In an article for Arab News, Dr. Majid Rafizadeh wrote: “Despite the Iranian leaders’ hyperbole and threats of all-out war against Washington, Tehran’s military is literally no match for that of the US. In addition, Iranian leaders must stop threatening other countries, including the US, with war because any conflict would be devastating for millions of people in the region.”

But how did he come to this conclusion? A simple comparison of the US and Iranian militaries, which does not end up with Iran on top. Let’s look at this comparison.

Budget

The US military budget is the highest in the world, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, with over $600 billion (roughly 4% of GDP). Iran’s is only $14 billion (or 3% of GDP). That means the US’s military budget is about 40 times higher than Iran’s.

Personnel and weaponry

The US currently has 1.3 million active, 811,000 reserve, and 73 million available personnel for war. Iran, by comparison, has 550,000 active, 1.8 million reserve and 23 million available. Anyone can see that the US would be able to crush Iran with sheer numbers alone.

The US military personnel are also better trained and using better equipment than the Iranians.

Land forces: The US roughly 60,000 tanks, total artillery, and armoured fighting vehicles, compared with Iran’s 8,000, meaning the US has eight times as many vehicles. Plus, much of Iran’s weaponry is outdated.

Air forces: The US has about fifteen times more aircraft than Iran (12,000 versus 800) and the US fleet is top of the range

Nuclear: While Iran undoubtedly has a nuclear weapons programme, it does not yet have any warheads, but the US has over 7,000 nuclear warheads.

Rankings and History

In fact, according to the 2018 Global Fire Power report, the US has the most powerful military in the world.

If we look back at previous wars, the US was able to defeat Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and the Taliban in Afghanistan in just a few weeks, something that Iran was unable to do in lengthy wars.

Dr. Majid Rafizadeh wrote: “In other words, in spite of the threats from Qassem Soleimani, Iran’s Quds Force chief, that the Iranian military is capable of destroying all that the US owns, if the regime went to war with Washington, the US would most likely paralyze various parts of Iran’s military in a matter of weeks.”