Alex Ritson

So looking at the senior leadership of Iran has always been a lot of analysis mixed with a lot of guesswork.

And you can read analyses coming from very well-qualified people that completely contradict each other.

But what I would say right now is that I think one of the major questions is whether Iran will stick to this strategy that it's got of trying to hit allies of the U.S., trying to spread the war, trying to spread the pain or whether they will decide that they might need to try to make some kind of a deal.

But I think the kind of deal that the Americans would have in mind is not the one that they would want.

And let's not forget, Donald Trump has said he needs to choose the Supreme Leader.

Well, he didn't.

And he wants an unconditional surrender.

And that's something they won't give.

So while both sides are locked in those positions, this goes on.

Does President Trump have a plan and is it working?

President Trump has oscillated all over the place in terms of his objectives, as stated by him.

When he was being dismissive about Britain possibly sending an aircraft carrier to the Mediterranean...

He said the war's been won.

He's also spoken about everything from a decapitated dictatorship like Venezuela to the fall of the regime to a whole new beginning for the Iranian people, though it's up to them to try and make it happen.

I mean, he is going all over them.

He gives every impression of being a guy who's making things up as he goes along.

I suspect that he had hoped that they would be able to move to a pretty swift victory after Khamenei was killed.

And they didn't give a great deal of thought about what happens if that didn't do it, that Iran is not a one-man show and therefore that the war was going to go on.

I think there is no evidence that they did a great deal of deep thinking about the future before they went into this.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but there's no evidence that's emerged that that is the case.