Adm. Brad Cooper, CENTCOM Commander, reported that US forces have struck 9,000 targets across Iran in 25 days, destroyed 140 vessels, and flown more than 9,000 combat sorties. The target count rose from 8,000 just days earlier, itself up from 7,000 the week before — a sustained pace of roughly 1,000 additional targets per week. Cooper said Iran now fires missiles "one or two at a time" compared with salvos of dozens at the war's outset, which he characterised as "desperation."
Ten days before Cooper's assessment, Iran fired two intermediate-range ballistic missiles at Diego Garcia — 4,000 km from Iranian territory, double the range ceiling Tehran had publicly acknowledged. In the same period, ballistic missiles struck Arad and Dimona in southern Israel, wounding 124 people; Israeli firefighters confirmed interceptors launched but failed to hit at least two incoming warheads. The IRGC announced its 70th attack wave on Saturday. Reduced launch volume may reflect stockpile conservation or a shift toward selective targeting — it does not self-evidently equal the operational collapse Cooper's language implies.
The 140 vessels destroyed — ten more than the previous week's count — have eliminated Iran's conventional navy as a fighting force. The strategic consequence, however, is narrower than the number suggests. Iran's maritime leverage over the strait of Hormuz rests on shore-based infrastructure, fast-attack craft, and territorial geography, not blue-water surface combatants. Foreign Minister Araghchi has stated the strait is "closed only to ships belonging to our enemies", and the IRGC's toll system continues to operate from the five-mile channel between Larak and Qeshm islands, charging up to $2 million per vessel1. The US has air superiority over the southern Iranian littoral — evidenced by A-10 Warthogs and Apache helicopters flying low-altitude anti-shipping patrols. But air superiority over open water has not translated into control of a chokepoint where the adversary's leverage is territorial, not naval.
