Why not? Are they invincible wonder weapons capable of reaching the coast of Iran without being targeted?
With what? First of all,
they won't be sitting in Iranian Coast like back when USS Vincennes did in 1988, they will be sitting at the edge of their operational limits, that's 650 miles away, and that is before the capability of Aerial Refuelling
Secondly, There are only 3 things that can destroy a CBG.
1.) Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile - That is if you are lucky, and rich, because you will need to go thru the entire CBG defense, and have good enough guidance system to guide that missile to target hundred or even thousand of miles away and that is if you can fire it off at the first place, before F-18 take care of it. You can't launch these LOS missile underground like ICBM.
2.) Air Power with bomb and missile - Well, how many fighter Iran had can make that range and attack a CBG? Between Land base and Naval Base aircraft in the area, US have roughly 600 aircraft in the region, all of them are going to be protecting that 2 CBG Iran have less than 200 Fighter with god knows how many are operational, even if they can some how punch thru the combined Navy and Air Force fighter screen in some divine miracle, and come within 150 nmi of the CBG, whatever that left will be dealing with 5 AEGIS Destroyer, and 1 Cruiser, chances are not good.
3.) Naval Power - Well......Do you really needed me to explain that to you? 1 CBG are tasked with 3 nuclear sub, 5 Arleigh Burke Class AEGIS destroyer, 1 Ticonderoga Class 1 LHA, and you are talking about 2 CBG. With what in Iranian arsenal can repel even 1 CBG in a naval battle??
What you are thinking is US will just ram CBG 10 mile off Iranian coast so a combine of Iranian Air/Land/Sea attack can launch with impunity, Reality is, US CBG don't really need to get this close to Iranian coast and they most likely wouldn't need to get this close, Strait of Hormuz is an enclosed sea, which mean US Navy don't really need to send anything inside that strait, all they need is to hold the choke point, which half of it is owned by Oman.
Of those, only Turkey shares a land border with Iran, and Turkey has a long standing policy that it will not allow a US invasion of Iran to go through Turkish soil.
This will not be the case if Iran attack Turkey, which is what this poster suggested.
Unfortunately for you, and what you omit to point out, is that most 'targets' in Iran are not within 400km of its borders.
Well, and unfortunate for you, that is just one of the example.
How about B-1 dropping air launch 820-mile (1300km) Block III Tomahawk?
How about B-52 dropping air launch 680 mile (1100km) AGM-86B ALCM?
en.wikipedia.org
en.wikipedia.org
Also, you need to consider the push/pull effect, even if the US don't use Tomahawk or Air Launch Cruise missile (or naval cruise missile for that matter) then you will still lose out the coastal part of Iran which you put nothing in because they will be destroyed 400 km out. In the military, we have a strategy called "Bite and Hold" which mean you use that 400km buffer to support your ground operation, once you land, you use that gap to provide cover to move your ground component further inland and cut the gap that way.
The fact to the matter is, you need to push your air defence zone out in an area you can't possibly defend, and US simply will overwhelm you with standoff range which you either need to take the strike, which mean taking the damage, or come out and fight so they can annihilate you.
What is the "entire zone"? The US can only attack via certain vectors.
You need to re-read what you type? You are saying there is a limited vectors for Air Strike?
And even if you are talking about approaches, you are talking about 400km, even if we separate 1 degree of air attack per approach, at half the attack zone (which is 180 degree) you are looking at each sector. You are talking about 1400 sq kilometers area per degree (Area = pi R^2, a circle have 360 degree so each degree would cover an area of (3.14*400*400)/360, so you are looking at 252,000 sq kilometers area just the half the approach which is what Iran facing. Tell me with what in Iranian arsenal can defend that?
And that would have been moot because most of those area is covered by a third country, (Oman, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq) which mean unless they allow Iranian fighter to fly over, you can't really defend those approach unless you drag every one of them into the war.
Massive decentralised, mobile SAM network spread across a vast and challenging geography of Iran, while targeting the source of those planes (airbases and carriers).
Well, that's what Saddam said back in 1990.
US military is a master of SAM Suppression, or SEAD, there are number of appraoch US can deal with SAM issue, from decoy to electronic attack. Read up Operation Bolo and Desert Storm.
They are already operating outside their 'borders' (which do not exist) in Gaza and the West Bank. They have operated outside of their 'borders' on many occasions since their supposed creation in 1947.
Dude, the last time Israel venture out of their own border (not counting Gaza and Westbank because that's not international recognized border is 2006 when they went into Lebanon. The scheme and dynamic have change much since 1948, even EU condemned Israeli back in 2006 for their disproportionate use of force, technically only US and more specifically Bush admin supported Israel on that one, and don't forget that war is the lynch pin that elevate Palestine into non-Member Observer status in the UN with that UNGA vote in 2012.
The Israeli knows today if they venture further than what they were supposed to be operate on, they are going to lose international support fast.
