An Israeli colleague who visited me in Dubai recently asked for reassurance about the US-Iran agreement that may or may not materialize. I gave an unexpected answer: despite the headlines, the agreement holds little interest for me, and not because of disdain.
My concern is what follows the headlines, the burdensome question that many avoid: How are we preparing for the next war once Iran restores its missile capability, regains financial solvency, and resumes support for terrorism in the region?
When will it happen, what will it look like, how will it unfold, and how will the region face it again?
The question about the agreement is valid, but it remains on the surface. Agreements are tactics. The structural reality is different. Iranian history shows a recurring cycle: periods of calm have preserved the expansionist project.
They have given Tehran time to recover, reorganize, and rearm for the next round.
The regime is aggressive by nature, treats de-escalation as a chance to circumvent, and responds only to a painful cost that threatens its survival. So the agreement – if it materializes – will prolong the threat rather than end it.
That is why I see it as only part of the picture. The real issue is the consequences years later, not the day an agreement is signed. Understanding the situation starts with asking why Iran will rebuild its military capabilities.
Iran’s security doctrine relies on three pillars instead of a conventional air force: strategic depth, the proxy network, and missiles and drones.
These tools are more than hardware. The regime sees them as the guarantee of its survival. Losing them in war strikes the core of its doctrine, not only its stockpiles.
Rebuilding is therefore inevitable. A regime that views missiles and proxies as vital to its existence will cling to them, regardless of how long calm lasts or how severe sanctions become.
Pressure and exhaustion do not deter it. They harden its resolve. Tehran may emerge exhausted, but its exhaustion fuels vengeance, not prudence. The comeback is not speculation. It reflects the regime’s nature.
The timing of renewed danger is complex, governed by three separate tracks.
The first is financial: when will Iran regain solvency and spending power? This depends on sanctions relief, unfrozen funds, and oil revenues. Here the agreement matters.
It could fund rearmament or delay it through inspections.
So what I dismissed may actually determine the timing of my concern.
The second is industrial: when will Tehran rebuild missile and drone production?
The answer is faster than optimists estimate. Technical knowledge survives bombing, factories can be rebuilt, and expertise remains with its owners. Many military experts estimate restoration will take several months to two years, not a full decade.
The third is regional – the slowest and hardest. Rebuilding the proxy network depends on people, loyalties, and war-worn geography, not factories.
This is likely the longest phase. The danger peaks when the three tracks converge: available funds, restored production, and rebuilt proxies. Any lag in one delays them all. Several observers place that convergence somewhere in the middle to late part of the decade, if the tracks advance together.
The next war will look different
Timing is debatable. The character of the next war matters equally for serious preparation. Iran’s lessons from this war will define its next arsenal. It will likely adapt the model rather than repeat it.
It may decentralize further, dispersing production and launch sites underground and in civilian areas, complicating preventive strikes. It may favor cheap quantity over quality, overwhelming costly defenses with drone swarms costing under a few thousand dollars each.
The undeniable point: the next war will be about cost as much as firepower.
This raises the practical question of readiness. Serious preparation rests on three axes. First, defense must be sustainable as well as effective. The current round proved interception is possible but expensive. Future readiness requires a low-cost interception layer, so the shield is not financially exhausted before it is breached.
Second is the preventive strike. Infrastructure must be struck while fragile, not after Iran rebuilds. This approach troubles concerned capitals, torn between “mowing the grass,” periodic strikes to prevent buildup, and waiting for the threat to mature.
The right course, with Israel in the lead, is periodic mowing, not waiting.
Third is the most critical front: blocking the flow of money, technology, and spare parts that restart factories. Here, the agreement must be treated as a weapon rather than an afterthought.
Its inspection and sanctions provisions will set the pace of Iran’s comeback more than any airstrike. They must be tightened fully.
Open talk of readiness revives an old political debate. Iran follows it. It knows its adversaries are preparing and is planning its own next war. Some argue that adversary readiness drives its arming. That view reverses cause and effect.
The regime is rebuilding for its own expansionist motives rather than in response to a threat. Halting preparation will not halt Iran. It will read it as weakness, and push further. Laxity will not curb its aggression. It will give it a free hand.
The writer is a UAE political analyst and former Federal National Council candidate.