U.S. Officials: Sanctions Hurt Iran More Than Bombs
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- Senior U.S. officials believe President Trump's economic assault on Iran may ultimately do more damage to the regime in Tehran than his bombing campaign
- Trump's economic strategy has drawn only a fraction of the attention devoted to his military strikes, while U.S. intelligence and open-source media reports point to a deepening economic crisis inside Iran
Why it matters: If senior officials are correct, the economic lever — not the bombs — is doing the structural damage to Iran's regime, meaning the most consequential U.S. policy tool is also the least visible one. That gap between public focus (on strikes) and official assessment (on economic pressure) reframes which part of the Trump administration's Iran posture actually matters.
