Afrasianet - Laila Nicola - The U.S.-Iran war is based on a fundamental difference in the understanding of deterrence and escalation, as Washington relies on the threat of pressure while Tehran bets on resilience and expanding the cost of confrontation.
On August 1, 2026, US President Donald Trump returned to a pattern that had been repeated at many stages of the US-Iran war: verbal escalation and threats that included threatening to target Iranian infrastructure or launch large-scale strikes on Iran, before reversing the more extreme scenario and talking about diplomatic tracks.
This round of threats and retreat is no exception, as this tactic has been used repeatedly over the past months, and it seems that the US president is using it as a psychological and political pressure tool aimed at modifying the adversary's behavior and pushing Iran to make concessions, rather than an actual return to a comprehensive confrontation (at least temporarily).
The phenomenon of mutual threats and the failure to adopt the "maximum pressure" rhetoric that maximizes the threat reflect a profound difference in the understanding of the meaning of force, escalation, and deterrence, as well as the limits of military capability when the war itself becomes a complex political and strategic equation.
Difference in understanding the threat messages
The main problem with the Trump administration is that Iran is not receiving threatening messages in the same way as expected. The United States views escalation as a way to force Iran to back down and make concessions, while Tehran sees retreat under pressure as encouraging further targeting and undermining the elements of deterrence it has built over months of war.
From the Iranian perspective, demonstrating the ability to expand the conflict to the countries of the region, including Jordan more recently, represents a strategic tool for rebalancing in the face of American military superiority that is difficult to confront directly. Therefore, Iran adopts what can be described as "horizontal escalation," that is, expanding the scope of the cost of confrontation with the Americans to include multiple parties and arenas, with the aim of changing the calculus of the stronger party and convincing it that the continuation of the pressure will be more costly than containing it.
Initial U.S. and Israeli assessments that assumed the regime's rapid fall, or that increased military pressure would push Iran back, prove to be wrong.
The past months have shown that the Iranian leadership has prepared for all possible scenarios, benefiting from the gaps exposed by the first confrontation in June 2025, and benefiting from the experience of dealing with attempts to destabilize the internal instability that are currently being threatened as well.
Statements by U.S. President Donald Trump in April 2026 sparked controversy He said that the United States sent weapons to Iranian opponents through Kurdish mediators, while Israeli reports and statements spoke of Israeli roles in supporting the anti-Iranian movement, but this did not lead to the overthrow of the regime, and it is not expected that it will succeed if it is implemented now.
A divergent appreciation of the role of time
The Iranian approach is based on the assumption that resilience is itself an element of strength. This approach is based on the assumption that conflicts are not always resolved through direct military superiority, but through the ability of the parties to bear the burdens and sustain confrontation for long periods, which indicates Iran's ability to continue confrontation and move from reaction to action, despite high pressures.
Here, the two sides differ in their assessment of the role of time in the conflict. The U.S. decision is largely influenced by domestic political and economic considerations, and by the need to show tangible results within a specific period of time before this year's midterm elections, where policy toward Iran is expected to be one of the issues in the domestic political debate. Iran, on the other hand, is more willing to deal with the conflict as a long-term process, betting on changing regional and international conditions and on the erosion of the willingness of adversaries to bear the cost of continuing the confrontation.
An important factor is also the different priorities of the two parties. The United States views many of the Middle East's crises as part of a broader set of international challenges, forcing it to distribute its resources and interests among multiple regions, as reflected in the Pentagon's statement on the impact of depleting missile stockpiles on the confrontation with China. Iran, on the other hand, treats the conflict with the United States as an issue that is directly related to its national security, existence, and regional position, and thus the level of willingness to take risks or costs is very high.
The real challenge in the U.S.-Iran war, which is currently underway at a low pace, is not just about managing force, but about managing mutual perceptions. It is clear that each side has a different perception of deterrence, a different standard of success, and a different appreciation of what escalation means. Thus, the continued gap between these two visions makes it difficult to reach a stable end to the conflict, or sustainable security arrangements in the region, in the foreseeable future.
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