The US will shift focus to striking targets deeper within Iran after having taken almost complete control of the country’s airspace, Washington’s defense secretary said.
American forces were also keen to destroy Iran’s navy to protect shipping through the Persian Gulf, sinking an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean.
The change in priorities came as the war expanded further beyond Iran’s borders, with NATO forces intercepting a missile in Turkey, Azerbaijan accusing Tehran of firing a drone at its biggest airport, and Gulf capitals again coming under attack.
Increasingly, “the possibility of [the war’s] expansion, into Asia and elsewhere, is no longer theoretical,” a geopolitical analyst wrote in The Diplomat.