[Pasdaran general] Jafari warned that if attacked, Iran would strike back, including choking off the strategic Strait of Hormuz, a narrow outlet for oil tankers leaving the
Persian Gulf. ...
Jafari also warned that an attack against Iran will also prompt Muslims, including Shiites, to harm U.S. and Israeli interests throughout the Middle East in retaliation to any attack against Iran. He mentioned the Tehran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
So Iran launches missiles at Israel, tries to block Hormuz and otherwise tear of the Persian Gulf region, and orders proxies like Hizbollah and Hamas to strike Israel and the Mahdi Army to hit America in Iraq. This is about what I figured.
Which means that Iran has given us notice that any strike against Iran's nuclear programs needs to be much broader right off the bat in order to damage Iran's retaliatory capabilities.
This is the basic problem of hoping Israel can solve our Iran problem for us. Israel cannot conduct such a broad attack. Even assuming you add in Israel's submarine capability and perhaps some special forces/intel direct action people, that 100-aircraft practice run (which included support aircraft and helicopters in the total rather than being 100 strike aircraft) does not mean Israel can conduct the breadth of strikes needed for long enough to really cripple the mullahs.
Strategypage sees the exercise as a signal to Iran and not as practice for a strike on Iran:
Unmistakable signs of preparations for an air strike on Iran? Probably not. This looks more like an Information War operation, intended to put some fear into the hearts of anti-Semitic Iranian leaders who insist that someday, somehow, they will destroy Israel.
Still, I imagine the Israelis will conduct such an inadequate raid if they feel they have no choice but to let Iran go nuclear. Better to buy time than live under the Iranian nuclear shadow, I assume.
It is good to know all these things ahead of time. Do not be confused. I don't think we can get away with a "surgical" strike--ours or Israel's--that eliminates Iran's nuclear threat.
If we strike Iran, it will look an awful lot like war.
