Lessons from leadership decapitation and Iran’s mosaic defense

Decapitation is a strategy of deliberate targeted removal of national or organizational leaders to effect collapse of opponents’ regime/chain of command. The strategy may be applied through capturing/hijacking top leaders (US forces capturing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife) or assassination (US and Israel joint strike campaign against Iran in February 2026). However, opinion on the efficacy of decapitation strategy is divided.

Critics point at several counterproductive outcomes that the strategy may generate or even worsen the situation including intensification of patriotic and nationalistic fervor, sense of belonging, and “psychological reactance” which is described in psychology as “boomerang effect.” The strategy is flawed as it complicates subsequent negotiations if central leadership is decapitated and more radicalized leadership takes over. Many experts question legality of assassinating national leadership on the basis of disregard for the due course of law and international humanitarian law. Often, the environment might take a dangerous turn and result in unexpected negative consequences for regional and global security.

On 28 February 2026, the US and Israel jointly launched decapitation strikes, targeting top Iranian leadership, in a high intensity military campaign under operation code named “Epic Fury.” According to The US Institute for the Study of War (ISW) and the Critical Threats Project (CTP) at the American Enterprise Institute, The United States and Israel have launched a strike campaign into Iran in order to topple the Islamic Republic of Iran, among other objectives. In a video statement President Trump called on the Iranian people to rise up against their regime.  The initial attacks targeted Iran’s Presidential Compound, the Supreme National Security Council building, and various IRGC headquarters. Simultaneously military targets were also engaged to degrade Iran’s retaliatory capacity and create response paralysis.

Cumulatively, the strike campaign has resulted in the death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Defense Council Secretary Ali Shamkhani, (IRGC Commander Major General Mohammad Pakpour, Defense Minister Brigadier General Aziz Nasir Zadeh, and Intelligence and Security Minister Esmail Khatib. In a video statement President Trump stated that the objectives are: to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, “raze” the Iranian missile program to the ground,” “annihilate” Iranian naval forces, and prevent the Axis of Resistance from harming US forces in the Middle East. Separately the IDF also released a video that stated that it seeks to “remove existential threats” to Israel, including the Iranian nuclear and missile programs and Axis of Resistance.

The US and Israel joint military campaign against Iran did not produce the anticipated outcomes. The primary objective of regime change through assassination of top leadership and expected mass uprising did not happen rather rejuvenated Iranian nationalism in the face of aggression. Perhaps Washington and Tel Aviv failed to fully contemplate the “boomerang effect” of carrying out decapitation strikes in disregard of Iran’s history, culture and martyrdom spirit.

Militarily, Iran’s retaliatory capacity could not be neutralized despite overwhelming power, real-time battlefield information, communication and satellite systems that provide complete air superiority over the airspace and thus enable strikes against targets throughout Iran, more so, with least interception. As anticipated by analysts around the world, Iran’s retaliatory response was quick and effective but what has surprised many observers is, its endurance, consistency and sustainability in attacking military targets in Israel, and US bases in Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia. Reports suggest that Iran has been preparing for such a military showdown for decades and deeply studied Iran-Iraq war and the US military operations across the globe.

Lessons from these conflicts led to strategies of asymmetric warfare, decentralization, optimal utilization of ground for protection of missile and drones launch sites, and reliance hardened missile/drone production facilities. Ali Larijani, Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council in an interview said, “We are definitely more powerful than before. We have prepared in the past seven, eight months. We found our weaknesses and fixed them.” More significantly Iran’s preparations focused around designating four layers of succession of top leadership and “decentralized mosaic defense” aiming at raising the cost for attackers in a protracted war.

Report carried by Al Jazeera explains that central premise of Iran’s doctrine implies that war is not decided only by relative military capability at the outset. It is also shaped by time, endurance, adaptability and the ability to survive the opening shock. The strategy allows for independent decisions by regional commanders in case of communication breakdown or decapitation of central command, for a protracted war. It does not aim to generate immediate effects rather erode the political, economic, and military capacity of the opponent, simultaneously leveraging global energy market shocks by effectively closing the Strait of Hormuz and managing interruptions in Bab al Mandab.

Over the years Iran closely watched the US operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya and invested in decentralization, dispersion, and redundancy to absorb the first blow. A US former command pilot said, “Concretely, that meant expecting air defense suppression, command-and-control strikes, loitering drones, and leadership targeting.” Under the auspices of IRGC, Iran’s military structure was reorganized into 31 self-contained commands (one for each province) incorporating Basij and local militias to resist not only foreign aggression but also overcome public agitation against the regime, proxies form part of the expanded “mosaic”.

The fact that Iran is standing up to the US and Israel’s attacks and maintaining retaliatory capacity is an expression that it has learned from the past experience and closely studied the US military conflicts over the past decades. Apart from geopolitical and geo-economic lessons, there is much to learn from the ongoing war especially the impact of decapitation of top leadership and Iran’s doctrine of “decentralized mosaic defense.”

The first lesson is learning from past experience and closely studying the adversary’s war playbook, preparing innovative counter strategies to offset adversary’s military superiority and exploit vulnerabilities with consequences at local, regional and global levels. The second lesson is building a concentric society that remains united in challenging times even if top leadership is decapitated. Leadership continuity through designation of layers of succession is essential.

The third lesson which is of high consequence, is military restructuring into decentralized yet potent regional, theatre or territorial commands to survive, sustain and press on with the aim to keep raising the cost for the adversary. The fourth lesson is operational endurance through logistical viability and more importantly protecting the defense industrial base from external shocks. The fifth lesson is innovation, adaptation and capitalizing on the strength of geography. Last but not the least, the sixth lesson involves preparing for the changing nature of war and investing in innovative but cheaper technologies such as UAVs, miniature satellites, AI, and commercial off the shelf technologies.  

The US-Israel War on Iran has, once again, demonstrated that decapitation of leaders and structural impairment may not dismantle the resilience of a nation possessing a knack for adaptation, innovation, preparation to foresee emerging threats in changing nature of warfare. Lets end with a quote, regardless of who originally said it, “An idiot with a plan can beat a genius without a plan.”