Iran possesses missiles fast enough to pose a theoretical threat to US naval assets, but it lacks the sensor networks and targeting infrastructure required to reliably locate and strike them. Against a mobile aircraft carrier shielded by multiple layers of defence, sheer missile speed—even hypersonic—is insufficient to ensure a decisive hit.
As tensions in West Asia persist, the deployment of the US Navy’s aircraft carrier strike group led by the USS Abraham Lincoln in the northern Arabian Sea has revived a long-debated strategic question: does Iran actually have the capability to seriously damage, or even sink, a US aircraft carrier?
In theory, US President Donald Trump now has the option of ordering rapid air strikes against Iran. The Abraham Lincoln, a Nimitz-class nuclear-powered carrier, carries roughly 60 F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jets, giving the US the ability to strike deep inside Iranian territory at short notice.
However, while American power projection is formidable, Iran is not entirely without countermeasures.
Iran’s conventional air force is widely seen as one of its weakest military components. Decades of sanctions have left Tehran operating an ageing and shrinking fleet of combat aircraft, vastly outnumbered by the aircraft embarked on a single US carrier. Where Iran compensates is not in air power, but in missiles.
Over the years, Iran has developed one of the world’s most varied missile arsenals, spanning short-, medium-, and intermediate-range ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and increasingly, hypersonic weapons. Hypersonic systems, which travel at speeds above Mach 5, drastically compress reaction times for defenders and are viewed as potential game-changers in modern warfare.
Iran claims to have deployed hypersonic platforms such as the Fattah-2, which uses a boost-glide vehicle to manoeuvre at extreme speeds. Some Iranian ballistic missiles have also been modified for anti-ship missions, a capability indirectly demonstrated in 2024 when Houthi forces used Iranian-supplied missiles and drones to attack commercial shipping and naval vessels in the Gulf of Aden.
Despite these capabilities, the Abraham Lincoln is far from an exposed target. It operates as part of a carrier strike group that includes cruisers and destroyers equipped with the Aegis combat system, among the most advanced naval air defence architectures in service today.
This defensive system functions in multiple layers. At long range, electronic warfare assets attempt to jam, deceive, or disrupt incoming threats. Beyond that, long-range interceptors such as the Standard Missile family engage targets at distance. Each Aegis-equipped destroyer typically carries close to 90 air-defence missiles, including the RIM-174 SM-6, which has a range exceeding 400 kilometres and can engage aircraft, cruise missiles, and some ballistic threats.
More advanced variants of these missiles are also capable of intercepting certain ballistic and hypersonic weapons during different stages of flight, further complicating any attack.
If Iran were to attempt a strike on the Abraham Lincoln, it would almost certainly rely on volume rather than pinpoint accuracy. Iranian forces could launch large numbers of Shahed-136 drones alongside ballistic and cruise missiles in an effort to overwhelm US defences and deplete interceptor stocks. Only after exhausting these layers might higher-value hypersonic missiles be fired in hopes of slipping through.
Geography would also play a critical role. The US Navy is unlikely to send a carrier into confined waters such as the Persian Gulf, where Iran’s coastal missile forces are most effective. Instead, the Abraham Lincoln would operate in the open Arabian Sea, with the terrain of Oman providing partial geographic masking and greater manoeuvring space.
Iran’s most serious limitation, however, lies not in weapons but in targeting. Aircraft carriers are constantly on the move. A Nimitz-class carrier, displacing more than 100,000 tonnes, can travel at speeds above 25 knots and shift its position by hundreds of kilometres in a single day. Strike groups deliberately vary their courses to avoid predictability.
To hit such a target, Iran would need a robust and resilient kill chain—real-time satellite surveillance, rapid data fusion, secure command-and-control networks, and immediate missile-launch capability. At present, Iran lacks a dependable near-real-time satellite system capable of continuously tracking a fast-moving carrier and feeding accurate targeting data to missile units. Without this, even the most advanced missile risks striking empty ocean.
In theory, Iran fields weapons capable of threatening even the world’s most powerful navy. In reality, sinking a US aircraft carrier remains extraordinarily difficult. The Abraham Lincoln is protected not only by advanced missile defences and electronic warfare, but also by mobility, secrecy, and redundancy. Iran’s missiles may be lethal, but without the ability to see, track, and cue them precisely, their effectiveness against a moving carrier strike group is sharply limited.
The balance, therefore, reflects a familiar strategic paradox: Iran can increase the cost and risk of US naval operations, but reliably destroying a carrier would require surveillance and targeting capabilities it does not yet possess. For now, deterrence hinges less on raw firepower and more on who can find, track, and strike first.
