What is the US endgame in Iran, as the war escalates? 

More than two decades after the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, the United States, alongside Israel, has launched a war against Iran that has now entered its second week. Yet as the missile strikes on Iran mount, so do the shifting and at times contradictory positions articulated by US President Donald Trump on what the United States is truly after — leading to a central question: What is Washington’s endgame?

US forces have struck nearly 2,000 targets in Iran since the war began, eliminating several top Iranian officials, including the country’s then-Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in Tehran. Subsequent attacks have targeted nuclear facilities, civilian areas and critical infrastructure such as oil refineries and a desalination plant.

Iran has retaliated by launching hundreds of missiles and thousands of drones targeting Israel and Gulf neighbours. Tehran says the attacks were aimed at military bases used by the US, as well as energy infrastructure, US embassies and civilian areas.

So far, the US and Israeli attacks have killed more than 1,200 Iranians, including more than 160 children killed when a school was bombed. Seven American soldiers have also died. Yet, analysts argue, Trump and his administration have never clearly explained how they want this war to end.

We unpack some of the positions Trump has taken over the past 10 days of war, how they’ve played out since then, and how realistic those scenarios are:

Regime change — by making the Iranian establishment collapse

The attacks on February 28 started with the killing of Khamenei, who had led Iran as supreme leader for 37 years and had previously served as the country’s president.

Though the Trump administration has never explicitly mentioned the words “regime change”, experts say that its actions appear to have been aimed at getting the current Iranian establishment to collapse.

“The objective of the strikes was instant capitulation of the regime and a popular uprising,” said Mustafa Hyder Sayed, executive director of the Pakistan-China Institute.

Muhanad Seloom, assistant professor of international politics and security at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, said that an “unstated bet” appeared to have guided Trump’s approach.

That approach assumed “that removing the head and enough of the body will cause the system to either collapse or become so weakened that whatever emerges cannot restore Iran’s pre-war posture”, Seloom told Al Jazeera.

In reality, despite many senior military commanders and leaders being killed, apart from Khamenei, there is little evidence so far of deep fractures within the institutions that hold up the Islamic Republic. On Sunday, Iran announced Khamenei’s successor as supreme leader — his 56-year-old son, Mojtaba Khamenei.

“I believe it was a miscalculation on the part of Trump, because they didn’t expect and understand that Iran has the resilience and the staying power to fight a long, drawn-out war,” Sayed told Al Jazeera.

A deal with the IRGC and Iranian diplomats

From the moment the so-called Operation Epic Fury was launched, Trump’s messaging has oscillated between dealmaking and the destruction of Iran.

Early on, he called on members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) to lay down their arms and surrender in exchange for immunity. Later, he asked Iranian diplomats to switch sides.

But the IRGC has been leading Iran’s counteroffensive against the US and Israel, and also driving Iran’s attacks on other Gulf countries. And Iranian diplomats have in a public letter rebuffed Trump’s offer, insisting that they remain committed to their role as representatives of the Islamic Republic.

“The IRGC has just pledged full obedience to the new supreme leader,” Seloom pointed out. “Trump has designated them a terrorist organisation. Neither side has the political space for that conversation while the bombing continues.”

Eliminate Iran’s military capabilities

Trump and his team have also repeatedly spoken of decimating Iran’s military capabilities — its ballistic missiles and facilities that manufacture them, and its navy — as key war objectives.

US and Israeli strikes have targeted Iranian naval assets, including a warship off the coast of Sri Lanka, as well as missile infrastructure. Both countries say they now control Iranian airspace.

But Seloom argued that military power alone cannot deliver the political outcome Washington may seek.

“The military instrument has been authorised far beyond what the strategic objective can deliver. The US can destroy Iran’s hardware, but it cannot manufacture a political alternative from the air,” he said.

‘Take over your government’ — but let Trump decide who leads it

Following the February 28 air strikes on Iran that launched this war, Trump said: “To the great people of Iran, I say that the hour of freedom is at hand. When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take”.

Subsequently, Trump also said that he would prefer someone inside Iran to lead a post-war government — in effect downplaying the chances of Reza Pahlavi, the son of the former shah of Iran, who has harboured ambitions of returning to Iran and leading the country despite having not stepped inside it in decades. Pahlavi lives in the US.

But Trump has also since insisted that he was opposed to Mojtaba Khamenei as Iran’s new leader — and demanded that he have a direct say in choosing the leader. Then, on March 6, he posted on his social media platform Truth Social, demanding surrender.

“There will be no deal with Iran except UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!” he wrote, adding that after the regime surrenders, “GREAT & ACCEPTABLE Leader(s)” must be selected.

Tehran’s response to Washington’s shifting demands has been consistent: no surrender, no negotiations under bombardment, and no externally imposed leadership.

Mojtaba Khamenei’s selection as Iran’s new supreme leader, say experts, is a direct rebuke to Washington’s ambitions.

Seloom believes Mojtaba’s elevation signals that the IRGC has consolidated its role as the true centre of power in Iran.

“For US goals, this is deeply inconvenient. Washington wanted the succession to be a moment of internal fracture and potential opening. Instead, it has produced a rallying effect,” he said.

“Trump called Mojtaba ‘unacceptable’ and Iran’s establishment chose him precisely because the enemy rejected him. If regime change was the goal, this appointment is evidence that it has already failed in its political dimension,” Seloom said.

Kurdish invasion — or not

Another option that the Trump administration is known to have considered involves Kurdish forces attacking the Iranian military, setting the stage for a broader uprising against the establishment.

The US maintains relationships with Kurdish groups in Iraq and a military presence near Erbil. However, deploying Kurdish fighters inside Iran would be a far more complex proposition, say analysts.

Though Kurdish leaders have confirmed that Trump has held discussions with them, experts warn that such a move could trigger wider regional tensions.

“Iranian Kurdish armed groups lack the capability, unity or logistics for anything resembling an invasion,” Seloom said. “And any serious Kurdish mobilisation would alarm Turkiye profoundly, creating a second crisis the US does not need while managing the first.”

Ground invasion

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has said that Iran is prepared for the possibility of a US ground invasion.

Trump and his administration have refused to rule out putting boots on the ground.

But Kamran Bokhari, senior director at the US-based New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy, said Trump’s domestic political calculations — he won on an anti-war platform — and the lingering shadow of US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan mean that a ground invasion would be difficult for the president to pull off.

“Ground troops are the most unlikely option given the president’s political imperatives and the failures in Iraq and Afghanistan,” he said.

Israel has long treated Iran as its biggest enemy.

But Mahjoob Zweiri, director of the Gulf Studies Center at Qatar University, said that Israel sees the current war as part of a wider project to reshape the region following the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023.

“What Israel plans to do is essentially use October 7 as a pretext for what they call reshaping the Middle East, exactly as the United States did after 9/11,” he said.

“Israel wants to eliminate, marginalise and defeat every potential player capable of challenging it, including Iran.”

What’s a realistic endgame for the US?

Amid all of the contrasting goals that Trump and his team have laid out for the war, Andreas Krieg, associate professor of security studies at King’s College London, told Al Jazeera that the most practical option for the US remained a coercive settlement rather than a ground war.

“Washington could still be open to an understanding with elements of the regime, including IRGC-linked actors, if those actors were willing to protect the state while conceding enough on missiles, nuclear restrictions and regional behaviour to let Trump claim success,” he told Al Jazeera.

Sayed of the Pakistan-China Institute said Trump’s pragmatism could ultimately shape the outcome.

“Trump is quite a pragmatist. He would like to make a deal, declare that the US has achieved its goals, and conclude the war,” he said.

“He can redefine victory, say Khamenei has been killed, the armed forces destroyed, and end it. A ground invasion would mean a political setback domestically and losing the midterms.”