state genuinely requires, as opposed to what it claims to want. Russia required buffer territory and the exclusion of NATO from Ukraine’s future. The United States and Israel pursued outcomes consistent with the effective elimination of Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile capability. Neither objective was achievable through the negotiating frameworks publicly presented, and both were ultimately pursued through military means.
Adversarial red lines indicate where movement is structurally constrained regardless of pressure applied. Iran’s ballistic missile programme was not negotiable, as stated publicly and repeatedly by multiple senior officials over several years. The demand that it be included in a final agreement was not a position to be gradually softened. It was a structural incompatibility that made agreement on those terms practically unavailable.
Force posture shows where assets are actually concentrated, not where statements suggest attention is focused. The volume of tankers, carrier groups, bomber variants, and the drawdown of non-essential personnel from Gulf bases pointed toward offensive preparation well before the first strike.
Framing shifts in official language tend to be a late-stage signal. The migration from “we are engaged in productive talks” to “we have exhausted all diplomatic options” often indicates that a decision has been made and public justification is being assembled. That language appeared on schedule in both cases reviewed here.
The gap between public statements and observable operational reality is itself diagnostic. Russia said exercises. The United States said diplomacy. Both statements were technically accurate in the narrowest sense and operationally misleading in every practical one.
Analysts who anchored their forecasts to declared intent failed in both cases. A framework oriented toward structural logic, observable force positioning, and documented red lines produced a clearer picture, without classified access, than the dominant public consensus did.
V. The Long Aftermath
The strikes achieved several of their apparent objectives. They did not resolve the conditions that made conflict highly likely in the first place.
Ali Khamenei was killed on February 28, 2026. Over 5,000 targets were reportedly struck in the first ten days of operations (US Department of Defense, 2026). By early March, approximately 40 senior Iranian officials had been killed, per IDF statements (Aviation Week, 2026). Iranian naval vessels were destroyed, ballistic missile launch sites were degraded, and nuclear infrastructure was struck again at multiple sites.
Iran responded under Operation Truthful Promise 4, launching missile and drone strikes against US bases across multiple Gulf states and into Israeli territory (Recorded Future, 2026). The Strait of Hormuz was effectively closed to commercial traffic, triggering the largest reported release of strategic oil reserves in IEA history, 400 million barrels, to stabilise global supply (Iran International, 2026a).
On March 8, the Assembly of Experts elected Mojtaba Khamenei, son of the late Supreme Leader, as Iran’s third supreme leader (NPR, 2026). Trump called Mojtaba a “lightweight” and suggested that any leader selected without American approval “is not going to last long.” On March 17, Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, was confirmed killed in a US-Israeli strike. Iran’s own Supreme National Security Council acknowledged his death in a statement, noting he was killed alongside his son and senior aides (Al Jazeera, 2026c; Bloomberg, 2026).
As of this writing, Mojtaba Khamenei has not made a public video or audio appearance. His first statement, issued on March 12, was read aloud by a state television anchor alongside a still photograph (Iran International, 2026b). Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth claimed at a Pentagon briefing on March 13 that Mojtaba was “wounded and likely disfigured,” without providing evidence (Al Jazeera, 2026b). Trump stated he was “hearing he’s not alive” (Fox News, 2026e). Iran’s Foreign Minister described the new Supreme Leader as in “excellent health” and “in control of the situation.” The public record at this point offers two conflicting official accounts from governments that have each managed information strategically throughout the conflict. Neither should be accepted uncritically.
The ballistic missile capability, the strategic asymmetry that made a negotiated outcome structurally difficult from the outset, has been degraded but not eliminated. Iranian launch tempo declined through early March, consistent with stockpile attrition and possible conservation for a longer conflict horizon (Recorded Future, 2026). The technical knowledge required to rebuild those capabilities has not been destroyed. The political incentives to pursue nuclear deterrence covertly have arguably increased: a leadership that has just lost its predecessor to a joint US-Israeli strike has rational reasons to seek a capability that raises the cost of repeating the exercise.
As the conflict entered its fourth week, the geographic and economic scope had expanded well beyond the initial strike package. The Armed Conflict Location and Event Data project documented nearly 2,300 distinct conflict events across 29 of Iran’s 31 provinces, with Tehran sustaining the heaviest bombardment (Al Jazeera, 2026d). Iran had by early March fired over 500 ballistic and naval missiles and approximately 2,000 drones since February 28, with roughly 60 percent directed at US regional targets and 40 percent at Israel (Al Jazeera, 2026d). Iranian strikes penetrated Israeli defences in the south, with missiles impacting the cities of Dimona and Arad, wounding over 100 people in one of the most significant escalations of the conflict to that point (Al Jazeera, 2026e). The IRGC framed the Dimona strikes as a direct response to US-Israeli attacks on the Natanz nuclear complex, and IRGC aerospace commander Majid Mousavi publicly declared that “Israel’s skies are defenceless” (Al Jazeera, 2026e). The Strait of Hormuz remained effectively closed, with over 3,000 commercial vessels stranded and crude oil prices rising approximately 45 percent to above $110 per barrel since the war began. The Trump administration responded by temporarily lifting sanctions on Iranian oil already loaded on tankers, an attempt to ease market pressure while simultaneously threatening to “hit and obliterate” Iranian power plants if the Strait was not fully reopened within 48 hours (NPR, 2026; CNN, 2026c). Iranian drones struck Kuwait’s Mina al-Ahmadi refinery, one of the region’s largest processing facilities, in two separate waves (Al Jazeera, 2026f). The United Kingdom authorised US use of British military bases for strikes on Iranian missile sites, and the E3 agreed to back proportionate defensive military measures if required (Al Jazeera, 2026d).
On the question of operational tempo and war termination, Trump stated on March 21 that the US was “getting very close to meeting our objectives” and was considering “winding down” military efforts, while simultaneously ruling out a ceasefire agreement with Iran (NPR, 2026). The US shift to Apache helicopters and A-10 Warthog aircraft for certain attack missions was assessed by analysts as an indicator that Iranian air defence and anti-aircraft capability had been substantially degraded (NPR, 2026). The contradiction between those two signals, a declared intent to wind down alongside an expanding target set, is itself consistent with the pattern this article has traced throughout: official language and operational posture pointing in different directions at the same time. Whether this represents a genuine off-ramp or the preparatory framing for a next phase remains, as of this writing, unclear.
The strikes removed a significant figure and degraded key infrastructure. They did not alter the underlying strategic incompatibility that drove negotiations to failure. That problem remains, under a new leadership with different political incentives and, as yet, an unclear public posture.
VI. Conclusion
The argument made in this article is not that wars are always predictable in their precise timing or exact character. It is that the dominant expert consensus has repeatedly failed to anticipate wars not because the signals were absent, but because the prevailing analytical framework assigned the wrong weight to the wrong inputs.
Stated intentions are the least reliable variable in geopolitical forecasting. They are also the ones that receives the most attention. Russia said exercises. The United States said diplomacy. In both cases, a reading of structural interests, documented red lines, observable force posture, and the gap between official language and operational reality produced a more accurate picture than years of accumulated regional expertise oriented toward public statements.
The Russia-Ukraine case and the Iran case are not isolated failures. They reflect a systematic bias toward declared intent and away from structural constraints. That bias is convenient for governments managing public perception during the preparatory phase of military action, and it is costly for anyone trying to forecast what follows.
The more consequential implication is the template itself. The concurrent use of a diplomatic process and military preparation, with the diplomatic process functioning as both time management and public justification, is now a documented and replicable pattern. It succeeded in 2022. It succeeded again twice in four years, in 2025 and 2026. There is no structural reason to assume it will not be employed again, in other theatres, by actors who have watched it work.
The question for analysts and policymakers is not whether they had access to the right information. In both cases reviewed here, much of the relevant information was publicly available. The question is whether they applied the right framework to it. As long as the dominant answer to that question is to read what governments say and treat it as primary evidence, the next conflict will also arrive as a surprise to most of the people whose job it is to see it coming.
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